Smackie's Puppies

We knew Raskull got ahold of Smackie in heat, but for the longest time, didn't look like she was pregnant, and I breathed a sigh of relief. Smackie was one of the ones born on Aug. 25, 2007 and she had already had a puppy, Hurricane Boogy, June 1 of this year. Two weeks ago I noticed her stomach was getting bigger, but that was about it, nothing like when Dixie was pregnant. Last week I noticed her nipples getting bigger and knew she was pregnant. On Saturday I was out feeding Dixie's 5 week old puppies outside. (They could make all the mess they wanted out there!) I noticed Smackie kept pacing around the cage, but couldn't figure out why until I saw 2 little feet protruding out. I ran to the front and got Amber so she could put all the puppies back and Brian, Amber, and I held Smackie down in the yard while I helped deliver the puppy. Pure white, it was. I washed it off and gave it to Danny to hold while Smackie was brought into our bathroom to lay in the tub. I knew the Christmas Parade was off about that time. She ended up having 7 puppies, 4 white with varying shades of light brown, 1 all brown with some white on it, 1 brown spotted, and 1 that is silver/gray and white. On Monday morning the first born died and today I had to have the smallest white one put to sleep...their lungs were't developed enough. Smackie would be a great mom if she would let them nurse. She'll let them get on a nipple before she moves off and tries to lay on them. We have the 5 remaining ones in a box that we try to keep as warm as possible, either in front of the fireplace in the evenings until it gets too warm, or in front of the space heater in the bedroom. I just hope and pray the 5 left will do well. The silver/gray one I named Bandit because it looks like it has a mask on. The rest of the names will come over the next week if they survive.