You may have figured out by now that The Dog rules this house – or at least she thinks so, and we don’t have the heart to tell her otherwise.

The best advice we received when adopting an energetic puppy was, “A tired dog is a good dog.”  Truer words have never been spoken.  We have been very fortunate to have just a few cases of chew toy mistaken identity (my new boots, my new hat, and the living room light/fan remote). However, The Boy and I would like to think we have one part good dog, and one part tired dog thanks to our efforts.

We go through about one small peanut butter jar a month filling up The Dog’s Kong (a/k/a Kongaleeza Rice), and we used to just recycle them.  The Boy had a brilliant idea to make them into toys for The Dog.  This actually occurred for the first time after The Dog’s first birthday party, when she gorged on doggie cupcakes and doggie ice cream (and doggie treats, and other dog’s treats, and anything that fell on the ground), and then went on a hunger strike for several days.  We could not get her to eat her regular food at all, and we refused to continue feeding her junk.  I’ll quit rambling and tell you already.  Sheesh.

Drill holes in the lid of the peanut butter container, throw in some of your dog’s regular food, and watch them bat it around like idiots trying to get the food to fall out.

Yep, it is that easy. The last picture is showing how I fish out the little chunks of plastic that end up in the jar.  They probably wouldn’t hurt a dog who inhaled a rib bone and lived to tell about it, but I’d rather not risk it.

The Dog picks this jar up and throws it across the room with her mouth. It is pretty hilarious, and fun for the whole family. The food also gets a light coating of peanut butter in the process, making the reward that much more tasty (and harder to get out!).  We use a 1/4″ wood boring drill bit and make three holes.  However, we buy the mini-chunks, so if your food morsels are larger you may need bigger holes to allow the food to fall out.  Also, every dog is different, but I would never leave mine unsupervised with this toy, because she will chew the lid right off and rip the plastic to shreds (and ingest it, which cannot be good for her intestines!).

I will try to get a video of our furry fat kid going nuts over this, and update this post.  She never seems to cooperate when the camera is on.  I hope your furry kid enjoys this as much as ours does!