New puppy sleeping arrangements - so confused!

[YakkaSkink]

So, the new puppy is coming home from the rescue centre on Saturday and I think I'm as organised as I can be. She'll be 11 weeks and was dumped in a box with two littermates a fortnight ago, she's still a bit shy and needs more socialisation to catch up. I've got out every book on dog care from the local library and asked assorted friends and they've all given different advice on nights and what to do.

I have a small crate as I needed something to transport her home in but she'll outgrow it in a couple of months, I have a dog bed that I thought would fit in the large crate but turns out not to (both sized for estimated adult size) and the aforementioned large crate. The options seem to be:

1. Put her straight in the large crate in the kitchen, bedding at one end and with newspaper at the other end so she can just wee and poo on that during the night (nights being for sleeping and all). Ignore crying, clean up in the mornings and focus on getting her going outside during the day. Or will this set up a habit of going in the crate?

2. Put her in the small crate in the kitchen and set an alarm to get up and take her outside every couple of hours, ignore crying, with the aim of starting as we mean to go on.

3. Put her in the small crate in my bedroom so I can hear her wake up and (negotiating flight of stairs with stairgates - really?) 'whisk' her outside to wee/ poo. Move the crate downstairs as she becomes able to hold on for the night (can't use big crate upstairs as she grows though, as too heavy to lug up and down stairs so she can use during daytimes)

4. Put in small crate in kitchen and sleep in kitchen with dog for a few nights to help her settle/whisk outside for wees when she wakes, then go back to my room and schedule a couple of midnight outings.

She's obviously had a couple of weeks without her mum but I'm sure she'll be missing her siblings, so I've got cuddly toys and ticking clock and will bring bedding from the Centre.

What's the best way to do this?

To be honest I'd not be delighted if I was forced to sleep in my own cr*p either. It's not about letting your dog "rule" you, but expecting a tiny creature to have prefect bladder control from day one is as realistic as expecting them to respond well to being chucked on their back and held down by the throat just so that you can show them who's boss.

Our hound now sleeps all night and much of the day. He knows he's not allowed on the furniture or in the bedrooms and his biggest vices are a slightly ropey recall and a dislike of wet grass. I guess letting him go to the loo when he needed to as a puppy hasn't turned him into a little Hitler after all.

I dont think anyone, especially me, was suggesting any kind of physical violence fraggle. I find that quite insulting.

Dogs wont mess where they sleep. If a dog does its probably not well, on the wrong food, desperate due to not being let out last thing, or has some kind of psychological problem.

Eek - I wouldn't get up at all. We took our pup out last thing at night, and then I get up at 6 anyway so would take him out then. For a few months he did an excitement wee on his way out of the cage, but he is a springer and was still doing excitement wees when he was 18 months old!

Once he managed to poo through the bars of the cage (clever boy!) and once he regurgitated what I think were great piles of horse shit.

He only whimpered for the first couple of nights.

Our puppy didn't have a crate but like Exit we just took her outside about 11ish then again around six in the morning. We had very few accidents.

I was prepared for lots of crying in the night but she isn't cry at all, just slept right through