First Restaurant Style Training

Oh my, where to begin?  Kings has just been an absolute delight.  He works so hard during training sessions, and is so easy going in new experiences I truly feel blessed to be HIS partner!  We worked twice now in his first service dog harness, which he acted as if he had worn a thousand times already!

12 wks - in a wonderful sturdy harness donated by Shoshana Rappaport

Because he has been doing so well with distractions, car rides and meeting new dogs, I brought Kingsley along to meet my friend, Alicia, who is in from MD for the weekend.  We met at Sonic for some food, and there is outdoor seating there.  Kingsley just simply blew my expectations out of the water!

He walked into the van nicely again, and did not try to chew his harness like many young puppies do riding in the car.  Once there he waited patiently while my wheelchair was unbuckled, and joyfully got in and out of the car with my mom as she got situated.  He walked across his first parking lot with confidence and nice leash skills.

My friend had her intact 1 1/2 year old Golden Retriever along, who is a very easy going but eager to greet everyone kind of dog.  Although Kings was a tag on the shy side, he didn't have any negative response and wasn't overly worried.  He did quickly try to say hi to my friend in an appropriate, friendly way.

Ordering food is done through a loud intercom system.  Kings simply laid under my feet and listened as we all stood around ordering and the intercom squeaked and talked back to us.

Under my chair while ordering food

He had no problem walking to and from the table, and wasn't interested in the carhop who was a loud young girl that moved very fast.  He literally stayed put while she gave us all our food, and while we ate!

Under table while eating dinner

Towards the end of the meal he did get bored and wander over to the nearby grass, where he laid and rolled around on his back happily.  He did so great through the meal that I let him goof off a bit.  To my delight he had NO response other than curiosity when a Sonic employee started mowing the lawn directly next to us with an old clunky lawn mower!  He checked out the sound for a mere 5 seconds and then went right back to rolling around and playing in place!

The great evening ended with Alicia buying Kingsley and Terp both small vanilla ice cream dishes, which of COURSE they loved!  This way little mans first vanilla ice cream <3 and he couldn't have been more polite or adorable!! <3 <3 <3

Kingsley eating his first ice-cream <3

And officially my favorite picture so far of my handsome boy...

ICE CREAM FACE MCGEE!! <3 

Tomorrow will be Kingsley's first PAD event!  He will accompany me to our table event at the Lititz Market from 8am - 12 noon!  He will have the chance to meet dozens of people and many dogs!  If he's not too exhausted afterwards, we're going to the doggie pool!  

Until next time...