Saturday, July 08, 2006

From the Comments....

Leo and Carolyn asked if I can tell anything about their personalities yet.

YES!!

Amigo is the go-getter in the group. Plays the hardest and sleeps the hardest. He absolutely loves everything about being alive. The other morning he and his littermates were out playing on the deck. He caught sight or me watching him and simply threw himself up in the air in a leap of joy. I've never seen a 7 week old puppy go that high! I think he's going to be a digger, he loves to dig in a full food bowl and I think he's the one who has been digging in the litter box at night.

Sam is the most cautious of the three puppies. He is not fearful, just watchful. In this way he reminds me alot of his mother Aliy She likes to watch and see how things are going to play out before she makes an opinion on things. I remember when she was about 5 weeks old and I was giving her and all her littermates their first baths. She was the last one to be bathed and after watching her 5 siblings get washed and then dried (each with lots of crying and wiggling) she decided it was a little scary but she was going to live thru it and submitted to the whole process without the slightest protest. This is how Sam is too. He also loves to be held and cuddled, in this way he is like his half sister Babe who even now likes to crawl onto my lap and fall asleep.

Tina is like her grandmother Raven, quite the independent little princess. She doesn't like it when the boys get too rough (even though she is still the biggest of the three) She is the bold one in the group. Knows no fear. An explorer at heart. I let her out in the yard and she take off all by herself in whatever direction looks interesting.

DJ asked if there is any chance of getting apicture of them with Mom and Dad before the puppies head to their forever homes.

Probably not. Aside from the fact that Mom Aliy is a bit embarrased about her appearance right now (Mom dogs start to lose ALL their hair right about now and look like goats) and because of the non-stop rain we've had for the past week Daddy Max looks like a dirtball, the biggest reason we'll see no family portrait is because Max is kind of afraid of his kids. Yes, these little 10 pound balls of fluff send him hunting for higher grouond when they come around. In all fairness, he's getting more and more curious about them every day, but asking him to let them sit near him for a picture? I'm not sure he's willing to do that yet.

Georgia wrote "Anne - I think it is time for you to go to town and leave Bill with the marking pens!!"

She is referencing an incident which happened with Aliy's first litter.... I used to mark the puppies with different colors of ribbon around their necks. Then I discovered permanent marking pens. The idea is to put a colored spot on their back so you can tell which puppy is which. A day or so after I started doing this my husband got creative with the pens. We had racing stripes, zebra strips, flames, etc.

With these guys they all look so different I haven't needed to mark them at all and Georgia is apparently disappointed :)

This afternoon the puppies are going to meet new people for the first time. Several of my friends are going to help me evaluate the litter and try to decide if I should keep one and if so, which one. We will be looking at their structure, size, coats, personality etc. They had baths this morning in an attempt to make them look their best. Unfortunatley they only got somwhat clean :) For some reason these guys really like to chew on each other and they all have saliva stains around their necks. But they do still look pretty cute.