New Puppy

~ Cathy Cade
Pickle and smidgen

If you’ve been reading these for a while, you may recall my post about the sudden death of Digger last November and even an earlier introduction to little Digger (pictured below with next door’s Duke) and Pickle, our ageing Staffie (pictured above).

Since my return from New Zealand, we’ve been searching in vain for a small dog to rehome. We wanted a small dog (to fit into our motorhome with Pickle) but one that wouldn’t feel intimidated by Duke, next door. Duke is a softie, but rehomed dogs tend to be nervous.

Duke and Digger (he’s bigger now)

Also, we now have grandchildren to take into account.

It occured to me that I didn’t rehome rescued dogs until my own children were teenagers; until then we had brought up puppies. So, after a fruitless search around rehoming centres, we decided to get a puppy instead.

sleeping pup

Meet Smidgeon.

Smidge is a 9 week old Jack Russel/Yorkie cross, who joined us on Monday.

smidge in kitchen

I’m sure you will be seeing more in these posts about Smidge and Pickle (who will be 15 next month and is now rather stiff for puppy games. She’s leaving all that to Duke).

In the meantime, I’m re-aquainting myself with the delights of house-training a puppy (it’s been a long time…). Fortunately, it’s summer, the back door is open, and she’s following the other dogs.

puppy in folding steps

I’m off now to reinstall the chicken wire to the bottom of the front gate. (Digger had grown too fat to get through when it came loose so I pulled it off. Short-sighted of me…)

Puppy training and chicken-wire fixing… have you had to revisit activities you thought you’d never need again? 

19 thoughts on “New Puppy”

  6. I can see the issues with rehoming and the circumstances you have to consider. Smidge is such a cutie – he’s lucky to have such a loving home to start his doggy life, looking forward to seeing how he gets on. I hope he settles okay, little darling furbaby!  ♥
    Caz xx

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    1. Thanks for your thoughts. smidge is a very laid-back little pup for 9 weeks and mostly well-behaved… so far. Sleeping under my chair right now. I’m relieved to discover that this morning’s suspicious odour is nothing more substantial than wind.

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  9. A fellow animal lover 🙂 So good to see you helping pups in need. I volunteered at shelters for years, and it always broke my heart that I couldn’t foster at my rental places. Glad you to know people like you are out there.

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    1. Thanks for reading. We’ve rehomed rescued dogs ever since my children were old enough to not pester them. My daughter has volunteered in rehoming shelters in most of the countries she’s lived in.

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