Penny Sanford Porcelains: Westie-See-Humans-Do

Bath day yesterday. Martha in Alabama, who fostered Molly, our first Rescue Westie (I promise to tell you that story soon), told me about putting the little white dogs in the shower with you to give them a bath. It works great and is LOADS easier than trying to wrestle a soaped-up dog in the sink or tub! I've had two Westies in the shower with me at one time...easy as pie!

After I towel Annie off (we are a one-Westie-household at present), I let her out of the bathroom, and she races down the long hall in the old farmhouse. Just like Molly, she sees that hallway as something of her personal cat walk, and boy, does she work an already adoring audience! By the time I emerge from the bathroom with my layers of creams and lotions, Annie is almost asleep in my mother's lap, under the warmth of a reading lamp and the massage of a gentle hairbrush.

So yesterday after her shower and brush-out and massage, Annie was ready to come down to the studio (where Gordon and I live until we renovate Grandma's house).

Here she is wearing her new "Blue January" collar while watching TV with Gordon. My mother always called January "Blue January" because everyday life seems a bit drab after a sparkly December.

The next photo is how we see Annie much of the day....either standing or sitting right by one of us with that intense look of contemplation on her precious face. She studies everything!

I recently shared the following Annie-funny with "The Aunts". (That is what I call the Westie Rescue heroes who have blessed us with Molly, Rebel and now Annie.)

I wrote this short story just 2 weeks after we received Rebel, age 13, and Annie, age 8, from Louisiana Westie Rescue.

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"Westie-See-Humans-Do"

On this particular night, Rebel was stretched out as far as he could stretch between Gordon and me as we propped up in bed, communing with our respective laptops.....and Annie, tired and satisfied from a very active day, lay at the foot of the bed where she could watch all warm-blooded inhabitants of the studio. (She was really waiting for Rosalie the Rescue Siamese-mix to surface so that they could play chase!)

Gordon and I had paused our computer reverie to look at our babies, fill our hearts with a fresh charge of contentment from their mere happy presence. As we have done a thousand times already, one or both of us commented on how sweet, how precious, how loving, etc.....these little white bundles of soft fur are, and how we feel blessed to have them in our lives.

Miss Annie Bright Eyes either had this experiment planned, or she made this game up on the fly.

Annie looked over our heads at the ceiling above us, and panned the area with her sharp, observant eyes.

Gordon and I looked up to see what had caught Annie's attention. We saw nothing, and we looked back at Annie, in unconscious unison, to see Annie's eyes sparkling at us, her face now in a Full Alert.

Annie looked up at the ceiling above our heads and studied the object of her attention.

We again looked up at the ceiling above our heads to see what had caught the fancy of those bright black eyes.

We looked down at Annie sitting at the foot of the bed, watching us with rapt attention.

Annie looked at the ceiling to see what we were looking at.

We again looked at the ceiling to see what Annie was looking at.

We looked down again to find Annie observing us intently.

Annie looked up at the ceiling to see what we were looking at.....

(Do you recognize a pattern here?)

Well, as we looked up at the ceiling again, I commented to Gordon how this had become a contagious game, and none of us were actually SEEING anything. We had stumbled into this ping-pong-game by sheer chance.

Gordon and I became giggly as the game continued with the same rhythm.....

1. Annie looked at ceiling.

2. Gordon and Penny looked from Annie to ceiling.

3. Gordon and Penny looked back at Annie who, in turn, peered intently again into the aforementioned space.

Giggles turn to belly-clutching laughter as the game continued. Sweet deaf Rebel never stirred between us, and Annie continued to sit primly at the end of the bed, her eyes sparkling at us as she messed with our questionable sanity.

Belly-clutching laughter turned into gasping-for-air-making-squeaky-sounds laughter.

Annie thought this was delicious fun, and even more interesting than a squeaky toy! She nosed our faces with her sweet little wet nose to see what was wrong with her human subjects, and she wiggled all over with glee, rolling around in what was probably Westie Laughter!

Between squeaky gasps, I looked deep into those intelligent black-brown eyes, and discovered, to my satisfaction, that Miss Annie was playing a game with us. What may have started innocently, Annie intelligently turned into a game!

Several times since, she has tried to start this game with us, and we have played along for a while. Annie, I think, has been disappointed that her human toys did not squeak and gasp as we did for the first game!