Happy Birthday Devon!

Today is Devon’s 3^rd birthday. I cannot believe my “baby girl” is heading into the doggie equivalent of middle age! She comes from a truly remarkable litter, and her momma Lily gave Gayle quite a lot of worry before they arrived. Lily had the canine equivalent of
Braxton-Hixs contractions about 24 hours before she whelped. These contractions are quite rare in dogs and essentially meaningless. From the early concern, I’ll let Gayle take up the story of the Dancing Litter’s birth:

Sure enough, at 4 AM, Lily went into real labor and at 4:45 AM, Mulligan was born at a whopping 15 3/8 ozs. He was followed by Castle at 5:07, weighing in at 14 ¾ ozs. The arrival of Spring (13 ½ ozs) at 5:20 AM had us beginning to worry whether we’d see any girls at all in this litter but Tess showed up 30 minutes later to calm our concerns. She was only 11 3/8 ozs but she was a strong girl. After that it became boy-girl-boy, like a nice dinner party. Michael followed Tess at 6:10 and weighed 14 ¾ ozs. Miss Lilac, Devon came at 6:40 and weighed 12 ¾ ozs.

Lily began to get a little tired so things slowed a little. Bebop (14 ¾) arrived at 7:40 and Jerry (12 ¾) showed up at 8:22 AM. Bella (12.0 oz), the blond in the litter, popped out at 8:53 and finally, last but not least, the biggest girl, Brita (13 ½) rounded out the litter at 9:22 AM. Four and a half hours from start to finish and Lily presented us with ten beautiful, healthy pups.

The pups have been a busy bunch since puppyhood and most have pursued all kinds of competitions, from obedience to rally to agility to tracking to field. They are hunting dogs and family companions, too. This young litter made their mom, Lily a GRCA Outstanding Dam before they turned 3, a truly remarkable feat. Today, the Dancer’s are:

Gaylan’s Water Dancer of Emeline CD SH OA OAJ RN WCX CCA (Brita)

Gaylan’s Firefly’s Moondance SH WC Therapy Dog (Michael)

Gaylan’s I’ll Steel This Dance TDX JH NAJ RN WCX (Devon)

Gaylan’s Gracie’s Fancy Free CDX TD AX AXJ OF RAE WC (Jerry)

U-CDX Gaylan’s Dirty Dancing Oreo CDX TD OA OAJ (Castle)

Gaylan’s Belle of the Ball JH (Tess)

Gaylan's Bop Til You Drop CD RAE OA NF (Bebop)

Gaylan’s Mulligan Fling (Mulligan)

Gaylan’s MyTGold Rite of Spring (Spring)

Gaylan’s Midnight Belly Dancer (Bella)

You can see all the Dancers and their adventures on the Dancing Litter’s website.

Devon is enjoying having me home all day today. At Noon we're headed to agility class and this afternoon we'll do some obedience training. Right now the birthday girl is watching the world go by from her perch on the daybed in front of the upstairs window. She's wishing it was warmer outside so we could do some field work or tracking. Earlier she brought her food bowl into me ... was she wanting birthday cake? Maybe I can arrange a trip to Three Dog Bakery after her agility class.

Happy birthday my beautiful baby girl! You a truly a remarkable dog, and I’m so very fortunate you are mine.