Two Weeks!

Time is flying by. The pups are already two weeks old, and growing so fast.

They still mostly spend their time eating and sleeping, but that means all their energy is going to getting bigger. This is extremely evident when I go to weigh them, and have to daily adjust their collars to make sure they are loose.

Our little purple girl has already started showing she's not sure about being like her siblings, occasionally pulling her collar off, or crawling under the blanket. Of course, her crawling under the blanket means I now have to double check the puppy count before going in the enclosure, just in case I need to look for a lump under them and fish her out. She's constantly crawling around, climbing on top of her siblings in order to find the most comfortable spot to sleep.

Now that the pups are two weeks old, their eyes are starting to open. Some have their eyes almost all the way open. Their ears are starting to flop down too. Only a couple more weeks before they'll be able to hear each other making noise.

Others still have their eyes somewhat slitted, but in a day or two, they should all be rather wide-eyed, at least as long as they are awake and not nursing.

They are starting to try walking, rather than crawling too, which involves quite a lot of tumbling over, which makes them look like little polar bears. Of course, they like sleeping stretched out too, which makes them look a bit like tiny snow seals too.

Their poor daddy, Raiju, isn't sure what to think of everything either. He's not fond of steps, so lays at the top, whining, when I'm sitting down there giving the pups and their mama, Shisa, attention. Shisa is not fond of the fact her pups mean she can't spend every moment with her humans, but she's being a wonderful mom, only coming upstairs to make sure her humans are okay, before turning around and going back down to keep an eye on her little ones.

For those worried Raiju's being left out, don't worry. To make sure he doesn't feel too neglected, I'm making sure to take him on walks, which he loves. He doesn't play in the water as much as he does when Shisa is there (and she wants to be there, but with the pups so little, I'm not taking her on long hikes), but he likes trying to run up and down the ravines to explore, coming back whenever he realizes I'm not following him down the narrow tracks he finds.

I'm looking forward to watching how the pups grow over the next few weeks. And with their eyes opening, how much they start exploring their world.