Twiggybet1's Blog

Life with Puppy
Feb 13, 2009 | 10:45 PM PST

My oh my, having a puppy in the house is a lot like having a toddler in the house - they both get into EVERYTHING! And you must watch them EVERY MINUTE!  Our new little girl puppy Bella is settled in just fine, and is actually quite spoiled, sometimes seeming to think she runs the house!  I had worried at first that she wouldn't get along with our Beagle Bailey, as he seemed a bit jealous and very nervous with her around, but after a few days, they were playing like best buddies.  However, Bella thinks it is fun to chase the cats.  A big no-no, she is going to be way too big to pick on them once she is grown.  She has also discovered that she likes slippers and wood furniture.   Kind of reminds me of kids, they all seem to discover all on their own how much fun it is to jump on the bed. So far, we have caught her in time before she caused any permanent damage.  The housebreaking is going so-so.  She does very well some days, and others are full of "mistakes."  But it seems she is making progress as time goes on.  A tip for anyone considering getting a puppy:  invest in one of those quick mops - the kind with the throw-away cloths that squirt cleaning solution.  I have one of those Clorox ready-mops, and it has really come in handy for cleaning up puppy messes.

Here is a picture of Bella with her siblings:

They are, left to right, Star, Rose, Bella, Sword, and Goliath.  My sister is keeping both Star and Goliath.  By now, both Rose and Sword have gone to their new homes and are probably renamed by their new owners, I imagine.  Both Rose and Goliath have blue eyes, the other three are yet to be determined, but are probably going to be brown.  This picture was taken when they were a little over 4 weeks old, they are now 8 weeks old. 

A sad little story:  My nephew was playing with Star on the couch, roughhousing, and she fell off the couch.  She yipped once, but seemed to be o.k.  Then, my sister noticed she was limping slightly, and thought maybe she got bruised on her leg.  She checked her out, palpatated the muscle, and the puppy didn't seem to be in pain, but several days later, she was still limping, so my sister took her to the vet.  Guess what?  Her femur is broken.  They can't cast it, it is still growing.  It was entirely split and separated, but has started to heal.  She has to pamper her for 2 weeks and take her back for more x-rays.  She will not be able to pull a sled, and will probably have a limp forever.  There are 2 different surgery treatments (depending) that they may try.  The vet gave her pain medicine for the puppy, even though she didn't act as if she was in pain.  The vet thinks her bones may have been weakened because she wasn't able to nurse after 4 weeks when the mother dog died, and wasn't getting enough calcium in her puppy food.  Poor little thing! 

We have had all sorts of weather since I last blogged.  We had a real cold snap, with single digit temps for several days, dipping into the negative numbers at night.  It snowed almost every day during that time.  Then, the weather warmed up considerably for a few days, warm enough to melt all the snow, all 18 inches of it.  Then we had a couple of days of very heavy rain and strong wind, and flood warnings.  They cancelled college classes one day on account of flood warnings.  And now, the temps are back down to the normal usual range, 20's to 30's, and it snowed this morning. In fact, it's snowing again right now as I write this.  What a weather roller coaster!  I would have loved to get outside to work in the yard when it was warm, but everything was too wet and muddy from melted snow and rain.  The only outdoor chore I managed to get done was poop-scoop duty.  Not my favorite, goes without saying. 

I have been very busy preparing for Spring! I set up my shelves and fluorescent lights, rounded up my seed trays and now, I just have to fill them and sow my seeds. I also have been saving milk jugs and similar containers for winter sowing. It is still a couple weeks too early to start peppers and tomatoes indoors, but I want to do both indoor and wintersowing, and compare methods. Last year, I didn't know what I was doing with the wintersowing, but live and learn, I am determined to do better this year. I have a note book that I will put to good use taking notes. I placed a couple orders from some seed catalogs, and am anxiously awaiting my deliveries!  One thing I ordered this year is a mushroom growing kit.  Yeah, I know, they seem exorbitantly expensive, but I have been so curious about them, and have been looking at them in seed catalogs for a couple years now, so I thought just this once, I would indulge myself with this extravagance.  My whole household loves mushrooms.  I just hope I get my money's worth of harvest.  Lately, fresh mushrooms have been very expensive in the grocery store, so it makes the growing kit seem not as expensive.  That's my justification and I am sticking to it!!!!! LOL!

When I haven't been busy playing with my planting materials, or on puppy-sitting duty, I have been busy with early "Spring Cleaning."  I have sorted through nearly every drawer, closet and cupboard.  I have 2 dressers that are currently not being used to store clothing, and I plan to take them to the property and put them back to good use there.  I have decided it might be a good idea to set aside some of our clothes to keep up there (make it easier to take off quickly for a weekend if I have less packing to do).  Mostly leisure and work clothes, of course, seeing as we have so much work to do up there this spring.  I also sorted through my kitchen utensils.  I have always complained that I don't seem to have enough cupboard space, but after sorting through all my stuff, I discovered I have quite a few doubles.  No wonder I didn't have enough space, and why didn't I realize this sooner?  Well, good thing I didn't, because there is absolutely nothing up at the property yet.  I am setting aside some bedding and bath linens also.  I have a couple of painting projects I have been itching to do, but haven't yet found the time.  Some of the molding in some of the rooms are in desperate need of touching up.  I really want to get this done before the weather warms up, because once the gardening season begins, I'm likely not to get to it. 

February is a pretty busy month, as far as family birthdays go.  Today (13th) is my sister Cindy's birthday.  I had to tease her that it was Friday this year.  I told her to have christmas lights instead of candles on her cake to avoid catching her hair on fire. hee hee!  (I actually DID catch my hair on fire from my birthday candles one year long, long ago!)  Sometimes, she gets in the oddest predicaments or weirdest situations, we are all forever teasing her that she was born on a Friday!  Next weekend, we are going to my inlaws for my Mother-in-law's birthday. Hers is on the 22nd.  I am supposed to bake the cake, and my daughter is going to decorate it (she took cake decorating classes and loves to do this).  I will try to remember to post of picture of the finished cake.  Also this month, 2 neices and 1 nephew are also celebrating birthdays.  Besides birthdays, my one neice who lives in Florida is coming up for a visit.  Really looking forward to that, it's been almost a year since she moved down there, and I miss her and her kids. 

 I have been enjoying reading everyone's blogs.  It seems so many of us are anxiously awaiting spring, and a lot of us gardeners seems so enthusiastic and raring to go, once the weather starts cooperating!  It's fun to see what others are planning on doing this year, lots of good ideas out there.

Happy Spring Garden Planning, everyone!  until next time....