The first few weeks of a puppy’s life mom does most everything. My job is to make sure pups are gaining weight, handle them, change beds, keep mom happy with plenty of food, water and breaks.

Once the puppies hit about three weeks we introduce the UGOdog litter box system. With one or two pups it’s pretty easy to rinse and clean the box out once a day. With a bigger litter like four, five or more pups the litter box tray fills up pretty fast. And not to get gross, but mom does poop duty and keeps pups cleaned up pretty well until they hit about four weeks. Then the pups are pooping on the UGOdog and it smashes in the grate and gets messy and harder to keep clean. That’s about when I switch them over to the litter box with pellets. The pellets absorb the liquids and the poop is easily scooped out with a kitty litter scoop.

Because of the number of pups in Sage’s litter, we moved them upstairs today. They just needed more room!

All set, just add puppies!

Puppy moving basket loaded and ready to haul upstairs. (I should be dropping pounds now with all the stair climbing I’m going to be doing for the next month+!) 😛

Now they have a crate to get used to sleeping in. I’ve put three litter boxes in. (Normally they would be introduced to the plastic litter boxes with pellets before we move them upstairs, but there just wasn’t time since we are moving them early.

This crate has a front and a side door which I strapped open with a small bungee cord. I have a short sided litter box placed outside each door. Then as you can see, a longer litter box with the side cut down next to the one short one to give them plenty of potty spaces right outside their crate/bed.

And look at that! Just a couple minutes after I plopped them in, someone had deposited in the litter box! Of course, someone else had missed, but it is a learning process and they’re doing really well for their age.

They were happy when mom came back from her break!

As you can imagine as the pups grow and mature they become more active, messier and nosier but also a lot of fun! It’s my job to keep them clean, feed, happy, stimulated,  learning and experiencing new things in the final weeks they are with us.

Cute neighbor!

And since we moved Sage, it’s just the right time for Amber and her babies to move into the small puppy pen that Sage and family just vacated!

As we did with Sage’s and every other litter, we’ve set the puppies up for success! A big bed takes up one half of the puppy pen and the UGOdog litter box takes up most of the other half. All the babies have to do it toddle off their bed onto the potty box.

Just add puppies! (Mom was out on a potty break).

Mom is back and inspecting the puppies’ new home.

And since Amber is protective of her babies and likes her privacy, I usually keep her pen covered to make her feel safer and not so worried about other dogs in the house getting too close to her home.

And since these guys are three weeks old today, it’s time for their three-week-old “portraits” and names. Can anyone guess our (silly) theme? I just had to do this with three girls and one boy. 😉 hehe

“Jill”~dark apricot female (yellow collar)

2# @ 3 weeks

“Kelly”~red female (pink collar)

1# 14 oz @ 3 weeks

“Sabrina”~apricot female (purple collar)

2# @ 3 weeks

“Charlie”~red, male (gray collar)

2# 4 oz @ 3 weeks

And with every litter, weekly pictures take time especially as they get older and more active! Then after taking multiple pictures of each pup comes the editing, watermarking, and putting them in their respective albums. Plus each pup is weighed, collar checked, adjusted or changed and little toenails trimmed for the week. Whew!

Raising quality puppies takes a lot of time and hard work but it so worthy it!

❤️