I have a three year old mixed, small dog who has become very nippy, but only with my husband.

He was a rescued dog, had a lot of problems, most of which have been cleared up and corrected. He's normally a very loving, cuddly, happy little guy.

When my husband gets up in the morning, the dog will race toward him, and nip at his heels, then dart back to bed. It has come to having to close the door when husband gets up.

When my husband is laying on the couch watching TV, if he gets up to go to the bathroom, or to bed, same thing. The dog will nip at him, and dart back under my feet, or very close to me.

My husband can even just be picking up a piece of the newspaper, and that little change, the dog will behave like he's going to nip him again.

He does not actually bite.

We had a similar problem with him over his food for a while. If my husband went anywhere near his food dish, he's nip at him, but we figured that was because he spent nearly the entire first year of his life in a cat carrier, and was not nourished properly.

We have tried with the 'bad dog', and 'go lay down' (which he does), but nothing we can do or think of changes, or gives any understanding of his behaviour.

Any ideas?

If he is a rescue it can be hard as you don't know his past but to me it sounds like he might have had a problem with men in the past.

Some friends of mine just 'rescued' a Husky from some other friends of ours... the 'friends' that had him originally did not treat him well, the man would grab the dog by the collar and drag him around. This has now become a problem with his new owners because he tries to bite whenever a man tries to touch his collar.

I would suggest some one on one training between your husband and the dog.
You can enrol in obedience classes or even just get your husband to take the dog down to the park on his own. The dog needs to learn that your husband is also above him in the family, not just you and obedience is a great way to start the process.
You can just get him to teach him a few basic commands (sit, drop stay etc) and just walk him around.