Nice Day!

It was beautiful weather out today, and that may have been part of the reason that it was quiet at PetSmart - hopefully people were out enjoying the great weather before it ends. However it did mean that we didn't have a lot of luck at PetSmart, at least with dog adoptions. Penny, one of my favorite Heartland dogs, was adopted. She is a border collie mix, and very sweet. Also, Luke, a chocolate lab, and Hannah, a dachshund mix puppy were adopted. So all in all, it wasn't a bad day - although it would have been better (in my opinion) if Lacy or one of the lab/border collie puppies were adopted. Derby also is finally going to his new home tomorrow morning - hooray! I am hoping by next week to have Pepsi and Ginger ready for their first trip to PetSmart. Tomorrow I am determined to get pictures of them so I can get them on the website. And now I must end this, because Hunter is harassing Remi, Derby and Noelle are harassing Blaze, and I have no idea where Lacy is or what she's up to!

More about my new fosters

I just had to share more about my new fosters. I still haven't taken any pictures, but I did find some pictures of the dogs from when they were at the shelter, so I will post those.

This is Noelle, my deaf pit bull puppy. She is such a great dog - I'm already thinking about adopting her myself. The problem is if I do that, it will be one less dog I can foster in the future. But I'm totally in love with her, so I'm not sure I will be able to give her up. She has a pretty bad cough right now, so she's on antibiotics, and I'm taking her to the vet this afternoon to get her checked out. She is just so loving - she constantly wants to lay at my feet. She's also very low energy - I'm not sure if that's just because she's not feeling well, or if that's her normal activity level, but I'm hoping its her normal activity level. :-) She just follows me around, and every time I stop she lays down by me, and then when I move she gets up and follows me again! She never jumps up on me, and she even appears to be housetrained. Most of the dogs I get to foster haven't had any training - they jump, and bark a lot, and have other undesired behaviors. So when I get one that is either already trained, or just naturally well behaved, I am always very happy. :-) Noelle appears to be a large dog in this picture, but she's actually not very big - around 27 pounds right now.



Next is Pepsi. She's also a pit bull puppy - very young I think, but I'll have to wait for the vet to give me an estimate. She is a very happy, very hyper little girl. She is always so excited to see someone, that she tries to jump into their arms, and her tail just goes crazy wagging! Her and Ginger are about the same size, and while at first Ginger was intimidated by Pepsi, now they're best friends. I let them play together and they have a great time wrestling and playing chase. Whenever I hold Pepsi she settles down and puts her head on my shoulder and cuddles up to me - its so cute. As you can see in this picture, she was scared - see how her mouth is closed, ears back, and the worried look in her eye? I am sure the shelter was a scary place for her to be!


And last is my little Jack Russel mix puppy - Ginger. The cutest dogs are generally the most annoying, and she fits that profile. :-) She is a very loving dog - she just has the ability to destroy her kennel! I have puppy pads in there, since the puppies are not housetrained and are too little to hold it while I'm at work all day. Pepsi is very good about using the puppy pads, and making cleanup easier. Ginger on the other hand, prefers to tear up the puppy pads and newspaper and leave a huge mess everywhere in the kennel to clean up. Other than that, she's a great dog. She has very soft fur, and she loves attention. She also is hilarious to watch when she gets a stuffed toy - she picks it up and shakes it back and forth - definitely a terrier! Again, in the picture below, you can see she was scared when they took it. I will try to get some pictures of the puppies looking happy soon! :-)



Lacy and Derby are still doing well. They both went on long walks last night and walked very well on the leash - no pulling, or at least not much. They're having fun playing together, and I think Lacy will miss Derby once he's gone.

New dogs on the way!

I was going to wait until I had pictures, but I just can never wait to share happy news! I have a new foster dog, and one or two more on the way. I am so excited. :-)

Remi got his stitches out and got a clean bill of health from the vet, so he's officially back to normal now! Derby was supposed to be adopted on Sunday, but his new family decided to hold off for a few more days while they finish putting up their fence. I just hope they get it finished soon, since he's staying with me until they do! Since I only have one official foster dog (Lacy, the basset hound) I decided another trip to the shelter was needed. Of course, the adorable dogs there sucked me in and instead of leaving with one, I signed up to take two. Then after I left, another volunteer called me - she'd contacted another shelter that was going to have to euthanize animals soon, and they had a dog she thought was perfect for me. I immediately thought "oh no, I'm going to hear about this dog and have to turn it down, knowing it will be euthanized, because I just committed to these other dogs". Then she told me about this dog, and sure enough, it was perfect for me. It's a pit bull mix puppy and it is deaf. I love pit bull puppies - they've been some of the very best dogs I've fostered. And I always want to save the deaf ones. So, I decided that since she was going to that shelter anyway to look at some other dogs, I might as well meet her there and check out this puppy. So, guess who came home with me last night? An adorable, all white, deaf pit bull puppy! And she is so sweet - very calm and loving. She'd been picked up as a stray and been living at the shelter for the past month. She's about 3 months old now. I am so glad that the other volunteer called and found out about her, or she probably would have been euthanized. That shelter is not allowed to adopt pit bulls out to the public, due to city regulations, so if a rescue group doesn't take them, they are killed. There's another one there (not deaf) that I really wanted to take also, but if I did I would be homeless I think. So I'm hoping someone else will save him.

I'm going back to the first shelter this afternoon to pick up the two dogs I already signed up for. One is a brindle pit bull puppy - super high energy! The other is a jack russell terrier mix - very quiet and shy and such a cute dog. I may also end up with a cocker spaniel puppy that was there - not sure about that yet. Fortunately a volunteer offered to keep the jack russell terrier mix for a while if needed (if my husband threatens to leave me). :-) I will post pictures of everyone soon!

Great Day!

Hershe was adopted!!!

I'm so happy for her. It's surprising to everyone that she found a home, because she's been in foster care for so long, but the right people just happened to come along today. They have very well behaved children, and no other pets, and were looking for a lab that wouldn't jump up or be hyper, so it sounds like a good situation for her. I've just been smiling non-stop since they adopted her early this afternoon. :-) It's so rewarding to see a dog that had a hard time finding a home be adopted. Now if we can just get Kermit a home.... he and Hershe were best friends, and he has been depressed and not eating much since she came to my house last week. I thought he'd be better soon since she'd be going back to live with him, but now that she has her own forever home, he's going to keep being sad. I hope he feels better and finds his own home soon. I've been posting more flyers, and asking others to post them places as well, so maybe the right person is out there for him and will see one of those flyers soon. If you go to the O'Fallon Petsmart, you can help by stopping by the Love-A-Pet-Center and picking up a few flyers to hang up at work, church, school, the library, etc - any public bulletin board you see. The flyers are in a green folder in the red cart outside the LAPC. Take as many as you can hang up - I will print more if we run out. ;-)

In other great news, two other dogs were adopted today as well. Chester, a beagle mix, found a home. I always thought he was funny looking and smiled everytime I looked at him - to me his head just looked wrong on his body. But he is a wonderful dog, and the family who adopted him thinks he is perfect. He's a very sweet dog and I'm so happy he found a home. And the other dog that was adopted is Derby! He has been waiting so long for a home - not as long as Hershe, but still a long time. We could never figure out why no one adopted him - he is friendly, gets along well with everyone, and is an all-around great dog. I was actually going to foster him next, and even took him home for a weekend not long ago. He had a short "vacation" at my house. :-) Here is a picture from when he was here last.

Don't you love his big ears? He actually is here at my house again tonight, I'm just too lazy to go find the camera. I'm taking him back to PetSmart either tomorrow or Monday for his new family to get him. In the meantime, Lacy and Derby are having a blast playing together.

Speaking of Lacy, once again she wasn't adopted. And neither were any of the adorable lab/border collie puppies! I'm very glad the hard-to-adopt ones are being picked, but its always surprising that the "easy" ones get passed over. Here are some pictures of me and Lacy from the Prairie Day event we went to a few weeks ago, and then from the Diabetes Walk we went on last Sunday.

Prairie Days - Lacy howling ;-)

Me and Lacy at Prairie Days.

Me and Lacy at the JDRF walk

This is toward the beginning of the 3 mile walk - Lacy was pulling me. Toward the end of the walk, I was pulling her!

Here we are after the walk ended. That's my grandma with me - she's awesome. I'm not just saying that because she reads my blog either. Hi Grandma! ;-)

Thanks to Angie for the Prairie Day pictures and my mom for the JDRF pictures!

I'm going to try to get back up to PetSmart tomorrow afternoon and see if I can get a kitten adopted! My orange kittens won't be ready for another week, but I still have Blaze, Astro and Buttercup to get adopted. Buttercup actually stayed up at PetSmart today, in one of the permanent cat cages that are there. Hopefully someone will see her and want to adopt her soon.