Hello all! I hope everyone is doing as well as they can be! My wife(F 33) and I (M 35) along with my 2 children (G) 7 (B) 5 are purchasing our first family pup. As mentioned in my title/header we are going to get a Labrador. We will collect him on March 30. I have read up on many training methods and we have decided we are going to crate train. We have also enrolled in puppy school. The main issue that is eating away at me is that my wife and I work and the pup will be home by himself Monday-Wednesday between the hours of 7:30am-3:30pm. My wife is able to work from home on a Thursday and Friday. So 3 days a week the pup will be alone for 8 hours. I grew up with dogs and I am trying to remember back to what we did but it was different times then. My parents worked full time and the pup was left to it’s own devices throughout the day until we all got home. In this day and age though I feel bad and I am nervous the pup will hurt himself or destroy the house while we are gone. I am planing to buy an enclosed play pen for inside the house so when we are away he can stay in there and I will train him to do his business on a pad in the pen. Also I was looking at buying some food puzzles for him to play with to keep him busy.

Is there anything you all could advise for me to do? Previous experience/what worked for you.

Many thanks!

Edit: we won’t leave the pup in the crate all day, we are using a child’s play pen and put the crate in the play pen area so it can move in and out of the crate throughout the day. It will be 4m by 5m and we will put a pad down to do it business.