Big Paws Only Dog Forums

We have a 4 month old OEM, she is around 30 lbs and is eating 4 cups of food a day, spread over 3 feedings.  Her stool is quite soft, and our vet swears that there is a direct correlation between amount of food served and stool consistency.  So we are cutting her back to 3 cups of food a day and will see how it goes.  She is on a really great kibble, so we are not really worried about her getting all the nutrients etc.

I think we are very prone to worry about underfeeding our Sam, every vet visit the one burning question we have is whether she looks too thin.  So far tho our vet has tried to keep us calm and says she looks fine.  We feed her after walking her for 10-20 mins, depending on the time of day and how much time we have.  She does wolf the food, but then has a nap, so I don't believe she is going without.  But who knows, kinda like babies, they can't tell you what they need.  But she is steadily gaining weight and you can feel the meat on her bones so we will stick to the current diet plan and see what kind of improvement we can make on the stool consistency, since it is no fun to try and pick up the loose poops

Hi I'm a first time poster but I have learned quite a bit already from just reading your posts and looking at various sites on the net. My Girlfriend and I (Jenna and Dave) are thinking (quite seriously) about purchasing a saint puppy as a new addition to our family! we have a Gigantic dog already (miniature schnauzer about 5 LBS soaking wet AFTER feasting) and a 11 year old boy (Matt). Our concerns have nothing to do with size; cost, shedding, drooling (in fact Matt and I are looking forward to see how far the saint can fling his/her drool!). The only reason we did not purchase from one of the breeders we are looking at in the last month is because both Jenna and Myself hold 8 - 4:30 jobs (really we leave at about 7am and don’t return until 5pm - 5:30pm each day). So our idea was to hold off until the New Year to see if my job would allow me to work from home so I could be with the saint. That does not seem to be panning out as hoped, so my question is this: How long (realistically) can a saint be left alone at home? We have a decent sized backyard and a smaller back room also a detached garage where we could setup to be his "home away from home". But is that realistic? On the weekends wherever we go the puppy of course could come with us (got a nice big SUV that some dog drool and fur will really make it feel used!!  ) Any advice would be super!! we are very enthusiastic about getting a puppy and having him/her as part of our family however, we also want to be super parents and give the puppy all the attention he/she needs and wants! so if we should wait we will wait until I get to work from home.

Thank in Advance!