Sat 1st June 2013 - Making himself at home.

Today felt like a normal day with Twiglet in the house.  Usual dog walk with Twiglet on a long line and wanting to go and visit every dog he sees!  Feeding time is fun.  We need to feed the dogs in the correct order - Harry, Elvis, Twiglet.  Harry and Elvis will sit and wait in front of their bowl until told to eat, but Twiglet behaves like a greyhound in the stalls!!!  While we are restraining Twiglet - who needs to eat last, Harry takes advantage and tries to eat - so he gets told off and has to wait,  and in the middle of this Elvis just sits there like the 1 well-behaved child in the class wondering if he will ever get to eat again!  This needs work and at the moment works best as a 2 man job!! I can understand Twiglet's enthusiasm for food but he needs to learn some manners! 
Caught Twiglet opening the - now dug up and retrieved - dog treat tin and helping himself this afternoon.  He is much more steathly and silent in his approach than Harry and Elvis so needs watching more closely - they would have been far more clumsy and knocked the tin off the worktop with a huge crash!
Later in the day I had a huge fright as suddenly, Twiglet started barking ferociously and charged out into the garden, with barking Elvis hot on his heels, and Harry last - who was asleep in his bed and thought he ought to join in!  It appeared that next door but one's bitch had made it's way into next door's garden again and Twiglet thought it might be encroaching on our territory.  All 3 dogs were barking and I think that the poor thing was grateful to be captured and returned.  Twiglet clearly now sees this as his patch!
I went to bed fairly early to as I had to get up early to do some work.  I must have left the door at the bottom of the stairs open as Harry and Elvis are not allowed, and do not try, to go upstairs.  Having  drifted off to sleep, I woke to find the small black scruffy dog curled up asleep on the bed next to me with Chris trying to persuade him to move!!!  Twiglet was so relaxed / stubborn that Chris had to carry him back down to his crate!  I think Twiglet feels at home!