Whimzy Makes a Statement

So our puppy Whimzy (5 months old now) has obviously decided that the celebration of Christmas should be confined to the time between Thanksgiving and Christmas Day. Here's the story.   

Buddy 1 was a stuffed toy something - it looked like a moose, but had a horn (unimoose) - that Whimzy loved. At least she loved to chew it. And she would run around the back yard with it in her mouth until it tangled with her legs and she did a somersault. It died an ugly death when the puppy ripped open its stomach and pulled out lots of stuffing. I had already sewn it up twice before from small tears. This one was not going to be sewable.   

Buddy 2 was a stuffed giraffe. Also well loved and her first (and only) choice for what to take to bed with her into her cage. Whimzy performed a tail-ectomy on Buddy 2 and, more importantly, ruined the squeaker in its tummy. No squeaker made Whimzy very sad, so we went today to pick up some things at the pet store (and look for a new stuffed toy with a working squeaker). Now you might ask why we are spending money on a third stuffed animal if she destroys them within a month. I have no answer for that except that if we weren't spending it here we would probably be wasting it somewhere else, like on our kids. And they're the ones who talked us into getting a puppy to begin with, so they will just have to deal with it. Week by week their inheritance is getting eaten up by stuffed toys with a squeaker. So be it.    

Which brings us to Buddy 3. This time we are going with a more spherical animal - which could only mean ... ? Right, a hedgehog. And because the pet store has already shifted into Christmas mode, a hedgehog with a Santa hat sewn on. I would like to show you a picture of that, but it took me five minutes to find the camera, and during that time, Santa the Hedgehog was unmasked (well, unhatted, anyway).      

Does Whimzy look guilty? No, I didn't think so, either. So now the toy is just Buddy 3, the non-Christmas Hedgehog. And no, we don't call her Buddy 3, but we explained it to Whimzy when we bought it today so that she would know that it was a different Buddy. Unlike Darrin on Bewitched and the new Dumbledore that didn't really look like the old Dumbledore, but never gets explained in the movie. Come on, it's a movie about magic; you can't figure out a decent explanation to give us?   

Old Dumbledore

New Dumbledore

So we have a pool going on how long Buddy 3 lasts, but I'm worried that Ann may not be an impartial observer now that she has money on it. If I see her taking too much interest in Buddy 3,  I may have to set up the video camera to keep an eye on her. I'll let you know the outcome.