The Life of Toven; Toven Goes Sledding

thoughts written by Patti Dienhoffer


More then anything in life, Toven loves to go on adventures, ok that’s not exactly true but, after playing ball, Toven loves going on adventures. Today I had an extra special adventure in mind. 

We are going sledding!

More then anything in life, Toven loves to go on adventures, OK that’s not exactly true but, after playing ball, Toven loves going on adventures. Today I had an extra special adventure in mind.

We are going sledding!

Now, I have had Toven for 5 years and as much as he loves winter, I do not. When you live in upstate New York you can’t avoid winter so you better learn to enjoy yourself. I never learned to ski, I have never been on a snowmobile, but man do I love sledding. So for the first time I wanted to take Toven just to see how he would do.

My prediction is that he will love it. I used to have a corgi named Annie, Annie absolutely loved sledding; even when I got scared and let go of her to grab the sled and she would go flying off the sled and into a snow back, she loved the rush of it. If he really likes it, I think Toven will be able to sit on the sled all by himself. I definitely believe that once he gets done with the first run he will be hooked.

The park we went to is a park that Toven and I visit all the time; usually to walk, run, play ball and when he allows I get to swing on the swing set.

When we pulled into the parking lot needless to say, he was very excited. But, he soon became confused when I didn’t pull out his ball but rather I pulled out this big round tube. But, he was at the park with a lot of sniffing to do so he was happy and we headed in.

First run was hilarious; I went down alone to see how he would react. Toven excitedly jumped and ran after me, jumping into my lap as the sled came to a stop. All I could think was, YES! He is going to love this! We got up and headed back up to the top of the hill. This time I sat down and told him to sit on my lap. He was so excited; he jumped and circled around me. Then he put his paws up onto my shoulders, as he started to bring his back legs up, suddenly he got nervous and he pushed off my shoulders and jumped away. Waging his tail he circled back around, this time putting his front legs into my lap, he leaned there for a minute and again jumped away.

As he jumped away I pushed off so that the sled started to go down the hill, and again Toven excited, tail wagging he circled around and ran down after me. Jumping onto me once the sled stopped. Time and time again he would jump so excitedly, circle around me wagging his tail, he would try to get onto my lap but again and again he would chicken out and jump back off my lap. Toven was so happy just to be outside at the park, he enjoyed running after me in my sled over and over again down the hill and running back up just to do it again. But he never got enough courage to ride the sled down.

For the most part, Toven’s adventure sledding was a hit. I think the key for future sledding adventures will be getting a bigger sled, maybe he will feel more comfortable sitting in front of me.

To be continued…