Well, Pebbles is now bred to Charlie. She is a beauty- those are going to be some gorgeous chocolate pups.

Millie got x-rayed today. She isn’t very big- she has just started to show. We wanted to make sure Charlie’s boy’s could swim after Maggie and Izzy not being pregnant by him. I guess he was just too young then because we saw at least one little puppy in Millie. She was borderline too early to be x-rayed and the puppies bones had just started to calcify so we were thrilled to see one. The vet thinks she has more in there that just have not yet calcified so they don’t show up on the x-ray.

Sophie is getting downright huge. Her belly is just big- there are no butts about it. The poor girl waddles around. She is hard to pick up because she’s so wide. She still has 10 days to go. I doubt she makes it ten days. I am going to have to get things set up for her early just in case. She can have them as early as Feb 3rd and I want to be fully ready for her by then. ( YAY PUPPIES!! )

Tootsie and Cookie are getting quite lumpy in the belly. Those are two cranky girls when they are pregnant let me tell you. I have been penning them together but away from everyone else because they have been causing a ruckus not wanting to share food or doghouses. The hormones are really cranking I think. They were nasty to poor Amanda almost two weeks ago and she ended up having to get stitches in her belly. Poor girl. This happened the same day Cyndy asked me how many fights a week do I have to break up and I said, “None- they all get along great.”

They always have all gotten along before that incident, but Toots and Cookie are the jealous type and they love each other. They share everything and love being together. I think they know they are sisters and they get jealous when anyone else gets in between them. So- they are in solitary confinement together but perfectly happy that way. I may make their own little doggie yard and leave them together all the time when spring comes.

Heidi is still kicking- she’s about the same. I hope spring will loosen her up and put a little spring back in her step! I am ready for spring. Come on spring hurry up!

It won’t be long and I’ll have puppy pictures to post. So stay tuned!

Well winter has finally come to Kansas- about 2 months late. The dogs don’t even know WHAT this white stuff is! It sure was pretty this morning when nothing had been touched yet. Since we’ve missed out on a lot of it this year, I didn’t mind shoveling too much this morning. This picture is our goat pen and chicken coop blanketed in snow.

We let the girls out to go potty this morning. Hazel and Maggie LOVE the snow. We have to watch Maggie because she is foolish and will make herself into a furcicle if we let her. See her snow helmet? This was taken AFTER I wiped most of it off. She could not even see- her fur was frozen down over her eyes like a helmet that was too big. Poor Mag!

Amanda ran around and around and when she came back, she had a snowbeard from eating snow. I hope she was wary of the yellow snow. Isn’t she cute?

Hazel saw Amanda’s snowbeard and said, “Mom? Are you going to eat that?”

Old Heidi has been with us for about 6-7 years. She came to us already 6 years old I’d guess. We rescued her from a family who could not keep her and had contacted a shelter to find her a home. We were looking for a companion for our daughter who is now 10. We were her 3rd family. So, she is getting up in her years at approximately 12-13 years old.

She has had quite a life. Her original owner was an elderly lady who fed her at the table and spoiled her rotten. Her second owner was a family with kids who got “too busy” for her and ended up crating her from 7 am to 8 pm at night and she was free in the house only as everyone slept. She was extremely obese when we got her from being fed canned food and from being crated all day.

So- we got her and put her on a diet which consisted of all the DRY food she wants- and lots of exercise and play outside. She slimmed down and learned to love being outside chasing critters.

After having her several years, we discovered her out in the yard paralyzed from her waist down. The vet said put her down, she had a 0% chance of pulling through. Instead, we made her a cart to hold her back end off the ground and carried her around for awhile to keep from getting sores. We gave her a couple anti-inflammatory shots. Weeks passed and she slowly, but surely, regained her feeling and eventually her mobility. She has always walked with a limp in her two back legs since then, a reminder of her paralysis.

In the last two winters we have thought she wouldn’t make it through the winter. She is graying all over and looking her age for sure. But, she keeps making it through and the warm weather is easier on her and she does better then. She seems to forget her stiffness momentarily when there is a critter to chase.

This fall, more than once we saw her standing in the middle of the road, blocking traffic, unaware she was doing so. We are the only ones on our road, so it’s not like there is a lot of traffic, but, we realized she can’t see or hear very well anymore.

This winter, she is very stiff. Her body almost looks contorted she is so stiff. In the morning she can’t walk right off- and drags her rear again and we wonder if she’ll be able to get her feet under her or not? After she warms up, she is able to sort of hop her legs around behind her but she doesn’t really move them independently anymore.

We invite her in the house whenever she wants- but she prefers outdoors and likes sleeping in the alfalfa in the shed in her spot. Well, this morning, I went out to check on her as it has been very cold. She barely could get up. She begged with her eyes and I carried her up to her food and water by the house. She refused her food and went to the front door and begged with her eyes to get in the house- which she NEVER does. You see, outside is where all the hunting and excitement is- inside never appealed to Heidi.

So, I brought her in and set her up with a bed and food and water in the house. I thought after she warms up, she won’t want in anymore and will start yapping like she does to go back out. A few hours later, no yapping, but I picked her up and brought her out to potty because it was that time. I set her down and she was hippity-hopping on the driveway and losing her grip on the ice and twisting sideways and sliding her back end around on the ice. She would hop her legs back under her and try again, barely able to control her own hind end. I think she is losing feeling in her rear, because as she hippity-hopped, she pottied and she didn’t even know. She hadn’t even found her “spot” yet on the lawn.

I watched her in the window for 5 minutes struggle outside and head for her hay in the shed, pause 1/3 of the way there, then turn around and come back to the door and beg with her eyes to let her in again. She NEVER begs for me to let her in except on the occasion of thunder and lighting or fireworks because, because, like I said, all the excitement for her is outside. She loves digging holes, hunting up squirrels and mice, and being, well, a Dachshund! She is more Dachshund than any Dachshund I’ve ever known.

It’s heartbreaking to see her give that up and want in the house- because that isn’t who she is. I have never put a dog down before. I have hoped and prayed she would die in her sleep in her “spot” sometime outside- die naturally, peacefully. I don’t want to have to be the one to decide, but I also don’t want her suffering and in pain. At what point do you give up? Or do you ever give up?

What do you do with an old girl like Heidi?

Franny keeps falling into the little gap between our chainlink kennel in the backyard and the retaining wall. We weren’t sure if she was being foolish or what the deal was. Everyone else manages to stay out of it. We have put rocks in the place where the dogs could climb in to keep them from doing so- but it wasn’t working for Franny.

Well…..l we figured out what was going on the other day on our twice daily “dookie patrol.” Guinny and Franny love to wrestle and play. Apparently, Guin has outsmarted her sister. She wrestles Franny strategically over to the place where you can fall in, leading her over there with a tumble here and there…. then she backs Franny up to the hole all the while putting on the act of playing around- and SHOVES HER IN!!! We have now seen her do this twice!! What a nice sister huh?

Poor Franny is gullible everytime and she is no match to her ever growing sister. I think Guinny is looking more like a walrus than a Dachshund these days. She is just down right huge. She knows some pretty good wrestling moves too- so don’t mess with Guin.

Well, I started a new tradition— or bad habit— whatever you want to call it. When I cook pancakes, I cook an extra one for each dog who is in the house that morning. I put butter and syrup on it (REAL maple syrup mind you), cut it up, and put each dog’s pancake on his or her own plate. Then, they all have breakfast on the kitchen floor and they all are learning to eat their own and not take anyone else’s pancake just because they are slower. Sophie, who has a hard time eating off a plate with her flat face, gets hers fed to her off a fork. She’s the little princess in the family so it’s only fitting anyway.

Now, some people would think I am nuts….but I think it’s so cute when they start getting crazy and excited when they smell me cooking pancakes!! They all hover around and KNOW what they are about to get. If Thomas chucks a piece to the floor while they wait- all the better!!

My Mom and step Dad used to do this with our dogs growing up. I couldn’t break tradition now could I?