More puppy trouble

We have a second puppy who is in trouble. Our veterinarian gave her a vitamin shot and wouldn't remove his dew-claws because this little one is too weak right now. Instead she gave us a feeding tube and a syringe and taught my dad to feed her through a tube. He and Mom fed it once, and it died on them, but they revived it. Mom thumped it's chest and rubbed it and lo and behold it came back to life. I think that's pretty impressive. Anyway, I've got it now and am holding it in my lap and keeping it warm and I'm glad to report he is breathing and every once in awhile he lifts up his head and moves around. His fur is already kind of thick. He's very soft. I hope he makes it.

Puppy count currently stands at:

4. We lost the littlest male last night. I think we knew from the beginning that he was in trouble and might not make it. We bought him a little bottle and some puppy formula from PetCo (where the pets go!) and brought him upstairs and tried to warm him up and get him some food, but he just wouldn't or maybe couldn't suck from the bottle. So we tried to feed him one drop at a time, but he still wasn't really eating. The other puppies were moving around a lot, being very vocal and nursing a lot, but this one wasn't able to move very much and was very quiet and obviously wasn't able to nurse.

I feel kind of bad. It's very common to lose a puppy or two in any litter, especially when you didn't even know your dog was pregnant to begin with! We're still getting over the surprise. We've been breeding puppies for years now and I've made it my new policy not to get worked up over the puppies and to not get attached. But we did try to help this puppy and it makes me happy to know that at least we tried.

The good news is that Brandy is an excellent mother and the other 4 are doing very well. They're fat and happy. I can't wait till their 2 and half to 5 weeks old. That's the fun age. They're so cute then and fluffy. I'm sure I'll have pictures to show soon.

Missing:

I can't seem to find my Sew U: Built by Wendy book. I haven't looked through it in awhile and I wanted to see if there was a certain pattern in there.

I wonder what I did with it.

Puppy count

The count is up to 5. She had the last one around 11 pm last night. They all seem to be doing well.

Now the big question is: Is Jazz going to have puppies too? Brandy went into heat first and we never saw her and Solomon mate. We never saw Jazz mate either, but she is rather large. I guess we will just wait and see.

I went to see Penelope at Sarah's house tonight. My mom and sisters and I all went over for a movie night. It was fun to be with the girls. And Penelope was a cute movie. I liked the Penelope's clothes. :)

I have to finish my homework this weekend. Ick. I can't wait to take classes I will actually enjoy. I've pretty much changed my mind about dental hygiene. I am thinking nutrition now. Or perhaps education. I'm really leaning toward nutrition though. Maybe I can teach it when I finish. Right now I'm just tired and I don't know what I want to do or be. Sometimes I just don't want to think about these things. You know, like decisions. But they have to be thought about sometimes. I just get worried that I will make the wrong decisions and regret something. But then, it's not like I make decisions alone. My parents are pretty involved in most of the decisions I make. By that I mean that I get their advice in most things.

I wish I was a little more spontaneous and happy-go-lucky. Are those traits that can be cultivated or are you mostly just born with them? I like to have a plan before I do things. I have said to myself several times that I'm going to do something spontaneous like go out and get my ears pierced a second time or getting my hair cut or something without telling anyone, but I never do. Maybe that will be one of my goals this year. Do something completely spontaneous without telling anyone. Of course, getting my ears pierced again is out as far as that goes because when you've been thinking about doing something for over a year it's not really that spontaneous. And I'm growing my hair out so I won't cut it off now.

So someday, I might just write a blog post that is about something I did that was totally spontaneous and unexpected.

Just be on the lookout...

RADIATE 08

So I made it there! After trying and trying to get people at our school interested in going I ended up being the only person from school who was able to go. There were a few people who were interested, but unfortunately weren't able to go. But my friend Elizabeth who lives locally, but goes to Concord University was going to go so we ended up riding in together. That was great. I didn't know Beth very well before the trip but I got to know her a lot better which was wonderful. She is a sweetie pie!
As soon as we got to the Marriott I was surprised at how many students were there. The place was mobbed! And the elevators were swamped too. By the time our elevator reached the 12th floor (which is where our rooms were) they were so crowded that people were standing shoulder to shoulder and everyone was all smooshed together. The ceilings were mirrored so I took a picture of us in the ceiling. You still can't even properly see how crowded the elevator was and it got worse than this anyway. It was funny.
They had a lot of musicians come in for a concert. This was Jonathan Lee, but they also had Vicky Beeching and Brenton Brown. I liked Vicky the best. She was kind of like a cross between Rebecca St. James and Sarah Brendel.
On Tuesday we went out into DC for the Day of Faith. We split the entire conference into groups of about 100 each and everyone had different metro routes to take to get to the Washington Monument. It was pretty crowded. But the entire time we were at the conference we were crowded. I didn't really mind though. Everyone was really nice.

We reached the monument and we spread into a really big circle (and the circle was about 2-3 people thick in some places) and prayed.
I asked one of the girls from Concord if she wanted me to take her picture in front of the monument and she said sure. So we stopped and then three other girls jumped in too. After we prayed at the monument we split back up again and walked and walked and walked and walked (you get the idea) to South Eastern University (which is a school that's not actually much bigger than my school if you can believe it) and we split into even smaller groups of about 5 and we prayed together for the school and the community and the capital and the nation and our schools....and pretty much everything. My group found a pretty little spot in the park to sit and pray and before we left to rejoin the group we went down the slide a few times. :)


We had all of our main sessions in the ballroom. It was really big and there we still didn't seem to have enough chairs for everyone. We had the sessions, the concerts and the New Years party in there.
These were two of my roommates. The one on the right is Lauren. I roomed with her at Sneak Peek too. It was really nice to see her again. She is so nice. :) The other is Jordan. I didn't get to know her as well, but she was really nice too.This is my other roommate. Her name is Brionna. She was a lot of fun. We spent a couple of hours on New Years eve finding her a costume for $5 prom. Look at how horribly messy our room is! I have to admit that I got kind of spoiled having people come in and make the bed for us and clean our bathroom...I miss that. :)
This was a wing that they named the Prayer Journey. Some of the Radford students helped to set it up. There were Bibles in there and different 'stations' set up with Bible verses to read and topics to pray for (ie: country, government, military, family, schools, friends, etc.). It was a really nice place to go to when you wanted to be away from the noise and crowds and read your Bible for a little while.
Here we are! All ready for $5 prom.
I thought our costumes were a little bit tacky, but this guy's costume trumped everyone. A chicken suit topped with a pink dress suit. I can only imagine he was dying from being overheated.
I had a great time, but by Thursday morning I was ready to head home. I was exhausted and getting sick. But I still miss Radiate sometimes. I miss the seminars, the speakers (which were wonderful!), the students, the Marriott, and even DC (I am not really keen on big cities). I am really glad I went. I am looking forward to next year too! Beth and I are hoping to go to Sneak Peek together if our campuses don't want to send anyone else. So that's something to look forward to. :)

So there...I'm a month late, but there is my Radiate post!

Doggy update:

Brandy has 3 puppies now. They all look like Newfs. :)

Snow and Ice

The weather has been so icky this week. I got a snow day out of it, but I missed an afternoon of work because of it. I think I would have rather gone to school just so I could work too. This college student is broke and has a bill to pay. I take that seriously.This was the residue of the ice we had. The trees are clear now. The ground is still icy and snowy. But we've been lucky because we haven't lost power at all.

News flash:

My dog (Brandy) just had a puppy. We didn't even know she was pregnant. Imagine our surprise! We are just hoping they aren't half collie because she went on a little overnight trip with our neighbor's collie, King a while ago. So far the first one looks very much like a Newfoundland. Brandy is very calm and seems happy. Mom and Dad are monitoring her.

I'll update later.

Completed project, WIPs, and a self-portrait. In other words, its time for some photos on this blog!

Here is a picture of the bag I made on Christmas Eve. I stayed up late and finished it in the wee hours of Christmas morning. Merry Christmas to me. :)

The bag itself started out as a sweater a friend gave me. I loved the color of it, but it looked pretty bad on me. So I cut the bottom off and sewed it up and turned it into a bag.

The inside is lined with some fat quarters I got on sale from Joann's. The inside can also be used as the outside. It's reversible. I just love reversible things. I don't love that the handles aren't centered very well. Such is life.
Here is my current work-in-progress. A scarf in Mountaineer colors. It will be for a WVU student most likely!

Here is my other work in progress: Help please!
Chemistry is kicking my butt right now...and it's only week 2.

And here is a self portrait of me. This is to show how much healthier my skin looks. I didn't even edit out any acne on this picture, which is what I normally do. Just let me get good and stressed though and it will become very splotchy!

Tea for Two

When you're really sick, sometimes something hot to drink and yummy to eat (even if you can't taste it) helps to make your day brighter. While I was sick I was really bored. All I did was watch TV all day and sleep. After I passed my sickness to Holly I decided that instead of letting her be as bored as I was, I was going to throw a tea party for us. Complete with tea, cookies, tuna on crackers, a quesadilla and applesauce. Not entirely conventional for an afternoon tea I'm sure, but we enjoyed it. Or at least I did. :)I think it's the least you can do when you got someone sick to begin with. Whoever it was who got me sick at Radiate owes me a tea party!