Nothing like a pal

This is what two ecstatically happy puppies look like.  On the left is Ella, while the insane looking animal on the right is Dionne. 

The girls are almost exactly the same age (Ella's five days younger.) When I picked up Dionne from the CCI's Southwest regional headquarters on December 5, Kathy Alameda also arrived to pick up Ella. Like Steve and me, Kathy and her husband have previously raised four CCI puppies, but then they took a long (8- or 9-year) break from raising. Still, I'd met Kathy before, through mutual friends who are active in puppy-raising, and I was delighted to learn that we'd be raising dogs on the same track.

When Kathy put out the word that she needed a puppysitter for Ella March 14-17, Steve and I volunteered to host her. It will be more work, but it will also be fun, we're confident, for the little girls to have four days of playmate-time. In preparation for that experience, I also agreed to bring Dionne up to Kathy's home the other day so that our two charges could meet before becoming roommates. 

We were pretty confident they'd get along, but to say they did feels like an understatement. Kathy has a huge yard, and Ella and Dionne tore around it at about 50 miles an hour. They did that not quite nonstop, because part of the time they were rolling in the grass, play-biting each other's necks. For all the wild play, we heard almost no growls or barking out of them (that's a CCI no-no.) 

Ella also led Dionne onto the landing of her swimming pool, but neither is confident enough for actual swimming yet (which is fine with Kathy and with me!) After almost an hour, we made the two puppies lie quietly near each other. They did fine with that too. 

I took some video footage of the two pups playing, as follows. There should be plenty more next week.