Apologies for the terrible spelling etc in my post above, I am entertaining the 15 week old puppy, putting away the supermarket delivery, cooking tea, trying to talk to DS about his report and also asking about DD1 and her day
Our puppy is 15 weeks old, he's a working cocker, he can actually take quite a bit of exercise. However, I am chucking the ball around etc for the springer, the puppy is tootling around by my feet still, which is where he would rather be anyway, but also enticed by sausage We go at his pace at the moment, so a walk round a field can take an hour, while he sniffs around.
When do you get your puppy and what breed is he/she? Some breeds are naturally more inclined to go off and explore the world than others, terrier breeds for example.
We slept downstairs initially, right next to the crate, both of our dogs (ddog1 is only 16 months), had a little stir in the night and we popped outside for a wee, with minimum fuss. Find a command that you use for toileting, our friends use 'be good', we use 'wee wee'. We gradually moved away from the crate over the course of 2/3 nights and they slept through from then. But, all pups are different. Ddog1 had/has the bladder of a camel, ddog2 dribbled with excitement or desparation until last weeks, but is only 15 weeks. And is now totally clean in the house.
I do leave both dogs, when they have been trained and exercised and loved and toileted etc. Today was my longest time I left them, and got stuck at work, 3.5 hours. The puppy hadn't wee'd and wasn't crated, neither have been chewers and ddog2 likes to sneak into ddog1's bed and they sleep together. I wouldn't have done this with ddog1. I felt like shit. They were fine