Fever

The puppies turned nine weeks old on Tuesday. I am having a BALL with little Fever. She's a nice outgoing puppy and always up for a good time :) She does get a little devilish on occassion, mainly when she gets over tired. She knows down and sit and will even stay for a short time. She's learned to walk well on a leash too. I think it's inherited from her momma's Heelalong lines :) They seem to just do it. Here are some pictures taken last Tuesday evening (the day she turned 9 weeks old). Thanks so much to Whitney Rupp for taking these beautiful shots :)





Also, here's one of Sirrah that Terry sent.

How the story ends....sort of :)

Well, to make a long story very short, Kelly Garver is now the proud owner of baby Sol. I realized that keeping two pups wasn't fair to anyone, me, them or my other dogs. So, Kelly (who wanted a pup all along but couldn't convince her husband), was able to work it all out. So, I brought little Sol to her house on Thursday. I'm SOOO glad to have her so close to home, I can't tell you. I am very lucky to have all the wonderful homes I have for our babies. I will continue to update the blog with pictures when I can. Until then, all the babies and Mom are doing great!

Still alive

Well, it's been so much quieter. I smartly scheduled private lessons all day yesterday so I wouldn't be home thinking about missing my puppies. I have SO much to do this week, I won't have time to think about it. I've received updates from everyone and everyone is doing great. Atlas is now Ransom's Brightest Star "Reece" is his call name. Mary is tossing around a few different names and is taking her time to find the right one. She had one picked out but isn't sure it suits him. For now, he's "Pup, Pup, Puppy!". I'm not sure about Sirrah. They were considering keeping the name. Whatever they decide is fine with me. Polaris is now Ransom's Temperature Rising, call name "Fever" and Sol is Sol :) Ransom's Heart and Sol. So far, everyone seems very happy with their new babies. It's so nice to get the updates. I can't tell you how much it helps :) I took some video last night of the girls playing in the yard and a small clip a little while ago of Shock with her baby sisters. Shock is really very good with them. She would LOVE to have them out of the pen, chasing her around. Unfortunately, she's a "little" rough so I'm not going to let it happen until they are a bigger. She plays with Frisco all the time and honestly, I don't know how he stays sound! He is a crafty, tough, quick little guy. Thank goodness or he'd be dead!

Gone

Well, everyone started arriving at around 11 am to pick their puppies. Terry and Carol Smorch from Minnesota arrived first and spent a lot of time with the puppies. Then Denise and Terry Elger from Milwaukee came next, then Mary Klein from Columbus, Oh. We had a really nice time playing with and watching the puppies play. Terry and Carol actually arrived early so got quite a bit of time to play with each pup individually. I've decided to keep Polaris and Sol for now. Polaris simply because she IS her momma (and that's why I did this breeding) and Sol, because she is special, has been from the day she was born. If I decide that I'm crazy for keeping two, I have a good friend who may be able to take her down the line. We'll see. For now, they are both staying. It's better for me emotionally to have two left. It was so hard to let the others go. I honestly have been having such a hard time dealing with it since it hit me hard on Thursday that this was all coming to an end. Now that everyone has left, I feel so much better. Just seeing how much everyone liked their puppies helped so much. I think everyone got the puppies they were hoping for. I was most worried about Sirrah since she's pretty attached to me. As I already mentioned, Terry got to play with each one. Atlas had a ball, then Vega was a little out of it (honestly, not his normal self AT ALL) and the Sirrah. I got smart and went in the house when Terry played with Sirrah and watched from the kitchen. I was amazed at how she took to him. She can be a little shy but was chasing, tugging and kissing him. I agonized over letting her go. Not anymore. Terry chose Sirrah. I think it's going to be a great match. She really loved him. I've never really seen her take to anyone like that. I'm at peace with it all now. Then Denise got to choose. She took the pup I thought would fit her too! She chose Atlas. He's simply stunning and looked even MORE stunning in her arms :) Then Mary got the red boy she's been wanting all along. She just had an attachment to him. I can't believe it all worked out, but it did. I'm so incredibly happy about how it all went today. I think I may even be able to sleep tonight :) I will miss them terribly but I remind myself that they won't be little puppies for long. Here are pictures of everyone with their new babies :)

Video

Some video from Sunday (once they felt better) and Wednesday.

Update

Well, it was a rough weekend. The puppies had an apparent reaction to the vaccines and were very sick. It started on Sunday am with Sol, then Polaris, then Sirrah, then Atlas. Vega seemed to escape with just a little diahrrea. The others were vomitting as well. I was on the phone with the vet four times on Sunday. At first, we didn't know what it was and I was panicked. As the day went on, they seemed to get better. Took Sol about six hours to come around but the others really felt better in an hour or two. By Sunday evening, everyone was able to keep water down but I didn't feed them until morning. Then, just a bland diet. They are all doing great now. Actually, by Monday, everyone was back to their old selves (except Atlas who wasn't affected until Monday). They are SOOOO busy, it's unbelievable. I've been lucky, the weather has been really good so they have been able to play outside a lot. They are also pretty much house broken. I don't think anyone has gone in the house in over a week (other than when they were sick). They all know to go outside. Sol even scratched at the door the other night when she had to poop. Smart puppies. They start going to their new homes on Saturday. I will miss them so much but luckily, I will get to see them all pretty frequently. I hope to post some video or pictures later today or tomorrow.

Pictures from Yesterday

What I wake up to in the morning :)


Vega

Sirrah and Sol

Sirrah

Atlas

Sol (ears starting to go up :)

Sirrah and Sol again

Polaris

Polaris

Sirrah and Polaris

Vega

Sol

Atlas

First car ride

Well, today was a big day for the little ones. Off to the vet to get their first shots. They did pretty well. The car ride went pretty well. Very quiet puppies for the most part. Once we got to the vet, Sol was first and DEFINITELY the most stressed out. In fact, someone threw up in the car and I'm pretty sure it was her :( I think having to wait a while for the vet did her in! The others were pretty good. Vega was probably the best (he tried to jump up on the vet), closely followed by both Sirrah and Polaris who kissed the vet :) Atlas was pretty stoic. Didn't seem to mind much. When we got home, I put them in a BIG pen I set up outside. I had to take down the other one since they figured out how to escape. Now I've got two ex-pens together so they have lots of room to run around. After a while, I let them out of the pen so they had the run of the whole yard. Yesterday, I did the same and little Sol escaped to the neighbor's yard. I had to block off a part of the fence that Frisco had chewed a larger opening in (in an unsuccessful efforts to escape :). So far, so good. Also, today was the first day they ALL made it down the back step to the patio by themselves. They are all doing really well pottying outside. They've pooped out there every time for two days now. In fact, Atlas even cried to get out this am so he could poop. It's SOOO much easier to take care of them when they go outside :) They love being outside too. They just run and play and run and run play. Atlas is so funny, he tries to entice everyone with a toy to get them to tug with him. They all really love the toys. So fun to watch. I'll get more pictures up soon and hopefully more video too! BTW, here are the weights from today at the vet.

Sol 6.7 lbs
Polaris 7.6 lbs
Vega 7.9 lbs
Sirrah 8.1 lbs
Atlas 8.2 lbs

Pictures

Video from a few minutes ago

Colors

Just a quick note to update puppy colors. It is apparent now that Sol is a black shaded sable, not a black tri. Atlas is a black tri. So, I've got two B/W girls, one sable girl, one tri boy and one red boy :) Quite a colorful litter :)

Basement Test

When Shock was around 6 weeks old, I decided to take her into the basement since there are five different surfaces down there (slick indoor/outdoor carpeting, cement, inflatable matress, kiddie lock mats and obedience matting). Shock wasn't all too happy about the "dungeon". She LOVES the basement now (since there's agility equipment down there :). So, I took each puppy, individually, down there today to see how they would react. I was really surprised that ALL of them passed with flying colors. No one was worried. The girls and Atlas all reacted about the same, just went around, investigating every thing. Vega just started running around, could care less where he was :) I had a small rocker board (that I used for rehab of Shock's shoulder when she was injured as a baby). It's like a little teeter. They all went over it confidently. In fact, Atlas went over it about five times:) I also have a tire taped to one of the poles (on the ground) and Vega crawled through it. These are really nice puppies, if I do say so myself :)

Pictures from last night

Pics

Vega and Sol



Sirrah



Polaris



Atlas

UHG!

I can't believe I only have two more weeks with these guys! UHG!!!! The thought of them leaving is agonizing and the thought of picking one, even more so. I enjoy every minute with them. They are really nice little pups. All of them. Not one bad one (OK, they are all really pretty bad, most of the time :), in the bunch. Ransom has pretty much decided that she's just about done nursing them. She did a quick feeding this am (about 3 minutes), then taught all the pups that when she says "no", she means "no". Good lesson for all the pups. Learning to respect adult dogs. The girls got the message right away. The boys, not so much. Took a few times for them to figure out (amazing, huh?). This am, I had them all out running around in the family room and Shock came in the room. She's really only been subjected to them one at a time, or separated by an ex-pen. She got immediately swarmed by all five. She was SOOO good about it. Did a quick hello, then jumped on the couch for safety (smart girl). I later opened up the kitchen as well so the pups had a big area to run around in. It was so funny, they just ran laps back and forth, from one end of the kitchen to the end of the family room. They had a BALL! As far as other stuff, they are all eating well. They are on about 2/3 regular puppy food and 1/3 weaning formula right now. They also get hard puppy food when I put them back in their ex-pen as a treat. I put a handful on the fleece bed and they munch on it. Much easier to get them back in the pen that way :) They are drinking water like regular little puppies now and pretty much doing all regular puppy stuff. They are pretty good about keeping their pen clean. They prefer to potty on the papers in the family room. They are also really good about going outside too. Sirrah figured that one out quickly. Tomorrow, Denise (future puppy owner) is coming to see the pups. My nephew came over again yesterday. This time, they ALL swarmed him. I think Vega was the first to say hello. We'll see how they are with two new people tomorrow. I'll try to get some new pictures posted later.

Five weeks and two days

I'll write more tomorrow. Quick video of puppies being stacked for the first time ever.