Surviving a house move with dogs
Moving house has a hundred hassles built into it. But only for humans. For dogs, it seems to be more holiday than hassle.
At least, that's what it looks like going by how my dogs have handled our shift of house last month and the weeks since.
We tried, husband Tom and I, to keep the stress on Phoebe and Connor to a minimum. In the old house, the dogs' crates and blankets were always around. Sleeping, feeding and exercise routines didn't change, even as the cardboard boxes piled up.
Before the big move, we took the dogs to visit the new house, just for a run-around. They ran around. This visit also told us something important: we reckoned that the fence had at least a couple of places where the dogs might squeeze out – clearly, countermeasures or constant supervision would be needed (more on that in a moment).
A day before the removal truck was due, we delivered the dogs to their usual boarding place, where they were welcomed as old friends.
Three days later we picked them up and brought them, permanently, to the new place.
Our furniture was in, dog blankets were deployed and their two dads were right there. The idea was for the new house to be familiar/strange for the dogs, rather than just strange.
And the dogs reacted just as we'd hoped. Phoebe and Connor settled straight away. They discovered the places they could sunbathe, the watching and listening posts, the warm and the cool refuges.
They found a long, long carpeted passage where full speed could be reached. They experienced their first polished-wood floor – the kitchen and dining room – which now resounds to the rhythmic tap-dance of their toes many times a day.
And that's just the indoors. The outdoors? A story of careful planning.
This new house has a big yard, but unlike our previous place it's not easy to keep the dogs away from anyone who opens the gate and heads for our front door. At the same time, the dogs need an outdoor area they can get to from inside the house. This is a rental house, so building a fence wasn't an option.
Tom solved it. On TradeMe he ordered two types of modular fencing – one of them wire and the other white pickets. Cunning placement of these means that the dogs have a free space (the poo zone) accessible through a pet flap in the laundry door, there's a gate-to-front-door corridor for visitors, and then there's the rest of the yard, a zone we want to limit the dogs' access to.
We're quite proud of this setup. We think it'll work. But it's still being patrolled as though it's the perimeter of Colditz.
So yes, moving the dogs has had its hassles. But for Tom and me, not them. They're happy, and safe, with a whole new neighbourhood to get to know.
It seems a highly dog-oriented neighbourhood. A big part of its dog-friendliness is that a grassed walkway and stream meander through it, so every day dozens of dogs and their owners pass by, sometimes to the excitement of Connor and Phoebe, but I think they're getting used to it. There's also a council-designated dog exercise area just 300 metres away.
We and the dogs are starting to get to know the local pets quickly. There's the hyperactive Maltese over the road; the elderly Pomeranian the other side of the park; the pair of Staffies who get their run while dad cycles; the caramel Poodle-cross who peers and yips at our dogs as we pass its fence; the gorgeous senior Golden Retriever who sits at her gate and thumps her tail on the ground every time we walk by.
And, just quietly, the smoochy cat named Saffy (it's on her collar) who's liable to greet us – but only if the dogs aren't with us.
Written by Nick Barnett. First appeared on Stuff.co.nz. Image credit: @connorandphoebe/Instagram.