What's in your Cairns toy box?

[kayharley]

I was on vacation this week and started on some spring cleaning....one target was the dog's toy box. I could not believe all the stuff that is in there that they never play with...(why is having Cairns so much like having young children again ? )

I found rubber balls, vinyl balls, nylabones that have never been touched, glow balls, rope toys, kongs of all shapes and sizes including a huge black one I ordered by mistake, puzzle toys, dismembered bees, birds and squirrels, orbit toys, frisbees, hol-ee balls, twist n treat saucers, rubber pull toys, gigglie/wigglies, Fat Cat bird minus one beak, rubber bounce bones....

Am I a normal Cairn mother or am I spoiling my crew?

[Toto times 2]

Last count (not including stuff buried around the house): 2 rope toys. 1 plastic frisbee, two balls with bells inside, two rubber kongs, 2 types of nylabone, 1 stuffed cat, 1 stuffed ram, 3 or 4 fake mice, 1 rubber ring AND a partridge in a pear tree.

[Guest Guest]

Liddy is drowning in toys, too. She still has some that she never touched when she was a puppy. Usually, I'll buy her a new toy when I get tired of throwing the same old things around.

[Bekah]

Sorry, that was me in the last post, I didn't realize I was logged out.

[Milopup]

I have lost count as to the number of toys that we have for our pup. Most look like rejects from Dr. Frankenstein's laboratory though, and are often missing various limbs and/or the head. Anyone else have this problem??

[toomanypaws]

My cairns don't have a toy box, they have a toy basket that's overflowing. I honestly don't know just how many toys they have, but it's alot. They do each have favorites that they have claimed and know are there's. Their are some things that always remain in the basket like their bones, nylabones, squeaky toys, and certain stuffed ones they can't live w/o, but the other toys I rotate out. Something I learned from doing w/ my dd when she was younger was rotating toys. I don't let them have everything at once because then they seem to have so much to choose from that they don't know what to pick. I split the toys up and keep a pillow case full that I store in the laundry room. Everyday I toss a couple toys at them and that becomes their new favorite. This works great, especially w/ my two youngest ones. Once a toy has been rotated to the point that the stuffings gone, the squeaky has been ripped out and it's basically a shredded piece of material, I toss it (w/o being seen :ninja:).

I love nothing better than coming home from somewhere like Petsmart w/ a new toy for each of them. They are so cute and wait their turn to receive their new toy and then they proudly march around w/ their new treasure just daring the other to even think about wanting it. Except Abbey, she immediately checks out where the squeaker is and attempts to remove it. Abbey is also the one at night who quietly watches me as I return all of the toys to the basket (except for the couple they sleep w/) and then will walk over to the basket and tip it back over.

Like me, I think you're the normal cairn mom spoiling her kids.

[CathyAnn]

Here's an old picture with Piper as a pup. As you can imagine, now having 2 Cairns, our toy box is heaped to about 3 times what you see here!!

Cathy

[Guest mrskti]

Oh thank god, i thought I was going overboard buying toys everytime i went shopping....now I see I'm perfectly normal!

[kayharley]

CathyAnn...that is an adorable pic.

I buy alot of dog stuff online so whenever I walk upstairs carrying a delivery box, Madison goes wild. I should take some of their old toys, put them in a box, seal it up and leave it on our front porch...she'd never know (or would she?)

[Guest LynneO]

Our Cairn's toy basket is so sad looking - with only a few toys. Whenever I give him a new one his intent is to just chew it up. He even chewed through a puppy kong!! Our neighbor brought him a raquet ball yesterday and within minutes he had destroyed it. Forget stuffed toys...they are ripped up in a day. So I still buy him a new toy at least once a week and he has nylabones and rawhides...but the toys go to the garbage once destroyed. The one item I have found that he can't chew up is a lacrosse ball...but then he seems to lose interest in it.

[Brigette]

Our toy box has several items, but mainly there are shells of former "babies" that have been de-stuffed by my Labrador. My Cairn and other small dog still carry their "babies" around in a sad, lifeless kind of way.

[Tribo64]

What a funny thread! My pups have chosen their latest favorite toy as the basket that houses their toys! So, sadly, the basket had to go.....

Charlie's absolute favorite toy is a seven-year old doll that we bought our son (when he was a toddler, of course). The doll said the name of any body part you squeezed and my son, being a boy, promptly chewed off all the fingers, toes, nose, etc. I don't know why we kept it around (Memories, I suppose). My daughter later adopted it as her own and WOULD NOT let me throw it away.

SO, to make a long story short, we've kept it in the family by giving it to Charlie. He LOVES it and it is funny when we have to explain to new people that Charlie didn't chew off the appendages, my SON did!

[wags]

that post above mine is really cute!

I get Wes toys from garage sales. Saturday I asked that a teddy bear be reduced because his nose was missing. The first thing Wes does when he get a stuffed animal is try to take its nose off anyway.

[Toto times 2]

I buy the boys lots of stuff at Goodwill, Salvation Army etc. I just always remove the eyes or anything else hard that they could swallow. It is funny Ghillie could care less. He only likes balls, but Smokey loves squeakies and stuffed toys.

[Eliz222]

This is what is in my toy box!

Finch is usually IN the toy box! She loves to sit in there...and will sometimes give me a look like "well, are ya going to come in and join me?".

We have stuffed animals, 1/2 stuffed animals, rubber toys, 1/2 rubber toys, and some kongs.

Finch is busy chewing on a bone in this picture.

[Kathryn]

What fun! Cairns and toys just seem to go together!

Allie has a favorite ball -- bought when we can find it at Petco -- which has a squeaker that I swear sounds like a dying rabbit (and I really think so now after she caught that one a few weeks ago). It's so irritating, and of course it's her favorite toy. We have several in the house for her and, when I just can't stand it, I put them away in a drawer. Later Steve will find her barking at the drawer, open it and find the toy. She NEVER forgets...

One of the fun aspects of spring is finding toys dragged into the yard that are now uncovered by the snow melt. Allie and Walt (the "extra dog," border collie) play regularly in Walt's back yard, which is much bigger than ours and thus much better for long games of frisbee. We try to pick up the toys but sometimes lose a few in the snow. Then they also drag them outside on their "breaks." A walk around the yard this spring uncovered a really worn soft frisbee, a couple plush toys that were immediately tossed (yucky, dirty wet fleece - ugh), and a few squeak toys (a carrot, a newspaper and a bird...) that no longer had their squeaks. Plus a couple really dirty tennis balls that were too soggy to bounce.

Allie tears apart Walt's fleece and plush toys, so we have to buy him a few every once in a while to make up for it...He loves them dearly even when all of the stuffing is gone.

[Mama Kim]

Piper has a toy basket that is overflowing and still, I buy her more!! I can't help myself!!

[Guest cairnmother]

It is such a hassle when you have to vaccum. I swear it takes more time to pick up all the toys than it does to run the vaccum over the floor. I can't help myself when I see a cute toy. Teddy looks so cute and it makes him so happy to get something new. My last cairn Ozzy would de- stuff a toy in no time flat and his toys would get thrown away after a few they had surgery preformed on them a few times. Teddy has never torn one up. I don't buy any more toys than I used to, I just don't have to throw any away.