SkippyJon Jones, his first two traumatic weeks with us
I've finally (thanks so much Phoenixfirewolf) started a list of links of some of my favorite authors. They are in no particular order. I have a lot of authors, and reviewers that I like to follow, so the links list might get a little long....
Right now I'm trying to post a little, and pay attention to my little ball of terror, SkippyJonJones. We (my granddaughter and I) named him after a book character - this character is from a childrens' book. The original Skippyjon Jones is a siamese cat who thinks he's chihuahua. This poor dog of mine went through two weeks of different names before we finally settled on SkippyJonJones. {I hope the author, Judy Schachner, doesn't mind, but we aren't going to make any money off him. By the way, her website for her books http://www.skippyjonjones.com/ is an excellant site for young children.} Some of the names we tried were Bennett, Rocky, Baby, Cornelius (that one lasted one day - he never responded to it). We finally settled for SkippyJonJones, although both Liliana (my granddaughter) and I tend to call him Baby a lot. He comes to both names.
my two grandchildren - cousins
About two weeks before my procedure, my son's girlfriend asked my daughter if she wanted a dog. her boyfriend didn't want a small dog. When I saw a phone pic of the puppy, I fell unreasonably and unsensibly (is that even a word?) in love. I don't even really like small "yippy-yap" dogs, but something drew him to me, or me to him. SkippyJon is a part chihuahua part terrier mix. His parents are about 8 pounds, so he's unlikely to get any bigger than a cat. That's probably all I can handle anyway. I won't need any help bathing, walking or handling him.
first day with us.
feeding the puppy
His first week with us was a traumatic one for him. I had that week off work for spring break. The second night that we had him, my usually passive, submissive bull/mix dog bit him. He didn't bite him hard- he could have killed him if he didn't hold back. I think Buddha actually mean't to just snap at him, but he punctured his chee, and scaped below each eye. So SkippyJon looked pretty bad at first. He went into a little shock. I was able to put some pressure and hold ice on him to stop the bleeding, found it wasn't too deep. We didn't have money for an emergency trip to the vet, so I just stayed up all night with him. Since he acted a little shocky, and stunned, I put honey in his mouth, and fed him honey water all through the night. By the next morning he was already better, little swelling, no more bleeding. Of course Buddha was ready to play with him at this point.
A few days later, SkippyJon began acting strange after dinner. He wouldn't drink any water, and for a while couldn't even stand up straight, he would fall over when I tried to take him out to go potty. He had been fine all that day. I've learned that a lot a times when a dog gets sick, if they can get past the dehydration, they get better - but if they get dehydrated, they can die. So we were back to the honey water again. At 4:00 a.m. SkippyJon suddenly threw up. A whole undigested slice of mushroom - probably from dinner the night before, possible from the floor, droppings from the 2yr old grand daughter. After that he was fine.
Terrorizing each other.
SkippyJon is about 10 weeks old now. He and Buddha get along most of the time. Buddha is a five year old pitbull/terrier mix, who is now getting more excercise during the day than he's had for a few years. He's looking a little more fit, but the puppy does tire him out at times. The other night he snapped at the puppy, and though he didn't make contact, the puppy yelped and ran around the kitchen for 2 minutes before I could catch him to make sure he was okay - he was, just scared. This happened because we had just finished dinner, and my husband had walked near Buddha with his empty plate. Even though my granddaughter can put her hands in Buddha's face while he's eating, we obviously need to keep the dogs separated while they and we are eating. Buddha must be feeling a little insecure and jealous, and wanting to establish his role of top dog.
Skippy has now out-grown her lap
SkippyJon has grown quite a bit since he came to us four weeks ago. He's lived through a lot for a little puppy too, already. I've become really attached to him. My husband has too. When I go to bed, I bring the puppy with me, and my husband always pulls the puppy to him. cracks me up. The husband cuddles him a lot when I'm at work too, which is good, puppies and babies should be cuddle a lot.