It was easy to get Teddy Bux used to playing and hanging out in the open crate, but getting him to sleep in a closed one at night was no easy task. At first we would leave the crate open beside the bed so he could sleep partially out but was not able to move around too much. (we used the bed, a wall and a baby gate to prevent him from getting too far). After a couple of days we moved the bed entirely into the crate but left the door open, in a few days more we closed the crate and then slowly started inching the crate away from the bed. Now experts suggest that we should have moved the crate entirely out of the room but we stopped at the door. With the dog in the room we can hear any emergency wake ups without a bark upsetting the neighbors or sleep in on weekends. But if you do want the bed in another room, you can just keep inching that crate out the door.
The beauty of the crate is that we can bring it anywhere and Teddy Bux is sleeping in the comforts of his own home. We also sleep easily knowing that he and all the stuff in our apartment our safe and secure. It proved to be a much better solution then having a 50lb snoring, farting bulldog lying in bed beside us. Now the issue of how to disguise a giant wire crate in the middle of our living room is one I haven't yet resolved. Perhaps thats for another blog post!!!
