I know Shadow was orginanly an outdoor dog, only because my dad got her when the rest of the family was in BC, and he was not sure my mom wanted a dog in the house, shadow however went to work with my dad every day, he had built her a dog house etc.. when we cam back my mom said shadow would be an inside dog, however she slept chained to the backdoor(just inside the door) only later did she start to become a completly fully indoor dog, BUT she STILL loves to be outside, she does not make a racket, if someone opens to the gate to let her out she wanders next door, then comes back to the yard. at her new home she spends a lot of time outside still, but they also have an 8 foot privacy fence. an indident we had at one point though was some kid tried to shoot shadow with a bow an arrow this was at out old house, she was a fully inside dog at the time, things can happen outside dog or not. my friends old dog sparky was an outside only dog, they insisted that sparky liked being outside... uhh yeah, and thats why he tried to come in the house any chance he could get, and they had to force him to go back outside again shadow is an inside dog there but she askes to go out, and they have to force her to come IN. none of my current dogs lik ebeing outside for long periods, actually they hate it lol Happy is not a happy camper when she is indoors, but she only likes being outside if I am with her, if I am not with her she will go out, potty and come right back in. Misty likes being outside for the sole purpose of barking lol we dont allow that the rule is you bark you come in, like it or not. on the topic of crate training, well all my dogs are crate trained and even perky who absolutly hated crates has started going in them, half the time you cant get that dog out of a crate anymore. Happy is the only one who is not crated while we are away, but she goes in her crate anyway, doors open the whole time. we dont have a problem getting the dogs crated we have a problem getting the dogs to go in the RIGHT crates lol I say crate happy and misty run into the same kennel, or misty runs into blairs kennel, or perky runs into Ripleys kennel then Ripley tried to go into his kennel... lol we have acually locked 2 dogs in the smae crate by mistake before, Misty will goe in Ripleys crate(even though its half her size lol) and Ripley happens to be curled up in the same crate in front of misty so you just close the dorr not realizing misty in there lol then you come home to see 2 sets of eyes in the same crate lol