Wednesday, July 28, 2010

Happy 12th Birthday to Nike!

Nike's 12th birthday was July 27th. She celebrated with a car ride to the store and some excellent meaty bones, preceded and followed by some naps on the sofa. She came into my life at 20 months of age, and once she decided she liked me enough to listen to me, there was no turning back.

She's gone from being my fierce little AirNike to being the world's snuggliest dog. I found some pictures recently of her getting her Schutzhund 2 title--I tried to scan them today, but my scanner software keeps borking on me, so it looks like it will take a trip to Kinkos to get them scanned in.

Here's some pictures of her from her years with me. I can only hope that she sticks around a few more years.

Nike -- Ike vom Del U Haus, KK2, SchH2
mother to many much loved puppies, working in SAR, herding, and schutzhund




Monday, July 26, 2010

Belated puppy pictures

I've never before had 2 litters of puppies at a time. The age spread has made it relatively easy--right now, the N puppies are the perfect age for cuddling and playing and the O puppies are just opening their eyes and starting to walk. The O puppies are here in my office (where the N's spent their first 3.5 weeks), so I spend most of the day in the room with them, all too often getting entranced by some new thing they are doing--whether walking or climbing out of the box or vigorously demanding that Xita be more accommodating of their every need and whim.

The N puppies are now 6 weeks old have graduated to the front yard, mostly, where they have shelter and water and room to explore--and, most especially, room to teach themselves to seek out the grass and to go potty. This has translated nicely to their mid-day siestas in the TV room, where they hide in the AC to avoid the excessive heat (it was 102 here on Saturday!). At 6 weeks, they are actively seeking specific areas to potty and if I walk them outside, they take turns pooping in the grass before we head back into the AC and away from the blasting sun.

On Sunday, a friend helped to give the puppies a great snuggle/play session and to take pictures of all the babies.
Nineva, Nora, Navarre, Nick, Nemo--look at Nemo's ear up! (for all for 30 seconds)

They are turning out to be delightful babies, very affectionate and kissy, and are showing very nice drives--between nap sessions! Nineva even retrieved a ball many times in a row, running and sliding to catch the ball before it got away, then pausing to chomp thoughtfully on the ball for a few seconds before happily bringing it back to be thrown again. Such a good girl--and a natural retrieve at 6 weeks!


Nineva and her ball

Nemo has grown big and handsome and true to his earlier experience of falling asleep in the food bowl--he is *very* food motivated.

Nemo 

Nemo and Nora had a fun time playing tug together and were very interactive and affectionate.

Nora and Nemo

Nora is a lively girl with very nice drives and excellent eye contact. She's a charming girl who will do well in almost any sort of home that offers her love and regular exercise and intellectual stimulation--whether a competition/working home or an active, involved companion home.

Nora

We tried to photograph Nick during his nap time yesterday and got shot a few dirty looks because of that, but he's shown himself to be lively and bold and very friendly, with good drives.
 Nick

Navarre shows flashes of very nice drive and also of being people oriented, but naptime took him under quickly and I only have a few shots of him awake. He seems to be affected by the heat more than his siblings, and I'm not sure why. I think I'll be looking for a loving pet home for him.
Navarre

Monday, July 19, 2010

Ohsocute!!!!

A friend came by Saturday, so naturally, I recruited her for help with puppies. For the little ones, everyone got their first nail trim and I removed the pvc pigrails from the box to give everyone a bit more room, then I refreshed nailpolish dots and added rickrack to a few puppies to make at-a-glance identification easier.

Then, we took puppy pictures! First some pictures of the wee ones--they were 14 days yesterday and their eyes have opened. They are greedy, hungry beasties and are all FOOD ME NAO!





We made philosophical statements with puppies....



Found ourselves unable to resist the cute...




Sought to demonstrate the EARS UP! look...


I decided to name this girl Sneezy... but that doesn't start with an O....maybe Ochoo?



I'm not even sure what I can say witty about this one... just.... awwww!!!!


This puppy is Osleepy....


Click for the full Puppy Gallery

Sunday, July 4, 2010

Xita x Laruh puppies

Six  Eight brand-new puppies out of my new import V Xita v Ludwigseck, KK1a, SchH1 and V Laruh vom Grafental, KK1a, SchH3--100% DDR bloodlines, bred in Germany.

Xita worked hard lining up puppies last night. She required me to stay in attendance and awake through the night, so I only got about an hour of sleep. Fortunately I have friends visiting this weekend, so I have ample hands to help snuggle the N puppies and more hands to help with all the other myriad chores that spawn around puppies.


First puppy was born at 1:11 and she's had 6 puppies since then. At the moment, there's 4 girls and 2 boys--2 solid black girls, 2 black sable girls, and 2 solid black boys. I think there might be two to three more puppies on the way. I've put in an order for 2 more boys. :)

I just have a few pictures at the moment, but there were at least 4 cameras snapping, so I expect more soon.



Enjoy!

Edited to add: last pup born at 8 pm, bringing the total to 9 pups born, 1 stillborn. Final tally:

3 black (very black!) sable girls
2 solid black girls
3 solid black boys

Weights between 13oz and 17 oz


Xita's being an excellent and very loving mother, but she is very, very tired. Look how proud she is, though, of her 4th of July babies!



Thursday, July 1, 2010

Life Is Hard... and then you sleep

Hi! I don't have a name yet, but you can call me Yellow Girl. I was just trying to eat. It's only my 2nd meal, but it seems to be good stuffs. My stoopid brother fell asleep in the food--and he was in my way!


It's SOOOOOOO embarrassing. Do you see what I have to live with?

Then he tried to push me out of the way. The jerk!


That's OK.... I have the last laugh. Hee!


Stoopid boys!