Sorry I forgot to address the crating problem.

I don't crate but here is a good site for you to check out how to crate training.
http://www.inch.com/~dogs/cratetraining.html

You can do a search on Google to come up with many ways to crate train.

Here are pics of wire crates that are available some of my friends have used them and the dogs really like them rather than the usual Vari Kennel crate.

http://www.drsfostersmith.com/product/NavResults.cfm?N=2001+114010

Thank you for adopting Casey!!!!!