One week old FAT squeakers!

I suppose that you would like some more pictures!?  Well, here they come.

This is from a few days ago.

Taken this AM, about 0841!

Believe it or not, there ARE seven fat puppies in that pile!

Touille protects them from me or the camera, who knows which?!

She also cleans them constantly.  It is a wonder they still have hair!!!

I did remove dew claws two days ago and everyone seems fine after that trauma.  It REALLY traumatizes me to do it.  I can't stand hurting them!  I lessen the hurt by injecting numbing liquid, lidocaine, each time I do it, so the injection is all they feel and that is less than the dew claw removal would have been without the lidocaine.  I figure that in the long run though, the hurt is less than making a dew claw bleed over and over when clipping nails over a lifetime.  I do nick a dew claw on one of mine that hasn't been removed once in awhile and feel horrid after doing it.  Dew claws are a pain in the neck or leg, depending on one's point of view!
Their next trauma will be when I implant their ISO microchip.  I HATE doing that too!  That is a microchip that is recognized all over the world now.  These babies will be able to go to Crufts, Canada, or Hawaii with less rigamarole than otherwise!  VBG
Well, enough blabbering.  How's that, Angus?
The Curmudgeon needs to get to work. 

Traveled babies!!!

This is their second day coming to work.  They don't mind it.  I heat up the heating pad, put it in the carrier bag, put all seven of them in on top of the warm heating pad, zip it up and wrap the bag in a warm blanket.  Then we hop in the car and come the three miles to work.  They are quiet and content, not cold.  No screaming, which is what they would do if they were cold.
They are doing well, nursing most of the time.  They are fat and their coats glisten like seal fur.  I love how their coats look at this age.  Little boogers that they are, they do wiggle lots when I pick them up.  I have already started the rubbing their chests when they are on their backs in my hands.  That calms them right down. 

Touille is a good/great mom. 

Can you tell how much fatter/bigger they are?  They are really filling out!  Again, the grizzles are kind of bunched together!  You can see their brown heads.  The blues have heads that are black and one can see their brown eyebrows.

How did that Hawaii picture get in there?!!!!!  Cute little house.  I hear that there are at least five bunches of bananas in that banana patch!

OK.  The Old Curmudgeon is being called back to work by her conscience and other things!  I'll get more onto the blog soon.  Fat babies unite at the milk bar!

Doomsday or The End of the Mayan Calendar!

Today started out with a bang, but a constructive bang instead of a destructive one!  At close to 3:00 AM Touille had her first boy.  She ended up, by about 6:10 AM, having SIX boys and one lonely girl.  She did an amazing job.  What a great little girl!

Touille and her team and cheerleader.

They seem to be healthy and eating.

There are four blue puppies, of which the girl is one.  Betty says that the boys will have to watch out for that sister, but six against one is pretty hefty odds!
Touille is always a bit protective of the babies at first.  She is even afraid I will eat them!  All the good mamas are like that.  See how her front leg is kind of shielding them?  I put the blanket over them and that makes her happy.
They came to work in a bag with a heated up heating pad in the bottom and I placed it on the heated front seat.  I ran the car for awhile and had the heater on full blast.  We are having a bit of a cold snap.  Luckily, after today, we will have about four days at home.  Yippee!!!!!
Clicking starts soon, as well as the neurological stimulation exercises.  These puppies will never get car sick because of going back and forth to work every workday.  Scientifically proven!!!!
Enjoy the pictures.  More to come!
Don't worry.  I'll kiss them LOTS.
The Happy Curmudgeon with the terrible cold (I need rest!)

OK, more brags and not about puppies

So, the weekend of Oct. 27, 2012 we went to Ridgefield, WA to dog shows down there.  Saturday was OUR day!  I took Zinger and entered her as a champion because she had finished her championship.  That day she took Best of Breed and there were nine specials that day, meaning nine champions competing.  That was a very nice win.  She then went on to win a Group 3, and she was handled by Caleb Campbell, a junior handler.  Pretty nice win.
Ono took the boy points and that was a major win, and that finished his championship.  Pip won the girl points and then was proclaimed Best of Winners so she also got the boy major.  A major means that the dog has beaten a pre-set number of other dogs.  AKC doesn't want a dog to just beat one other dog fifteen times; they must beat a number of other dogs to be considered good enough to become a champion.
Elwha Border Terriers did well that day.  We didn't do as well the next day, but we did well.

Zinger winning Best of Breed  She is a very nice little girl and I am excited about her.  She is doing fantastically at Nosework too, she, Betty and Bonnie.

Pip, sideways, getting her first major.  I don't know how to rotate this picture, even though I tried. (Don't look at the doofy breeder in the picture!!)

Zinger's Group 3.  She looks mighty nice there with Caleb, doesn't she?!!!

I don't know if I ever added Zinger's Group 2 that she got.  This was even better as she was not yet a champion, but took the breed over champion and went on to get a Group 2, even better than the Group 3.  Like I said, nice girl.  Sweet girl.

That was at the nearby dog show in Sequim at the end of July.  Zinger turns two years old tomorrow.  Sorry about the rotation here too.

Finally found Ono's win picture.  Is your neck stiff yet?  Sorry.

On a very sad note, Zinger's brother, Norman, who took Select Dog at this year's National Specialty and Winners Dog at last year's National Specialty under a British judge, was lost from his backyard on Oct. 30th.  My heart is broken as well as Star Ott's and Joni Gibson's hearts, besides all the people who wanted to use him as a stud.  I have learned at least one thing from this tradegy, and that is to have TWO fences around my dogs, so that someone would have to stupidly leave open TWO gates when leaving a yard and maybe that would keep them from leaving any gates open allowing my dogs to escape.  I have boarded up my gates so that this doesn't happen to one of the ones at my house!!!  I will take those boards down when I get the inside perimeter fence up.  What we do to protect our loving companions!!!!  It will keep me from having a broken heart again, hopefully.

Enough.  The Sad Curmudgeon, and The Proud Curmudgeon.

How boring can I be? Or, can I put you to sleep while I brag?

I was in Hawaii for two weeks moving the contents of my house back into the house after the inside was painted.  I also was buying a few more things it needed.  It will become a vacation rental, starting today!  I get to "rent" it myself when I want to see Frank, Michelle and the boys and all the other sweet people there who mean so much to me.  Kathleen threatens to move there to be near her brother, so I am happy I could find a little fixer upper!  ANYWAY, back to dogs!
I arrived in the Seattle airport from Hawaii on Oct. 18th at about 10:00 PM and drove home, arriving about 0130 on the 19th.  I worked on that Friday, and Saturday the 20th, the dogs and I went to Whidbey Island.  I had signed Pip up for a MOCK Nosework 2 trial, despite not having practiced for the two weeks I was in Hawaii.  I will tell you that Pip has not yet done much in the Nosework world besides passing her ORT for birch.  ORT stands for Odor Recognition Test and tells the governing body that the dog can at least recognize and tell the handler that they recognize an odor.  Then, when that is passed, the team can enter a test.  We passed the ORT, but have not had a test to enter since we passed the ORT.  Note the "we."  I should have said "she."  Pip is a "sniffaholic," for sure.  She LOVES this game.  I love to watch her play the game and am as delighted as I can be at how much fun she is having.
So, our instructor told the judge that Pip had never practiced "containers," which means Pip telling me where the scents are in spite of there being distractants planted inside some of the containers to stymy some of the dogs.  The judge told her she'd tell me where the distracting things were and Pip could practice finding the birch and anise smells since she has practiced both.  We had only just started on anise a week or so before I left.  The distractants were things like bacon grease, cinnamon rolls, bison treats, etc.  That is what the judges told us afterwards anyway.
When we went into the gymnasium, I told the judge that I would just like to see what my dog would do, not to tell me anything.  She motored through the gym and told me right where the anise and birch were and we passed!  Then we went outside and passed half of the vehicle search.  I was happy, but happier yet at lunchtime when they announced the best dogs and Pip came in fourth for the morning!  I cried I was so flabbergasted and pleased.  This novice dog with her love of sniffing and playing the game made her mom proud, proud, proud!

No pics of Pip hunting, but some of the house in Hawaii!

The front porch, a room in itself!

Backyard, looking toward Maui which we see in the AMs before the clouds roll in.

Some of my sweet, favorite people in my living room.

The banana patch Frank and I planted a year ago.  It is forming its first bananas right now!

Another view toward Maui, in the afternoon!

For the afternoon we did average, meaning she did not find the scents outside where the bunnies distracted her.  Another story for another day!  She did great on the inside finds and the judge even gave us a "pronounced" designation, which means that she thought we were a great TEAM.  I was pretty pleased with that too!
So, I just got to bore you.  Now you know what makes me cry, besides the fact that Zinger's brother, Norman, Select Dog at this year's National Specialty, is lost.  Someone left a gate open Oct. 30th, where he lived in Temecula, CA.  I'm sick.
What I REALLY want to tell you in this blog is to go out and do Nosework with your dogs!  They LOVE it and have a blast doing it!  Old dogs, deaf dogs, sick dogs.  All can do it and have FUN!

Gone with the wind!

Most of the puppies are now in their forever homes, and, by all accounts, loving it!

Tigger, Zip, went first, to Chicago!  He lives with two other Border Terriers and Belgian Tervurens, and Jill and Ron.  Reports are good and he is well loved there, despite being a rascal!  He has a handsome new collar and thinks he is the grandest tiger in the jungle.  I couldn't figure out how to save the pictures of him and his new collar.  Computer challenged cantankerous curmudgeon....

Trekker, Lightening Bug, went next, on the 11th and made Randy and Kathy happy that the hole in their heart was again filled.  Trekker is playing with their two year old grandson on a regular basis and is, by their account, a fun, smart dog and a great playmate for the grandson.

Mia, Connie, went to live in Snohomish and is melding into that family beautifully.  Her buddy, Max, is happy to let her do anything to him, according to Laura.  Max is a Pip and Ono brother. 

Morse, now Angus, drove from here to Boise to live with his two new children and their parents.  These Border Terriers LOVE kids, and Angus lucked out with TWO!!!  Great kids who listen to their mother and dad and who were respectful of the puppies.  Angus has a loving family who also had lost an old Border Terrier and had holes in their hearts that needed filling too.  They got that!

Harper left Sunday and is in Colorado and happy with her new family including a cute BT named Stella.

Tate, Drew, is still with me and is doing very well with housebreaking and playing.  He was a bit reserved before, but has blossomed since his siblings left.  Interesting to me how they go through stages.  He wasn't fearful, just cautious.  The entire litter was more on the cautious side than my other litters have been.  Something in the water....

My someday store in Hawaii!!!  Getting ready for the kids to use!

BB loving his mama.  Yoga time!  Sweet picture.

Harper in Colorado having fun.

Trekker with his new buddy.  How cute is that!!!?

Until the next word splurge!
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Home day minus ONE

Good for the puppies, sad for the cantankerous curmudgeon....  Tomorrow the puppies, except for one, go to their forever homes.
Debby flies in today from Colorado to take the Dame away, and tomorrow Kathy and Randy take Lightening/Trekker, Laura takes the QT, and Lori and family take Morse.
The pups have been super good and stay in a crate without eliminating and are good about going in the yard to do their "business" and to have FUN with the big dogs.
We had good luck in Canada and Ono finished his championship there quickly, so we came home a bit early.

The

kids

and

the

puppies

had

FUN.

I

did

too

just

watching.

Crazy curmudgeon can't find the way to turn the picture right side up!  Zinger's Group II.  Isn't she gorgeous?

Today the kids came to the office to play with the babies.  Kids and pups had fun.

Going away for a week

to Vancouver Island dog shows.  It will be very much fun.  I won't have a chance to write on the blog though.  That is the warning!!!

Elli, my daughter's old dog in her new bed.  CJ's daughter.

Lightening Bug, now Trekker, on your left and Sleepy Morse on the right.

Trekker and his new mom.  They will go to their forever homes in about 8 days.Kathy and Randy had a HARD time deciding between these two sweet babies.

July 31

We had a great weekend and yesterday.

Saturday we went to our local dog show and Ono took his second major.  Zinger then went on to take the breed over an already champion.  Then she went on to take a Group II.  That was very exciting.  Ono didn't even take his class the next day and Zinger only beat the only other girl for one point.  She has majors to spare, so I'm not worried.  She will finish her next show most likely as she only needs one or two points.  She is VERY nice.

The puppies all have homes assigned.  Zipper/Sherlock has already flown, FIRST CLASS,  to Chicago to live with Jill and her Borders and Belgian Tervurens (and husband.)  Zip got to sleep in bed with Jill and her husband last night and I totally agree that that is the BEST way to start a new puppy out.  I put mine in a soft crate/"Sherpa bag" and when the puppy gets restless, I hear it move and I then take it out to eliminate immediately.  They quickly learn to "go" outside.  Jill seems to me to be someone who has read a lot of the same things I have read or something.  We do a lot of the same things it seems.  Zip will now probably be Tigger.  I have always thought that every other BT should be named that!!!  It has been on my short list for a long time.  I tend to name mine one syllable names though lately.  Maybe I'm lazy.

Connie may be called Abby.  They are still debating.  I have a bunch of puppies I've placed who are named Abby.  I think it is a very popular name.  She will live in Snohomish.

Morse and Lightening will go to homes in Idaho and Seattle.  The Seattle boy will be named Trekker.  Kind of a nice ring to that.  No idea what the other one will be called.  Nor what Drew will be called.  He will go down to Southern California.  His name may end up being Michael, for Michael Phelps.  The Dame will be a show pup and has the attitude to die for.  What a cute puppy.  I love her.

I'm sorry about the lack of pictures.  I have been twelve hours on the road since Sunday and am tired from all the hullabaloo!  Excuses, excuses!!!  Tomorrow probably.

Hugs from a tired, lazy, cantankerous, happy curmudgeon....

Hot off the press!!!!

Gonna get that Mom.

What are they doing over there?!

I spy.Zipper.

Cute, cute, cute.  Drew.

Dame

The Gang.  Boys.

They race up and down. 

Early morning intrigue.

Comin' at ya!

Drew again.

Connie and Drew.

Blurs in the yard.

They do very much like the cat tunnels.

Connie

Morse

The Inspector

Really?  A dog?  Where?

Exploring, because I put something in there, a smaller tunnel.

Race down. 

Touille watching for cats.

Holes at the base of the Rainier cherry tree.

True terriers.  They love the holes.

BB having fun.

More BB fun.

As promised, more pictures.  Pictures taken at 0645 today! 

They are seven weeks old today.  Sweet babies, for sure.
More pictures to come.

Above is one taken days ago.  They look too big to nurse, but they are still at it whenever they can, then they maul their mom.
As you see, three dark ones and three light ones.
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