Here a Puppy, There a Puppy...

Yup, you guessed it....everywhere a puppy! Well, our dog 'Nazzy' (named after the hockey great Naslund) has just had a healthy batch of pups. We can't say we were surprised. We knew it would happen again one of these years. I gave a gentle reminder to hubby every year...'you know, if we don't want to deal with puppies again we really should do something about it...' Well, time flies and things get forgotten and now we have no excuses! Now, don't get me wrong, puppies are fun and cute and soft but little puppies grow into bigger puppies who chew and pee and poo and then there's the work of finding good homes for them and so on. Thanks to the help and wisdom of a friend (thanks Heather:) we determined she was expecting pups about a month or so ago and were waiting for the arrival. The girls have been anxiously waiting and checking up on Nazzy every day. This past Sunday evening Naz took off and we didn't see her for about 24 hours. We knew what this meant...time to hunt for puppies! She was really clever this time and found an old out building in our bush that still had some hay and was dry and warm. What a good mama! On Monday night we heard her at her food dish and quickly headed outside to follow her. It was quite an adventure! It was pitch dark and pouring rain. So, flashlights in hand away we went! This is the part where I"m supposed to mention that it was actually Uncle Ken who found the pups...thanks Uncle Ken! Nazzy is the proud mama of 8 baby pups. All are doing well and the girls have swept themselves into 'mommy mode'. They traipse out into the bush every couple hours and make sure all is well. They fill Nazzy's water and food dish, and assign names to the babies. This has been a really fun family experience. Tonight we had the official moving of the pups to the pen up front so we can better care for all of them. Grandma and Grandpa came out tonight to check out their grandpuppies. We'll keep you 'posted' on the little critters.....