Help w/ confinement issue

[cece]

My shih tzu is 6 months old and is alone all day while we work. He sleeps in a md size crate at night next to our bed and he is fine. During the day, we leave him him in a plastic puppy play yard. He is down to little or no accidents now in the whole house but still cannot be trusted to be loose in the house. Too much for him to get into and get hurt, and he's a chewer. But, a couple of times he has jumped out :o and greeted us at the door. So far nothing bad has happened....I think he's only getting out right when we drive up and he gets excited b/c nothing was disturbed and one time there was a very fresh puddle right by the front door. I have the pen down to four panels (4 ft x 4 ft) and put one panel on top with tie straps and the other side I buckle closed but it still leaves a gap and it worked for a while but now he can jump out of that too.

What should I do? He's NOT happy in his crate all day as I did that for a few days after the first escape til I could figure something out. Any suggestions would be appreciated. I really don't want to buy one of the big metal pens that are taller b/c we really don't have a place to keep something that big and they're so expensive. And short of a bathroom we really don't have a room to keep him gated in that he wouldn't chew up.

[courtnek]

bathrooms work good.

[JackieMaya]

I second the bathroom idea. As long as you can ensure that he can't get into anything, it would be a good place for him to be. He wouldn't feel as confined as he would in a pen.

[mouseatthebusstop]

I think the bathroom is a good idea

[cece]

Thanks for the suggestions! The only bad thing w/ the bathroom is he chews, and I have a good feeling he would ruin the cabinets which we've been thru before w/ a previous dog 8) Today, I put a heavy comforter over the gap on the plastic playyard and down the back and he was fine. I thought sure I'd come home and find that section of the comforter in shreds or pulled thru the gap, LOL, but he was all nice and cozy!

Hopefully, he'll stop looking for new ways to escape!