Paws Afoot

If your reading reviews you already need a trainer, we should have found Lise 4 months ago. Bear is our 1 year old black Labrador, amazingly smart. Too smart. Lise has shown us how to work with our dog so that our whole family is on the same page. Our training sessions were developed for us with us. Lise is professional, courteous and completely loves dogs. Bear is the typical teenage dog, needed serious direction and she gave us just the right advice in easy to digest sessions with printed follow up material to study later. We focused on his "dragging us" on walks and she suggested a walking harness and some behaviors that are making an amazing difference already. Lise also had a list of training items she thought would be helpful and we have used them every day since, no wasted stuff. The simple progression of the training sessions have worked for us very well. The cost was reasonable, you have her to yourself, no big groups. Your dog is part of your family/life and she understands your fear and worry about your pet. We have more work to do with Bear, he is having trouble with being separated from his pack (us) but the good news is we have found someone we trust to help us figure it out. I know we can do it together and that's huge!

We are so fortunate to have found Paws Afoot when we did! We have a lovable but fearful and somewhat unruly Pom and we adopted sweet mix from PAWS only days before hiring Lise. When my mother who lived in Florida was diagnosed with a late-stage terminal illness and we were faced with my immediately leaving the state for at least a few weeks to help care for her, we were left wondering what in the world we would do for the dogs for such a long period - and on such short notice. Although Ella (our adopted girl) would have done very well at dog daycare, it isn’t an option for Whidbey (the Pom) due to severe “social anxiety;” and, with my husband’s long workdays, leaving them home alone all day wasn’t an option. Add to that Whidbey’s leash aggression and Houdini moves, and we had a problem; we had under a week to find a walker we could trust not only with spending time with our dogs, but one with whom Whidbey could be at ease and who could demonstrate strong experience effectively managing his brand of challenging behavior. Enter Paws Afoot! I searched the Internet for ideas and found Lise’s site. Since we live in an area we knew would be a stretch for her, I had little expectation that she would help us, but she seemed such a perfect fit and time was so short, I had to try. Happily, after I shared the details of our quandary, she didn’t miss a beat before agreeing to help us. There are no words for how grateful and relieved I was. She came to the house before my departure to introduce herself and to give the dogs a chance to become acquainted with her, and I knew we’d struck gold from the moment she arrived; her technique was spot-on for a dog like Whidbey. Things went swimmingly! We discussed our needs with her, she inquired about all of those “What would you like me to know about your dogs?” items, she gave me an opportunity to ask questions, and before she left, we had everything in writing. I found her thoroughly professional and approachable from the moment we met, and that impression would remain throughout our contract. Each day Lise visited the house, she walked the dogs and then spent time playing and snuggling with them (that snuggling extended to the cat – not that he would have given her an option ☺). She tended diligently to Whidbey’s on-leash behavior with patience and positive reinforcement – no small undertaking – and left notes after each visit so my husband would know how things went; she even went above and beyond to text me photos and updates that inspired a smile on even the most difficult days. Although she had offered to help us on a more temporary basis due to her busy regular training and walking schedule heading into fall, when my time in Florida turned from weeks to months, she continued to work with us to do everything she could to ensure the dogs’ needs were met. The woman is truly remarkable. We will be forever grateful for LIse’s generosity, dependability, professionalism, skill, and her natural and bountiful love for animals. She stepped up during what was to become the single most difficult period in our lives thus far and gave us one less thing to worry about. We cannot recommend her services highly enough.

Lise is great with our two dogs. She's been walking them for about one year, and they just love her! They are so happy when they see her and come back home tired and happy from their walk. One of our dogs was injured (not related to her services!), and Lise was willing to work with me on an altered schedule for two months to accommodate our injured dog for potty breaks and still keep our other dog exercised. It is so great that our dogs have a nice break during the work day! Lise has also helped us during vacations by coming to our house to feed our two cats twice a day for about a week. She sent us updates while we were gone so we knew they were eating and drinking well. All our animals love Lise!