Not what I expected to do last night...

This weekend was so long. Quick note- court for Little H was yesterday. We didn't get custody, but we did get extended weekends (thursday thru monday) and way more time in the summer, and we get to take him to Louisianna for Christmas (which his mother was so incredibly pissed about, because we offered to give her all of Christmas next year so we could have it this year, and she refused. the judge gave us most of Christmas this year- including both Christmas eve and Christmas day- and not letting her have any extra time to make it up). Bitch should have worked with us in the first place.

Oh, and I had sex with R on Sunday night. For the first time in 8 months. For the first time since before the separation.

Now, all about last night. After court, we went back to my parents' house to pack up the car and get the dogs. Trunk packed. Last minute things found and crowding the front seat. Tiffany super excited. Leashes located. Tiffany in the back seat. R on his way to get Argos from the back yard. My dad's dog has something in her mouth. It's a newborn puppy. Hear screaming. There's another newborn puppy buried in the dirt. And a third abandoned in the dog house.

(disclaimer- that dog showed up as a stray, she did not get pg at my parents' house as the only male around there is a chihuahua and these puppies are huge, way bigger than I would have expected out of a beagle-sized dog, they did not know she was pg as she was VERY fat when she showed up and has actually slimmed down slightly towards a healthy size, she was beyond obese before, it was sick)

In comes the dog (the pup in her mouth was not alive, we have no idea when she had those three), we warmed up the two living pups, search more in her pen out back to see if there were more, sent R to the store for any type of formula he can find. She had 7 more inside. She'd mostly take care of one, but once she had a second pup with her, she got overwhelmed and didn't do anything. At one point, she had two she was taking care of and gave birth to a third, which she completely ignored. We had to take away them away, I had to actually remove that ignored pup from the sac, she hadn't done anything at all. It was a frantic few hours, with the first two nearly dead from cold, one still in a sac that I had to cut out and convince to breathe (I nearly had to breathe for him at first), feeding 9 newborns with the only formula and bottles we could get without a 90 minute round trip, starting the feeding schedule all over again by the time we had finished with the 9th pup, tying strings on everybody to help identify them, making lists of who was who and when they ate, taking them all into the bathroom to wipe them with a wet washcloth to get them to potty. Oh, and taking care of my own two dogs somehow in the mix.

Once the mama stopped laboring, we gave her some time to relax, then put the pups in with her to see if she would take care of them. Thankfully, she allowed them to nurse and she started licking them and it looked like she was going to do her thing. She is still nursing and taking care of them this morning. She has to be hidden inside her crate at all times, because any time she sees a cat or person moving around she freaks out. We are so glad she's doing good, because I really didn't want to take on 3-4 pups (my mom would have kept the rest, she has help down there and I'd be doing it alone up here). It takes 20 minutes to care for each pup, so I'd be working with them for an hour and really only get an hour or so break before I had to start it all up again. R very much values my sleep, he knows how vital it is for my happiness, so he's very glad we didn't end up with pups. We may end up having to take in one or two (because mama doesn't have enough nipples to feed everybody at once), but not having to raise an entire litter is such a relief.

Anybody want a puppy in 8 - 12 weeks? Mama is a beagle/german shepherd?/something else hairy mix. Not sure what daddy is, probably something kinda big, most of the pups look slightly rottweiler-ish. Eventually they will be cute, I swear. And until then, they smell like puppies, which is awesome.