Amber first met puppies when she was less than 2 I think (I'll have to ask Vera if she has any pictures, to see when the date was). We went to visit the family of one of Theo's litters. Amber immediately broke into "aww..." and was so in love with them, just wanted to cuddle them so much, but she was clumsy and a little rough with them, enough that we had to take her away and she was so upset, she just wanted to love them so much.

A couple months after her third birthday, she got to have puppies of her own, our dog Coco had a litter of 9 Golden Retrieves, and she got to witness all off it. She really took to them from the beginning. We still had a lot of trouble keeping her from being too rough with them, and she would get mad if they didn't do what she wanted, but she was quite enamored with them. She even made up a little song that she sang to them that goes "I love you, I love you, I love you, always".

Later when they got bigger, and learned to scratch and nip, they were just too much for her. They were approaching her size, and there were always so many, they would just bowl her over and jump all over her. She didn't like that so much.

And then they all had to go to new homes. The whole experience is so intense, but ultimately pretty short, at 8 weeks off they all go. We talked to her about it as it approached, that we couldn't keep the puppies, they were going to grow into big dogs and they needed to go to families that didn't have a dog. Several times she said, exactly in this way "But I love them, I will miss them," and we would explain that we would too, that's what happens.

The night before "go-home day", when most of their people were coming to pick them up, I explained again that they were going to their new families tomorrow, did she want to stay and say goodbye to the puppies, or did she want to go to the parade with Uncle Steve and Aunt Rimli? She clearly picked the parade. She did get to witness a couple of the goodbyes, but it wasn't really clear if she knew what was going on, she was absorbed in her own concerns.

Now there is just one puppy left, who had to stay for a few extra days because his family has some schedule complications. I brought Amber down to the puppy room, just to make sure she understood that the puppies were gone, except the one. He was really sleepy, it was a really big day for him, and she sang "Twinkle Twinkle Little Star" to him and kissed him on the head.