Chihuatude

Sorry for the wait, but I have been on the road, and a little occupied.  Blinda however has been at home, caring for the chi-ildren, and taking care of all the issues.

Babe finally did give birth, but it was only one puppy, a little white and black female, who was unfortunately stillborn.  It’s always painful and sad when this happens, and it does happen once in a while.  We were looking forward to another litter of rambunctious little puppies.  The combination of Babe and Junior Boy would have been quite interesting.  Babe is such an active, hell, hyperactive little thing, and Junior boy so laid back and loving.  Perhaps another time, we’ll get lucky and see the results of such a joining.

Right now, Tia, Callie, and Roxy are in heat.  We are only allowing Tia the freedom, and keeping Callie and Roxy segregated.  It is quite the chore to keep the kids segregated, trading time in the kennels, and being as equal about it as possible. Callie had such a hard time with her first litter, we are a little scared to let her get pregnant again.  We will probably get her spayed in the near future.  Roxy just had her litter, so we want her to have a good rest. 

Tia as usual, is being the drama queen she has always been.  For some reason, she is not interested in Peanut, but wants Teco instead.  This is a new occurrence, and could prove very interesting.  Teco has long hair in his background, and has produced some gorgeous long haired puppies.  Tia always throws beautiful puppies, so we’ll just have to wait and see.

Once again, after nearly three years, Babe is once again expecting.  It has been a long time indeed, but she finally did it.  Perhaps I should say Junior Boy did it, although, obviously Babe had a part in it.  I’m not really sure what had happened previously, but I thought perhaps she had become sterile.  Peanut and Teco have had their turn at her, and neither one has accomplished what Junior Boy has. 

I’m looking forward to the arrival, sometime in the next week, of the new babies.  I really am interested to see what the combination has created.  In the past, Babe has always had chocolate and white puppies, and a few mostly white puppies.  Of course that was when Gizmo was the father.  Since Gizmo’s passing, Babe has not been pregnant again, until now.  I guess she just decided that Junior was the man she wanted, LOL.

Here is a picture of one of her last litters, there were 9 puppies in that one.  This time around, I don’t think she’ll have that many, because she just isn't that large.  The official due date is Wednesday, but you never know they can come earlier or sometimes later.  I’ll be sure to update when the happy event happens.

Back in the last week of October Callie gave birth to her first and last litter of puppies.  She only had two puppies, and they were perfectly healthy.  She had such a hard time with the delivery, we decided that she would have no more.  If not for her, for our own sense of sanity.  You can not imagine the stress involved when one of your kid’s is having such difficulty. 

Peanut was the daddy, and he is a pound smaller, 3 pounds 4 ounces, than Callie, 4 pounds 8 ounces.  But it didn’t seem to matter, her two puppies were very large, especially for her little frame.  I don’t think they are going to be large Chihuahuas, it’s just that when they were born, they were larger than we were used to.  As a matter of fact, her little girl probably wont be more than 3 pounds, I think.  We do hear from her parents from time to time, and she is still pretty small, so I guess we’ll see what happens. 

Things started out easy enough, and pretty much on par with what we are used to.  Callie didn’t eat at all that day, which is normal.  She got this forlorn look in her eyes, and started “preparing” the couch.   She doesn’t look very big in this picture, but by the time she gave birth, her little belly looked as if she was carrying four or five puppies.  When she started scratching the blankets up and laying ON TOP of them, we knew it was time.  We had already set up a birthing kennel, so we moved her over there. 

Now Callie is an independent minded, read spoiled rotten, little thing.  A Momma’s baby from head to toe, capable of bending her Mothers whim with a simple glance of those precious brown eye’s.  Of course I’m totally immune to this, yeah right I’m just as much of a push over as Blinda.  Callie was going to have none of this birthing kennel thing.  Her spot is on the couch beside Momma, and she knows it.  She fought us, resisting the kennel, a first for her, and insisting on staying where she was most comfortable.  Of course being Callie, we had to sit, one on either side of her for the duration, she’s such a needy child. 

She really did have a difficult delivery, we were very, very, worried.  In the end, I had to kind of move things around a little so the babies would pass through he birth canal.  I noticed that the babies seemed to be pushing on the upper side of her vagina, and I had to pull it up a little so the first one could slip out.  After that, it was no time until the other little tyke was born.  As these things seem to go, the biggest was born first.  A little boy weighing in at a whopping 8 ounces.  The second was a little girl at 6 ounces.  There was no doubt they were Peanuts babies, both of them had the exact same markings as him, and his ears and head.

We were able to move her to “her” kennel when all was said and done.  She just was not going to have anything to do with that birthing kennel.  Callie was an exceptional mother.  She seemed to never want to leave her babies side.  Blinda had to physically take her outside, being sure to shut the doggy door so she couldn’t rush back in.  This went on for nearly a full month, it was pretty funny, now that I look back on it.  Callie even ended up taking in two other puppies when we lost Sable, a story I will get into at a later date, very tragic and hard for me to talk about. 
 
I almost thought we were going to end up keeping Callie’s little girl.  Not because no one was interested, everyone wanted her, she was so small.  She was just had the most outgoing, sweetest personality we have ever seen.  Blinda became so very attached to her, when she finally did head off to her fur-ever home, Blinda cried for hours.  That is one of the hardest things about breading, the letting go when it’s time.  She was forever holding her, and calling her Itty Bitty or Tiny Girl.  The little boy was a tad more “boisterous”, and was always play rough with Itty Bitty.  She held her own though, and would keep the others in their place.

I had promised to mention a surprise puppy.  During the time we were letting Callie out in the first month, we had to lock all the other dogs up in their kennels, or Callie simply would not come out at all.  She was just so protective.  One night, we were letting Callie have the run of the house, to stretch her little legs.  All the dogs were in their respective kennels, taking a nap.  All of a sudden there was a commotion of activity, and the every one of them started barking. A different bark than normal.  We went to see what was going on, and low and behold, Tia had given birth to a single baby boy.  Teco was sleeping with Tia at the time, and when we found them, he was as far away from Tia and that funny looking little thing as possible.  I think if he could have squeezed through the kennel bars, he would have happily. 

We had just that evening laughed and commented that Tia must be having sympathetic pregnancies syndrome.  Her teats were swollen and she acted pregnant, but was not big at all.  Little Tia had been segregated when she came into heat the last time, because we were trying to skip this cycle.  Little did we know Peanut snuck a little time with her before we caught on.  Yes it was with out a doubt Peanuts offspring.  A little, solid white long hair boy.  who became the plumpest Chi baby we have ever had.  Tia had also taken in two of Sable’s Babies afterward, and later Annie's runt because her other babies were not letting it get enough milk.  We called him Weebles, as in Weebles Wobble but don’t fall.