First Photos - The Girls Part II

And last but certainly not least:

Even though she was the last born,

we think our brownie Lindy has the Spirit to

accomplish great things. 

And the last of the girls - little brown Piper

will be a real Ace

First Photos - The Girls Part I

And now, we introduce our lovely ladies:

For those who don't know (like I didn't), Allison is very famous type of airplane engine. 

We think our little  brownie, Allison, will "engineer" her way to the top someday. 

Like her namesake, Amelia is a woman with a strong mind and personality.

She's a blackie with the personality of a brownie. 

And we think Miss Cessna, another blackie,

 will take off and fly with the eagles. 

First Photos - The Boys Part II

And the rest of the boys include:

Doolittle is a handsome black boy who will Doo a Lot More than just a Little in his life. 

Sikorsky is another black boy who will hover in someone's heart and family

Yaeger I'm not 100% sure of color but think he's black too.  Time will tell. 

First Photos - The Boys Part I

We took individual photos last night and proudly present our newest batch of high-fliers:

You can't tell it from here but Orville has a black ear patch

And brother Wilbur is the other bookend with a left ear patch

And then there's Wiley - he's one of the pups I'm not sure of color yet

but I THINK he's a brownie. What do you all think?

Road Trip

Well, the kids took their first road trip on Tuesday when they went to the vet to have dewclaws removed.  Actually, we had an appointment for a C-Section but since Jenga took care of that one Sunday, I called and told them we just needed dewclaws removed.  Poor Alan, he had to load everyone up, including Mom, and make the trip to the vet's office.  He said Jenga was frantic when he took the basket o'babies out of the car into the office.  However the old Switcheroo Game kept her from panicing too much.  When he brought her into the office, the babies were already moved to the exam room and she didn't even KNOW she should be looking for them in there. 

 Just like always, the babies are no worse for the wear.  When they're less than 3 days old that bone in the dewclaw hasn't ossified so it's not like we're lopping off any of their toes  It's more like clipping a toenail.  As you can see, courtesy of our lovely assistant Yaeger, it's little more than a scab that will eventually drop off, leaving a nice clean leg.  It's not a "cruel" procedure at all - in fact, removing it now could save a lot of grief, pain and expense if, as an adult, the dog happens to catch the dewclaw on something (like a chainlink fence) and tears it.  MAJOR OUCH!

So Jenga and family "survived" the Road Trip just fine and Mom was content to bed down with her kidlets.  A friend of mine at work saw this photo and laughingly said, "Yep, nursing mother!  Gotta keep the food right there in front of you at all times!" 

Alan's putting the finishing touches on the whelping box he built so hopefully we can move everyone into their new digs today or tomorrow.  Stay tuned for more updates.

Puppies!!

Well Puppy Watch is over and (the New and Improved) Puppy Watch begins.  Jenga who always marches to the beat of her own drummer, decided to do puppies early.  After a long hard day, and a trip to the emergency vet, we have 11 beautiful babies - 6 boys (2 black ear patches) and 5 girls (no patches).  We've got them in both colors but I've not sorted that out exactly. 

Jen was doing great until she got to #8 and then she just stopped.  She was having hard contractions but no puppy.  So off we went to the emergency vet where she promptly delivered #8 (oh yeah, wait until we get there!).  Since we were there we decided to have her x-rayed and we were informed there were 3 more to go.  Good Grief Jenga!  While we were there (and waiting for the vet again - he had a higher level emergency) Jenga decided to produce #9 and #10.  Knowing there was only one more we opted to take her home and let Nature take its course.  Well, we did help her out with a shot of Oxytocin the vet sent home with us.  We got her home and settled and administered the meds and within a half an hour, #11 made her appearance - and I'm pretty sure she's a liver. 

  

We've decided to do an Aviation Theme for the litter this time, so the girls are Amelia, Lindy, Cessna, Piper and Allison.  The boys are Orville and Wilbur (the 2 patch boys of course), Wiley, Yeager, Doolittle and Sikorsky.  we'll try and get photos up tomorrow of everyone but in the meantime here are a couple Alan took last night.  Now, off to cuddle puppies.

Puppy Watch Begins

Well today is Day 58 and Jenga looks like she's ready to pop.  It's hard to believe she's still not technically due until Wednesday.  If she makes it till Monday morning, I'll be surprised.  If she does, I think we're going to go ahead and do a C-Section.  She has a history of very large litters, 14 and 12 puppies, respectively, and rather than take a chance on her getting into it and getting too pooped to push (which happened with her first litter of 14), I think we'll let the vet give her a hand. 

We took her temp this morning and she was at 100.4, which is about doggy normal.  Once she drops below 100 and stays down around 98, puppies should arrive within 24 hours.  Unfortunately, for her temp taking is going to be a twice a day procedure until it's time.  But she still has her appetite which generally means no puppies for awhile but she has been eating smaller meals more frequently.  Hmm, babies are squishing her tummy.  We'll keep you posted.