Weekly Puppy Pictures

Mira's boy Jet

Well, the new year approaches and who knows what joys and sorrows it will bring us? Right now, I am focusing on the joys part, the "ups" and not the "downs." There are new people to meet; new puppies to welcome; Maggie to train, to take to puppy class, and to introduce to the ins and outs of the show ring; Walker to show as long as he enjoys the ring; perhaps Breaker to take into the ring again to work on his Grand Champion title; family and friends to spend time with; and a job to go to. Many many blessings for sure!

Mira's girl Maggie

You will notice that puppy photos right now are reduced to five. Vanilla is gone, as are Socks, Carmel, and Tara to pet homes. Their new owners are all lovely people and we have enjoyed getting acquainted via email and finally meeting in person. My intent at the present time is to keep Maggie from Mira's litter.

I'm discovering that the blacks are not as popular as the golds and few people are interested in considering a black puppy as their pet. I've always loved the black Lhasas. Our first was a female we bought from Mary Soto named Sunshines Black Cherry. From Cherry, we got our black male Ch. Joyslyn's Mirage. He was so gorgeous. And from Raj came Bert, who taught me never to let my kids name puppies since he was fat little guy that the kids named "Fat Albert." We ended up keeping him and the name stuck (shortened to Bert though!) His AKC registered name was Ch. Joyslyn's Masquerade. Raj and Bert's pictures are on the Scrapbook page of the Joyslyn's website, but I'll try to remember to post them on the blog one of these days. We also had a black female named Mysti (Joyslyn's Mystique) and another male (I do love Lhasa males!) named Ch. Joyslyn MiToya Escapade.

As much as I love the blacks,  my preference right now is not to keep another black since I have Mira and since the color black seems to take over pretty fast. On the other hand, I imagine I might be keeping Whisper as well as Maggie unless the right person comes along for her.

Mira's girl Whisper

Whisper was involved in a mishap shortly after she was born. Mira, as we discovered during whelping, is an extremely protective mother. She loved her babies and watched over them and protected them well. Little Whisper was not interested in nursing, which worried me, so after all the puppies were born and while I was cleaning the whelping pen and arranging clean papers, towels, and a heating pad, I asked my husband if he would put Mira and her puppies on a quilt on the family room floor and make sure all the puppies were nursing, especially little Whisper.

Mira's girl Raven

Mira was not at all pleased to see Lynn handling her babies. Just as he was positioning Whisper on a nipple, Mira decided she had had enough and she growled and snipped at him. He jerked his hand away (an automatic response that he now regrets). Mira missed him and snipped the puppy instead, taking off about 3/4 of Whisper's right ear flap. It healed rapidly and there is no injury to the ear itself. My guess is that once the hair grows long on her head the injury will not be so obvious.

Dancer's boy Ty

After all these years of whelping litters, that was definitely a new experience (and one I hope is never repeated)! My vet tells me it happens often, but it hasn't happened to us before and I hope it never does again! As upsetting as the experience was, upon reflection I decided that it could have been much much worse! (My motto: Always look for something positive.)

The next big thing will be thinking of AKC registration names for the puppy(ies) I keep. Right now, I am sure about Maggie so I will be calling upon readers for some suggestions. I'd like to use the word "Magic" in her name, or perhaps another word that starts with "m-a-g," so put on your creative thinking caps. Suggestions are welcome. A friend has offered "Joyslyn's Clearly Magic" or "Joyslyn's We've Got Magic To Do."  (Those of you familiar with the musical Pippin will recognize where that name came from.) That's as far as the suggestions have gone.

So, life goes on at Joyslyn's as Lynn and I look forward to the coming year.

We wish each and every one of you many blessings during 2011. May you, your families, and your dogs enjoy good health, peace, happiness, prosperity, and Lhasa love.

Life is good when you have a Lhasa to love you.

Joyce