Day 6

Brinkley & Brandy have now been home for 6 days and we have had so much fun. They are hard work but such a joy. It’s really good to have wood floors everywhere, so much easier to keep clean than carpet. They must think that the world smells of disinfectant as we have cloths, sprays and floor mops all doused in the stuff (special pet formula of course – don’t want to upset their tummy’s – and have even more mess to clean up!)

So far they recognise their names, come running when you call them through for food and fight each other whenever they are awake. They know what ‘No’ means and haven’t damaged anything, even stuff that’s on the floor. They try to chew most things but are easily distracted with one of their toys. When we get up in the morning we have to be careful where we put our feet as they are prone to accidents in the night but at least half of the time they are using the training pads properly. Brinkley is learning quicker than Brandy.

We’ve got a puppy play-pen so that we know where they are. We thought this would be useful when visitors come round especially our grand-daughter who is only 10 months old. One slight problem, the pups are so small they can get through the bars. It will be a couple of weeks before they have grown big enough not to escape in the meantime they play in there quite happily with their toys, or fighting with each other, and when they have had enough they just walk out between the bars and go to bed, or go and check the kitchen to see if any food has miraculously appeared or just come over to the settee to be picked up and cuddled. Oddly enough, they will quite happily go into the playpen themselves to play with their toys and even if the gate is open, will go in through the bars. I can see one of them is going to get stuck in a couple of days time when they have put a bit of weight on.

We got through Christmas without any major problems. Yesterday we were up at 4.00am because they wouldn’t settle once they had woken. Trouble was later in the day Neil & I both fell asleep on the settee and when we woke up had no idea where the 2 of them were, but we didn’t need to worry – they were quite happy, playing with their toys, they seem very content little pups. I’m sure having 2 has made settling them at home easier.

We can see changes in them already. Both noses have got a lot blacker, I hadn’t realised that their noses and paws were pink when they were born. Brandy has one paw pad that’s turning black all the others are still pink. Brinkley often sits by the patio door looking out, fascinated by outside but until they have had their jabs they can’t go walking outside. We have put their collars on them for a short time each day to try and get them used to them – Brinkley really isn’t impressed but Brandy tolerates his quite well.

Tomorrow we have a trip out to Dad’s so it will be interesting to see how well behaved they are in the car and in someone else’s house. In the meantime we’ll see how well they sleep tonight. We have had a couple of broken nights – 4am and 5am but this morning they slept through until I woke which meant we all had a good nights sleep but they were absolutely turbo charged for the first hour – then instant collapse.