Home Improvement

No time last night to post. Spent the evening building The Containment Field. Last week the puppies graduated from the whelping box to the ex-pen but because of their size they are now able to easily move the pen so that eventually it’s a weird shape and parts of its floor area is not covered by paper. Plus I wanted them off the hardwood and onto the plastic floor covering I have for this particular purpose.

So last night Phil and I took Raimi for a quick blast at the park, stopped at A&W, picked up some dog food and then made our way to Home Depot. Before leaving to go into Home Depot we put the dog food and treats inside the crate in the van to prevent any Raimi investigation/destruction and as we walked away from the van I said to Phil “I hope you weren’t attached to that root beer” (which we’d left in the cup holder) and he laughed like I was kidding. Yes, the dog is loose and the crate is used for storage. Go figure.

I have to say I love those DIY stores. They are a treasure trove of possibility. I get that a lot of women don’t particularly like wandering about The Man Store but I really enjoy looking at the tools, wondering what the heck they’re for, learning about them and being constantly marveled by human innovation. I also like the abundance of DIY ideas that come to me when I’m there. My favorite part of the trip was standing in line behind a man who was buying several large pieces of raw wood and wearing a charcoal pinstripe fingertip length suit jacket and matching pressed suit pants. He must have thought he was pretty casual as there was no tie but the effect was quite impressive. He seemed unconcerned by the sawdust collecting on what was obviously a fitted suit, loaded up his wood under his arm and off he went. Dollars to donuts neither Phil nor the cashier even noticed what this guy was wearing. I tell you it was a treat compared to some of the plumber cracks and construction coveralls so dirty they could stand up themselves and probably build a house for you. Only at The Man Store.

So we pick out our previously determined supplies which included 2x4s (which aren’t actually 2x4 in case you didn’t know – they make them 1½ x 3½ to allow for the addition of a ½“ of drywall thickness – thank you Phil for that little nugget of DIY knowledge) and some screws. That’s all we needed. After some sly negotiation with the van about how everything would fit and determining that Raimi likes root beer and my black leather gloves do not, we were set. But not before Raimi was also re-arranged – anyone else ever try to contain a large bouncy happy Ridgeback and have a gaggle of Asians stare in horror from across the parking lot?

Now to the task. The idea was to take the 2x4s and put them around the outside of the pen thereby keeping it squared and in one spot on the laminate flooring. I had originally determined that I wanted a 4x4 and a 4x8 pen but ultimately we came up with a better solution (I think). We made one 4x8 frame and put the two pens inside it with a section separate for them to use as a “litter” area. It’s clearly defined and I’ll gradually move the paper over there to teach them that is where they need to go for private moments. So they have a 4x6 area that they can play in that will stay relatively clean and a 2x4 area that they use as a bathroom.

Sometimes I wish there was a constant feed of video recording these things we do in life. I can’t imagine what we looked like and I lost track of the number of permutations we came up with for the ex-pens in the 4x8 space. Seriously, who knew it would be so complicated? Phil had cleverly turned a 2x4 on it’s side on the 4’ end so the expen door would open because it’s set 2 inches off the ground and otherwise would not open with a 3½” piece of wood in the way. I had not accounted for the futon which made opening the door a little cramped. So after much discussion and ex-pen wrangling we managed to come up with a solution I can live with. It looks pretty good I must say. You may well ask why wood pieces as substantial as 2x4’s … well, at 8 weeks when each puppy weighs at least 15 pounds times 12 puppies that’s almost 200 pounds of puppy. You do the math. I will also have to reinforce the top of the pen because they will push on that too - but not for a couple weeks at least. For now we’ll just have to wait and see what Phil and I didn’t think of. There’s always something.

So far I’ve deluded myself into thinking it will work a treat. It keeps them reasonably contained, saves the floor from their attention and leaves enough room Raimi to annoy Halo and Halo to empty her roll-a-treat balls.

Pictures to come … no time to download last night.

All the Right Moves

I finally got around to videoing the puppies exploring their room a little. They aren't very exciting but it is interesting to see them in action. Puts a little perspective on the drunken puppy syndrome. Sorry it's so orange ... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=il-BS96j964

Spread out like that they look like a lot of puppy.

However they have many forms of being. Yes this is the same 12. This is a puppy pile of 10 tummy aches - you can see the stuffed tummies sticking out on a couple of them. However of the 12 there are two who don't like dog food. They are somewhere in the pile. So while everyone else was stuffing their little faces these two were commiserating in a corner and then curled up together on the heat register when the hot air was blowing out. I'll try them again later when they're hungrier but if they still won't eat I'll get Halo to feed them. They don't have any reservations about eating from Halo so I'm calling them Princess Pink and His Royal No Ribbon. They'll obviously have to eat real food eventually, they actually both did yesterday, but I can't starve them out - they lose body mass so quickly - so I'll try mixing it with a little goat's milk and see if that helps.

The rest of them were trembling and moaning for a few minutes after their meal because they had all eaten so much they had tummy aches. It's the ultimate puppy pile. Such a different kind of food is stressful to the system and it's not warm - if you try to feed it warm it doesn't make any difference to the trembling and it cools too quickly to make much of a difference to the puppy. They eat it readily regardless. They are getting much better at it but definitely still need a lot of coaching. They are still trying to suck as well which gums up the works a bit so to speak.

Here's some random cuteness ...

Big Brotherhood

Raimi has taken quite a liking to his siblings. He is pretty careful with them except for the poking - he likes to shove things with his nose and if he does that he sends them tumbling.

It's pretty alarming how significant the size difference it. They have to grow so fast in such a short amount of time. This is Red Boy investigating The Boy's foot - it would be scary to be that small and encounter a giant.

Blue Boy looks concerned about the attention he's getting but Raimi just wants to say hi. Unfortunately saying hi sometimes results in being knocked over. Soon tho Raimi will not know what to do with himself when he's being chased by a dozen little monsters.

I think Raimi is pretty sure this is a dog ... maybe. He still doesn't understand why I spend so much time with them tho. According to him they still aren't as interesting as he is.

Off Switches & Petal Kisses

Currently everyone is sleeping with fat fat tummies with a combination of Halo food and Tamzin food. The most interesting part about feeding them is that they want to suck the food up instead of chew it so they get going on the sucking and create a seal with their tongue in the mouth and have to unstick everything before they can start eating again. It slows down the consumption a bit.

They now like to take a little stroll around and generally make a puppy sized commotion of noise and tipsy turvy. I had a friend over this morning and they were all staggering off in little drunken directions and because he disliked their apparent distress he started picking them up and putting them on the moose bed thinking that would be less stressful. I think it took about 4 seconds for them all to fall unconscious. Must be some sort of off switch connected to the bed. I told him it was because they are Ridgebacks to the core - couch potatoes extraordinaire when it comes to something sooooofffffttttttt. Since they are big enough now and I want to teach them to pee on the paper I put this bed in the pen. Well wasn't that a stroke of genius. They sleep like the dead, roll off the bed to pee and poop and stagger back to dreamland. Phew.

Here is Petal caring for Orange Boy who is getting a kiss on the forehead.

Petal is very happy that they are wandering around more now because she can take care of them as a Granny is meant to. She especially likes cleaning their faces and sniffing them all over. She will play with them until they get to almost her size and then she’ll get up somewhere high and bat at them with her paw. She also seems to care more about their general cleanliness than their mom who is only interested in cleaning bottoms and a good scrub when they're covered in puppy food. Petal cleans all the puppy anytime, including bottoms, and they usually sit still for it.

Raimi has much more respect for Petal than Halo because of this attention as a much smaller puppy; he is very careful to note where Petal is to not step on her. Halo doesn’t care if she squashes Petal and has gotten heat several times for being careless. I think Halo has lofty designs on Petal’s position in the household.

Learning to Eat

Today was the big day. Eating real food. It could be comparable to getting your driver's license or your first kiss ... an event to be remembered. Neither of these things involves the mess that occurred today(well ... one hopes). I was right to assume that the puppies who have been bottle fed immediately started eating whatever was on my hand. The ones who have never seen the bottle had to be encouraged by way of prying open their little gobs and poking food in. Once that was accomplished they seemed to figure it out. I'll tell you who figured things out in a screaming hurry; Pale Pink girl had everything well in hand. Takes after her mom that one. She was exhibiting a level of focus I have rarely seen in one so young. Her little tummy was fit to burst but I swear she would have fallen asleep in the dish if she could have.

The rest of the pack seemed to get easily distracted from their mission to fill tummies - some ate a bit and then wandered away looking for Halo or to go pee or poop somewhere. They came back eventually and I stuffed more food in them. Their tummies weren't as full as Pale Pink here but they got the idea. The only other puppy with anywhere near the same level of commitment was Blue Boy but even he couldn't stick it out til the end. The puppies missing from the photo are scattered to the 4 corners doing blind puppy things and crying.

I let ... sorry ... made Halo come in and feed them. I told her to lie down and the puppies topped up the tanks with some milky Halo goodness. She did not get the leavings of the puppy mess ... she stole it and got in big trouble. I left the room for a moment and when I came back the puppies were staggering round looking for her and she was eating the food as fast as she could. I won't detail what I said to her.

As you can imagine the whole process is an unmitigated gong show times twelve. I generally let Halo lick up the leftovers and wipe up the slobber when it's clean according to dog tongue. It is hard to keep track of who's eating and who's not but whenever a puppy got close enough that wasn't eating I'd pick it up and stuff it's little face. This will be the process for the next couple days and they will pick it up fast - not as fast as Pale Pink obviously but she must be a quick study. Soon enough you'll be catching them on the counter and stealing your Cadbury Cream Eggs when you're not looking ... Raimi.

I'm a Celebrity ... Get Me Outta Here!

Halo can now sit up and the puppies can eat still. She has been dying to do this for a few days now because it's easier for her and she can leave faster. She is so happy to see visitors because they are the only people who don't force her to feed her puppies and utter death threats. I think she feels this is some sort of punishment for something she did that she can't remember.

So I came home from lunch to check on the little blighters and to make sure Halo fed them. They are so excited to see me it's really super cute. Make me feel wanted and all that.However, some of their excitement is a little misguided as evidenced by the wrong turn one of them took up my pant leg. Needless to say puppy was a little mortified when it realised it was stuck. I had to extract said puppy and set it right. No idea which puppy it was tho. Anyway I hope I don't have to wear elastics around my pant legs like a cyclist to stop this behaviour ...

A light bulb seems to have gone off in Raimi’s little brain. I believe it has occurred to him that these are DOGS. He hears them bark and his forehead wrinkles up with his ears perked and he twists his head from side to side. He also wants to sniff their little bottoms by way of introduction. They were out listing around while I was changing the paper and he was lying down with his head between his paws to get a real close look at them at their level. Sadly I didn’t get a picture because he stood up when I moved to get the camera. However I did catch a moment of him napping with them. He's such a good Big Brother - but he's only lying there because the bed is there tho ...

This is Blue Boy yet again, however if you look close you can see a Red Boy in the background peeking up and over to see what I'm doing. And it wasn't a mistake -he really is peeking to see me because I was lying on the floor and he lifted his head to see over his brother.

I went through another 2 litres of goat's milk ... in 3 days. Yikes they're eating a lot. Tomorrow begins the solid food fun ... I bet that will be an interesting time.

New Digs

Progress is now pretty significant, even from yesterday, walking looks more like a case of beer instead of a case of beer, a 2-6 of vodka and 4 shots of tequila. Their teeth are also coming in which will make getting Halo to feed them more of a chore - her skin is already getting red from the little nippers. Eyes are almost wide open and they definitely choose direction now based on sight and smell rather than just smell. This gets them in more trouble … not less.

The cutest thing is when they realize food is coming, lots of barking, whining and a seething mass of puppy bodies stumbling around looking for me or Momma. They still do the puppy turn – anyone who’s ever had puppies know what the puppy turn is; because they can’t go backwards they turn in circles to try and find what they’re looking for. They go round and round until they either get lost or find the puppy pile, mom, me, etc.

To some of the puppies I am an alternate source of food so the second they ‘see’ my feet they start trying to nurse on my slippers. I seem to be very popular. I was feeding a puppy and Halo was sniffing the bottle and looking at me like “Whatcha got there? Food?” Seriously, if she could take food right out of their mouths I’m sure she would. I certainly know she’d steal their mash in a second if I gave her the chance as demonstrated with the last litter. No qualms about pushing them out of the way and eating as fast as she could before I caught her. This Friday is The Big Day for introducing solid food - which is good because they aren't that good at sharing. If these guys are the sharks I think they are there will be no trouble accepting a change in diet, especially when they realize they can eat as much as they want without competition; as demonstrated by two puppies trying to nurse from the same nipple.

I love those fat little bellies let me tell you.

We have upgraded already to the ex-pen. There was a significant lack of space in the whelping box especially for nursing so I put them in here now. This will also make it easier to paper train.