death and life on the "farm"

Yesterday, a whole lot of death and a little bit of life passed through our home.
Our dog, Brownie, whelped her puppies. She had a litter of 4 (3 girls and a boy ). The first one was dark brown with light brown jowls and white on the chest... light brown inner back legs... a real cutie. Number two came out lighter brown over all and with the white chest markings of dad. Number three was daddy's girl, all black with white chest markings. All three girls were still born.... despite my quite heroic efforts at puppy CPR.... We thought she was done.. so we weren't really expecting pup number four... in fact i would have missed it entirely, if i hadn't heard a noise outside that registered as familiar... and ran out to check. I grabbed # 4 and rubbed... and he took a big gulp of air... i can not tell you how cool THAT was.... As of right now... he is still hanging on... if he is a fighter we may have ourselves another dog... not sure how to give him to another family when you spend all this time listening for him... and walking by and looking to see if he is eating or breathing even....

Hunter and Jeremiah saw girl2 born, and they both thought it was pretty cool. Hunter said that it was taking way to long.... he said the Lion he watched have babies on TV had them in like 2 minutes.... why was brownie taking FOREVER????
He seemed fine with the puppies not being alive until it came time to pick a spot to put them in the ground.... He and daddy went out to the backyard... and had a discussion about death, and they way sometimes babies, from humans... to birds come out this way. He came in for dinner and was a bit wrung out... full of tears that he had to put the puppies in a box and bury them. Right about that time #4 came and was a ray of hope for a sad little boy. He was so sad that he almost didn't want to pray for his dinner, until we told him that God is the best person to talk to when your heart is heavy.... so his prayer over dinner was that we would have a good day tomorrow, and that please could brownie have a puppy that stayed alive.... it was very sweet.

Last night late... he went outside with daddy to be a little man and bury the pups.... he went out in his tennis shoes and his underwear. It was hot.... and he had gotten "ready" for bed... what can i say... He did notice that he was awkwardly attired... and told his dad "it is not likely that you would find many little boys in their underwear burying their puppies" to which daddy replied.."probably not sweet boy, probably not"

I think that God gives us the ability to grieve over something we barely knew, so that when time comes for us to grieve something we have known our whole lives... we are prepared, even just a little bit, for the pain.