My plans for Alfred are mainly food oriented. As a lab, food is the center of his life. He is my fifth lab but the most food oriented of them all. He has three slow bowls because he gets faster as the week goes on and I must trade them out weekly. He wolfs his food and chokes himself if we are not careful. But I have some interesting treats set aside for him and will have a little baking session to make him some cookies and little treats too.

I have also purchased a stuffed animal for him. From time to time he likes to rip the stuffing out of them. I can restuff for quite some time before it is truly dead.

A few years ago I enrolled in BarkBox so we got our monthly box with treats and a couple of toys. At one point, there seemed to be a mix-up as he was getting a lot of toys of a type that I had specifically asked be removed. He is not particularly fond of balls and prefers stuffed animals with squeakers inside. But he was getting stuffed animals with balls inside. I contacted them and discovered that they had written down his preferences exactly backwards. They apologized and said they'd send an extra toy as an apology. Quite a while went by and still no toy so I recontacted them and they apologized again and said they'd get on it. I jokingly suggested they just wander around the warehouse and grab all the fluffy critters and toss them in a box for him. Well, much to my astonishment, a large box showed up on our doorstep sometime later. Inside were a dozen assorted fluffy critters. Hooray to bark box. The only problem is that Alfred doesn't tend to destroy these smaller toys so they have been hanging around for ages. Many are still set aside waiting their turn. A few have been given to friends as gifts. But basically we now have a lifetimes supply of small fluffy toys.

I have friends who have a 2-year-old black lab who is an aggressive chewer. He regularly demolishes their firewood! I am thinking of enrolling them in a short subscription to a box that targets aggressive chewers. I think it's called bully something and has good reviews online. They'd send four or five chew treats per box. They can tailor it so there is a box every couple of months. I am thinking I will just add a note saying that Alfred negotiated this gift and his commission for acting as their dog's agent is that he gets one of the toys per box.

Historically, my dogs get a can of sardines packed in oil as a special Christmas treat. Often given over two feedings to spread out the oiliness although it means that the nasty fish smell hangs around longer. Otherwise there's really no special Christmas food. Of course, I am a bad mummy and I share my food with my dog so he will get nibbles of whatever I eat. Please don't yell at me! My vet already does.