Monday, October 1, 2007

How It Started

I’m not sure what made me decide to foster dogs. I guess it started several months ago, when we adopted Remi. My husband had been wanting us to get another dog for several years, but I had been putting it off as long as possible. Dogs were okay, but I was more of a cat person. Besides, I wasn’t ready for the large amount of work that I knew would come along with a dog. In addition to the normal daily feeding, and the dog hair, dogs required walking and cleaning up after and a lot more attention than I thought I wanted to give. At least, that was until we got Remi. Since my husband wanted a BIG dog, I started researching dog breeds. He was leaning toward a Mastiff, but they kind of scared me, so I looked for something else that would fit us and our lifestyle and still be really BIG. That’s how we decided on a Great Dane. Danes are known to be laid-back, great with children, low energy dogs. They are one of the few breeds known as “gentle giants”. That sounded perfect! So we adopted a 1-year-old Great Dane from a local Great Dane rescue group.

And that was the end of life without dogs for me. It took awhile, but I eventually stopped being scared of Remi’s big size and bigger bark! I did a lot of reading on how to train dogs, and learned how to communicate with them. I also learned in the process how many dogs are out there that don’t have a safe place to stay, or someone to love. So I talked to my husband, and convinced him that Remi needed a playmate. And then I applied to be a foster home with the Heartland Humane Society of Missouri.

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