Petunia had her first litter of puppies! They were delivered on Thursday the 8th. She is a petite pug and we were worried about how many she could carry and whether or not she could deliver them naturally. On the previous Friday night, she started acting like she was going into labor, then nothing on Saturday, but we took her to the vet anyway. He confirmed that we still had a few days to go (we expected them on Tuesday) and he took x-rays. Found 5 puppies with an extra shadow that could have been a 6th. However, she was not to go past Thursday night. If the puppies hadn't come yet by Fri morning, she was to go in for a c-section.

Well, she waited and waited. I was already making arrangements for her to go in on Friday when she started into labor on Thursday morning. With the help of some homeopathic remedies to strengthen the uterus and to aid with contractions, she finally had the babies. Puppy #6 is nicknamed Shadow and puppy #7 is Surprise. All together there are 6 males and 1 female.

So can you count 7 puppies in the picture? Neither can we - lol! Try counting them at 2:30 in the morning when one of them is squealing and you're trying to make sure they're all ok.

Speaking of squealing - this litter has a runt. It's a cute little thing with a huge zest for life. Invariably it'll end up under one of the others and will shout his discomfort. So I'll rescue him and put him in the middle of the bed where at 3 days old, deaf (ears haven't opened) and blind, he'll squirm straight for momma's nipples and make it there in record time. He'll then make all sorts of contented noises while suckling and if another puppy crawls over him and steps on his head, he manages to squeal some more but never let go of that teat!! He's the only other one with a nickname so far. He came out of the sac looking like a 70 year old chinaman. Not too old, but somewhat aged and wise. I half expected him to recommend some ancient herbal remedies to me, but he just squawked his discomfort at being out in the big wide world.