dog ate MIL''s Christmas present!

[monarch64]

For crying out loud. My dog is two years old, pretty well-trained, and has turned out to be a major pain in the you-know-what. I was just downstairs on the computer and doing laundry for like half an hour to relax, the dog went upstairs about 5 minutes ago and things were nice and quiet. (Hubby is doing a business dinner.) Sure enough, things were TOO nice and quiet. I went upstairs to start on baking cookies for my exchange at work tomorrow and lo and behold, there was a shredded Christmas present under the tree, along with a guilty looking beagle. Dammit. Of all the things he could''ve decided to shred (he''s never pulled this one before, I made the mistake of trusting him after two Christmases and no problems with ornaments, trees, or boxes underneath them). He picked the one containing a black knitted scarf with pockets I had bought on a MIL/DIL bonding, shopping excursion a few weeks ago. She was admiring it, and I waited until she was in the ladies room to purchase it! AARRRRGGGHHHH! Boy is he a fast chewer. The box was shredded open on one side, the scarf, still folded, but removed from the intact tissue, has several pulls in the yarn and he chewed off the tag, as well as some faux (or so I thought) fur trim on the pocket on one side. I want to laugh, but I had finally found something I knew she would love! I don''t know what to do...you can tell that some of the fur has been chewed off. The tag is still intact, and I have a receipt for it, but I can''t bring it back to the store knowing my dog chewed part of it! Yes, the dog is fine, he never actually swallows anything, I found all the remnants of fur, paper, box, etc. BLAST IT ALL AND BAH HUMBUG!!! Stop laughing!

 

[ame]

Can you call the store to see if they have anymore???

 

[Mara]

haha sorry to hear that!!

Portia was fine with the tree (except that she would go in the back corner of it and make a bed for herself)...I think when I added the presents she got irritated because she started shredding the paper...left the gifts entirely alone (even dog cookies she opened and just left there!)...thank god..but she did shred a card that was attached to the gift for my sister that had directions on how to use the gift. Greg said that I could still give her the gift and say that it was from Portia.

I would call the store and see if they have another one, suck it up....hahah there's no way you can return it and you can't gift it the way it is...chalk it up to experience...those dogs! So far P has just shredded two gifts paper and that's it..keeping fingers crossed that she seemed to get it out of her system after that.

 

[jennyann2]

funny i have a story very similar to that. one year my dad bought my mom a pair of rabbit fur earmuffs and sure enough, he came home one day to find that the dog had sniffed it out and tore open that present ripping the fur mostly out. well he went back to the store (Hecht''s) with the earmuffs in hand and said he needed another pair cause his dog ate it and they did an even exchange for him! he fully expected to have to pay for it but the lady found it funny and just returned them! you could try it!

 

[monarch64]

I may either wait til after Christmas and return it, or just tell my MIL what happened and let her assess the damage for herself. It was only $26, you have to look for the missing fur spot, and I can pull the yarns back through where they''re pulled out. I should''ve known that dog''s sniffer would seek out the box with fur in it first.

 

[Patty]

Is you MIL a dog lover? If so, she''ll probably get a kick out of the story.

 

[monarch64]

Patty: yes, she is definitely a dog lover. Currently she has an adorable Cocker Spaniel/Springer spaniel mix that she adopted from the local humane society...he has proven himself to be a springer in that he has leapt up on top of dressers and chewed up everything from eyeglasses to (gasp) dentures, etc. So I''m sure she''ll get a big laugh out of this. But still, I was disappointed in not only myself for giving the dog five minutes to get into trouble (damn laundry and pricescope), and THE DOG for being A DOG!!! LOL. No harm done to the dog, and it''s just a silly scarf, so all is well. I was just upset that it was finally the perfect gift for my MIL, and it''s ruined!

Thanks everyone for your suggestions/funny stories!

 

[Mara]

OMG so today we came home and Portia had shredded TWO more gifts, the little terror!!! Greg says we have to put the gate up around the tree now when we leave because there are tons of gifts under there now. Little rat! But the look on her face...she so knows she has done wrong!

 

[Patty]

I think that the story of how the dog ate her scarf will be around much longer than the scarf will be!

I''m glad she''s a dog lover...she''ll laugh at what happened!

Yes, Mara, I know the look well when they''ve done something that they know they shouldn''t have.

We have two wooden table leaves under our tree to keep Oliver from getting under there and knocking down ornaments. The presents are on the buffet in the dining room. I don''t trust him at all with those!

 

[VegasAngel]

Thankfully my dog is behaved, It''s my cat who is the terror. She is tearing down the garland & dragging it all over the house. It''s hard not to laugh when I see her do backflips off the wall trying to grab it. We don''t even bother with Christmas trees because of her. One year I came home to find all the balls broken under the tree and the lights pulled off. Weve resorted to those little table top pine trees & even that she can''t stay away from. Gosh the stuff we put with from our pets because we love them.

 

[stretch4]

Oh Monarch, I bet your MIL will just love the entire story since she is a dog lover.

Is there any chance that you could buy another one since it was only $26? You can give her the dog eatten one first and tell her the funny story, and then give her the one in better condition

.

My parent''s cocker spaniel is an absolute horror. He will pick up the smaller presents and totally tear them apart. He is so bad that my parents cannot put any gifts out under the tree, and when it is time to open gifts, we have to keep them all on our laps and up on high places to keep him for stealing them. I remember one Christmas my mother bought me a pair of nice leather riding gloves ,and I actually never got to open the gift wrap because the dog stole the present and totally destroyed them LOL. Most of the fingers were missing from the gloves

 

[monarch64]

Ok, so the story of how the scarf got eaten will definitely be around much longer than the scarf. I have decided to chalk it up to a loss and just tell my MIL what happened. She will understand, be disappointed a little, but probably laugh a lot about it and have a good story to tell coworkers when she goes back to work next week! DH and I have been socializing the last couple of nights and telling our friends about it (sharing bad dog stories and such), so I feel much better about the situation now. And of course, hearing from fellow PS''rs doesn''t hurt!

I have a beagle, and they are bred to hunt rabbits (rather, they are trained to round up the rabbits for hunters, but not to kill rabbits themselves), so I should''ve known that even wrapping a present with fur, which probably was rabbit, was my own mistake, I guess I was asking for trouble right there! I looked back at my original post, and thought, jeez was I ever a dummy! I didn''t even give the scarf a second thought, thinking he hadn''t been a bad boy for two Christmases! Oh well, lesson learned. Times like these make you wish you were Dr. Doolittle and could "talk to the animals" or at least think like them to avoid these mishaps!