First Dog - advice needed

On Saturday night Siri will spend his first night away from home as we are going to MIL's 88th birthday party up north. I whatsapped our dog sitter an updated photo and saw my last update to her was 10 weeks ago, what a difference 10 weeks makes when they are young!

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Lab puppies are terrible chewers. Our lab didnā€™t get out of his chewing phase until he was around 2yrs old. Laptop cables, carpets, seatbelts in the car etc etc. I would heartily recommend crate training.
They are one of the most biddable dogs though so you should manage to lead, toilet, basic train it reasonable quickly.
Teaching them to drop whatever is in their mouth to command is a must imho as they will put things they shouldnā€™t in their mouths. Being able to get them to drop it without having to tussle with them is brill.
Just a few of the most basic things
 
Our nearly 13yr old lab lying next to the carpet he trimmed the tassels on all those years ago. Bless him, I doubt heā€™ll reach next Christmas as his back end is starting to go. He has had addisons for 5 or 6yrs now and gets a monthly injection and daily preds. Initially this cost us around Ā£1600/mth until we got him stabilised, now around Ā£200/mth. So lifelong insurance is a must.
Dentastick every am to help with keeping teeth clean and heā€™s only needed one dental in his life, around age 11yrs. So I heartily recommend this as a way to help reduce dental issues (I havenā€™t the patience to brush his teeth every day, and I have no excuse, I was a vet nurse for 30yrs so know exactly how to do it).
He was house trained and recall trained by 10wks of age. However, he now doesnā€™t hear so well and will at times use this to his advantage, selective hearing and a nice spot to sniff are more important than coming back when hollered on. Happily we taught him hand signals also, so even when he canā€™t hear he knows the hand single for sit or come back so as long as he hears us and looks over weā€™re ok.
The collie (8yrs) has been blind from birth and is naughty so our lab feels he can also be naughty.
 

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