Calgary
Board and train before Christmas guests
A Christmas house is a hard exam for a dog: the door opens again and again, relatives arrive with arms full of bags, the table is laid with food at nose height, and a cousin's toddler wants to hug the dog's face. Each of those is a trainable skill or a management rule, and the useful version of board and train before the holidays builds the skills, then hands you the rules.
Last reviewed October 4, 2026
Four holiday skills
Door, place, leave it and a quiet room carry the season.
The door comes first. Before anyone knocks, the dog is on a leash held by an adult or behind a gate, and a door is never shut on a dog mid-rush. Then place: a bed within sight of the table, held for a whole meal. On-Leash Foundations, two weeks at $1,865 + GST, works on place, sit, down and stay around everyday distractions; Private Training, $150 + GST a session, writes a plan for one habit, like table diving.
Children and relatives are the part no program can train for you, so they get rules. Children never train or test the dog, an adult sits between a child and the dog on the floor, and nobody hugs, pokes or hand-feeds a dog who has not walked over and asked. A dog who stiffens, freezes or growls near a relative gets more distance, never a correction. That moment calls for a professional assessment, which is where Behaviour Rehab begins.
- Leash on before the door opens
- Place within sight of the table
- Children watch, never test
- Growling earns distance, not correction
Handover before December
Finish the handover lesson while the calendar is still quiet.
The arithmetic is worth doing on paper. A two-week program ends with the handover lesson, a three-week program a week later, and either should leave you a stretch of ordinary November evenings to run place and the door routine before anyone arrives with luggage. Count back from your first guest, not from Christmas Day. The included follow-up session is yours to use after the first guest has been through the door, when your questions are concrete.
The protocol is short. Leash held by an adult before the door opens. Guests ignore the dog until it is settled on place. During the meal the dog holds place or eats in another room. Leave it covers anything hitting the floor, and a stolen bone is traded for something better, never chased or handed back. The crate room stays a true exit. Behaviour may slip in a full house; if it persists or escalates, reassess with a professional.
The programs
Programs and prices
SW · Weekdays, drop-off 8–10 am · pick-up 5–7 pm
Day Training
Professional training all day, your couch at night.
Includes weekly one-hour go-home lesson, daily structure
NE · 2-week board & train
On-Leash Foundations
If every walk is a wrestling match, pulling, barking, zig-zagging, this two-week program rebuilds the walk from the ground up with foundational on-leash obedience..
Includes handover lesson, follow-up session, lifetime support, slip lead + collar
Asked and answered
The questions people ask us.
Can board and train get a dog ready for Christmas visitors?
It can build the pieces: place that lasts a meal, sit and stay while the door opens, and calm around everyday distractions, all taught one-on-one and then handed to you in the handover lesson. What it cannot do is manage your relatives, so the guest protocol is yours to run. The consultation recommends the program, and a smaller one if that is all your house needs.
How do you keep a dog calm when the whole family comes for Christmas dinner?
Decide where the dog will be before the first car pulls up: on place within sight of the table, or in a quiet room with the crate and a chew. Guests leave the dog alone until it is settled, and children stay off the floor with it. If the dog cannot settle at all, it goes to the quiet room without fuss, and that is information for your trainer, not a failure.
Our dog steals food off the table, will board and train fix that?
A board and train works on place and on holding position around everyday distractions, which is the foundation table manners sit on. The habit itself still needs you to keep plates out of reach and to run leave it at home, and Private Training at $150 + GST a session writes a plan for exactly one habit like this. Nobody can promise a dog will never try again.
Is it safe to have a dog around grandchildren at Christmas?
Treat it as a management question first: an adult between child and dog at all times, no hugging or face-to-face, and children never asked to train or test the dog. A dog who freezes, growls or moves away is telling you it needs more space, and that is never corrected. If you have seen any of that already, a professional assessment comes before the holiday, not after.
Keep reading
Before the first guest
Book a consultation now and the handover lesson can sit on your calendar before the doorbell starts ringing in December.
From real owners
Rated 5.0 on Google.
Real Northline dogs