04/14/2025
If you have a Maywood puppy in your life, you know that I send birthday cards to your pup every single year. The card is a new one for each year, and often one I've put together with photos of dogs mostly from my first litter.
When I first set about this idea, I organized files with birthday cards for each year, one file per year. Since filing cabinet space is at a premium in our house, John and I agreed that well, maybe after 10 years I can combine into one file because let's face it, as hard as I try to breed for longevity, not every single puppy will make it past the breed average. And unfortunately, statistics suggest I'll need substantially fewer cards in those years.
Last year I went ahead and made separate files for years 11 and 12, as 90% have made it to 12 years. In a few more months, I'll be adding one for 13. And as I was just digging into my Year 12 file, thinking oh, I'll have plenty of cards left since I have to order a minimum each time, I found that I NEED TO ORDER MORE YEAR 12 CARDS!
A big thank you to all who have loved the puppies from our program and taken truly exceptional care of them. I know there have been a few really unfair losses - genetics are certainly a gamble sometimes - but as a whole, I'm so very thankful that after 13 years I'm still having to worry about getting birthday cards out on time :).
Photo from our local First Litter kids' 12th birthday last summer.