Halloween!

I'm pretty far behind in my pictures, if you can't tell based on the holiday pics...  DH and I often end up doing really elaborate Halloween costumes.  But with trick or treating effectively cancelled, we decided not to do it this year.  Which means I didn't have a Halloween costume for TerraDactyl either.  I figured I would just dress her in one of her Halloween themed outfits.  We had a few friends stop by, so TerraDactyl did get to try on a costume.  Who wore it better?

Of course, TerraDactyl is too opinionated about her clothes to just settle for a costume.  She had to add to it.  So she ended up being a Crigunk.  A Crigunk is a crab-tiger-skunk.  It's a distant relative of the Chimera.  😉

It was so much fun watching TerraDactyl interact with baby Ruvalwood.  It makes me wish we weren't in a pandemic...  But we all know that if wishes were horses, we'd all be eating steak.  The two little kids were just so funny interacting with each other.  So drawn to each other, but also a bit uncertain.  And maybe jealous.  TerraDactyl didn't come cling to my leg until after baby Ruvalwood used my leg to help him stand up.  

TerraDactyl was more than willing to hand toys over to baby Ruvalwood, but she was also willing to take them back.  So I'm not sure that she fully understands what sharing is yet.  We'll have to keep working on that.  Last time TerraDactyl saw Baby Ruvalwood, she sort of treated him like Riley - she even petted his hair!  In the last few months, she's started playing with her dolls:  hugging them, kissing them, carrying them around...  So, I think she was a little better at treating him like a human rather than a dog.  Of course, it may have helped that he was standing upright this time, instead of just crawling around on all fours...  :D

DH got his half-marathon swag in the mail the other day and TerraDactyl was super excited to explore it all.  She was very excited to empty out the box.  And then fill up the grocery bag they sent.  And try on all the clothes.  She also needed to read all the papers they sent.  It was pretty funny to watch.  

One challenge we've had now that TerraDactyl is starting to understand us, is how to discipline her.  It's not something that comes up super often, so DH and I hadn't really discussed it so we could get on the same page about what warranted discipline and how we wanted to go about it.  The big thing that's come up though, is playing too rough with the dog.  Sometimes she'll pull on Riley's tail, or whack him too hard.  Riley's been a real trooper so far, but we don't want to push our luck.  So we're really trying to emphasize being nice to dogs (and other people, but people are less likely to snap and bite your face).  We've got a few baby fences that we've set up into a time out corner for now.  It'll keep her contained and safe while she contemplates what she did wrong...  or at least while we count down 90 seconds (we're going with a 1-minute in time out per year of life approach).  She's had a few time outs (mostly right before nap or bed time, so I think tiredness is a factor).  But I'm not sure she's quite caught on that this is a punishment.  Take a look for yourself:

 

The other night when TerraDactyl was brushing her teeth before bed when she found DH laying on the couch.  They spent about five minutes doing this adorable ballerina spin routine.  It cracked me up.  TerraDactyl eventually got so dizzy she fell over when she tried to spin.  But she got back up and then started spinning in the other direction.