Advices for first time dog-owner

One of my co-worker recently quited her job & moved away because her husband's found a much better job in another city, so right now she's jobless. Last night, her husband came home with TWO 8-week old puppies, a maltese & a yorkie, that he's purchased at a pet store (for $1200 each :yikes for her to "play with while she's nothing to do". She's clueless about dogs & admits that she doesn't even like them - but now that she has two to care for.. She came to me for advices..

So what should I tell her? What does she needs to know in order to ease herself into her new role as dogs-owner? (I already told her that dogs are not toys to keep when you feel like it, and dump when you loose interests, and that she should socialize the dogs & enroll them in puppy's training session & take them to the vet for vaccination...). I also told her that she needs to LOVE the dogs because they depend on her love to thrive..

What else?

Oh wow. She is going to have her hands FULL with two pet store puppies. Wow.... where do I start? I really think she should get some puppy books. I know Grammy always recommends How to Raise a Puppy You Can Live With. Anyone else have some other puppy book recommendations?

anyone else wanna help?

Oh wow, good thing these dogs' owner have you as a friend. I don't see much of a happy ending with these dogs. I hope you can find a solution but, and I hate to be negative here since it's definitely not helping you, the best thing for these dogs are different homes, IMHO.

This must be tearing your heart apart, M&M's Mommy.

oh i have this REALLY good dog book i can't remember what it's called. next time i run upstairs i'll get it. it helped me a lot with basic stuff

All I can say is let her know how much fun having a dog can be, they are incredibley smart animals and when socialised and tranied correctly they can be perfect companions.
I would definetly advise her towards puppy preschool and obediance class, maybe see if there are any dog sports she'd like to get involved in with them?

$2400 on soemting for her to play with?!

To be honest, I have the same fear that when she's working again, the dogs will be neglected. Fortunately, right now she plans to "take a break" from the work force for a couple months & seems to enjoy having these dogs around. She (and myself even more so) are just nervous because she's never owned any type of pets before, and didn't really plan to, until her hubby brought the dogs home!

I did work with her for quite some time to know that she may be clueless, but she's definitely not a heartless person. I'm sure the dogs will grow on her, and she'll gets to taste the the joy & the fulfilment our dogs can bring to us. Since her hubby paid big bucks for these puppies, I don't think they'll consider rehoming them. At least not at this time.

But still.. it does break my heart to learn that she's feeding the dogs Pedigree kibbles, and that she "can't stand it because they pee in the house" . When I told her that it may takes months for her puppies to be 100% house-broken, she kinda freaked out..

I wanted to help so bad, but I can't do anything more than emailing her the things I've learned so far about dog ownership & the joy it has brought to my life...

Here are her little puppies..

Aww, they are cute!

I hope she does fall in love with them, how could she not?!! Look at them!! lol

I think you're doing the best you can to help her out. Puppy classes would definitely help her out. Keep us posted on how things go.

aww they are cute. Maybe steer her to chaz. There is so much good info here like that sticky about housetraining

look at those faces i give her a week and she'll be owned lol

They are really cute! I hope it works out!

I liked the book "Small dogs, Big hearts." Unlike lots of breed-specific books, it contained more info than just the basic, "You should work on potty training." Lots of stuff about diseases and how to feed (though erroneous info on raw) and such. I'd definitely try to steer her to a good trainer or class.

I think she needs a book. Enrolling in puppy training with help her alot. Being a frist tme dog owener, I think she needs every little thing you can give her. And it's great thought that she asked for help and didn't just try to figure things out on her own. Chaz would be a good thing for her. Lots of things here for her to learn!

Crates crates crates. That's my other piece of advice. Especially with two!

I think one thing to remind her of is that with two pups at the same age she needs to do things separately with them and with them together--so that individually they can bond to her and not just to each other--this means walks with one at a time and cuddle time with one at a time.
I would also recommend crate training and coming here to chaz to learn.

Please get her some better food! Does she understand why what she is feeding is crap?

Unfortunely it's the breeders who should have had "The" book ........doubt if they had the best care their 1st 8 weeks . Sad .

Crating (or some sort of confinement) could go a long way towards maintaining sanity during the potty-training months. Once the potty-training is over, she wouldn't have to crate them anymore. It just makes house-breaking so much easier to me. And Spanky loves his crate. I don't close him in it anymore, but he goes in it for naps all the time.

Actually, I do close him in it at night, but that's because he sits and pants nervously until we close the door. He's a real creature of habit!! We would love for him to sleep with us or on his nice cushion, but he wants to be in his crate with the door closed when we go to bed!!!

I think the best thing you could do for her is take her to a positive R obedience puppy class.

Get some books, and sign up for classes once they get all their shots. Make sure she works with them separately in training and has some alone time with each one every day. Get crates but make sure she is aware some pet store/puppy mill dogs are "dirty" and will soil their sleeping place.