Growing Up Gunther

(Most of these photos are courtesy of my friend, Justin.)

   In looking back over these pictures of Gunther, it is hard to believe how much he has grown. When we got Gunther, he was 7 weeks old and weighed 13 pounds. (You can read more about him here.) A couple of weeks after we got him, Jason had to be gone and I didn't want to leave him at home alone on the days I wasn't able to take him to work. So Uncle Justin, Gunther's godfather, got to babysit him.

 Eating carrots at Uncle Justin's is always more fun then eating them at home.

I still get this sad puppy-dog look sometimes. He was so little and cute back then!!!

Gunther's first day at the park. He still likes to chew on pine cones.

He looked like such a fluffy little black bear!

Meet Salem, Gunther's bestest friend in the whole wide world.

Salem is about 8 weeks older than Gunther and they play together in such a way that they never play with any other dog.

I really like the following action shot!

    It's hard to believe that my Gunther Bear is almost 5 months old now. I haven't gotten any recent pictures of him, but he is continuing to get taller and longer. The last time I weighed him on his 4 month birthday, he was over 40 pounds. I'm almost sure he is about 50 pounds now. There is not an ounce of fat on him; he is all dog. I am very thankful that he is a self-fed dog; I do not have to ration his food out. If he is not hungry, he will not eat. He will leave his bowl of food for several hours in the mornings until he is hungry. So for now, I don't have to worry about him eating out of boredom and getting fat, which is really nice. 
   The week before Jason left, Gunther got to go rock climbing with him, Justin, Jake, and of course, Salem.

Zane is the collie dog and he does not believe in any kind of playful activities, so he tried to referee Gunther and Salem the entire day. They paid him no mind, however, and played as hard as always.

       Gunther has recently outgrown the little 3-block neighborhood walks that we used to take. I have had to chart a new and longer route for us. We now walk about 1 mile and then run about 3/4 miles. He has started to let me know when he needs to go for a walk, which is pretty much every evening. He will go to the door and paw at it, then sit and look at me. If I ignore him, he'll try that one more time. If he still doesn't get a response, he comes in and starts talking to me and jumping around. At that point, I know that I won't get any sleep that night unless he gets his walk/run in.

   Another milestone in Gunther's life is I have started to leave him at home a couple days a week instead of taking him to work or Brittany's house. I rearranged the garage so that he can go in and out of it during the day. He has some outside toys in there, as well as his food and water. I also give him a kong (a cone shaped rubber toy) with some peanut butter inside when I leave. That way he has something to keep him occupied for the first while. He has learned what it means when I get out the peanut butter and gets super excited for it. He has gone without it a few days and everything has been fine, but I guess I'm a softie and just like giving him that treat. He is always super excited when I come home from work, which makes me feel good.

    We are still working on manners and basic commands. He knows sit, lay down, no, and come. We are working on "stay" and he is figuring it out, but it's not second nature to him yet. The "come," we need to work on. He has the idea that if he doesn't want to come when he's called, he doesn't have too. He knows what it means and will turn around and look at you, but he has that defiant look in his eye and then turns back to whatever he was doing. He is going to have to learn that "come" is not an optional command.

   One thing I find really amusing is how he thinks that he owns Aunt Brittany and Uncle Jake's house. He has stayed at their house several times while I'm at work, and hangs out in the backyard with Zane and Zeke. When we are driving up to their house, he will sit up in the car, and as soon as I open the door to let him out, he hops out and walks directly over to the walkway, down the path to the door, and sits at the door and paws. He used to refuse to go thru the yard to the back gate; he thought he was to important to skip going inside the house. Since he has matured, however, he has realized that going thru the back gate is just as important as going thru the house. And that, my friends, is how we are growing up Gunther.