The Seventh Day of Christmas

...my true love gave to me,

Seven Doggie Paws (in their tack room)		Six Doggie Cabinets (in their tack room)		Five Doggie Tiles (in their tack room)
Space for 4 Big Dog Crates (in their tack room)		3 doggie leash hooks (for their tack room)		Two Doggie view ports

and a Doggie Door into their own space.Yes, all this, and more, is in the remodel. From the smile on Bell's face as she comes through that doggie door on Christmas Morn, you can tell they appreciate it.

The 7 dog paws on the tack room floor come from an internet find by Lynn Hammerschmidt. We were looking for touches and she stumbled upon these on the internet. With our plan for a dog door, they add a cute touch. The tiles have been spaced based on Dash's gait.

The 6 dog cabinets just worked out that way. These are over the area we designed for their dog crates.

The 5 dog tiles were another internet find of Lynn's. These are set above the counter over their crates. For the center, we picked a black spanel in honor of our first Springer, Folly. To either side, we picked the dogs each of us grew up with, a Golden Retriever and a Mutt. And to the far sides we placed a Terrier and a Poodle for some other influencial dogs in our lives.

Under the counter on the same side is space for 4, #400 crates. (Dog people know what that means.) We expect dog as our guests, as well as humans, and wanted to have room. Also, should I talk Laura into that 4th dog, or breeding Riley, we'll have that little bit of expansion available!

Now, the leash hooks, those we found at our local IKEA store. When we started the project, we needed a few things for the rental. Knowing IKEA has designs that work well for small spaces, and good value for the price, we shopped there. As we headed to the check-outs, we stumbled into their pet area. And there we found this coat hooks. We had to get them as a perfect touch for the tack room. But, shhhhh. Lynn hasn't seen them yet, so they're a surprise.

We picked the front door to be dog friendly. Originally, we'd leaned towards double doors. As we evolved to the current floorplan, double doors would have been out of proportion. We shifted to a door with sidelights, and insisted that the light go low enough that the dogs would also be able to see who was ringing the doorbell.

The dog door is a gift from each of us to the other. Pretty often in the old structure, our pups would whine and scratch at the backyard doors for their doggie doorman. This will give them a self-service option, and boy, will we be training them towards that. A bonus is that we're setting up the fenced yard just outside this to be a run for the dogs. And with dog friendly tile in this section of the house, when they track in a little wet or dirt, it'll be super easy to clean.

Whew! This is getting to be a lot of description. I think we'll cut back in the following days of Christmas to just the highlights.