Driving me crazy!

Yup, they are officially driving me crazy! At least this am I got to wake the pups up instead of vice versa as I had to leave early to take Babe to the shows. As it turns out, we all should have slept in.

Still, it was gratifying to shake them awake :0

Green Boy decided to show off his driving skills with the little beeping bus we have used for a rally distraction. Hopefully I have the right puppy - both Green and Blue were nude this am, so I quick slipped collars back on them. Luckily Kate has a code to tell who is who!

They are starting to play with toys as well as each other. They also play wrestle and fight - sounding quite violent at times.

The boom box appears to be ill so the pups are currently listening to "Puppy Sounds" by Dean Lake via my new laptop. Many thanks to Tom who guided me long distance over the phone on using it. Who knew a laptop would have something called a touch pad?! For those concerned about the puppies' classical training, Dean Lake is a bassoonist so that ought to count for something.

Off to fix Queezle's 3 pm feeding - darn, already 12 minutes late!

Boxed!

I decided to give the little angels a box or two today. So I added an empty cat food box (held cans) and an Amazon.com box. At first just the girls were checking things out. Like true shoppers, they went right for the Amazon box :)

Later, the boys woke up and they thought the Amazon box was more interesting too. I really need a bigger box or two for more fun.

I got this fun photo of Pink Girl sleeping on Queezle's head. I would feel sorry for Queezle except she sleeps on MY head part of the time at night!

Up to laundry load #5 today. I will have to give in and go to papers eventually but I hate the thought of newsprint on the pups. Hopefully the washer and dryer hold up.

I made them listen to corny dog songs again as payback for the 2:30 am ruckus last night :)

Belated update

Kate was home last week due to spring break and enjoyed spending almost 24/7 with the College pups. She is now back to Cornell and the pups are left with me.

They are growing like weeds - with most of them over 4 lbs now. They growl, bark, howl, wrestle and play. They also got Queezle's interior decorator gene as they are constantly tugging and rearranging the blankets!

I started playing the tapes for them. They have heard "obedience trial sounds" and "agility trial sounds". Currently they are listening to a set of somewhat corny "dog songs" like "How Much is That Doggie in the Window" and "Walking the Dog".

They had fun playing with a paper bag and none of them were bothered by the crackling noises. Now if they could just give up the late night parties!

St. Patrick's Day

The College Litter had a relatively uneventful St. Patrick's Day. Queezl enjoyed a spin around the yard enjoying the sun. She hopes her glasses kept her identity safe from any lingering paparazzi. She would hate to have any photos of her in her post pregnancy/nursing figure to appear in the dog show magazines!

Black Boy agreed to pose for the hat photo. Basically he was in the biggest milk induced torpor so we figured he would hold still.

Yellow Boy was caught having gone "over the wall" and heading for the study to start his own Facebook page this am while I got Queezle fresh water.

Green Boy wanted to celebrate the day by joining the Irish tenors. Alas, he is currently an upstate NY soprano - off key at that!

Scrap March 15!

First, let me say that *I* am a die hard morning person. I would prefer to sleep until 6 am but I can handle 5 am. Not 1 am or 3 am so much. When Kate came up with the college theme for this litter I should have nixed her right away. They truly do "come to life at night".

So at 1 am yesterday, they were partying wildly inches from my head and calling out for more drinks in the whelping box. Meanwhile Tom's Australian Shepherd, Baloo, was fussing. With good reason - he had liquid diarrhea in the laundry room. Cleaned that up, got room service back on track and back to bed. Unfortunately it all repeated at 3 am, including the diarrhea. This time, gave Baloo some metronidazole. Luckily all fine until 6 am.

The day went well - Queezle ate her meals, fed the savages, Baloo stopped the diarrhea. Then at 5 pm, Queezle barely went at her meal. Quick check - temp 104, 3rd gland on the right felt warm and a bit firm. Her glands had been normal at morning check. So off to the repro vet. I haven't done much repro over the years and with Kate on a bus heading to Minnesota with the pep band for the women's hockey tournament I did not want it all on my head!

Literally 1/4 of that one gland has mastitis. The repro clinic had never seen a case of mastitis caught so early. So now add compressing that gland and gently hand stripping it, giving Queezle antibiotics, and giving the puppies probiotic as they can still nurse to my day. Luckily Queezle ate at 10 pm and temp is normal this morning. Plus today IS a new day!!

Scrap March 15!

Wild times continue

The College Litter continues on the "party hearty "theme. Today, not only did White Boy once again go the nudist route, he convinced Orange Girl to join him. Blue Boy decided just to let it all show in a full frontal photo - though he does retain his rickrack throughout.

Meanwhile, sports training is under way. It is difficult to tell which sport the team will concentrate on. From the body blocks and shoves (especially at chow times) hockey could be on the line. An occasional competitor will head out for marathon running, circling the whelping box at speed. Track relay events have also been observed, with individuals doing a lap, then shoving a littermate off on a lap. Hopefully mountain and rock climbing will wait at least a week.

Dam Queezle is outdoing herself with her "timing" ability. It will be interesting to see if her puppies inherit that gene. At 10:45 am, demonstrating no problem adjusting to the time change, Queezle starts pushing to get her duck egg and cheese omelet delivered. The plan is for the omelet to appear at 11 am and so far, the chef is holding firm despite entreaties and threats. The same goes for the 3pm yogurt and kibble mini meal.

One week!

Well, so far we have all survived the first week of the College Litter. I am developing some serious concerns however.

We have two days of warm weather and the partying has taken over. There are now TWO resident nudists- Green Boy and White Boy! Furthermore, the wild partying - drinking to excess, loud noises, etc at 1 to 3 am is almost unacceptable. And yes, I have witnessed this all first hand sleeping next to the whelping box.

I suppose you could say the pups are taking the college theme to the extreme, but I never partied that hard through 8 years at Cornell!

I am quite sure this wild party gene does NOT come from the Chateau Blanc side. That means we must blame the Anduin faction. I sincerely hope they take this into consideration in future breedings :)

Thursday am update

Closing in on the one week mark for the pups - they were born last Friday night starting at about 7:30 or so - Kate has the times somewhere.

This morning's color scheme for the whelping box is plaid. Apparently Queezle likes this better than the stark white modern look.

I will put a plug in here for the pads we use. I got them from a company in
Wisconsin. http://www.odcmerchandise.com/ is the
site. They have a workshop for people with disabilities and recycle hospital
pads. The pads are great - easy to wash and dry. I don't like using newspaper
until the pups are older and messier. I don't want newsprint on them and I don't
want Queezle licking it all off. Prices are amazing - shipping is often the
biggest cost but you could combine an order with a friend.

Now, a tad scarey - a couple of the pups are actually standing - very wobbly but
up on all four legs. I believe that is about a week ahead of time! Look out
world - the college kids are going to be ready to rock and roll.

Puppy adventures continue

The pups all handled dew claw removal just fine. A couple of them had rear dew claws as well. Yes, I know some people advocate leaving them on but having HAD to remove many an injured dew claw over the years and having treated many a dog with an ingrown dew claw, we elected to remove them.
My dog Beep was sort of a control study on dew claws and agility injuries. He had one front dew claw (grew back) and one front leg without one. No change in arthritis, etc.

It is probably good that I have not figured out how to do a puppy webcam, though it might be funny. First, Deb lets Queezle outside. Then Deb moves puppies into a box, takes out dirty blankets and arranges new, lovely clean blankets. Puppies are artistically replaced in whelping box. Today on nice white blankets. Deb lets Queezle in. Queezle waits until Deb leaves and then starts yanking up blankets, scuffing them and totally rearranging them. Some times she creates a pile and other times, she simply shifts them all.

Green Boy has totally decided to go with the nude look. His ribbon keeps slipping off. So until I get some new ribbon and have Kate to help, he will be the resident nudist. What really confuses me is that at one point yesterday, White Boy had both his white rickrack AND the green ribbon on!

For some reason almost every time I check on the gang, six pups are readily seen but the 7th one is hidden - either behind Queezle, under the railing or hidden under a blanket. It varies who chooses to hide but drives me crazy!

The pups are actually starting to stand already which I think is early. Very active!

The College 7 are here!

Friday night (classic for a college themed litter!) Queezle delivered 7 beautiful Belgian Tervuren puppies - 5 boys and 2 girls.

And no, I don't want to hear about how I am depriving some shelter dog of a home. We had more homes than puppies and all of the people work with rescue and help their local shelters. However, their personal choice for a canine companion is a well bred Terv. Health clearances, temperament,structure and working ability all checked in parents. End of lecture!

The pups are noisy, active, and did I say, beautiful? Kate came home Thursday night so she was here for the whelping but back at Cornell now until next weekend. I am doing my best on the home front.
I am no Martha Stewart but I thought the blankets were arranged quite nicely. Symmetrical, sort of color coded even, pulled flat. Pink water bucket hanging for Queezle and nice red heat lamp over one corner. No - in total disgust, Queezle comes in and causes a mini tsunami. She roils up blankets, tumbling puppies heads over tails. Good thing they roll well at this age!

Then we have the interactions with my husband. "You aren't washing puppy blankets in with our clothes are you?" (Note that at this stage Queezle is doing 99.9% of the clean up so the blankets aren't very dirty.) "Of course not!" Because, actually, I am washing some of our clothes in with the puppy blankets - it is all a matter of semantics.

"Smells good in here. Is that our breakfast?" Well no, actually it is a fresh duck egg and cheese omelet for Queezle for her late morning meal - "elevenses" for you Hobbit fans. The other dogs will all get a bit too but the humans are on their own!