Not wanting to tempt fate...

I bought some puppy training pads for Horace. These are just absorbent pads which you put on the floor and then hopefully the puppy gets used to doing his business here rather than elsewhere. I hadn't heard of them before, or perhaps I had but they didn't register.

There seems to have been quite a few changes from when I first had Bob. I can't remember all the different variations of dog food being available then. Even here there's a plethera of options, I'm sure when I first had Bob it was just a choice of dry or canned.

And so far it seems to be working quite well. I guess that he can feel the difference and as we know to our cost, all animals appear to prefer to spend a penny on something soft, perhaps it will be easier to housetrain him than I thought. If we can get him so he goes on the pads, we can just move the pads closer and closer to the door. So far I put one by his bed and one on the floor by where I sit, so when I put him on the floor when he starts fidgeting I pop him straight onto that.

Charlie has been much more straightforward to housetrain as she can go outside. She's pretty good but not perfect.

It's surprising how much the two of them have grown, although it obviously shouldn't be that much of a surprise. Charlie now hangs off the box she used to sleep on. I often wonder if puppies feel it's strange - the fact that everything gets smaller as they get older!

Festivities

So we're now in the build up to the real celebrations and the anticipation of the three kings. Last night we could hear carol music and the shops are all gearing up to the busy time. The three kings even find their way onto Amazon:

All is well here. Horace is still perplexing with his eating. That's a really good way to describe it. He's putting on weight and is probably double the size he was when he came to us. And he does eat well - but generally only if we hold his food for him. He will eat on his own but it takes an eternity. He skips through his food, scattering it on the floor and then can't find it. And we then have to scoop it up, put it back in his bowl and start again. His bowl can't be any deeper otherwise he wouldn't be able to get to his food - and it's ceramic to stop him moving it around mid-skip.

He is also highly suspicious of anything that isn't his normal food. He needed worming so I popped a tablet into some pate. Normally the dogs are very enthused by this, and I gave him a tiny bit of pate without a tablet, I hoped to get him excited so he'd hoover up the tablety-pate. But he ignored it. I eventually put a tiny bit on his nose for him to lick off and he didn't like that. I tried putting some of his food with the pate on my hand, and he carefully ate his food and ignored the pate. So decided the pate approach wasn't going to work and put the tablet as it was into a pile of food on my hand and he eventually ate it thinking it was a piece of his food.

When he's a bit bigger we'll let him eat with Millie, he may be more focussed if there's another dog who will help him finish his meal!

The weather has been very nice. We even sat outside and ate our orange juice ice lollies on Tuesday! First time we've done that for a while.

Cheese Shopping

We went back to the vet this morning just for a revision following Tinks and Charlie's visit on Monday. They are both OK, so that's good.

Charlie is a star. Everyone loves her - and she loves them. It's partly due to her poor vision. She doesn't see everyone, so all of a sudden she'll see someone new and get's excited as if they'd just walked in. We saw the lady who first had Pirata. We see her occasionally in there and she's always pleased to see us (I think). She was in there with her dogs, one of which is 18 years old - which is a very good age.

We also went cheese shopping. We bought two cheeses. We didn't choose the second best cheese in the world - instead picking one we'd had before. The shelves were groaning with award winning cheeses - I think it was a good year for Extremadura cheese.

And here's a photo of Horace on my lap - but how did he get there...?? (oh yes, as a complete aside, I was looking at some photos we took in 2005 and I noticed I'm wearing the same fleece top I'm wearing her in this pic. I have worn it every year we've been here and as I got it from a charity shop - it was certainly a great investment!)

This is how he got there!

But it doesn't always go to plan, he got distracted in this attempt...

Horace Playing

Here's a video of Horace playing. He happily bounces around like this most of the time. This is one of the reasons it takes him so long to eat. He skips up to his food, scatters it on the floor, eats one bit, skips away again...

What is interesting is how he chases his tail. The vet said he has no reaction in his eyes at all, yet he appears to be chasing his tail. So it is either instinctive or he can 'feel' his tail chasing him.

Had to go to the vet yesterday with Charlie who has diarrhea and Tinks who has a cough. Hopefully Charlie will be better with some medication. A cough in Tinkerbelle is a little more significant. She coughs because her heart doesn't pump strongly enough to remove all the fluid from her lungs. This is what made her ill 18 months ago and was the first sign her heart was a little weak. The medicine has worked wonders, however the vet wanted to know if the cough meant it was time to increase her medicine. However she was x-rayed and it is just a cough, which is good news, hopefully. It certainly hasn't slowed her down in any way - she makes an appearance at the end of the video!

Charlie and queenie

Playing

Horace

Looking clean after a bath!

Roland, Pirata and Queenie

I couldn't have got them to sit like this if I had tried!!

Three Weeks in...

So, after three weeks with two new puppies things are nowhere near as frazzled as they might be! Charlie remains a very good puppy and while she's a bit bouncy, she's very well behaved. Although Charlie and Horace are the same age, there's a lot of difference between them development-wise. Horace is still a little baby, and while he has eaten a whole meal on his own yesterday and today, that's been the first time he's eaten without help. He's a happy little chap though, he bounces round like a lamb - with all four feet off the ground as he bounces. And he's just starting to engage with the others. He was trying to get Charlie to play on Saturday and she was very gentle with him. The others just ignore him.

Horace is quite nervous and will hide when he's not sure of something. He doesn't come to us, but he no longer squeaks when he is picked up. I think that life is a bit confusing for him so it will take him some time to get settled. Unfortunately he has to go back to the vet on Wednesday, so I hope that doesn't set him back at all.

The biggest challenge with Horace is keeping him with water. He's much too tiny to find his way outside and doens't know his way around the house yet. When we put water down the others drink it, so we have to remember to pop him away in the bedroom with a bowl of water a few times a day.

Charlie is beginning to get more fluffy. She's going to have soft and silky coat, unlike Queenie's more wirey coat. We can see the long hair starting to come through on her tail. We'll have to get her used to being groomed.

And our other new arrival, Missy the cat, is now fully recovered after her operation. She still hisses at the dogs, but is getting increasingly comfortable in their company.

In other news, after ten years my About contract hasn't been renewed so I am no longer writing about rubber stamping for them. No real surprise, but it would have been nice to have had it for another couple of months before we get money coming in from the course we're launching. 

Wilbur Substitute

More Horace and Wilbs

Horace and Wilbs

Dimrose

Looking content on.the clean washing!

I can't help myself

How could i not share another cute Horace pic!!!