Middle of the Night Fun (NOT)

The puppies who have left are doing well. I spoke with Jonn yesterday who reported that I had given him the greatest dog in the world (i.e, Homer/Ledger) -- clearly a good match between a great puppy and a great guy! And Terri sent an email announcing that she LOVES her puppies; I responded that was a good thing as I did not need to get Peaches (Sula) back! And Karen reports that Maya (Darby) is doing very well, and I suspect Megan is having too much fun with Purna (Kinsey) to give us a report but her mom says things are fine.

Galen spent yesterday afternoon making little tiny biscuits for Faith (Lolo). He made three varieties -- peanut butter, cheese, and pumpkin. He wonders if Megan is making biscuits for Purna?? Faith now basically ignores me and follows Galen around like a shadow -- it is pretty cute! Galen's recipes will be posted tomorrow.

Zoey Rose is doing well. Galen calls her the Energizer Bunny and she even jumps like a bunny. In our first litter we had a puppy named Cruiser (she was born in the back seat of Kim's police cruiser) who was also a jumper. Cruiser would just jump in the air with excitement and it was SO cute -- Zoey Rose does the same thing. I loved Cruiser and her happy, fun personality -- it is neat to see so much of her in Zoey.

Last night was another one of those times that people who think raising a litter is fun and exciting should have seen. At 2:15 someone decided she needed out - now. I tried to ignore her for about 30 seconds but I just hate to imagine them in any discomfort so I got up and took all four outside. I had forgotten it was wet, and mud oozed between my toes as I walked outside with them -- lovely. Madison ran off to potty like a good girl, and soon we were back in the house with puppies frolicking in all directions.

Someone had pooped in the x-pen so I had to get that cleaned up -- all the while puppies are chasing the cat, jumping with wild abandon on the big dogs, and just generally enjoying their 2:15 a.m. play session. So I got the puppy area cleaned, rounded up the puppies and put them back to bed, and got the mud out from between my toes -- and you can imagine that falling back to sleep was not an easy task after all that!

My little puppy alarms went off right on schedule at 4:15 a.m. -- darn that stupid Daylight Savings stuff! But we all got up and it is hard to be annoyed when puppies are SO happy to see you and SO thrilled to be starting another day -- we should all start the day with such joyfulness!

The puppies go outside immediately after waking up, and then they nurse. After that I feed them breakfast and we all go out again -- and again -- and again. They last almost exactly 1.5 hours before they wear out and start falling asleep. Right now they are all sleeping soundly in their play area and when it gets light we will head out for a morning walk. This is the last day we will have extra puppies with us so it is bittersweet -- we will miss them but it is time.

The G for Good Grief What Was I Thinking Litter is growing by the day, as evidenced by Cadi's expanding girth. They are due to arrive on November 21 so we have 13 days left. This morning Cadi started working on her birthing center -- she dug a nice hole under the deck. Why would she think that a cold, wet hole would be the optimal place to welcome her new family?! Joan has agreed to once again come up from Utah and help out with the delivery and no, it will not be happening in a cold, wet hole!

A number of people reading this Blog are interested in a puppy from the G Litter so let me just mention that puppy pick-up will be the weekend of January 17-18 so save that date! We will be heading to Utah from Montana on/about December 11 and will stay there for the entire winter break so puppies will be in Salt Lake City for the pick-up and for five weeks of visiting by all of our Utah friends. I am not sure how we are going to get all of us down to Utah but we have some time before we have to figure that little problem out!

(Later) I took today's pictures on our hike and immediately after as the puppies were falling asleep (or in Zoey Rose's case, still playing!). Cadi went along with us and that is Cadi with the two puppies in her face -- Zoey and Dawson. Faith is sitting alone in the road, Madison is standing facing the camera and also in two sleepy pictures. Dawson is in a standing picture and two close-ups -- one resting on my leg and the other with his head cocked. Zoey is playing with the toy and is also in the tunnel.

Thanks for visiting us and have a wonderful, happy day!