Xena is going to a new home!!

Well, we all knew the time would come, and here it is! Xena is going to a new home in Maryland with a wonderful family who will take excellent care of her and will love her dearly! Thank you all for your support of Xena. She is a lucky girl to have a second chance at a forever home, and I am confident she will have only happy days to come.

It is a bitter sweet day for me, because I am thrilled with her new home and deeply joyed that I know she is going to such a wonderful family, but at the same time, I have grown to love Xena and I will truly miss her.

Best of luck, Xena! Lucy, Jay and I will all miss you dearly!

Xena feeling much better!

Xena is feeling great! She is back to her old self, playing with toys, wagging her tail and walking back and forth between your legs. She now lifts her head/neck as she goes under and a few times; she's actually lifted me off the ground! But then I turn around and pick up her front legs and dance with her. She has taken a liking to many of Lucy's toys. Xena loves the small fuzzy squeaky toys. I've never seen a large dog play with them without ripping them, but Xena is a gentle girl. She takes them up in her mouth, stands up and throws them in the air and tries to catch them. She almost always misses. She will not be a contender for the blue man group, but she is still our sweetheart :) She also likes larger teddy bears.

While Xena was sick, I was supposed to keep her and Lucy apart, but that was very difficult! Lucy KEPT going right over to Xena and laying right next to her, at times shoving her nose under Xena's belly for warmth. Now, Lucy is a not a social dog... she is very fearful of dogs. However, you can see that even a scared chihuahua can warm up to Xena! If your dog is shy, I'm sure in some time they will be close friends, just like Xena and Lucy are now!

Last night Xena went off-leash in Central Park. There were many dogs off-leash (and just as many on-leash) and I was ready to see how Xena did. A few times I have taken her off leash in a non-fenced in area, and she walked right next to me. However, this was different because there were sooo many dogs around. Xena went up to many of them and sniffed them. She is quite fearful of dogs (and cats too) who are too interested in her. But for the average dog, she is happy to bend down and sniff for awhile. She did wander off a bit, but responded to "Xena, come" or just followed me if I walked away. She did take a liking to a few of the people who were carrying fanny packs filled with treats. I got the sense she was bothering them so I had to leash her for a bit. She kept shoving her nose in their fanny packs and sitting and looking at them intently. But, once we walked away from there, I didn't need to worry about her running back to the people with the treats. She does love her food, but I think she's more loyal to her people :)

Xena resting off a tummy bug

So Xena had a rough few days. She had a tummy bug and wasn't feeling too great. She's been resting it off and is feeling much better, on a prescription diet from the vet for the next few days and some antibiotic. So far, she seems like she's feeling much better! Not much to report... I've been keeping her indoors a lot and letting her sleep this thing off. I did take her for a calm stroll through central park today though. She's very tired though and needs her rest. What to expect from Xena if she is ill: She will cry to let you know she's in pain or in this case, has a stomach ache and needs to go out. She will sleep more than she usually does and will have no interest in drinking water (which is highly unusual for her... usually she gulps down as much as you give her!) and won't try to eat all food in sight (also unusual for her). She has not shown any interest in playing with toys, but she lets you lay down next to her and gently rub her back and legs, kiss her head and talk to her. When you leave her alone (and this goes for even when she is not under the weather) she prefers to have the TV on if you'll be gone for awhile. I think she likes the noise. I've used the tv to calm Xena down when she first arrived at my apartment and was having difficulty settling in the first few hours. Maybe she was used to the sound of the TV in her old house. Anyway, she is doing much better now and hopefully she will be back to her old fun self shortly.

Another fabulous week with Miss Xena

As you can see, the girls are getting along very well. The picture on the left is of a substitute dog walker who met Xena for the first time. You can see, Xena had no difficulty walking along side him. She is perfectly fine towards strangers... you don't have to worry about her being scared or nervous. It's dogs she is picky about!

I actually had to go to FL this weekend for a wedding, and I had my friend/Lucy's dog walker come and sit Xena. My friend reported absolutely no problems all weekend. You can leave Xena if you need to go away for the weekend, and she will not be a nervous wreck most likely. She adapts well to different situations. Of course, when I returned last night, she was all full of tail wags! She does this thing when she is REALLY happy and walks back and forth through your legs. It's very cute :) I received many kisses upon my return, and then we threw around some stuffed animals, went for a walk and called it a night.

Xena in the sunshine!

What a great weekend with Xena! This weekend, we went to lunch together outdoors. I didn't even need to hold her leash. She took a snooze by my side in the sun and paid no attention to the food and people all around her.

Then we went on a very long walk around the upper west side apartment hunting. Whenever she is in a new place, she does the same routine... it's a bit of restlessness I think. She basically walks around and around the new space, smells everything, sits down, gets back up right away and continues to walk around. It takes some affirmative action on my part to get her to calm down, but once she does she is good to return to that space without the same anxiety.

Took Xena to Central Park. She loves it there!! Xena napped (she's such a napper!) in the sun in the park and got up a few times to look around. I did not have to worry about her trying to run away/wandering into the road or anything like that. She seemed to be able to block out the bikers, kids, dogs and all the like.

When I got home with Xena, she began her new "play" routine. This involves taking stuffed animals and throwing them around the room. She does this by picking them up with her mouth, shaking her head dramatically back and forth, and then finally letting go, as the stuffed animal flies across the room. It's quite funny!

Xena-Rainy Day Sleeping Beauty

So, for the past few days it has been raining. Xena took the opportunity to get in some rest. She does not like the rain! She will go out and quickly do her business with your urging, but she does not want to walk around in the rain. This is actually a good thing, because for most of us, we don't want to walk around in the rain either! And what's even better, Miss Xena didn't become restless not having much exercise for a few days. She became a bit of a couch potato and thoroughly enjoyed her naps.

I took Xena to get groomed and from what I hear, she did just fine. In fact, all the groomers took a fondness to her! While all their other dogs needed to be caged until their owners picked them up, they allowed Xena to wander around and nap in different parts of the rooms. She is a very trustworthy dog!

I had to go to a passover seder last night and the night before. The first night, I thought I would leave her alone since it was at my family's house and I knew I could bail early. She was alone for 6 hours or so and was just fine. Happy to see me when I arrived home. She does this cute thing whenever I come home now... She walks quickly towards me, her tail wagging all up in the air, and then she walks right through my legs, pushing them open, and then turns around, walks right through my legs again. I usually lean down to see where she is going and then when she walks through my legs from back to front she jumps up a tiny bit and licks me. It's absolutely adorable! The second night of passover, my friend came to watch her and Lucy. Xena had never met him before, but she was okay with a "stranger" coming into the apartment. She is not territorial and almost never barks! She really is quite the catch!

Xena is a bit nervous with stairs. This has gotten much better though! I think she may just fear new places or something. Once she feels comfortable somewhere, she seems to forget there are stairs there and walks right up/down them.

The girls are napping now (Xena and my chihuahua) but I'm about to wake them up and take them for a walk since it finally stopped raining! More to report later!

The weekend with Xena

This was a fun weekend! We went apartment hunting together yesterday and encountered many dogs. Xena seems to be frightened/nervous around dogs who are interested in her, or show any interest. She tucks her tail and tries to get away... it's kind of sad, but I think she's just not used to socialization. She's better around smaller dogs. In the picture above, we bumped into another Rhodesian. Xena really wanted to get away from him, but after she realized he wasn't going to hurt her, she was able to sit patiently and wait for me to finish shmoozing.

Today we went to Westchester to my family's house. Xena definitely will need an owner who will be understanding that she is nervous in new places and with new people. She had not met my family before and had never been to the house. She walked around the entire house, smelling everything. She will not jump on on anything and will not take a seat on the couch without you offering it to her, but she takes awhile to settle down and relax. My father tried to give her some treats, which she was happy to take, but it seemed to excite her more. I had to leash her, put out a familiar blanket for her to lay on, and then she finally relaxed and laid down. She was great for the rest of the visit.

I thought, since my family has a large venced in yard, that Xena might want to play fetch with a tennis ball. She wasn't too into the idea... but I think it was because she was freaked out since she just left her family of 9 years last weekend, and has been with two foster parents in the past week... taking her to more new places might not have been the best idea, but given her week, she did wonderfully.

When we got back to the apt, Xena was sooo happy to be back! She knew exactly where the apartment was and wagged her tail all the way down the block until we arrived. Then, she was ready to play! I actually don't have much experience with large breeds, so I wasn't sure how to handle it. She was crouching her back and wagging her tail leaning over... she picked up one of Lucy's (my chihuahua) toys and threw it back and forth. This was the most playful I have seen her! Now, she is resting on my couch.

Xena does not go for people food. She lets you eat peacefully, no begging, no attempting to get at the food... she just looks, but doesn't get up from whatever position she's in.

That's all for now!