I've been trained. Now what?

She DOES have you well trained! And dogs are like perpetual 3 year olds--lucky for me, that is one of my favorite ages of childhood! When I have to be on the phone for a business call I have 2 choices: continuously throw Maddie's chosen toy of the moment, which she at least brings back to me, but this is pretty distracting, or put the girls in the bedroom and give them a small treat for going in. They are happy to settle down on the comfy bed, only barking occasionally when something like a leaf goes by the window ☺ What I should do, and occasionally work on doing, is giving them the command to go to their mats (2 cushy beds in the dining area) and putting them on a down stay. This is completely unreliable, though, because the cats love to go by and saunter in front of them, just begging to be chased. So that means lots of taking them back to their mats and putting them on another down stay. The only reason it doesn't work is that I have not reinforced it enough. The best way to do this is to put Freckles wherever you want her to be, then pretend to be on the phone, so you can easily redirect her whenever she breaks a stay. This, of course, takes micro mini steps and lots of patience. Or you can give her a chewy and put her in a room or in her crate, but no free chewy just for being Freckles! I am curious about what Maggie does during these times...

Maggie is pretty cat-like. She will slither up on my lap or sit right next to me. Usually, Maggie's barking will initiate Freckles to start barking...but not the other way around.

I'm not sure if this would be considered cruel or not but how about putting a muzzle on when the barking starts & removing it when it stops.

Freckles, I'm gonna try that!

I do this to my Momma too. Once she lets me jump up in her lap, I stop. Sometimes when she's working from home and can't have me on her lap, she'll put me in the bedroom and I just chill. I'm not a barker though....I just whine really loudly. Freckles probably is louder than I am....it's that great bassett voice. Good luck! :-)

Well, apparently this issue applies to anyone who's on the phone while Freckles is around! My sister was over at our house this afternoon and I called her to chat...I could barely hear her from the every 5 second "WooRoo!" coming from dear Freckles.

That's hilarious!!! I swear, they're just like human kids...fine when you're not on the phone but need you for some life-threatening reason when you're on the phone!

Thanks guys for all the advice. I know a lot of what's been said is "common sense" when looking from the outside, and I'm sure it would have evenutally made its way into my head, but oh, sweet Moses, the barking!! That loud bassy WooRoo drives me batty when all I want to do is communicate with the outside world!