The escape artist Yorkie

Well, with the exception of having taken a rather laissez-faire attitude towards her potty training, Puddin’ seems to be pretty much recuperated from her surgery ordeal. So much so, in fact, that I’ve had to shift gears from nurturing mama to vigilant disciplinarian.

Puddin’ is tiny. Well, by Yorkie standards (3 to 7 lbs) she is on the large side at 6 lbs, but objectively speaking, she’s tiny. We had “dog bars” built into a beautiful wrought iron gate at the top of the stairs so that the Maltese Mafia couldn’t just wander upstairs and wreak havoc. We also had the narrow dog bars built into the iron gates that separate our front courtyard from the street so the MM can’t bolt out through the front arches into the street. Puddin’ is so small, she can get through both sets of dog bars. We have a baby gate on the kitchen door so we can open the door for air but keep certain dogs out of the house and certain dogs inside…she can get through the bars in the baby gate. Right now it is mostly academic because it is winter and we keep the kitchen door shut, but there are those times…

Recently, because she has finally discovered the purpose of her puddle pads and has begun using them faithfully, we gave Puddin’ unfettered run of the house. She quickly learned to go up the stairs to the lounge and, being tiny, she could get through the dog bars. But she has toys, food and water bowls, and a puddle pad up there, and she’s not destructive (except to her stuffed toys), so it wasn’t an issue…at first. It became an issue when she…and we…discovered she couldn’t come down the stairs. Several times a day she would bound up the stairs and play with her rubber chicken or rawhide chewies, only to end up piteously whining at the top of the stairs, afraid to descend into the dark, curved, abyss on the cold, slippery tiles. And every time, one of us would come up the stairs and rescue her…which did nothing to curtail her forays up the stairs and her pitiful demands for assistance to come down. Finally, Hubby took it upon himself to help her come down the stairs on her own…after only two lessons, she was bounding up and down the stairs on her own, relieving us of rescue duty.

Yorkies are very small dogs, but they are fearless. This can work against them, as they have been know to leap out of their owner’s arms, breaking bones and even dying as a result. Puddin’ had made a couple of heart-stopping leaps off the bed so, once she had mastered the stairs to the upper floor of the house, I determined to get her something to let her get up and down off the bed safely. I found a plastic step stool and our local K-Mart clone and voila! Puddin’ was scampering up and down them in a matter of days.

So, on Saturday Hubby and I were kicking back on the bed, watching TV, when I realized I had neither seen nor heard Puddin’ in a while. Just like with little kids, extended absence and silence on the part of a puppy is generally a bad sign. A cursory search of our bedroom and bathroom didn’t turn her up but I noticed that, on his last trip to the loo, Hubby had obviously not fully shut the door. Puddin’s escape route from the master suite was revealed.

Our first thought was that Puddin’ had scampered up the stairs and was frolicking around the lounge, but on his way up he noticed that the kitchen door…the one that leads to the patio…was open. In a panic I ran to the bedroom to get some shoes so I could go outside to look for her while he checked the upstairs. The baby gate at the kitchen door was closed, but she can wriggle through it, and she had never been allowed in the back yard alone. We had dog proofed it a couple of years ago so the Maltese Mafia couldn’t escape, but she’s a lot smaller than they are and we don’t know if she can get out or not.

Additionally, Nash and Candy, the Maltese, haven’t exactly welcomed her with open arms. They haven’t attacked her or anything, but they’ve been rather hostile when she’s trying to gain their attention. Sadly, Puddin’ just loves Nash…she gets all wriggly and giddy when he’s around, but he’s in that grumpy old man stage of life and just doesn’t have any time for or interest in a puppy. That big back garden is the domain of the Maltese Mafia, their own private stomping grounds, and I wasn’t so sure how happy they would be at the sudden and unexpected arrival of a small, hyperactive intruder.

As I scrambled for shoes in a panic, Hubby used his head and looked out the upstairs French doors into the back garden. There, in the middle of the verdant, rain-freshened lawn, stood Nash, nose to the ground, investigating some fascinating smell or another. And right beside him, nose to the ground only inches away, was Puddin’.

Hubby beat me to the back garden but when he stooped to pick her up, Puddin’ had other ideas. Off she ran, scampering around like a mad thing, dancing just out of his reach, joyfully exercising her unprecedented freedom. This time it was my idea to use my head: I called Nash to me and he came running full tilt, ears flapping in the wind like silky white wings…and Puddin’ chasing him just as fast as her little legs would carry her.

As Nash came to a halt at my ankles and Puddin’ tried to jump on him, I scooped her up. Praising Nash for his obedience in coming when he was called, I held Puddin’ away from me as she was soaked…just dripping wet…from the lawn. It was past noon but we had not seen enough sun for the morning dew to have evaporated. She was only two days past her surgery and she was so wet she was shivering, so I took her straight to the bathroom and swathed her in towels.

She has now figured out that kitchen door is the key to unparalleled freedom and, instead of scurrying up the stairs at every opportunity, she now bolts for the kitchen door in hopes that someone has carelessly left it open enough for her to skinny through the bars on the baby gate and make her escape. She’s a busy little thing, and keeping up with her is quite the challenge!

Puddin' at 16 weeks

Today Puddin’ is 16 weeks old and it has become increasingly obvious to both Hubby and I that we are dealing with a “girly girl.” Oh, she is full of rambunctious mischief and is sometimes referred to as our “Yorkshire Terror,” but she’s definitely girly, nonetheless.



The first clue was when she looted my makeup bag. At first we thought it was just an example of Yorkie high spirits…these dogs are notorious for being energetic, after all…but the next time I opened the bag, I had to fight her off! She dove into the bag head first as if she were diving for treasure…which I suppose, in her little world, was the case. Her first foray into the bag had left the duvet littered with eye pencils and brushes, and she had even managed to extract a lipstick and get the cap off, quite a feat for someone who has no opposable thumbs!

The next clue was how cooperative she seems to be about wearing clothes. She has a small wardrobe of things both practical and pretty, and while she wriggles in protest at diaper time (a precaution against accidents when she is on the furniture or hardwood floors), she is cooperative when I put her onesies on her (usually for bedtime) and gets excited when I bring one of her dresses. She never fights or chews the clothes…even Hubby remarked that she seems to love them.

Grooming is a bit of a different story, but she seems to like having her face and head brushed, but not so much her legs and thighs. But she will sit and raise her chin for the brush to go over her face and throat, the top and back of her head and her ears, She even allows me to put her tiny little topknot in a pony tail with a minimum of fuss. But we weren’t convinced that she was fully committed to her femininity until the lace arrived…

Here in South Africa, it is a monumental task to find lace trims for sewing projects. In America you just walk into any fabric store and there will be a section in the shop devoted to lace and braid and sequins and ribbons of all descriptions. Not so in South Africa. Here, you have to go to a specialty shop called a “haberdashery”…assuming you can find one. Once you do manage to track one down, don’t expect to be spoiled for choice: the selections are invariably slim and prosaic. And heaven forefend if you are seeking ruffled or pre-gathered lace! It simply does not exist here! Being a person both resourceful and persistent, however, I have come up with a workaround solution: eBay!

I know what the meagre offerings of lace and eyelet trims go for here, so I use that as a baseline for my on-line shopping: trims that, including shipping, approximate the cost of a roughly similar item here, are within budget. So, if a piece of 1” wide lace would cost R25 a metre here, then a piece of lace on eBay costing $2.50 a yard, including shipping, is within my reach. Gathered laces can go for 50% more, since the gather ratio is usually 1.5:1. And so I have a fairly steady stream of small packages arriving from America as there are plenty of suppliers…some even ship free!...to feed my sewing machine.

A few weeks ago I received a packet of pretty pink lace…3 yards of it…and opened the packet on the bed where Puddin’ was taking a nap. I left the room for just a couple of minutes, returning to find her rolled up in it, yards of pretty pink lace wrapped around her like a cat! I took it away from her, but only under protest, and when I put the lace on the bedside table, she took to barking at it! Eventually it ended up trimming a dress and matching undies for her, and I thought nothing more of it…until today.



Yesterday I received a notice from the post office that my latest purchase had arrived and today Hubby and I stopped by to pick it up: 5 yards of gathered eyelet trim, destined to embellish a few more outfits for Miss Puddin’. Winter is coming and I need to get a few flannel pajamas and nightgowns ready. Don’t laugh…these dogs do not have an undercoat to trap air and keep them warm like most dogs do, which is why they do not shed. Also, because of their small size, regulating their body temperatures can be more difficult than for larger dogs, particularly since their energetic metabolism tends to keep them lean and without much fat to insulate them. As a result, they do need some extra measures taken to keep them warm enough in chilly weather. OK…they don’t actually need pretty dresses or nighties, but I can sew, so why not?

So we brought the eyelet home and I sat on the bed and opened the packet, then set it aside on the bedside table. A few minutes later we let Puddin’ up on the bed and, after her enthusiastic greetings were done, she climbed up on top of the pillows and began barking, her nose pointed at the table. After touching several things in an attempt to identify what she was barking at, my hand fell on the eyelet and her ears perked up. When I put the eyelet on the bed, she grabbed it and started unwinding it from the card! It was the pretty lace trim she was after.

She also likes jewellery. She will try to chew the aquamarine I wear on my right ring finger and last night, when we got home with seven pairs of new earrings…the insurance company finally sent us jewellery store vouchers to replace the stuff stolen in our Valentine’s Day robbery…she went for the little jewellery boxes just as soon as they were out of the bag! And speaking of bags…she ignores our briefcases…but if I leave my handbag on the floor, she will stick her head into it and root around.

So, when you add it all up…an attraction to make up, jewellery, designer handbags, hair brushing, pretty clothes plus a penchant for lace…seems like we’ve got ourselves a pretty girly little girl here. Now, if we could just convince her that chewing on other people’s fingers is just not ladylike!