Photo Op Bust

SO there I was this morning, camera and flash charged, backdrop hung, puppies pristine... and .... crud. Yep you heard me: crud. I think I got 3 good photos out of the lot. There's just no accounting for puppies and there moods. Now don't get me wrong - I have some experience with the preparation of this type of thing. Feed puppies, warm puppies, tidy and rub before looking for action (I WAS trying to get some pics of their new found legs and walking about)...yeah, not gonna work. Everyone wanted to go away from the camera, hide their face in the comfy blanket, our just plain get the heck out. Sooooo... I snuggled instead. The great news with my pups is that I spend so much time with them they think of me as another mom. They spend a good deal of time as a group on top of me, in my lap, wherever they can fit, really.

So, as all good breeders do when thy hit challenges, I rolled with it. I must have gotten some of the best dang pics I've taken of this litter just by letting them snuggle in my lap instead of the fantastic set I'd created. So what if the backdrop is my ugly green velour track pants, my unpedicured feet and my comfy sweater that I wouldn't be caught dead in public wearing... Guaranteed none of you will notice anything but cute cute puppies. :)

Never enough time to catch up - We'll just start from here!: Boleyn x Viking 3 weeks old

So here I am 3 weeks into puppies and I had promised myself I would blog the whole thing this time.... oops. :)
I've tried a couple of times to go back and describe this litter (Boleyn x Viking) from the start and it's just too much for my little sleep deprived brain to handle.... so I will skip ahead and start from now hoping you will all forgive that somehow I got to 3 week old pups instantaniously. ;)

These 3 pups are big, healthy and beautiful. Some of the best I've produced, I think. They are just at the point where they start to do more than eat sleep and void - and eyes have been open for a few days.

Yesterday was the first day that one of the pups tried to play (while tottering) with his mom. Mulberry, of course, who seems to be the first of everything in this litter except out of the the womb (Lychee was already raring to go in the birth canal when Jim (my Surgeon) went in to get them. It was (as expected) completely adorable and I fell in love with puppies all over again. Boleyn, who we've dubbed as a 'teenage mom' - even though she's 2 years old and very much old enough to be bred - was not quite sure what the heck he was doing, or what to do with him.... kinda her standard with the pups, really. lol

Boleyn is one of the sweetest dogs you'll ever meet. She loves everyone immediately and throws her young hearted lust for life into everything she does. She'll land on your lap faster than sitting for you if you have a cookie; that type. I love her to bits. When she started cleaning Shelby and the kids as soon as the pups took I thought for sure we had another Naveed on our hands - a true Maman that would steal everyone elses pups and pretend they were also her's... from her first litter forward. Not so much with Boleyn. She came home from the c-section and was more than a little wary of the little gerbil squeaky things I seems to want her to like. I was anxious as she initially seemed to think they were squeaky toys... nonetheless we do everything puppy together and she is never without me in the company of puppies. I need all the years at the end of my life I can get. I don't plan to lose any more to worry; I've seen what rejecting moms can do. I kept expecting the 'mom' to kick in.... not so much really. This was different, though, than the Dam who just doesn't enjoy being a mother - Boleyn LOVES her puppies, she's just unsure what to do with them. She refuses to clean them... and gives me the, "you expect me to WHAT?!" look every time I hint at what needs to be done!! You get the picture; this one is very much OUR litter - we are both the Mom (hence the teenage mom crack earlier). The pups adore her and climb all over her, and though she doesn't seem to know why, Boleyn seems to enjoy it.

I'm very excited for the next week; the time when puppies start to interact and play. Though early stages of motherhood seem to elude Boleyn playtime is her specialty... If I were a betting woman I would put good money down on this Momma really enjoying the next few weeks.