April 4, 2016 Pupdate

     It's good to be home.  At least, it is much easier for me and Mila seems to be quite content as well.  She loves the dog door - not that she is willing to spend much time away from the puppies.  She does leave them on occasion to go potty and to scope out potential new dens in case we turn her out of this one or stop cleaning it or something.  (If this wasn't something her granddam, mama and Aunt B had done, I would worry that she might not be comfortable.)  I put blankets or towels in all of the best potential locations but I do stil need to put a 'digging pool' outside so she won't dig up all of the river rocks beside the deck.

We started Early Neurological Stimulation yesterday.  It is a series of exercises that we do on each puppy once a day from Day 3 to 17.  I often refer to this as puppy yoga because of the exercises.  One of them is a true downward facing dog, it's just that the puppy is assisted into the position.

Several times today, Tamara said she thought she could see the puppies growing.  Perhaps she did because they had all gained nicely when we held the weight watchers meeting.  I knew they were because their collars were tightening.  I loosened all of them this evening.  Which reminds me, I need to order another set (I cut the first set in half and snip off a piece of each one from the first set for our version of the magnet board.  Instead of moving a magnet from one place to another, I move the snippet of collar from one of the extra collars to the other when we do something that we want to track.  As I recall, I started that when we had the litter of 10 puppies and I didn't just do everything in birth order.  Whenever I started it, I like the system and intend to continue to use it since I can't see words on a white board or anything like that.

Each puppy now weighs more than a pound.  From the sound of their activities since then, I think they are gaining more as I type, too.

Mila is careful when she gets in and out of the pool but occasionally, she wants us to move the puppies for her.  She will nudge them around once she is lying down but, to my knowledge, she hasn't moved them while she's standing.  A couple of times, her mama has come over to the box to see why a puppy is making sounds of distress (not screaming just fussy, "I need something' noises) but Mila addresses their concerns before SammieDoodlebug needs to intervene.

I have puppies to cuddle and it's about time for a 'midnight snack/2 am feeding' for the mama of the puppies.  She's eating for 7 these days and her caloric intake needs to reflect that.  It will increase over the next couple of weeks as they grow until they are ready for us to start helping feed them (she will most likely keep nursing them on occasion until they leave but they will be officially weaned.  She'll just use that when she wants to reinforce a behavior.)

For now, puppy breath to all and nighty nighty nighty!