Puppy Love Day

Mary-Ann Sontag February 14, 2021

Happy Valentine’s Day!

Check out what I got from Berkeley.

She is not even 4.5 years old.

I am reminded that when kids live an intentional, thoughtful, informed, and enriched life they are able to flourish and excel.

It is not so different for puppies, except they are unlikely to send written Valentine’s Day notes.

I love thinking of ways to enrich my puppies’ lives/environment. It is fun and I know it matters.

Rosebud is part of the puppies’ enrichment activities.

There is a tension — a sweet spot — between not enough stimulation and too much. If we under-enrich, we fail to push towards potential and lose opportunities to hardwire in positive ways. If we overdo it, we cause puppies (and humans) to shut down and risk unfortunate hardwiring in the developing brains.

Sirius and Heze with Miss Piggy 2-14.jpg

Miss Piggy was new today, and the puppies noticed and interacted — very cool. That is Sirius and Heze.

Novelty is important and so you will rarely see the same things with the puppies two days in a row. Because they grow and change so quickly at this age, even a two-day break from something gives it back some novelty.

Raising puppies in this intentional and enriched way doesn’t matter to everyone and that is perfectly fine; there are breeders for people who just want a puppy — or better yet, please rescue a dog or a puppy if early life experience is not critical to you.

My goal is always to place puppies with people who value and appreciate the informed and intentional way we raise puppies because it means those new homes will continue the efforts when they assume responsibility for the puppy’s life and welfare.

The Moonshadows are starting to play with each other…

Nova Jr.: “Will you be my Valentine, Miss Piggy?”

Have a LOVEly day.

Evening Update

I love this photo. Neil and Arch on a tolerant sibling.

Moons and Stars (Updated)

Mary-Ann Sontag February 13, 2021

The Moonshadows were — well — MOONED!!

Thank you, Anonymous Friend, for mooning the Moonshadows and making us all smile :)

Pozy, exercising her prerogative as the Big Sister, promptly stole one…

This seems like an opportune time to apologize to my Perfect Sister for stealing her clothes — except I might not be sorry for stealing the Good and Plenty shirt because I really did love that one.

Sometimes I cannot tell which puppy is in a photo — I take hundreds of photos each day and sometimes forget to also get the collar. And so the above is a mystery but below is Ariel.

Titan continues to grow into his mighty self…

Hunter doesn’t really need a collar — he arrived with his own flashy white bling…

Buck is in the green and black collar.

My daughter called this morning and wanted to know where the present from Nova Sr. was and I explained that I was late in posting since my daughter called to chat. Dear Daughter is not the only one awaiting the big reveal.

Puppy Nova is named for a Bright Star human, Nova, who lives in Minnesota, as I have explained before; human Nova is now known as Nova Sr. since she was the original Nova in the family.

Nova Sr. is known far and wide. Toby, who lives in Pennsylvania, has a friend who teaches an online tricks class. The friend/trainer told her class about the twenty Berner puppies (ahem — ten plus ten!) and long/funny story short — imagine the trainer’s surprise when she learned that one of the ten plus ten puppies is named after her student, Nova! Small world indeed.

Kris O. is also involved with Nova Sr. and will be doing agility lessons with Nova Sr. and her puppy, Hattie, who is a cousin to the Bright Stars.

So, Nova Sr. got a Bright Idea and TA DA!!!!

That is Nova Jr. on the teeter made and sent by Nova Sr.! Isn’t that amazing!? I am telling you — that girl is going places, and when she gets there she can team up with the girls who live with Wildflower, Lucy, who send me the best videos! I want to hold a Camp just for all the great kids in our community right now. But I digress…

Nova Sr. and her family need to do consultation for IKEA because their assembly instructions were fantastic — I had it together in no time at all. In fact, I think it took longer to get it out of the packaging than it did to assemble.

The new teeter offers a lovely object lesson. When training puppies and dogs (and humans), we must break things down into manageable pieces. So the end goal is the whole teeter experience but we will start with teeter as a tippy board — all agility peeps know that this is an ideal first step in training a teeter.

So much gratitude to Nova Sr. (and her parents) for helping with enrichment for the ten plus ten puppies so they can grow up to be as amazing as Nova Sr. (aka Super Nova). Some agility peeps back east are — no doubt — thrilled to see a teeter with their future puppies at such young ages.

It is agility day for the Bright Stars — Rosebud is helping out with the training.

Two new milestones for the Bright Stars — teeth are emerging and tails are starting to wag in a social way. SO CUTE.

Puppy eyes all start off looking blue-gray — this is Orion…

Capella and Zaniah…

Sun settling in for a nap…

I hope your day makes someone as happy as Nova Sr. made ours!

Evening Photos

The Daily Report (Updated)

Mary-Ann Sontag February 12, 2021

One good thing about the temperature being below zero is that I do not have to rush to get the frozen raw food that was delivered yesterday in the house in a big hurry…

This is helpful because things have been a bit hectic and crowded in here as we transitioned the Bright Stars out of the whelping box.

Consider how one takes down a whelping box and puts up an entire pen in the same space — while managing ten puppies and their mom. Enter Suzanne — she did not just help with the photos!

The additional space allows us to use some of the wonderful things we have been gifted — like this structure that Lori made and sent to us a few years back…

And just wait until you see what Nova Sr. in Minnesota made and sent to the puppies!

We also have some really great toys that have been sent and will be coming out soon. So much gratitude to everyone in the Bright Stars/Moonshadows community — for your gifts, your texts, your emails, your good thoughts, and your laughter imagining what it must be like to have 10 + 10 puppies in the house. It all matters.

Three weeks is a magical age. Hearing is emerging and vision gets better and better. The puppies are mobile and interactive. This means it is time for them to start expanding their experiences and their minds with safe, manageable novelty.

You will begin to see a constantly changing assortment of experiences offered to the Bright Stars — things that they can successfully master at their own pace, thereby promoting competence and confidence.

When the Moonshadows hit three weeks, they will be engaging in the same processes.

For now, the Moonshadows are doing what they need to do — getting ready to take on the world.

Potty pads are in the center of the Bright Stars puppy paddock because when puppies wake up or stop eating, they drift away a bit and potty; having the pads in the middle maximizes hitting the target.

We use spendy human incontinent pads because they stay dryer than puppy pads when used. Since smell helps puppies know where to go (literally), there is a used one under the new ones to help support success.

And so all is both well and changing here as the puppies’ developmental needs and capacities change.

Life in fast forward.

Have a lovely day.

Evening Report & Photos

Congratulations to the Bright Stars’ Auntie Ruthie on her first Novice obedience leg. First trial, first leg — well done, Team Ruthie! Being a star runs in the family :)

Our Big News is that Claire ate an entire meal from a BOWL!!!! This is literally the first time in about two months that she has done that. Dare I hope that we are turning a hormonal corner?!