Hi Friends!
It’s your buddy Charlie checking in.
Mom needed a break, so she said I could write another post.
Lucky you guys – right?!

Let’s talk about Mornings.

I’m a Morning Dog.

It’s the greatest time of the day! Don’t you agree?

Here are the TOP 10 things I LOVE to do in the morning:

1. Leap into bed with Mom and Dad as soon as I see just one of their eyes begin to flutter open.  When I notice that from my bed across the room, I bounce into their bed with them and jump back and forth between them and off and on the bed and lick their faces to tell them, “It’s Morning, It’s Morning!  It’s another wonderful day!  Let’s get up and play!”  My mom thinks it’s great to wake up laughing every morning…
2. Eat breakfast.  Breakfast is one of my favorite meals of the day – closely followed by dinner (which is my only other meal of the day – unless I can snag some snacks).
3. Go for a walk –  preferably before Mom has time to even think about a cup of coffee!
4. Dig holes in the flower garden – especially after it rains for two days solid keeping me cooped up in the house – and only when my Mom is preoccupied with work to notice.  (Otherwise I get  – “NO! Charlie!”)  I hate that word No…
5. Zoomies.  After digging holes for a while, it is a BLAST to come flying through my doggy door, before Mom can catch me and ZOOM around every room of the  house – circling the furniture until I can hardly breathe any more.  Do you ever get the “zoomies?”  Sometimes I just have to run like the wind, and then I feel so much better.  You should try it when you have lots of stress or pent up energy.  It’s a great feeling.    And besides – what’s a little mud on the carpet matter?   It just dries and turns to dirt,  and then Mom can easily clean it up with the vacuum….. Right?!  It gives her something to do…
6. Pull all the stuffing out of my stuffed toys.  Isn’t that fun?!  Yesterday morning I polished off my Dog Equis  (It’s the doggy, stuffed version of a Dos Equis).  It was delish!
7. Chew bones.  I could gnaw on bones all day long, but I especially love them in the morning!  I also like to throw them around and drop them on the hardwood floor.  When my Mom is on one of those things she calls a “conference call,” she sometimes gives me dirty looks or tells me to “shush!”  I pretend like I don’t know what she means, because then she will put some peanut butter in my bone, which she apparently thinks is a good quiet activity.  BONUS for me!!!
8. Play tug.  Was there ever a greater game invented?  I bring a rope toy to my Mom, which I hang on to, but I pretend I want to give it to her.  When she reaches down to take it, I pull back.  If she lets go, I put it in front of her face again.  It’s so fun to tease her with this and show her how tough I can be hanging on when she tries to pull it.  Sometimes we growl at each other, but only in a fun-loving tug-of-war competition kind of way.    GRRRR!!!!
9. Play fetch.  Sometimes Mom says I have to “drop it” when we are playing tug.  (Sigh!)  Okay lady – if it makes you happy… I will give it to you.  You can then throw it so I can run across the room to bring it back, and then…. hopefully…. you will let me play tug with it the next time….
10. Ear scratches and tummy rubs.  My mom works on her computer A LOT!  I know she thoroughly enjoys when I give her the opportunity to take a break by resting my chin on her knee so she can scratch my ears and tell me what a good boy I am.  If she is too busy to notice this tactic (which I do strictly for her benefit as I recognize she is working much too hard!), I will resort to laying down at her feet and rolling over on my back to allow her to rub my belly.  I know it makes her feel much better…..

Afternoons are for napping.  Right?

Because then, you can get rested up enough to start the whole “morning” routine all over again when the rest of the family arrives home at the end of the day!

How do you like to spend your mornings?

Woofs & Wags,
Charlie