Due Date Has Arrived But No Puppies Yet (as of 7 pm)

Daisy’s temp dropped towards 99 yesterday in the late afternoon and was back to near 100 by evening — good thing I was checking every 2 - 3 hours yesterday or I would have missed it.

She had a good night under the watchful eye of Dear Husband and is resting uncomfortably this morning. If Daisy has read the playbook, puppies should begin arriving later today. Note: Dogs cannot actually read.

In the meantime, this is how things look at Puppy Central. I now have a desk next to the whelping box…

Daisy

Daisy

This is the view from over Dear Husband’s vantage point/chair.

Daisy and Harper

Daisy and Harper

The footstool has a story.

One of my wonderful sisters was in the midst of a small issue with garage sales — as in she spent all of her Saturdays finding bargains. Many years ago she gave me that garage sale footstool as a joke — it is ridiculously garish.

My return joke to her was/is that I love it!

But yes, it is time to get it refurbished — or whatever it is called when they put four colors of new velvet on an old garage sale footstool that probably cost $3.

I will update this post at the point at which I make the call to Suzanne to hurry over and help catch puppies.

(7 pm)

Daisy has been resting and panting today but you know what they say about that watched pot…

Daisy May 23 (1).jpg

Large and Holding Steady

Behold the difference six weeks makes — in figure and attitude…

Daisy, April 7

Daisy, April 7

Daisy, May 21

Daisy, May 21

The father of Daisy’s litter is GCH Pinnacle's Josey Wales AXP OJP FDC TKN SCN DD CGC. Known as Major, he is six years old and an intelligent, kind, and accomplished dog.

Major

Major

Major and Lawerence

Major and Lawerence

Major is also the father of our J Litter (The Sparklers). We are grateful to his humans for trusting us with another special litter of Majorly Awesome Puppies.

Because accidental suffocation of newborn puppies is a sad and real thing, we take advantage of our natural sleep patterns to have awake and attentive eyeballs on our puppies 24/7 for at least the first two weeks. We have already settled into the Puppy Central Routine — Dear Husband stays up overnight and I take over between 4 and 4:30 a.m.

Dear Husband shared this cell phone photo from last night — Harper and rePete getting things ready…

Harper and Pete in box.jpg

They are not the only ones. Daisy’s temperature is hovering at 100 but going up slower and not as high — I think we are getting closer to the warning drop, and I am certain Daisy is more than ready to get this show on the road.

Daisy May 21 (2).jpg

Happy Friday to you — stay well and rest up for the exciting and stressful weekend adventures.

Close but No Cigar

The temperature is stable as of 5:30 a.m. and so we are safe to keep cleaning and prepping for another 24 hours.

WHEW.

Daisy on May 20, 2020

Daisy on May 20, 2020

In spite of clearly being uncomfortable — and all you moms out there can SO relate — Daisy remains her usual cheerful self. She is very, very hungry but space is clearly limited and so we are now feeding her in five meals per day.

I posted a similar photo to the one above on Facebook and invited guesses for number of puppies. I then did an analysis of those guesses — one of my favorites: “40 pug puppies.”

Oh dear! Daisy would have some explaining to do…

The most frequent guess was nine puppies. Interestingly, the number on either side of nine received an equal number of guesses — both eight puppies and ten puppies were guessed 11 times.

My highly scientific Facebook survey appears to validate my own guess, which has been 8 - 10 puppies, although I suspect closer to ten than eight.

The whelping crew is ready.

karma in box (1).jpg

Suzanne and I had a whelping strategy meeting yesterday as we walked; Dear Husband will also be involved.

Looking at Daisy, I am starting to wonder if she will make it until Sunday — but I still have hope since that temperature remains up. If it drops today, this post will be revised with the news.

Have a wonderful Thursday!