Just a thought… To love and be loved is to feel the sun from both sides. [David Viscott]

I struggled with what to write for you today because my heart and soul are so wrapped up in this little cabin on a tiny Gulf Island off the coast of Vancouver Island. The last thing I want to do is bore you, or stop you from visiting here!

So today I’ll focus on some impending puppy news.

The last time Dottie was in a family way and I posted her brand new pups (that was around Christmas of 2023) I had just one person who was notably angry – probably on X, where anger goes to grow – that I was promoting a breeder instead of adopting strays. Let me say this first of all: if adopting is a possibility, people should definitely have the choice to do that.

My dear pal and Gracefully and Frankly partner Lisa Brandt is the first person to do so: she’s homed and loved many dogs as well as senior cats, to whom she has given the best years of their lives. Her current pet Cuddles is a prime example of that and I have the utmost respect and adoration for her for this reason: she knows she won’t have a whole decade or two with her beloved fur friend, and that there will be medical bills and worries. Yet she puts her big heart out there and she and husband Derek enjoy their family for just as long as they have him, her or them. So, yes, adoption is the way to go. (I have a joke about this at the end, by the way. I could NOT stop laughing!)

But with our Havanese dogs Dottie and Livi, they came to us in a different kind of way. We fell in love with the breed after seeing one in the Westminster Dog Show and knew of one in our Toronto condo building. They were the breed we wanted, having had negative experiences with a few others, and just as many with mixed breeds. We’re not species-ist, I swear!

Anyway, Dottie happens to share a birthday with our Lauren, and we found her the day after. It seemed “meant to be.” But she came with a caveat: Dottie was the personal pet of a highly-respected breeder in Cobble Hill, about 45 minutes up island from us, and she would have to continue to be part of owner Bev’s foster breeding program. Apparently this isn’t such an unusual situation, but it was (and is) for us.

This sounded great in our excitement about bringing this beautiful girl into our lives, but we have been at the mercy of timing and Mother Nature ever since. After Dottie’s first litter of six lovely pups, she’s been due to hook up with a boy for another one. Our vacations plus the breeder’s availability have gotten in the way and there has been no litter #2. Here she is with her new pups back in 2023.

When Livi went into heat six weeks ago, we figured Dot would follow in her diaper pads shortly thereafter. But nope. Livi has been successfully mated and as of this writing is halfway through her pregnancy…we THINK. The weird thing about doggie gestation is you often don’t know until they go off their food if they’re expecting. Livi is showing no signs of that, but the fact that she and her boyfriend mated (or “tied”) three times puts the odds in her favour.

Then there’s Dottie. She was due to be bred as well, which should have had both dogs in the “maternity ward” (where they met, and which first gave Bev the idea that we should take Livi home with us to stay, since her former owner was now unable to keep her) for June and July. This period without the pups would have allowed us to plan to go to Ottawa for a longer visit with the grandkids and their folks.

But it now looks like, if we go, Dottie will accompany us since now her timing is not meshing with the breeder’s plans. I’ll be SO glad when this time in their and our lives is done; we want the dogs to be 100% ours to enjoy for the rest of their (and likely our) lives. But who can plan when Mother Nature calls the shots, right?

As for their new part-time home on Pender Island, they absolutely love it. Not just the longer walks (not so much for Livi, who is a little bit of a slug at the best of times, and doesn’t keep up with the black and white blur that we call her “sister”) but having a big area to run in, to sniff and explore and in which to munch whatever grass the deer aren’t interested in.

Oh, the deer. Both dogs bark when they see one go by, but last week as a new mom and her fawn passed our window, I had Rob scoop up the dogs and hold them both where they couldn’t see our magical visitors. And I got this picture.

All in all, life here is so good that it’s taking all the self-control I have not to gush here every week. But I thought that sharing some puppy news might be a change of pace. And who can’t use some good news on a Monday after the bizarre weekend we just lived through (again)? Oh, and paying the joke tax, now that you’ve read the blog…