We Miss You

Over the years our family has had our share of pets:

-Otis (our 1st dog)
-Rex & Rico (iguanas)
-Wally& Chester (horses)
-Various fish and snails (In the end we had to "flush" the yellow snail because it ate all of the fish &    escaped out of the aquarium twice)
-Carter (cat)
-Daisy (dog)
-Shortleg (African bullfrog)
-Casper (kitty)
-Casper 2 (kitty)
-Pork Chops (Daisy's puppy)

As much fun and joy these pets have brought us...so also comes loss and sadness when they die.  Our latest loss is Daisy.  She was easily the biggest sweetheart in the whole world.  We lost her back in January, but it has taken me this long to write about it because we have been so sad and devastated.

The story is so bizarre and disturbing.  I came home from picking Quincy up from preschool one afternoon in January (the 30th, 1 day before Sambo's birthday) and started fixing her lunch.  My next door neighbor Tasha came running in my front door completely frantic.  She was yelling that Daisy was in the back of the garbage truck!  I ran outside and the truck was just leaving our street.  I looked at how big and tall it was and thought my sweet neighbor had gone completely nuts (she had just had a baby a few days earlier and was very sleep deprived)!  But I didn't see Daisy anywhere and the look on Tasha's face convinced me she was in there.  I caught up to the garbage truck at a nearby stop sign and a gentleman had waved him down because Tasha had told this random man to stop the truck.  I didn't see or hear any sign of Daisy being in the back of the truck.  The driver looked at me like I was insane and that there is NO WAY my dog is in there.  He climbed the tall ladder to look in the back and didn't see anything.  This was maybe two minutes max from the time Tasha had looked out her upstairs window and had seen Daisy jumping around in the back on top of the garbage while the truck was emptying the garbage can in front of our house.  At that point she was alive and well.  But then now there was no sign of her. The driver told me he was heading straight to the landfill and that he would look for her when he dumped the garbage.  He called later and told me he didn't see anything.  Quincy had witnessed the whole fiasco.  Throughout the day she kept asking me if we got Daisy out of the garbage truck yet?  Knowing how a garbage truck works, BS and I decided to tell the kids that she got carried away in a garbage truck and that hopefully she either jumped out at some point and found a new family that loves and cares for her, or that she is very happy living at the landfill eating as much food as she wants.
We got calls from Draper City for the next week because everyone was so concerned.  The question is how did she end up in the garbage truck?  It would be impossible for her to climb up that huge truck.  So was she in a garbage can?  And how did she get in the huge garbage can without tipping it over?  She is a 75 pound dog!  And why didn't the truck driver see a 75 pound dog get dumped into his truck?     Completely baffling.  I bawled for 3 days.  BS was super upset too.  Except that we had to put on a happy face for Sambo's birthday and his party.  We didn't have the heart to tell him and the other kids about Daisy until the day after.  Then Sambo said, "That's why I don't like pets...because they die!"

Whatever happened, we miss her dearly and loved her so much.  We were lucky to have her for 6 years.  She went on many adventures with our family and was an awesome pet.  Here are a few pics of her over the years.

The day we got brought her home

February 2006

Hanging out with Millie, listening to her troubles

Just part of the family

Daisy LOVED to swim and play fetch.  She would have fetched the ball until she collapsed if we let her!

She was a fabulous Mama to her litter of 10 puppies!  She let Chops hang on her neck and nurse until he was as big as her!

She was also known to be a little Rascal at times - here she went snooping in somebody's garbage and came home with the lid stuck on her.  This is how we found her.  Still don't know who's it is!

The only thing that has helped a little is that we still have her puppy Chops with us.  And somehow he has turned into quite a good dog in the last six months.  Probably something to do with that he is now two years old and mellowed out.  He's taking after his Mom, just as sweet as he could be.

But wait.
And then there's Casper 2.
We went to Moab for Spring break and we came home to find that Casper 2 had left...and never came back.  Bobcat?  Eagle?  Suncrest isn't the best place for an outdoor cat I guess.  Despite the fact that he was a cat (BS and I are not cat lovers), he was a pretty cool cat.  He lasted about a year at our house but maybe, just maybe, he has also found a new home with milder winters and a family that will let him inside more.  We just feel bad for Quincy and her buddy Conner.  They loved this cat so much.  Like so much.  He entertained and played with Q for hours everyday.  And he didn't mind the dogs.  They liked each other.  Something funny about him is that on the occasion when he was let inside, he would always jump up into BS's bathroom sink and lay there!  These pics were taken on different days:

The Pumpkin Bandit Strikes Again!

Every year for the past 4 years, our jack-o-lanterns always disappear the night of Halloween. The first time this happened, we were baffled. See here and here for a little history. We have learned not to place out our carved pumpkins until literally moments before it's Trick-or-Treat time to avoid them getting swiped.

Having uncarved pumpkins on the front porch has never been a problem. They have never been taken. We had 3 large pumpkins on the porch when we left for St. George a few weeks ago. When we came home, we found that 2 big ones were gone! Only mine was left {the ugly one with warts all over it}.

Our first thought was that it was Daisy and Chops, but we couldn't imagine how they were able to carry or roll those heavy things off. Who knows???

While we blame Daisy as the suspect, we really have had no solid proof of this crime.

This year, we caught her in the act:

This pic was taken at midnight on Hallow's Eve. BUSTED!!!

1 week old

We are all in LoVe!
We have lots of visitors everyday who come to see and snuggle the pups. 5 have already been claimed, but we aren't thinking about that yet. They are irresistible.
At one week old, they have more than DouBLeD their size. They have fur on their faces and ears now, and they have big fat pot bellies. We love how they cuddle up to each other and pile-up to go to sleep. Their eyes are still closed but they are starting to scoot and slide around a little bit. Daisy is getting cabin fever!

"They are trying to steal my birthday"

....Continued from last post:

Thursday March 18th (Will's B-day), started off like any other day. We got Millie and Sambo off to school, and as mentioned before, I started preparing to go out of town. The plan was that I was going to go on a girl's trip with 4 other friends to a cabin near Zion's park. BS was going to take the kids to St. George where he had some work on Friday (Uncle Denny and Aunt Marcia were going to take them to lunch and the park while Sam worked). I was going to meet up with the fam Saturday morning and we were all going to Vegas to meet up with the Clark aunts and uncles and grandpa and grandma.

Except, when BS went to feed Daisy at 9:00 am, he heard little squeaks coming from Daisy's dog bed. He looked in and this is what he saw:

He called me down and we looked at each other in disbelief. We felt excited and confused. To understand our confusion, you have to refer to here and here.

Daisy was in heat in January so we tried to breed her again. After spending 5 days at the stud's house, the owner told us that it wasn't successful...nothing had happened between the 2 dogs. We decided that Daisy just wasn't meant to have pups. Who knew that getting a dog pregnant could be so hard?

But, there was 1 instance (a couple days before Daisy went to see the stud) where I let Daisy out of the garage while I ran the kids to school. It was 15-20 minutes tops. I came home and there was a golden retriever named Chopper hanging around our house. Nothing exciting was happening between the 2 but I panicked for a minute and decided nothing happened.

Over the last couple weeks it has been pretty obvious that Daisy was pregnant. Except after the last attempt, we had a hard time believing it, especially since "nothing happened." Well, something did happen, we just don't know when or who.

Right now, it doesn't matter because we have a litter of the cutest, sweetest pups. When we looked in Daisy's dog house she had 4 puppies. We quickly set-up a space for them in the storage room, whelping box and all (BS built it last Fall). We made it nice and cozy for her. She took to it, and in the next couple of hours she delivered 6 more! That makes 10! We awed at the maternal instincts Daisy had. She had no problem and did such a good job getting them all clean.
When we showed Will the puppies, he smiled and said, "They are trying to steal my birthday!" We laughed at that.
There were 7 males and 3 females. 1 runt and 1 weakling. 8 are white just like Daisy and 2 are darker.
I never thought having puppies would be exciting but our whole day was consumed by it. It was clear that our travel plans had gone down the toilet. I went to the school (again, to take teacher appreciation gift) and told Sambo and Millie the news. Both about the pups and also about no vacation. They were happy and bummed. But when they came home and saw them, they were just fine with not going on a trip anymore. Millie did say, "Darn Daisy, you have bad timing."

Which is true, but if she had waited just 8 hours longer, we would have left town and left her to have puppies outside in the cold.


The first night I didn't sleep at all. It was like the first night after having a newborn baby. I kept checking on them, worried they were getting squished or that some weren't eating. I spent the whole next day (BS was in St. George again) checking and rotating the pups trying to keep track of which ones were eating well and which ones weren't. Some of them are definitely more alpha than others and Daisy only has 6 good teets. Millie and I used different colors of nail polish dots on their heads to identify them, and Millie made up a chart so we can keep track of their feeding. She has been very sweet and constantly nurturing to them.

The bad news: 3 have died. The runt died first after 1 day. He was half the size of the others. The 2nd one died last night after struggling for 2 days - he was very lethargic and weak. We tried to bottle feed it and assist it to nurse and keep it warm, but we knew it would die eventually. The 3rd (one of the darker ones) died this morning which was a sad discovery to us. Just hours earlier it appeared to be healthy and strong, eating and active. The only thing we can think of is that it got smothered or something. After talking to several experienced folks and research on the internet, this happens often. Basically in a litter as large as 10 puppies, you can count on some not making it. It just happens. We have already used this experience to teach the kids about life and death. This has been so great and fun for the kids.

The good news: We have 7 healthy adorable puppies. Hopefully the Lucky 7. 5 males and 2 females. Can't believe how much they have grown already. They have fat little milk tummies all of the time and they don't wimper anymore. Daisy has relaxed and isn't so awkward when she tries to lay down by them (she was sitting on them sometimes on accident). We could not get her to leave the puppies other than to go potty twice/day. She has been them non-stop since Thursday morning. She is exhausted but she has been the best mama. Tonight for some reason she picked-up a pup in her mouth and took it to BS and dropped it in his lap. I guess that's her hint that is was his time to babysit and that she needed a break! He took her outside and threw the ball 20 times. She ran like nothing had happened. Why can't it be so easy for us? She had 10, and all of them sucking on her teets 24/7, and she's acting like it's no big deal.

Well, here they are tonight. They are quite the event of the neighborhood. They have lots of visitors and everyone is in love with them. We will update often.

The saga ends (maybe???)

So we think the Daisy "pregnancy" saga has come to an end. After being on edge for 64 days (the dog gestation) plus an additional 2 weeks, just to be safe, our beloved dog has been diagnosed with pseudocyesis aka Canine false pregnancy! Who would have guessed that a dog can actually make their body think they are carrying pups, when the uterus remains empty? We are not just talking about a mental/emotional condition, she full on had lactation, morning sickness, decrease of energy, vomiting, weight gain, boobs, and loss of hair on the belly, all of which are symptoms of pregnancy! It was clear that pseudocyesis is rare, as everytime I called the vet, they had no answers as to why Daisy had not delivered on days 65 and beyond. We should should have assumed that our first dog breeding experience would include the most freakish, weird and rare issue.

So where do we go from here? I guess we get a professional involved next time. We realize the Clarks just aren't cut out for dog breeding.

Expecting?

Daisy is almost 4 years old. When we bought her, we decided not to have her spade right away because Sam wanted to have one batch of puppies first. No reason, just for fun. I agreed. The only problem is, we are clueless with the whole breeding thing.
Until this summer we managed to keep her virgin (can I say that?). In the past, her "in heat" cycle just hasn't grooved with our schedules and vacations. We have been pretty careful in making sure that when we do breed her, we will be around and ready when the puppies are due.
Well, we came home from Lake Powell in late July and noticed Aunt Flow had come to visit her. We realized that we wanted to breed her because the timing was right and come October it's not too cold outside (what, you think I'm going to let her deliver puppies in my house? no way). We got on KSL and found a great match to be her "stud." His name is Gage and he lives in Provo. We researched the timing of Labradors and scheduled a time for Daisy to go visit Gage, which was to be 5 days later.
That week Daisy was the most smokin hot female in the neighborhood! We were fighting off dogs who wanted to be friendly with her until we finally let her in the garage for the night. We weren't too worried because those dogs were neutered.
But then he came. The big, red, hairy, ugly dog (with balls). He wouldn't stay away. Twice Sam walked him to his owner's house way down the road and kindly asked the owner to keep his dog in his yard, and explained the importance. Twice again Sam walked the dog back home, and tied him to the door because nobdy was home. Twice our kind neighbors did the same thing. Those few days were very busy and it was too hot to keep Daisy in the garage all day, but I just couldn't let her inside because she sheds so much. We kept her in the back yard. It was a group effort in keeping Daisy pure and untouched by this beast. It took a village, and I'd like to thank my neighbors for helping. You'd think that would be enough.
But we got a phone call on a Friday night from my friend and neighbor who said she had just witnessed Daisy being violated by the big ugly red dog. Joy.
The next morning Sam had words with the dog's owner. He told the guy that if indeed Daisy got pregnant and the puppies come out red, then he will be the one responsible for them and responsible for paying the fees for the stud. The owner agreed.
Unsure how much that dog had his way with Daisy, we decided to take her down to Provo anyway (apparently, when it's successful, they "lock" together for awile...ewe! and ouch!). She spent 5 days down there with Gage. Gage's owner never witnessed any locking, but he said that doesn't mean it didn't happen.
So now we're left with 2 big questions:
1) Is Daisy pregnant?
2) Who is the father?

It has been 1 month, so according to the internet, she should be showing soon. We read that one sign of pregnancy is that they lay around a lot more. Duh. We think we have noticed that she is laying around more lately. For example, the kids were playing in the backyard yesterday and usually she is righ there with them. Sam was in the basement and looked and saw Daisy laying in her igloo bed in the middle of all the action. Here is a picture of Quin hanging out with her:Doesn't she look like she's got that pregnant mama face? Not feeling too good Daisy?

We will see...

Short-lived Shortleg

Sam with Shortleg the day he got him Feb/2008

In the above post I mention how I would be giving the kids some bad news. I also mentioned how in the morning of the first day of school, I noticed Shortleg in a bad way. I didn't bring attention to him so Sambo wouldn't worry about him on his big day. I slyly told dad to go look at the frog. He came back downstairs and gave me a look that confirmed my fear: Shortleg was dead.
From the way he looked all sprawled-out on his back, there was no question he was dead. Sam had to rush off to work, and I was rushing out the door to follow the bus and take pictures of the kids at school, so we decided to deal with him later that afternoon.
About 4:00 that day, we looked in the tank and Shortleg had moved to his water bowl! He wasn't dead! He looked really pale, but he had moved! We were so relieved, but then Sam picked him up and he wasn't moving at all, not responding. Our hopes died as we realized he was dying, on his way home. We looked at each other and we were both surprised how sad we felt. Not only because he was an awesome pet but because we knew it would break Sam's heart.
I immediately got on the phone and started making phone calls to any pet store who might know if there is something I could do to save him.
We were racking our brains trying to figure out what could be killing him because he was his normal chipper self just 2 days prior when we fed him 8 grasshoppers.
I mentioned this to the guy and he said, "You have to be careful with grasshoppers, did you pull off his hind legs?"
"No, why?"
"Some bigger hoppers have spiny hind legs. The sharp spines can damage their G.I tract and cause death."
Nice to know.
By that night he was gone for sure. Sam put him in a box and into the freezer. We told the kids and I'm not kidding you, I cried. I cried because I could feel Sambo's pain as his deep heartfelt cry came hollering out when he heard the news. As cruel as it sounds, I wish we had a video camera to record all 4 kids reactions. Millie sobbing, Sambo crying HARD, Will crying on and off, and Quincy fake crying. As we tucked Sam into bed and comforted him he sadly said things like:
"I thought I would have Shortleg when I got married"
"Will I see him in heaven?"
"Is it okay if I still feel sad when I wake up?"
"He was such a good friend"

Our pets sure have come in handy in teaching our kids some of life's lessons :)
We have used a past cat named "Carter" to teach Millie about change and moving. She was feeling sad about moving from our old neighborhood in Mtn. Green to Draper. The day before we moved here, we could not find Carter anywhere. We told Millie that "see, even cats have to get new homes." She was content with that. No one saw Carter again.
We are using our experience of trying to breed Daisy about the birds and bees; just little bits of info. The kids have been wondering about when it will be time for puppies and about Daisy going to visit a boy dog in Provo for a week. We are telling just enough to keep them satisfied. Last week, Will saw some dogs trying to mate and said, "I think that dog wants a piggy back ride!"
(We are still waiting to see if Daisy is pregnant. Who knew it's such a process? Post on that coming)
Today we used Shorgleg to teach and emphasize about what happens after death. They have heard about this before but I can tell that having experienced it in real life with Shortleg, they seem to understand more and feel better about our Savior's plan.
When Millie and I returned home from the Oquirrh Mountain Temple dedication, we held a Clark family funeral. Everyone took a turn saying something about Shortleg, Sam dug a hole, then we covered him and made a gravesite.
Shortleg was the size of a quarter when we got him, when he died at 1.5 years, he was the size of a softball. R.I.P.

Dracula meets his match

In recent posts we mentioned the weather for Halloween was going to be nice and that our dog Daisy loves pumpkins. Well this picture says it all. Sambo took his pumpkin out on the porch, went inside to get a candle, came back outside and this is what he found: Needless to say the tears washed away some of his scary make-up. As far as the weather; it rained hard during trick or treat hours. We will have a complete Halloween post sometime this week as Holly is on a girls trip for a few more days.

6Clarks: The case of the missing pumpkins

Last year we bought a bunch of pumpkins to decorate our front porch. We noticed that the pumpkins disappeared one after another. Sometimes they would literally be gone within 10 minutes of being placed on the porch. We just thought it was some punk teenagers being funny. To prevent the kid's Jack-O-Lanterns from being snatched in a similar fashion we waited until Halloween night to set them on the porch. Each kid took great pride in their creation. Finally the time had come to set them on the porch and get their costumes on. I placed a candle in each pumpkin, lit the candle and went inside to help out with the kids.
10 minutes later the kids were on the porch with trick or treat bags in hand, when Wilbur noticed his pumpkin was missing. The crazy thing is, the candle was left on the porch with the pumpkin lid. Needless to say he freaked!!! Once again we blamed the teenagers for being cruel and boneheaded. After calming Will down we went trick or treating around the cul-de-sac. As we passed by our house (maybe 10 minutes after departing) we noticed that Millie's pumpkin was missing but the lid and candle remained. These teenagers obviously knew what they were doing and I was looking to give them a beatdown. We finished off the night trick or treating and upon arrival at home noticed that our pumpkins too were finished, that is all but the lids and candles. The next morning I looked for any sign of smashed pumpkins in the road, nearby fields, etc.. only to come up empty handed. Needless to say we were all baffled by the disappearance of the pumpkins. Later on in the after noon I caught a glimpse of something white buried in the back yard bark. Upon further inspection IT WAS A PUMPKIN. I pulled out the pumpkin and guess what I saw? Teeth marks. We had solved the mystery; DAISY was the pumpkin thief and was EATING the pumpkins and I guess was saving this one for later. The crazy thing is already this year we have caught her stealing from the porch decorations.

Night Prowler

In addition to the six Clarks we also have an African Bullfrog named Shortleg and a Yellow Lab named Daisy. This story is about Daisy. You see everything she does is intended to please her family. What we didn't find out until this morning is that Daisy lives 2 seperate lives.

Ever since we moved into our house 2 years ago Daisy has had a wireless shock collar that defined her boundary. Don't worry PETA, for the last year the battery was dead and it didn't work. We didn't tell her this and she thought that as long as her collar was on she better not try to bolt. A couple weeks ago I took her collar off and was throwing the ball to her for a little exercise. This is a daily routine and she loves it. Anyway I placed the collar on the bumper of our Suburban and forgot about it. The next morning we tore the house apart looking for the collar. Those things ain't cheap. On my way to work I noticed a pink strip on the highway near our house. After further review, it was the collar/shock box, completely destroyed and broken in a hundred pieces. We were faced with a decision, pay $150 for a new collar that we really didn't need, or try a regular collar that was $10. I went with the $10 collar and it worked like a charm; at least that is what I thought.

Here is how I found our beloved Daisy this morning.


She had snuck off and raided someone's dog food storage container and literally got caught. If you are missing a lid like this please let me know and I will replace it. I wonder how long these night food raids have been going on. It looks like someone is going to have to cough up the money and get a working collar.