The Dackel Princess

Greta, Anneliese and Arnie

My day started at 5 AM, when Anneliese woke me to go out. I crawled out of bed, put on my robe and slippers and coat and walked her in the yard and then returned to bed, hoping upon hope to sleep another hour or two.

Forty-five minutes later I was awakened, and gave up all hope of sleeping in. The robe and slippers came back on, and my jacket once again. I put Arnie and Anneliese on leashes, but left grown ups Greta and Fritz to walk freely, as they are usually good.

Not today! Greta and Fritz raced off, up the hill and before I could get out a good yell were gone!

I finished the walking of the two pups and brought them in. I grabbed the keys for the Jeep and headed up our driveway. I got half way down our street and there were Fritz and Greta walking along like they owned the road!

I yelled (quietly, after all it was Sunday) at Greta and Fritz, put them in the Jeep and drove back home.

As I came in the door I caught sight of myself in the window and cringed. Thankfully it was still very early, and hopefully no one saw me in my robe and jacket and slippers, with bed-hair and the sleep still in my eyes!

The day progressed and eventually I did shower and do my hair, but even then I wasn’t feeling too great. I definitely need a hair trim!

Enough about me. I know you all want to hear about Anneliese.

She is 22 pounds now and literally waddles when she walks. She doesn’t want to run around playing right now, she wants more than anything to lie in her little bed, with her ducky baby and rest.

Do you see the ducky under her? She just loves that thing, and hardly leaves it at all!

Occasionally she leans forward a little and nibbles on some dry food. Of course we keep the dish nice and close to her.

April 20 011

I love to look at her big fat belly! I used the clippers and shaved it today, to make it easier for the babies to find a teat.

She seems to enjoy all the attention, but then Arnie started to feel badly. Poor guy needs some attention! He was lying in the new doggy bed posing for me, so I simply had to take his picture.

No doubt at all that this is Arnie! lol! He sure knows how to make himself comfortable!

Her Baby Is A Duck?

Anneliese spends much of her time now in this little bed in the kitchen. She seems content out there where it is quiet and she can monitor her food dish.

Anneliese received a stuffed mallard duck today as a “shower gift”! How sweet it was, to watch her with this ducky. She has it on the little bed and snuggles it and keeps it close.

In some ways it seems that the ducky soothes her and brings her some comfort as she gets bigger and bigger. The days are slipping by and more than likely, by this time next week she will have several squealing newborns to contend with.

But for now, her baby is a duck!

Friday’s Happenings

Friday was such an emotional day. Taking Anneliese to the Vet’s and seeing the babies on the x-ray, makes it all so real. In another week they will be here and then the fun begins!

We also went out after lunch to see the movie “Doubt”. It’s with Meryl Streep. I will tell you, it is a very well done movie, and Meryl Streep is totally fabulous in her part as usual! I wasn’t really looking forward to the movie, but in the end, I admit I enjoyed it!

A dear friend of mine passed away this week. It was sudden and unexpected. She was a young woman, pregnant with twins. She was happy and full of life and the promise that the future held for her and her husband. Rest in peace, dear Louise with your little angel babies!

Now the week is over. Next week at this time we will be awaiting the arrival of the puppies. New life. Sweet life.

Have a great weekend everyone!

4 or 5!!!

Here are the x-rays! We could clearly see four little heads and spines, but suspect a fifth head and spine lost in amniotic fluid. The red arrows point to the confirmed pups. The blue arrow is the suspected fifth one. Just click on the photo to get the largest picture.

The Big Day

Here we are. The Big Day! I will be taking Anneliese in to the Veterinarian’s Office at 9:30 this morning for her x-ray! I’m beginning to think that she has a few babies in there! She is huge, and she still has 10 days left to go!

I started to take her temperature today. You see a normal doggy temperature is 100-102 degrees F. When the female’s temperature dips down to 99 degrees, it means that delivery is imminent.

I also got out my delivery kit, and will be washing out all the towels and doggy blankets over the weekend. I also have the warming block for the whelping box. It’s simply a pink disc that you can put in the microwave, wrap in a towel and place in the whelping box with the babies to keep them nice and warm the first few days. If we have a cold snap, I’ll break out the space heater.

Once I get back from the Vet’s office, I will post a picture of the x-ray. So check back later on to see the x-ray and find out how many little ones we have in there!

Protest!

I attended my very first protest rally. I’m 50. I was a little too young to protest the establishment, in favor of flower power in the 1960’s and I actually thought that Saddam Hussein needed to get his butt kicked, so no protesting there. However, today, I felt very strongly and despite my migraine, I went out with Hubby and we protested.

What The Tea Parties (Taxed Enough Already-Protests) Are About.

It’s about spending — too much spending, to be specific. Too much taxing. The idea that a business is too big to fail is anti-American; we’ve always been for the underdog, but why should we be bailing out AIG or GM or Ford, etc.?

It’s about putting my family — my children and grandchildren — under $12.8 trillion in debt; all it took was two presidents and six months.

It’s about power — too much power going to federal government.

It’s about corruption — too much corruption, in both parties.

So we went to the State Capital and stood with our fellow New Hampshire-ites to protest the craziness in Washington. I don’t think it matters if you are a Republican or a Democrat.

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Today I was an American, who was fed up with what my government is doing, and because I still live in a free country, I protested!

I love my country, but right now, I am not happy with the way it is being run. Come on people, you can do better than this!

The Belly Girl

I’m sure you all think I am a little bit crazy for being so focused on Anneliese’s belly right now. I swear that she grows by the moment and I can hardly wait until Friday when I take her in and find out how many little babies she has in there!

These were taken this morning and you can see how big she has gotten!

Did I mention how crazy I am about this little girl?

Doesn’t she just look adorable?

She is pretty quiet now and sleeping a lot. She looked at the puppy room and checked it out, but isn’t at all certain that she likes it in there. In fact, she seems to prefer Hubby’s side of the bed! I have told her, however, that I will sleep in the puppy room with her for the first few weeks and help her out, the same way I helped her mother out when she had her first litter of babies.

The Puppy Room

I took big old Fritz in to have his yearly shots today at our Veterinarian’s office. He was an angel and even though he is strong, he did obey me when I told him to sit, to wait and to get into the car. In fact the command to get in the car was hardly out of my mouth when he leapt into it!

Dr. Chris asked if I had the puppy room set up yet, and he also asked how Miss Anneliese was doing. I mentioned that she was doing well, but pretty much stays in the kitchen now stretched out on the throw rug in there.

So Dr. Chris mentioned I might want to set up the puppy room so that Anneliese has a chance to get used to it.

I came back home with Fritz and once I settled him down, I looked at our mud room to determine how to go about this transformation.

I have a table in there that we use under our mirror to hold our hats and gloves in the winter. Okay, that would go into our dining room. Check!

Then we have a bench that holds all the yard toys for the dogs, and extra gloves and hats. Okay, that goes into the dining room too. Check!

We have pegs on the wall that we hang up our jackets on, so all those jackets needed to be moved into the front hall closet. Check!

I got out the vacuum and cleaned everything with that, and then got out the disinfectant and washed everything down. Floors, walls, etc. Check!

I sat down long enough to watch “All My Children” (yes, I know, no snickering please!) then got out the kiddie pool and washed it down with disinfectant too, dried it and put it in the puppy room. Check!

I brought out the towels, all my birthing supplies and placed them in a tote bag which I hung on a peg. Check!

So in just 12 or so days we will be welcoming little bundles into our home and they will settle in the puppy room, with their Mommy, Anneliese and their Granny, Maribeth.

I can hardly wait!

Easter

I was amazed at the brightness of the day, and although it was very cold and windy, somehow the sunshine made me feel like spring had really come to New Hampshire.

I was up early, and turned on the coffee. Then I put on my coat and went out to walk the dogs.

I am beginning to think that perhaps some evil household appliance ghost is haunting me, because when I got back, instead of finding a nicely brewed pot of coffee, I found the coffee had jammed the drip area and spilled all over the counter top! A little had made it into the pot, so I took a cup and filter, and poured some into the cup, so that while I cleaned up the coffee mess, I did, at least have a cup of coffee to drink.

Once the coffee mess was cleaned up, I made breakfast. A WW modified version of French Toast/Bananas Foster! It was really good!

Just as I finished cleaning up the kitchen, Anneliese stretched out before me. All of her! Oh my goodness she gets bigger by the second!

She really enjoys sunning herself.

Do you see this belly? Amazingly big!!!

Well, we will find out on Friday how many little babies she has inside, and then really it is just two weeks from now until the puppies are due.

Our Easter dinner will be roasted lamb, roasted potatoes, and asparagus! All my favorites.

I hope you all had a blessed Easter or Passover!

Okay, So We’re Getting Old!

Hubby asked me to find some papers that he’d left lying around since before my Dad’s funeral. Hubby is like that. He has trouble with paper control and usually he believes that I have thrown away his paper.

And usually he is right.

So, I started to look in all my usual places. Like the trash. Oh, Gag! I do not handle stinky old trash very well, but since I had to find these papers I had to look everywhere!

I searched high, I searched low (can’t get any lower than the garbage!). Nothing. I went through my file box, which you all might recall is very full, all the time, because I hate to file. Nothing!

I went back down to the garage to the old garbage and began to search again. Gag!

Then, a mere 1 hour after I started to search for these important papers, it hit me! I suddenly knew where they were.

I went to the stairs and started up, my knees shaking with excitement and nearly buckling under me. I ran down the hall to the office and pulled open the file drawer and there, filed nicely and neatly in a new folder, just as HUBBY HAD INSTRUCTED ME, were the two documents that he needed.

I can’t totally blame Hubby for this fiasco. After all, I was the one who made out the file and placed the papers in it.

Then I started to laugh. I’ve admitted to a short term memory problem and now Hubby must as well.

I wonder if they have service animals for this. Maybe we could train Arnie. All I would have to do is say, “Arnie, where did Mummy put those papers?” and he would run to the file box and point with his nose!

Oh I am just laughing like crazy!

Happy Easter everyone!