my wife has moved to another country for a year of work and now dash seems to get kinda stressed and i think its partly due to my own stress and worry over it all, as i know they tend to read our emotions easily. he keeps lookiing out the window and whining and then he will come stand up in my lap and just lay his head on my shoulder. what can i do to ease his stress from this? we still go out and play evry night and he does ok with that but he just seems to know something's missing in the house. any suggestions?

Time will take care of most things.

Teach him new tricks like sit, down, jump over a hurdle (broom stick) etc. That will take his mind of and boost his confidence.

makes sense, may help me distract me as well and teach him new stuff.