So Last Year

A few people have asked what my New Year's plans are. Likely tonight I'll be doing the same thing all night I was doing all last night - midnight will come and go regardless. Getting up every two hours to force Halo to feed her puppies instead of sleeping dead to the world in her bed in my room. The puppies would wake ME with their hungry noises every two hours and I'd tell Halo to get up, get into the whelping box, lie down, and forcably turn her on her side so that more than 4 nipples were exposed. She is so over the puppy thing. It is so last year. As evidenced by this expression ... which seems to be half annoyance and half resignation.

The milk bar is getting smaller or the puppies are getting bigger ... everyone is at least 1.5 pounds now, the largest is almost 2 pounds. That's black boy - he's a porker. I never feel bad about pulling him off a nipple to feed a smaller puppy.

It's official - there is only one true black mask in the litter. Everyone else has a small mask which will fade to dark pigment and some black hair around the nose only. I thought there'd be more black as Halo has a pretty distinctive black mask ... ah well. I didn't expect 3 light wheatons either. Genetics is a marvelous mystery. I was watching a commercial the other day which informed me that if my DNA was unravelled it would reach the moon - no wonder it's so hard to predict genetics ... and such a danger to mess with.

We went to the park again with Riami and Petal; Ryder joined us there for the last romp of the year. It was a decent sort of day, bright sun, not too cold and lots of dogs at the park. Petal was wearing her new Christmas boots - two of which she lost in the first 10 minutes - we managed to recover them tho and hopefully we don't lose them entirely. Halo had to stay home again and watch over the family - and also do a little interior decorating while I was away. Notice anything amiss in this picture? Maybe compare it to the one above.

It would seem that Halo is incapable of not doing something stupid while I'm out. I shudder to think what I'll come home to on Wednesday as my first day back at work - she'll be alone for 4 whole hours ... gawd knows what she'll get up to. As long as she doesn't lie on a puppy she can wreck whatever she wants.

The stupid thing is there was a perfectly comfortable futon AND brand new dog bed in the room with her that she could have lay on. But no. She had to try and make the whelping box more comfy to feed babies in. Oh yes yes I COULD put a towel or a blanket in there but I did that and here's what happened; I was out for two hours - buying dog food and treats and new dog beds - and she buried the puppies in the blanket and lay on them because she couldn't see them. She didn't managed to suffocate any but I won't take that chance again - the blanket had been in there before but she was still in "instinct mom" stage and not as concerned about her own comfort as she is now. You may think, and rightly so, that she is trying to hide the babies so no one else can see them. That would make perfect sense to most people, except I know this dog and I know what she's thinking, in fact, once I watched her thought process and the execution of the plan.

Picture this: a whelping box with 7 puppies in a pile on a flat towel. Halo wants to sleep so she starts pulling and digging at the towel til it's in a scrunchy ball away from the puppies and then she lays on it in a tight little pretzel and goes to sleep. In the process of course she's upset the puppy pile and they are scattered hither and yon and yelling their heads off but she doesn't care - she's already asleep on her comfy towel. The pretzel position means they can't nurse. Oh my Halo, so maternal. She'll pop 'em out no problemo but the care after day 3 is negotiable. THAT is what she tried to do with the foam base only it doesn't scrunch, it shreds. So now it's in the garbage. I told her she can lie on the hardwood if she wants but the foam would have been more comfortable.

Those foam pieces are so cool - they are children's flooring puzzle pieces and wipe up quick as you please and are a soft and clean alternative to towels. Now we have 3 - we'll see how long they last. Thank gawd they are only $13 a set. I'm sure I'll come home Wednesday at lunch to find little blue, yellow or green peices of foam everywhere.