There were only three (from left) Yoda, Bailey and Pluto. - Contributed photos

Chapter two of our bedtime story is told by Yoda, one of Eloise's pups.

My name is Yoda and I am one year old. I have short and glossy honey-coloured hair. You met my Mummy Eloise last week, but I have two Mummies who look after me. The other one is a human. I think my Daddy was a Rhodesian Ridgeback because that is what I look like. My human Daddy is like me! He's handsome, strong and athletic. He's loyal to both my Mummies and he likes to run around the garden. Only, I don't understand why he's not playing with me in the sand mound we have in the driveway. He keeps using it to mix with something else and now there's a large wall up next to the road.

Playing in the sand

My Mummy plays with me in the sand every day. We like to bury ourselves in it, getting the granules to stick to our hair. This works better on Mummy than on me. I don't think human Mummy likes it so much when we do this as she is always sweeping behind us in the house. Doesn't she like the way it feels on her feet? I love digging my paws into sand.

I wish we'd had a sand pit when my brothers and sisters lived with us. I think they would have loved it. They weren't with us for long because they went to stay with other humans, but I have some funny stories to tell you of the times they were here.

When we were very small, human Daddy built us our own house outside their back door. The walls were made with cement blocks and inside our home we had a lawn and a protective bushy area. He even put a wooden roof over a part of the grass in case it rained. There was one problem. As we got taller, some of my brothers and sisters would clamber over the walls and get out. Then they wouldn't be able to climb back, so they'd start whining in the middle of the night. This would wake up the humans.

Determined little Bailey

I'm Yoda

There were several times when my brother Bailey, who was the runt of the litter, would fall into the middle of a cement block, with his tail poking out of the hole. We all found it hilarious, but human Mummy seemed distressed and worried about it every time. Bailey was fine. He might have looked weak and helpless, but he was a determined little fellow. He was the only one who had the same colour hair as our grandmother, the golden retriever we've heard about. However, his hair was short like mine.

The loud-mouth rebel of the litter was my brother Pluto. He looked as sweet as pie, but he was always the one leading us into trouble, and he made screeching noises at night when he was hungry. Pluto was almost as big as me, and had a slightly darker coat than Bailey. All the human children would fall for those puppy-dog eyes of his when they visited, especially Cristina, whose hair was the same shade. She didn't realise how mischievous he was!

There were nine of us by this stage (one had gone to heaven very early on): Fluffy, Bassie, Nesta, Kiki, Casey, Pluto, Bailey, Blackie and me, Yoda. The first five were girls, all looking like some variation of chubby Shepherd dogs. They went to live with other humans when we were about eight weeks old, leaving the rest of us boys to get into more mischief. It was a very sad day when Blackie, who was identical to Bailey but with black hair, left not long after. The four of us had become quite close to one another after our sisters left.

Then there were only three.

NEXT WEEK: 'Rescuing my puppies', told by Eloise.

Emmadaltonbrown@gmail.com

When there were four brothers: Pluto, Bailey, Yoda and Blackie.

In the paragraph below, the number should have been 1,100 instead of 11,000, as was carried last week. We regret the error.

The idea of watching television and reading for so many weeks is a little scary. Let's assume that one sleeps eight hours per night, spends two hours per day eating, and another hour in the bathroom. That leaves 13 hours per day, seven days per week, for 13 weeks, which amounts to an impressive 1,183 hours with which to come up with things to do! There's no doubt you'll have a few visitors, so that'll while away some 83 hours, which will leave you with 1,100. What else to do?