puppies

Cadence was in 7th heaven

As usual, it's taken me weeks to get around to actually writing this out, (a month!?  how did that happen?) so forgive me if the pictures are slightly dated...One of Kelly's good friends, Joe, and his mom Lisa (who you may remember from this  and this) recently gave us a real treat - the opportunity to play with their puppies.  Their thirteen puppies.  And two grown dogs.  That's a heck of a lot of doggy wonderful!

All thirteen puppies in their cozy little bed.

Their dog Nala (who's father is Gunner, a big black lab that lives near us, and occasionally breaks free from his owners and comes bounding into our yard to visit Pepper) gave birth to the surprisingly large litter last month.  They'll be going off to their new homes this week, so I'm very glad we got the opportunity to meet and play with them all.

Mom shares a moment with a pup

checkin' out the visitors

Cadence, always the altruistic soul, spent plenty of time with 16 year old chloe, too.

Chloe seemed to be acting as a slightly aloof yet benevolent grandmother figure

..This one is a bit silly since its mostly puppy butts, but I like how it shows the puppy-to-Cadie size ratio. And how she was able to interact with them. She's really amazingly gentle. (we have growing up with the cats to thank for that, I think, as gentle was one of the first descriptive words she seemed to understand.)

A puppy in relation to James's hand. So teeny!

Puppy pile!

Nala is a good mama, she made sure to check out each visitor and everything we had around her babies...including my camera. Good dog.

And of course Cadence spent plenty of time doting on Mama Nala, too...she delighted in giving her treats.

It was a bit wet out that day (hence the splotch on my knee) and this pup seemed perfectly content to hang out in my lap.

A pup using my finger as a pacifier.

Cute blue-eyed close up...

James with an armload of pups

Cadence, Puppies, and Nala thinking that if she gets this many treats with visitors, she could get used to this whole idea...

Cadence gives a puppy a kiss

really wish this one wasn't so overexposed...I'll have to fuss with it someday...when I have time...

Cadence welcomes a pup onto her lap. We visited again a few weeks later and the puppies were already too big to fit like this.

I didn't manage to catch the shot I was going for with this, where cadence had three puppies sitting in her lap all once...!

Cadence had a really great time, but she later told us that she liked Nala best because she was the biggest.