I was leaving Hiro in the kitchen before I started to crate train him. He didn't quite get the pee pad thing... (not to mention that our house is like 100 years old and slanted so when he pees on the kitchen floor it runs ALL THE WAY DOWN the floor and under the cabinet! Such a pain in the a** to clean up! rofl)
Anyway, since he wasn't catching onto the pad thing, I decided (after much internal wrestling) to start crate training him. This has worked out better than I could have possibly imagined. He loves his crate. I feel bad about leaving him in the crate -- but he always has something to play with or chew on. Most of the time he just snoozes while he's in there. I take him out every 3 or so hours for a pee and or a snuggle or a play session. He has only messed in his crate once and that was at the very beginning before I made his crate smaller. He had too much room to roam around in it - mess in one corner and lay in the other. As a rule dogs don't like to mess where they sleep so this is what makes crate training so effective I think.
I look at it this way.
I want to be the best mommy I can to my little Hiro.
As his mommy I am charged with the responsibility of making sure he understands the rules of my house - and that I give him the tools to be able to follow those rules. If I have to crate train for a couple months to ensure that he understands and can follow the rules of the house then so be it. He has his entire little life to run around free as a bird in my house, so a couple of months of staunch training is a drop in the bucket and well worth the reward in the end. They say that it takes yorkies a while to get fully trained but my Hiro is well on the road to success and I attribute it to crate training!
Good luck either way!!!