At approximately 5:36 p.m. the email messages started pouring in: “I believe” and “Oh My god!” and “We did it”. They were, of course, referring to the Canada-U.S. hockey game and the winning of Canada’s 14th  and some say, most important gold.  The funny thing is that all those emails were from my Canadian friends who live in the States. They were watching with their kids and their Maple Leafs on their shirts and in some cases drinking a 2-4 of Canadian beer.

Some of them have lived in the States for 15 years, their kids were born there, they eat, sleep and dream the U.S.  and they are mostly like there for the rest of their lives.  But they feel Canadian, and they instill a sense of Canada in their kids too. One of my best friends lives in New Jersey Devils territory and even knows some of the players, but her son very politely told his pals that he would be rooting for Canada.

Day 12 in the world of puppydom and my dog trainer has already showed me up as a parent. She’s pretty good with the puppy, too but it is her interaction with my kids that I find the most interesting.

Her sheer positivity mixed with the way she sets up clear boundaries had my kids following her around like a pied piper. It also reinforces some parenting lessons in one short hour and reminds me that indeed, kids are like puppies. Maybe animal training and people training isn’t that different.

Amy Sutherland studied animal behaviour and applied animal training techniques to her husband with amazing results and then he turned around and started using them on her. Her book, What Shamu Taught Me About Life, Love, and Marriage: Lessons for People from Animals and Their Trainers is based on a widely-circulated article in the NY Times.

Here are some things that I have learned from the puppy trainer, and it works goes for kids, puppies, husbands, wives, possibly any sentient being in your midst ...

Warning: To those with mothers-in-law from hell, stop reading here. I have a mother-in-law that turns the stereotype on its head. She is non-judgmental, supportive and has never once made me feel that I “stole” her son from her. Sorry, no mother-in-law jokes in this post.

When my husband and I started dating back in1984, I’m not sure that his mother took me too seriously. I was a giggly 15-year old girl who travelled in a pack of other like-minded teens. I’m not sure when I started taking my boyfriend’s parents too seriously either. They were sort of shadowy figures who lent us the car and occasionally fed us as we passed through the door.

Me: What do you want for lunch?

Kid: Macaroni and cheese.

Me: But you had it yesterday!

Kid: Today is not yesterday.

Why does every kid love macaroni and cheese so much? (ok, every kid but one -- my oldest son). It can’t just be the Kraft commercials or the bright orange colour or the fact that it is some kind of Canadian favourite. There must be something in the alchemy of butter, cheese and noodles that turns it into the ultimate comfort food.

Can I bring Yseline? asks my daughter as she drags her doll towards me.

” Umm…ok,” I answer.

“ And my wagon? “ As on cue,  a toy wagon full of bits and pieces rolls towards my foot.

“ Umm…no,”

“ But I neeeed it!” Cries erupt.

I am momentarily distracted by the boys now fighting over a hat. ”That’s my hat!” yells  Aaron as he tries to squish the too-small hat on to his melon-sized head.

“No, it’s mine now!” yells Sam as he tries to grab it. Aaron flicks him off with a desultory slap. My daughter’s cries are getting louder as I try and force her foot into her boot while trying to find the mitten that has fallen under the bench.

‘Auggh… the puppy stole the hat!” yell the boys in unison. I ignore them as I am now scrambling for my wallet and trying to find my phone.

It’s just an average day in chaos, trying to get the three kids out the door. Doesn’t matter what our destination is, exiting the house remains one of the most difficult tasks of the day.

“My daughter is into bag lady chic,” bemoans my friend Chuck about her 10-year old. “I cannot fully explain the horror of today’s outfit: an open silver men’s shirt on top of a tiny Pucci-inspired blouse she found in the hidden give-away bag, track pants and mismatched socks.”

“That doesn’t sound too bad!” I say, Chuck’s daughter is the size of a teenager and infamous for her kooky outfits.

“Did I mention that that the silver shirt was from the men’s section of Value Village? Her dad took her there and allowed her to wander through the store and pick whatever she wanted, so she came home with men’s disco clothes. Oh, I forgot to tell you about the bright orange wool scarf that some amateur knitted it in the 70s. And to top it off, she often goes out with socks on her hands instead of mittens.”

"OK…” says me, stifling a laugh.

“And she went to my cousin’s party in that get-up!”

Once in a while you read an article in a parenting magazine that scares the &*% out of you. Last month’s Today’s Parent had an articleby William Sears that discussed NDD, nutritional deficit disorder. He essentially said that if your child is not getting enough Omega 3, they could have difficulties in school and show signs of ADD.

He went on to say that Omega 3 from flax is probably not good enough, it should be from either fish oil or wild salmon. Now, I love the Sears familythey have popularized a loving and thoughtful approach to parenting. But hello? Trying to get kids to take fish oil is a close-to-impossible task without some major tears and/or promises of video games daily. I still have the bottle of lemon-flavoured fish oil in the cupboard from years ago, I couldn’t force it down either. And I like fish.

We all have regrets. Mine include not being a camp counselor; not working in a restaurant kitchen and not learning to skate. I know it’s practically unpatriotic of me not to know how to skate, and even more so during the Olympics.

But somehow the combination of a British mother and a personality rooted inertia meant that I never learned how to propel myself on ice. Now I know what you are thinking, “that’s impossible, you can skate a bit!” and “who cares?” But no, I can not skate at all, and I care because it provides a bad example for my kids.

I fear that I have become a bit of a cliché. My third child starts junior kindergarten and suddenly I am walking to school leash in hand, fluffy miniature furball behind me. There are a number of mothers who got puppies when their last child started school as some kind of salve against empty nest syndrome (as if that precious two hours a day is really an empty nest) and now I have joined their ranks.

We are on Day Two of living in the puppy-hood and I was planning on writing a post on how much work it to have a puppy and how it’s just like having a newborn but without the pain and the ability to eat whatever you want, but really he has been pretty easy. Of course, as soon as this post sees the light of day, I am sure I will have a mini-Cujo on my hands.

Everyday the Olympics is offering so much to talk about with the kids. Tragedy, joy, teamwork, disappointment, cheesy Canadiana. It’s just a smorgasbord of teachable moments, and I say this as a non-sports obsessed family.

The truth is I do find the Olympic spirit catchy but that doesn’t mean that we haven’t already had some debates about the meaning of the “Olympic spirit” in our house. My son and I got into a debate about whether the Canadian women hockey team went too far in their overwhelming 18 to 0 win against Slovakia. I thought that by Goal 10 the Canadians should have eased up on the opposing team; my son felt that they should take every  opportunity in front of them and that they need the ice time to compete against the U.S. . He was especially impressed that the Canadian women set a new Olympic record for most goals scored, I thought that the women went overboard. But in the end it was a good example of what it means to be team looking for gold. And I am sure that there will be many, many more lessons to come: