Messy Wake Up Call

I wish people who think it would be fun to raise a litter could have spent the last eight or so hours with me. At 1 a.m. I heard the puppies so I got up, since they are sleeping all night now and this seemed urgent. Two puppies had escaped from the x-pen, which was inside the whelping box. This was making the other puppies frantic and they were screaming and running around – in the poop someone had left on the potty area. Well, it was smeared nicely by this time.

Eight frantic, messy puppies at 1 a.m. – not so cute. I was really not in the mood to clean up the whelping box and fortify the x-pen barrier so I put them in the play area in the Great Room. Luckily I had it all cleaned and prepared for the morning so it was easy. They settled down better than I expected and went to sleep.

At 5 a.m. I woke up to happy, hungry puppies racing around the play area, spreading yet more poop. This is not exactly a pleasant way to start a day, let me assure you!

I let them out to nurse while I quickly cleaned the play area before they were ready to detach and start potting all over the Great Room – mind you, I had been awake for about 90 seconds by this time. They are efficient nursers so were done in no time, and I corralled them back in the play area, and set about to get their second breakfast ready. As I was doing this I stepped – barefoot – in a nice puppy puddle.

So I finally got the plates ready and was feeding them two at a time. We were almost done when suddenly the weight of the puppies in the play area who were jumping up pushed over the x-pen and I had a flood of puppies rushing at me and Ledger, who had just started eating.

Okay, I got that back under control. Glaring at them and thinking some not very kind thoughts, I reinforced the play area with both of my x-pens so that they will not be able to escape or push it over. They are all now sleeping like the angels they are not!!

Consider the amount of laundry all this entails – two loads since last evening, and two really gross loads. Fun? Cute? Sure – it is fun and cute to be smeared with puppy poop while stepping in a puddle in your bare feet. This is why puppies are so darn cute – they would not survive otherwise!

And cute they are as you can see from the pictures we took last evening when Cindy and Rebecca came to visit them – the puppies have now met 26 new people! I love the two pictures of puppies with their big sister, Asia. The puppy sitting with Asia is Darby and the one sleeping is Rosebud. Asia is herself a puppy – not yet 15 months – but she is very sweet with her little brothers and sisters. Rosebud is the puppy working for the Pinecone Moving Company today, and Dawson is asleep on Rebecca’s lap – he is also the close-up of a sleeper in red. Rosebud is the sleeping puppy in the pine needles, and Madison is the awake puppy in the pine needles. Rebecca is holding Kinsey and Darby in one picture, and Cindy has Sula, who gave Cindy such a waggy, happy welcome! Rosebud, Kinsey and Sula are together in a picture, and an unknown puppy is in the bushes.

The good thing about starting a day like mine is that it typically can only get better! I hope your day skips the rough start and is filled with good things – thanks for visiting ☺