Faulkner (F) and Sadie (S) each have some new faves.

S first because hers came first. She LOVES romping like crazy all around my path while I do the fast AM housechores, eating ANYthing left on the floor, in high spirits. So of course before this begins an intelligent person first clears up the floor of inedibles!

F has long had carsickness/fretfulness in any car in any position and on any therapy/training one can imagine. But he has made some great strides and the credit is all his-- I'd begun to suspect that if he can't SEE things whiz by he may not get so dizzy and thus carsick... had some limited success with a few new tricks of my own there. Anyway he was so bored that he demanded one day to be taken along on a car ride so I took him, and he taught me quite a few new things about how to let him do it his way-- of course we had tried THAT, but we're all older and wiser now. So he's been re-learning the "No Jumping Out When Susan Goes into the Store" skills and today he really amped it up a notch-- "OK then I think I'll leave this nice front seat where I can watch for you, where I've been so much calmer... I'm gonna wait in the van's back end for you." When I came out of the store he came back up front to greet me and then hopped back into the back. While there he repeated all the great cooperative things I've asked up front, that I'd noticed helped him stay calmer. In baby terms, we would say that he "self-soothed." More car trips planned! Last week he got a LONG ride on a FreeCycle I needed to do without my usual security partner-- and served in his place quite handsomely.

Go Faulkner! Thank you Sadie!

~Susan