Author: Dackel Princess

The pups are seven weeks old now. Greta loves them, and she likes knowing that they are being taken care of, but basically she looks upon this time as her chance to mold their personalities and not fill their bellies herself. Unless, of course, she is getting me to fill a plate of food for them!

In fact this will show you why Greta has given up nursing them. The pups are wonderful, sweet and a delight, but….they are also little parasites whenever Greta gets too close!

The puppies got over the fence today and we had to build a higher wall. Anneliese who is the smallest of the puppies, was the first one to vault the small fence, and once she laid her eyes on Uncle Fritz, she chased him around the kitchen table! What a hoot.

I’ve decided that there is something in the scent of fresh newspapers that causes puppies to proceed to wee-wee and poop on them. Now although this is a good thing as far as house training a puppy goes, it is also rather maddening, when you are trying to keep a puppy room clean.

We went skiing today. It was cold and windy, but the snow conditions were awesome and we had a good time. We only skied until noon, and then came home to the puppies. I opened the door and I knew that my little cherubs had been working overtime decorating the newspapers in the puppy room.

So, I got out an old playpen and set it up in the kitchen, put the puppies in there, and then took everything out of the puppy room and washed it down. Once the floor had dried, I put down fresh newspaper, their toys and beds and then put them back in with a bowl of their food.

Now before they even had one bite of their lunch they all went around and wee-wee’d on the papers! I stood there watching, and decided to let them eat their food before I went in and changed the papers again, and it was a good thing I did. After lunch each one went to the papers and pooped!

After I got done cleaning up that, I sat down and played with the babies. They climbed on me, they chewed and licked and snuggled. It was a lot of fun.

They slept for a while, and I could see them as I stood in the kitchen working on dinner. Oh they are so sweet. Then they woke up and wanted their dinner and the cycle started all over again.

Did I mention we no longer bring our newspapers to be recycled? Now we go to the recycling center and get newspapers from them!

This morning Hubby and I took Anneliese and Arnie out to play with their Mommy. They ran around for a while, but then Greta lay down and nursed them. The video below shows Arnie on the left and Anneliese on the right. Be sure to have your volume up because there is a surprise ending.

It was also a very busy day for the puppies with visitors. First my daughter Amanda brought her sister to see the pups. Allyson is 15 and a really sweet person. She is the daughter of my former husband. I enjoyed meeting her and I could see the resemblance between Mandy and her sister.

While they were here we took pictures and played with all 5 pups. Emily (the Puppy Nanny), was also here and we somehow managed a two hour play period in the family room without one accident! Yay! It’s amazing to watch the puppies now. A month ago when Mandy was here the puppies were just eating and sleeping. Now they are so grown up and are “real” little dogs.

Anneliese

Arnie

Mandy and Allyson left and Emily and I watched a DVD I made of the pups life from birth to 7 weeks. It’s about 35 minutes long. It was so much fun to watch the tiny puppies grow before our eyes!

Then Paul and Stephanie came. They are adopting Anja and they wanted to show Anja to Paul’s girlfriend Tracy and her daughter, Emily. We all sat in the puppy room with the pups and cuddled and played with them. I can tell that Paul and Stephanie are really looking forward to the day when Anja goes home with them. It makes me feel good to see them bonding. Anja is so perfect for them, and I am really happy!

After everyone left I made dinner and cleaned up the puppy room again (for about the 100th time today), and fed the little ones. They ate up a big dish of food, and then they all crawled into a bed and fell asleep.

Another day ends at Puppy Central!

Today the puppies changed, yet again. Today they wanted dry, crunchy food. How did I find this out? Well, I had Anneliese out in the kitchen running around, and she went over to Fritz and Greta’s dish and started to chow down on the dry food. I picked up their food, because I wanted her to try the dry puppy food I have, and she loved that! As did the rest of the puppies when I offered it to them.

So, besides having their dinner of crunchies and wet food mixed together, they also got dry food after. Talk about a group of happy puppies!

The other thing that Anneliese did today was chase after Uncle Fritz. The poor boy is so worried by the little puppy, and here he was running away from her in the kitchen, and there was little 4 pound Anneliese chasing after Fritz! Now I am going to have to try to get this on film because it is just too funny!

Anneliese simply loves Fritz though and she seems incredibly unafraid of his size. Greta watches, but she has not made any threatening gestures towards Fritz. I think eventually he will relax. Maybe once we are down to just one pup.

I was thinking about that today. The pups are going to be 7 weeks tomorrow. Most breeders kick the pups out at 8 weeks. I am choosing not to do this because I believe that their socialization skills become better developed, and looking at how small they are, and how much time Greta still spends with them, I simply cannot fathom letting them go at 8 weeks.

Yet, I know that time is running out, and soon their new owners will be coming to pick them up and take them to their new homes. Although it will be a really sad day for me, I feel good at the homes we have found for our babies. We have just one female left to find a home for, and I hope in the next week or so to find a good family for her.

The weekend of March 4th (Their 12 week birthday), will be a tough one for me.

Yesterday morning at 11 o’clock I piled the 5th Dimension into a crate, got Greta in her sweater, and headed out to the car. I put the crate on the front seat facing me, with Greta sitting next to it. Leaving Uncle Fritz behind, we headed out to our Vets office for the babies first shots.

The puppies were not sure they liked either the crate or the car. They whined and fussed the entire way to the office. I talked to them, cooed at them and tried to calm them. Greta just looked at me, like I had lost my mind!

We arrived and Greta was weighed. She has lost all but 1 pound of her pre-pregnancy weight. Not bad considering she had quintuplets! We will slowly put her back onto regular dog food now. No more fattening puppy food for her.

Each puppy was examined, weighed, and given their first shots. There wasn’t a cry or tear from them once we opened the crate door and let them out. They were quite happy running around the exam room checking it all out.

Angelika and Arnie got the most attention. I think because they already have their wiry coat, but Anneliese, Anita and Anja managed to steal their share of hearts as well. In fact Anja was so busy chewing on the secretary’s shoe lace that she said she might just have to sneak off with her! LOL!

It was so much fun going back and having the staff see the babies. After all, the last time they had seen the babies they were just a few hundred grams in weight and either eating or sleeping. Now they are all 4 pounds and running around like little hellions!

At the end of the visit, Greta lay down on the office floor and gave her brood a little nourishment. They jumped at the chance for some milk.

We drove home in silence. I came in and I put the crate in the puppy-room and took the door off. No one came out. They all stayed cuddled up in there together. They slept for two and a half hours before waking up and having a light meal. They were up a very short time and then they fell asleep again.

This was a big day for the babies. Their first shots, first Vet visit, and second car ride (their first ride coming when they were a mere 3 hours old).

I bet they will sleep well tonight