How Cooper earned his nickname :the Pooper"

If you ever visit our home you will probably hear us refer to Cooper as "Pooper", "The Pooper", or "Cooper the Pooper".  Besides the obvious rhyming aspect of the name and the fact that he is followed by a constant fart cloud that smells like poop, there are a few major instances that earned him the name.

Instance #1:

I will set the scene:

Cooper is about 4 months old and hasn't been fully potty trained yet.  It is 8:30 in the morning and I am running late for work so I did not supervise Cooper's morning potty break to make sure that he actually went.  I am in the bedroom getting ready while Cooper is eating breakfast and playing in the living room.

I had just finished getting ready and started heading toward the front door.  As I rounded the bedroom doorway and stepped into the hallway I spotted an ENORMOUS pile of Cooper poop directly behind the couch between me and the front door.  At the same exact time, Cooper spotted me....  As I ran forward yelling ”NOOOOOOO", Cooper ran full speed ahead paying no attention to the fact that he was heading straight for the fresh poop mountain.  He sprinted straight through the poop without slowing.  Poop flew in all directions splattering the floor, the wall, the couch and Cooper. 

Needless to say, between scrubbing floor, wall, mopping the poopy foot prints and washing Cooper, I was pretty late to work.  I am happy to report that shortly after this incident we bought a bell for the door and Cooper was potty trained in a matter of days.

Instance # 2

Scene:

Cooper is about 6 months old, fully potty trained, and broken from chewing on our things. Chase and I had just used our Groupon to Chica's Mexican restaurant and came home to let the dogs out before going out with some friends.  We had to order a dessert to hit our spending threshold on the Groupon so we took a piece of cheesecake to go with us.  Chase and I decided that since Cooper had been doing so well in the house the few times we left him out, we should go ahead and let them stay out of the crate for the rest of the evening while we were gone.  We let them potty, gave Cooper a chew toy and went on our way. 

a few short hours later we arrived home to find a disaster. 

As soon as I unlock and open the door the smell hit me, I knew that Cooper had gone potty in the house.  The next thing that I notice is the bits of Styrofoam to go box all over the house.  I realized then, that we forgot to put the cheesecake in the refrigerator and that Cooper ate it.  Finally, I noticed the full extent of the aftermath: there was poop starting at the beginning of the hallway, trailing to our bedroom, it then trailed from the bedroom door all of the way to the back door.  If this wasn't bad enough, Cooper then ran through the poop several times smashing it down onto the wood and leaving poopy paw prints all over the wood floors.  We had to first wash Cooper so that he didn't trail the poop anywhere else.  After he was clean he had to be contained long enough to take care of the mess, which was torture to clean due to the size that his poop has reached.  Even after all visible signs were gone the house still reeked for 2 days despite the use of candles & room sprays.

Luckily I can say that those are the worse two incidents that we have had.  It still sucks to scoop the giant piles out of the yard, but it is MUCH better than having to clean it off of the floors.

My Big ol' Baby

Golden Retrievers are the biggest babies ever.  Cooper acts like he is a 5 pound lap dog most of the time.  I can’t figure out if he actually thinks he is a tiny dog or if he just really wants to be a tiny dog.  Cooper has gotten into the habit of trying to be a sneaky ninja retriever and creeping into bed when we aren’t paying attention.  We will be laying there watching TV or reading- the next thing we know Cooper is beside us and we can’t recall how long we have been absent mindedly petting him.  We have a good morning and bed time routine of giving him hugs and kisses.  Cooper comes around to each side of the bed and wraps his paw around us and gives us a kiss as we go to bed and wake up- it’s pretty sweet.

    The other night we were watching TV on the couch when Cooper started feeling extra needy.  He normally lays in the floor when we are in the living room, but this particular evening he climbed onto the couch and plopped down right in my lap.  Nothing exciting was happening- we weren’t giving Riley any attention, so I guess he just decided that he needed some lovin’ from momma bear.   It was so sweet I couldn’t find it in my heart to make him get down.  I just wrapped my arms around him and snuggled for a bit.  He always does the same for me when I am feeling extra needy and need a Cooper hug  J

"Knot" being clear

This post isn't really about Cooper, but it was pretty funny so I thought I'd share. 

Chase and I recently planted a few rose bushes in the yard.  Lately they have been wilted and dried out despite how much or little they are being watered.  I thought that the problem might be that the soil wasn't holding the water so I suggested adding some more mulch to the flower bed. 

Chase began the mulch as I watered the other flowers.  As Chase was adding the mulch I reminded him-
 "Make sure to leave the root knot showing".

 I continued watering the rest of the flower bed as he applied the mulch.  I noticed that he was really piling it up on the rose so I repeated myself-
 "Make sure to leave the root knot showing".

This time Chase began actually sprinkling mulch down into the branches of the bush, so I asked-
"Chase, what are you doing?"

Without missing a beat he said with a bewildered expression-
"If I leave the root "not" showing it is covered up right?"

Of course at this point I realized how unclear "root knot" is to someone unfamiliar with gardening terms. After laughing hysterically at our misunderstanding I hugged him, apologized and explained what a root knot actually was. Both of us left the conversation feeling a bit silly.  Little things like this is why I love our relationship- I love that we can  be on the same page 99% of the time and still have little things like this to laugh about.