Tags and Awards

I used to have approximately four readers of my blog.  They were faithful readers.  They came back week after week to read all about each foster pet I brought home.  They were with me during Noelle's puppy days, when Noelle was lazy instead of naughty.  They were even with me when I first started fostering cats.  They faithfully read my posts for the first two years of blogging, and that kept me going, and kept me writing this blog. 

Then a few months ago, another pet blogger discovered this blog.  And suddenly I was meeting people all over the world, instead of just the few people I knew in this small corner of the Internet.  And for the first time I discovered other blogs, and these fun blog games and awards.  So today I'm going to share some recent awards and tags that I've received from some new blogging friends.


I received the Sunshine Award from One Pibble's Wish.  The Sunshine Award is given to a blogger who brings a little sunshine into someone's life. Thank you Pibble!  Here are the rules for this award:
- Post the award within my post.
- Send the award to 12 bloggers who add a little sunshine to my life.
- Post links to the 12 blogs I've sent the award to.
- Leave a comment on their blog telling them they've gotten the award.
- Put these instructions in my post so they'll know what to do!

I've seen this award on several other blogs, so I'm just going to post twelve bloggers who add sunshine to my life, even if they've already received it.  I hope you'll stop by and visit their blogs if you need a little bit of sunshine in your life.

• Mayzie's Dog Blog
• House of Cats
• Pitter Patter
• Frankly Speaking
• Two Pitties in the City
• Tucker
• Brutus the Frenchie 
• Daily Dose of Jack
• Dog Eared
• kissa-bull
• Stella, Gunther & Betty
• Mango's Great Adventures

I also received the Happy 101 Sweet Friends award, which comes with the following rules:

- Copy the image and paste it to my blog

- List 10 things that make me happy, and do one of them today.

Noelle asked if she could list the 10 things that made her happy, so I said she could.  So here are Noelle's answers:

1. When mom or dad come home from work and greet me.
2. When we go for a walk somewhere with lots of interesting smells.
3. When Bernice or Angie C. come over and visit me.
4. When Remi or a foster dog plays bitey-face or tug-of-war with me.
5. Sleeping on my dad's lap while he plays his X-Box.
6. Sleeping on my mom's lap while she plays Farmville does important work on her computer.
7. Getting treats just for doing things like sitting or lying down.  It's so easy!
8. Chasing cats.
9. Chewing up frisbees. 
10. Showing my mom and dad how much I love them.

And finally, we've been tagged by the House of Cats and Mayzie's Dog Blog for the photo tag game.  Here are the rules: Go to your first photo folder, find the 10th picture, post that photo and explain the story behind it. Then, tag five blogs to do the same.

So since the House of Cats tagged me, I went to my cat pictures folder and found the tenth picture, which is from May 2009:

This is Anastasia, a previous foster kitten.  I was trying to take her picture for the website, but she was not happy about it.  I did not use this picture on her web page, because she looks a bit scary.  But I liked the picture enough to keep it on my computer.  Fortunately no one ever saw this picture, and Anastasia was successfully adopted. 

And since Mayzie the dog tagged me too, I went to my dog pictures folder and found this one from May 2008:

It is one of my previous foster dogs, named Vala.  She was the most energetic, happy dog I have ever fostered, and she just loved people.  I wanted a picture of her with her ears up, like she normally looked.  But when I had my husband hold her so I could get her picture (otherwise she'd go running and jump up on me), she would put her ears back.  So Dave decided to be helpful and hold her ears up for her.  Poor dog.  My fosters have to put up with a lot from us sometimes.

Thanks Amy and Mayzie for the fun game!  I decided to tag five other foster blogs, in case they want to play too.  Of course they may be too busy chasing after playing with their foster pets to participate.

krazycatlady's blog
Freckles' Foster Friends
One girl, too many animals...
buggaboone
kind hearts

Thank you to my four faithful readers (Hi Grandma!) who have put up with me for so long, and thank you to all my newer readers and new blogging friends for making me feel so welcome in your community. 

My puppies grew up!

Remember those cute puppies I dogsat for, for a few weeks? Here is their picture from when I had them, at three weeks old...

They went back to their first foster mom when I went on vacation. They had ringworm which had to be treated, and so they took a little bit longer than most puppies to be ready for adoption. The day is almost here, and the puppies are on the website now to find their own homes. Only they aren't tiny anymore! Check out the puppies now...

They got huge! I still think they're as adorable as ever. I can't wait to see how they turn out once they're all grown up - hopefully their future adoptive families will be back to share pictures and stories then!

Speaking of that, I talked to the new families of both Vala and Samantha this week. Both families say the dogs are doing great. It's always so nice to hear when the dogs have settled in and know that everything is going well - it just makes giving up the dogs I love much easier to know that! Now if I can just find some happy forever families for my puppies and kittens tomorrow! Skittles and Reese and Jade will all be making their first ever appearance at Petsmart tomorrow. Noah is an expert at it now - he's been going for several weeks. So are all seven kittens that I'll be bringing up with me - I'm sad that none of them have found homes yet, even though they've been going up to Petsmart several times, on weekends and during the week. Maybe tomorrow will be their lucky day.

Vala and Selena were adopted!

This was a good weekend for me at Petsmart. Vala was adopted on Saturday, to a nice family with two young boys. I had a really hard time watching her go - they picked her up on Saturday evening from my house, and Vala happily jumped in the car, but when they got ready to drive away, she just kept looking out the window at me like "aren't you coming with me?". I still have this picture in my head of the car driving away with her looking back at me as long as she can. I know she'll settle in and be fine, but I hate that I can't explain to her somehow what is happening. Whenever I bring home a new dog, I give them a brief explanation on why they're there, and how its just temporary and they will find their forever home soon. Unfortunately most of them don't seem to understand, and Vala especially seemed to think we were her permanent family. I really really hope this works out, because I can't stand for her to keep leaving and coming back - its so confusing for her. She was adopted out once but returned the next day because the person's dog didn't get along with her. And then we went on vacation and she was sent to another foster home while we were gone. So she's been moved around a lot lately, and I really want this to be her forever home.

Selena was also adopted, and went to her new home yesterday. She took a very long time to get adopted at first, and when I found out she was being returned, I expected to have a hard time finding her a new home again. But she came back on Saturday, and was adopted again on Sunday! She is a great dog - no major issues at all, just very high energy. The lady who adopted her has another dog for Selena to play with, and has some experience with dog training, so I hope that it will work out for her.

I am back to only two foster dogs now - Noah and Samantha. Samantha is doing great - she's ALMOST house-trained, and she is just the sweetest dog. She follows me around and just wants to lay at my feet all the time. Now that her best friend playmate is gone (Vala), she's kind of lonely. Remi and Noah are both older and don't like to play as much. Samantha is only 7 months old. I know a lot of people only have one dog, but if its a young dog, I don't know how they do it. It is so much easier when they have another dog to play with!

I am hoping to work with Noah more now that it is a little less hectic at home. He doesn't know any obedience commands - no one has ever even taught him to "sit" - or if they have, he's forgotten it! Shy dogs can do really well with obedience training, because it increases their confidence. Think about it this way - if you learn a new skill (say, you learn to speak French) then all of a sudden you feel more confident when you go to France. Sure, you don't catch every word - but if you can at least understand the basics of what people are saying, you are going to be a little less timid. Noah is doing well at my house, but he doesn't seem to be showing a lot of progress. I'm hoping that some basic obedience training will help him develop more confidence.

None of the kittens have been adopted yet. I am trying to talk my husband into letting me adopt Avalanche as a birthday present. He's the sweetest kitten - he just wants to be held and petted all the time. I don't expect to talk my husband into it, but I'm going to keep trying. :-)

Kitten Pictures

I took more pictures of all my kittens to get them added to the website, so I'll share them here also. Here are my cat-napped kittens...

This is Monkee - she has such a cute little face, and her fur is soooo soft!

This is Taffy - she's my favorite - she always wants to jump up on my shoulders, and just stays there while I walk around the house doing chores.


This is Blaze. He's the only boy of this litter, and he is very friendly. I found him yesterday walking on Remi's back. Remi is my 150 lb Great Dane. Remi just looked at him like "Huh?! What's going on?!".


This is Ella - she's the mom of the first three kittens I fostered a couple months ago. She is still up at Petsmart and hasn't been adopted yet. :-(


Here is a picture of Ace - he's one of my flood kittens. He loves to play with feather toys, and will growl and play tug with it!


This is Apollo. He came back from the vet with this cute little bandana, and I can't bear to take it off of him! It has little mice and cheese on it.


This is Astro - he is my attack kitten. He loves to sneak up on and attack a small stuffed dog in the kitten's playroom. (Yes, my kittens have their own playroom -- they're a little bit spoiled.)

This is Avalanche. He's the tough guy kitten - he growls at the other kittens if they try to eat while he's eating canned food. Its a good thing he's so cute - its very hard to take him seriously with his little kitten growl!




Okay, back to dog news. We went to the Rascal's baseball game last night - it was one of their "Take your Dog to the Ballpark" nights. It was a lot of fun. My husband went with me, and we took Samantha and Vala. Then he decided to go back home and bring Remi up also. All the dogs had fun. Noah wanted to go, but we thought he might change his mind once he got there. He doesn't like all the people and noise, so he stayed home and watched over the kittens while we were gone. Vala and Sam got lots of attention. We had set up a table on the concourse, where we were able to talk to many people about Heartland, and met several people who had adopted their pets from Heartland in the past! Samantha collected donations in her "Donation Dog Vest" and we made around $40 in donations. All the dogs did great at meeting the people and even the other dogs. The only difficult part was that Samantha doesn't like the mascots. She would go crazy every time one came by -- and they have several mascots at that ballpark! But in spite of that, it was overall a very nice night. Their next game where you can bring your dog to the ballpark will be on Sunday, July 13th.

This is what happens when my husband leaves town...

My husband is in the Army Reserves, and he had to go to Virginia for two weeks for military training. When he left, we had one foster - Vala. When he gets back next weekend, he's going to find seven fosters. Oops. I'm not sure how it happened really. It doesn't seem like that many, until they're all running loose around the house and I realize how outnumbered I really am! I thought Vala was getting adopted, so I took home Samantha again (see previous posts for pictures and info on her). I also brought home a little Pekingese - he was taken in from a backyard breeder, and has very poor vision, so the vet named him Ray. We're trying to get his eyes to heal a little bit, and now he's just so happy to be somewhere clean and where he's well taken care of. He is a very friendly little guy - he follows me all around the house and yard. But anyway, Vala ended up not getting adopted, so right now I have Vala, Samantha, Noah, Ray, and my own dog Remi. And I also have my cat George and my three foster kittens - Taffy, Blaze and Monkee. Overall, the house is a bit nuts when they're all running around together. But fortunately they all get along very well. The scariest part is that its starting to seem normal to me to have nine animals running around like they own the place. I guess my husband will be home soon to bring me back to reality. Because honestly, having all these animals IS a lot of work - but I LOVE it. I love holding the kittens and listening to them purr, or walking in the room and having Sam or Vala run up to me to see who can get petted first. I like going out to get the mail and having Ray follow me to the mailbox and back with this big grin on his face. I'm going to be really sad when I have to find somewhere else for any of them to go, once he gets home. I just hope one or two finds their forever home this week - and if not, maybe someone will come along and want to try fostering?! If you want to foster Ray though, keep in mind that my six-year-old niece has asked me to save him until she turns 16 - that's when her parents told her she could get a dog. Talk about a long-term foster! :-)

Introducing Noah, and new kittens

Here is a picture of Noah, the foster dog I brought home two nights ago.

He's such a sweet dog - he gets this really happy grin on his face sometimes that I just love to see. Last night I took him and Vala up to a "Party in the Park" event at Civic Park in O'Fallon. Noah wore an "Adopt Me" vest, and both dogs seemed to enjoy the park and meeting many new people. Noah is still very shy at times, especially with men. He loves to be outside, and I have to use really good dog treats to get him to come inside! He plays really well with Vala and Remi both. Last night they all three slept on the bed with me, along with my cat George. It was a little bit crowded, but I didn't mind. It's nice to foster such sweet loving dogs who are already house-trained! :-)

Here are some more pictures of Vala. She's such a loving dog - she has so much enthusiasm and just wants to be next to me all the time.

Next is one of my favorite pictures - my husband was trying to help me get a good picture of Vala, but she kept running up to me, so I asked him to hold her still. That worked, except she kept her ears back and I wanted her to put them up for the picture. So my husband tried to help me out by holding her ears up in the air. I almost couldn't stop laughing long enough to snap a picture. Vala puts up with so much from us sometimes! :-)

And finally, here are some pictures of my newest foster kittens, and my own cat George. First is Monkee, a female kitten with very unique markings.

Next is Blaze - a male kitten who looks like a smaller version of my own cat George.

And last is my cat George on the chair, and my last foster kitten Taffy (female) under the chair. Taffy looks a lot like her brother Blaze, but she has peach markings on the tips of her ears, her legs and the tip of her tail.

Queeny Park, Update on Fosters

Saturday was the Adopt-A-Stray event at Queeny Park. I believe this is the biggest adoption event that we do every year – more dogs are adopted during this event than at any other time. This was my first time attending, and I was very impressed. The event was well organized, and many more people attended than I expected. We had seven dogs adopted – four puppies, and three older dogs. The puppies were from two different foster homes – Arthur and Justin were cute little guys who were the last of their litter to be adopted. Ebony and Shadow came from another foster home, and while this was my first time meeting them, I enjoyed playing with them until they were both adopted as well! The adult dogs were Checkers, Piper and Harley. Checkers was my favorite – mostly just because I named him! He is a cute little black and white Chihuahua. Piper is an adorable yorkie mix – she was so cuddly and sweet! And Harley is a blue merle Australian Shepherd – very soft, and a great dog. His new owner is hoping to turn him into a Frisbee champion! Overall, it was a great experience, and I wish we could do it every month!

We still have so many dogs that need homes! Of course, I’m always partial to my foster dogs, so here’s a quick update on them. Vala wasn’t feeling well, so she missed the Queeny Park event. She’s doing much better now though, and hopefully will be able to go back to PetSmart next week to try again to find a home. Samantha had fun at Queeny Park and I enjoyed spending much of the time with her. She’ll be staying at the main foster home for now, even though I want to bring her home, because I’m bringing home a different foster. Noah, a Heartland dog who was adopted out last year, is being returned because he keeps running away from his family. He’s going to live with me for awhile and I can see if there’s something we can do to help him want to stay home. Kiya and the puppies are back at their original foster home, and continue to grow. The puppies are getting really big!! Kiya continues to be up to her escape artist tricks. Since I returned the puppies, I decided to catnap three kittens that were at the foster home. I have to admit I missed having kittens around. Besides, Vala loves to chase them, and since they’re used to dogs, they don’t seem to mind. When they get tired they just stop running and she sniffs them and turns away to find another one to chase. It gives them all exercise, and I get some great entertainment at the same time! :-)

Introducing Daisy, and other news

It's been a busy few days! Saturday was a bit slow for dog adoptions, and once again neither Vala or Sam were picked. There was one dog returned due to her owner having medical issues. Daisy is a German Shepherd/Husky mix who was adopted out last December (she was named Elkie then). She's only about 7 months old now, and is a beautiful dog. I haven't had a chance to take her picture yet, so hopefully I'll get that and post it in the next day or two. She was very shy and overwhelmed by the other dogs, so I offered to take her to my house and help her get used to her new surroundings. To keep from having too many fosters, I let Sam go back to the main foster home. It was hard to let her go, but I went and visited on Sunday and saw that she was very happy and settled in immediately. Sam loves to play and isn't shy at all, so she loves having other new dogs to play with now. Daisy has quickly become a model dog - anyone thinking about fostering should sign up for her - she's practically perfect! :-) She likes to play with Vala, although she's still not sure about Remi. She's quiet and obedient and house-trained and affectionate. I am really enjoying having her around.

In other news, its been a long week with Kiya and the puppies. One of the puppies has an ear infection, but other than that they're all doing great. They've started sitting up, and walking around a little bit. They're very wobbly and fall over sometimes, or they'll nudge each other and knock each other over. It's so cute to watch. Kiya has been a bit of a challenge, as she needs to eat a lot to feed her puppies, and therefore needs to be taken outside a lot more often than other dogs. Since this isn't always possible to take her out every few hours, she has become an escape artist at getting out of her kennel to go as far away as possible. I can't blame her, I would want the smell as far from me as possible too! But instead of using the puppy pads that I've strategically placed around the basement in case she does get out, she prefers to find more interesting places to do her business. My husband's working on finishing our basement, so there's a lot of tools and construction items lying around. The tools are a favorite spot of hers. Also in boxes of spooled wire, inside a bookshelf that he built into the wall, and even on top of the extra-large container of Nature's Miracle stain/odor remover that was sitting on the floor (guess she told me!). It's been a losing battle on my part to keep her in her exercise-pen where she's staying with the puppies. First, she squeezed between the door and the side of the kennel. I blocked that off, and she managed to get under the kennel by pushing it into a corner and squeezing underneath. I blocked it in so she couldn't move it around, and she somehow lifted the whole thing straight into the air and got out underneath. I tied it down with bungee cords, and she started climbing over the top. I tried a blanket over the top yesterday, which didn't work, and this morning I tried a fitted sheet which will hold better than the blanket. If that fails, my husband offered to find me a piece of plywood to try next. Hopefully that will work!! It'd be funny if she didn't make such a big mess everytime she got out. :-)

In happier news, Murphy is coming back! Murphy, who used to be called Coal, is my favorite previous foster dog. Every now and then I get to dog-sit for him while his owners are gone, and this weekend is one of those times. I am so glad that his owners kept in touch and let me be his honorary aunt. I generally don't have favorite fosters - or actually, I tend to think of each one as my favorite whenever I'm around them. But Coal somehow snuck in and stole favorite dog forever spot in my heart. So I'm really looking forward to seeing him again.

And finally, there's Ella. She's the mother of the kittens that I fostered, and she's finally almost ready to be put up for adoption. She goes in to the vet tomorrow to get her vaccinations and be spayed, and then on Saturday she'll be moving up to PetSmart to find a home. There are some cats that live at Petsmart 24/7, and volunteers come in during the week to care for them. Ella will become one of those cats, and hopefully someone will see her during the week and fall in love with her and adopt her. She's a great cat, and I hope she finds a home quickly, although I hear it will be challenging during "kitten season".

Introducing Kiya and Puppies!

First, to catch up from last week.... Sam and Vala went to PetSmart on Saturday, but neither one found a home. However, two other dogs did get adopted this week. Emmy is a pug that has been in foster care for awhile. My best friend was hoping to adopt her, until she found out she's very allergic to dogs. But she did spend enough time with Emmy that I got to hear about what a sweet wonderful little dog she was. Emmy got a lot of attention at PetSmart, and was adopted right away by a family with two other pugs, so she'll have new friends to play with. Ozzie was the other dog who was adopted, and we're very happy for him. He is a very sweet bassett hound mix, and he went to a home with another bassett hound mix! So both of our adopted dogs this week found homes with families who are already familiar with their breed - always helpful!

Sam and Vala have both been getting away with too much at home lately, and I need to get them back onto a better routine. They were both spayed a week ago and were told to "take it easy" until the stitches were removed, so they haven't been able to spend a lot of time playing or going for long walks or anything. This means I felt sorry for them and let them loose in the house without keeping a close eye on them. This is not good for their housebreaking, or for my shoes that they've chewed on several times. Well, one of them - the other downside is I can't tell who the culprit is, since I haven't caught them in the act! Oh well, they're both too cute to be mad at for long. Sam (the most likely culprit) is always ready to greet me at the door and give me puppy licks to say hello. She's very easygoing, and always ready to play. Vala, on the other hand, has become a bit lazy, and doesn't jump up and down like a bouncy ball anymore. She prefers to be a lap dog, and fortunately she's only 28 pounds, because she won't hesitate to jump onto the bed or couch or wherever a person is to make herself comfortable in their lap.

As if these two foster dogs weren't enough, plus one foster cat, and my own dog and cat, I brought home a mother dog and five puppies last night. This time I asked my husband *first*. Kittens aren't too hard to hide - but six more dogs in the house is another story. ;-) Another foster mom had taken in the pregnant dog (Kiya), and she had her puppies two weeks ago. Since the foster mom had company coming into town and needed to get them out of her house for a couple of weeks, I offered to dog-sit. So she said okay, but we worked out the details through some other volunteers. Imagine her surprise when she got home last night and the dog and puppies were gone! They'd been dognapped by me - and now I may not give them back! :-) The puppies are 17 days old today - they've just started to open their eyes. They can't walk or bark, and they just look like little potatoes. Cute potatoes, but potatoes nonetheless (sorry Gina, but its true). I'll post some pictures soon so you can see for yourself. They are happily ensconced in our basement now, safely away from the rest of the animals in the house. They weigh about 2 pounds and 12 oz. I'll post more about them soon!

Kittens were Adopted!

It was a good weekend for my foster kittens, as they were all adopted and went home to new families. I will miss them, but I'm glad they have new families and can get the love and attention they deserve. Now I just have Ella, the mother cat left. She'll be ready for adoption in two or three weeks.

The dogs didn't have so much luck this week in finding new homes. We took seven dogs up to Petsmart, and none of them were adopted. My two foster dogs, Sam and Vala, are at the vet today being spayed and getting their rabies and tests to get ready for adoption. I will be taking them to PetSmart next weekend for adoptions.

Sage was adopted!

Saturday was a very slow day at PetSmart, as only one dog was adopted. The good news is that dog was Sage, one of my previous fosters. I only had Sage for a short time, before she went back to her first foster mom's home. She went home to a family with kids, and I think she'll be a great fit for them. They were originally interested in Kermit, and while I know he would have been a little too much for them because of the small children, I was so happy that someone *wanted* him (besides the HHS volunteers). I really really want to foster Kermit, if I can ever get down to no other foster dogs. My only concern is how he will do with Remi, since they are both very large male dogs. But if he does okay, I want to foster him at least for a short time, and help him find a home that is perfect for him. (Read my old post on our special needs dogs, or his bio on the HHS website for info on Kermit). He's such a great dog, and if I can foster him and see how he does in a home, and find out more about what his special needs would be, it might be easier to find someone who will be able to give him his own forever home.

Vala and Sam are doing great, and will be ready for adoption in another week or so. I did decide to keep Vala's current name, since it won the most votes, and she's even starting to learn what her name is. Vala has calmed down quite a bit, and both dogs are settling in well. They're also both sleeping in our bed every night - once again, totally spoiled for whomever adopts them. But I figure that's my perogative as a foster mom. :-) They're not completely housebroken yet, but they are improving every day. They're also doing great with learning some basic obedience, and getting along well with each other, my dog Remi and the cats. In fact, the kittens came out of their room to check the dogs out, and walked around like they owned the place. It was very funny to watch.

The kittens went up to Petsmart on Saturday, but none of them were adopted. Hopefully this week they will do better! I also found out from one of the cat foster moms they're old enough to purr, but none of them ever do. So my new goal is to get them to start purring for me. Not sure how to accomplish that right now... but I'll see what I can figure out. :-)

Which name do you like best?

See the post below this one to learn about the two new foster dogs I brought home last night. My husband named the shepherd/rottweiler mix Samantha, so that's definite. We're trying to come up with a name for the Pitbull mix now. At the moment I'm calling her Vala, but I think I might change it. Please vote for one or more names listed in the poll at the bottom of the page, for this dog:

Of course, my husband gets final say, but I will try to persuade him of whatever the majority likes. You may ask why he gets final say -- since he doesn't read this blog, I will tell you. :-) He is not crazy about us fostering dogs. And since I work full-time, I depend on him to help me somewhat, by taking the dogs out when he gets home from work, or putting up with them when they have accidents or chew up his shoes or things like that. I think if I let him name the dogs, he becomes more attached to them and therefore likes them better. At least, this is my working theory. ;-) I thought when I got these two dogs that he would like the pit bull puppy - it would remind him of Koda, possibly. So I got the pit bull puppy for him, and the shepherd puppy for me. Samantha reminds me of Ernie, who I recently fostered. However, so far it appears that he will be more attached to Sam, and I'll be more attached to the yet-unnamed dog (because it would be unfair for both of us to be more attached to the same dog)! I've only had them less than 24 hours though, so we'll see what happens. :-)

Introducing Sam and Vala

Any Stargate SG-1 fans out there will know where those names came from. ;-) Sam is short for Samantha, and she's a beautiful shepherd/rottweiler mix, around 4 or 5 months old. She is shy and just wants to climb in my lap and hide. I had a hard time getting a picture of her this morning because she wanted to be right next to me at all times. But here is a slightly blurry picture of Sam:

And here is one of her in motion... ;-)

Vala, who's name may be changed later, is the complete opposite of Sam in almost every way. She is not shy at all, and has more energy than any dog I've ever met. I'm hoping its due to being locked in a small cage 24/7 and not even being allowed outdoors for bathroom breaks. The dogs picked up by Animal Control go into the shelter and don't see daylight ever again unless they're rescued or adopted. When I saw Vala in her cage she wouldn't even stand up to say hello - just looked up at me mournfully. However, once she realized she was saved, she turned into a non-stop ball of energy. She BOUNCES up and down, onto people, or furniture, or if nothing else is convenient, just up and down in the air. She is the best jumping dog I've had! Here is a picture of Vala:

She may look like she's comfortably lying in the grass, but don't be fooled. She's really just getting a good low position so she can jump even higher. :-)

My trip to the shelter

Okay, I couldn't do it -- go to a shelter with soooo many more dogs than I expected, and only take one. I wanted to take many of them - but some were not ready yet - they were still being held for the required six days in case their owner turned up for them. Other people sometimes were also interested in those dogs, and had put their name down on a waiting list to be informed when the dog was allowed to leave. So I was relieved that there were some names on the lists of the dogs I was interested in. Except for two of the dogs I couldn't leave behind - neither one had any names on their list, and both were living on borrowed time. One dog had been there since 4/2 and was supposed to have been euthanized last week, but was given a temporary reprieve. The other one had been there since 4/14, and since it was a pit mix, had very little hope of getting rescued or adopted. I took both of them home. My sneaky plan to let the expert foster mom do all the work while I took the ready-to-be-adopted dog went out the door - I will keep these two young dogs at my house and deal with any sickness or problems while I get them ready for adoption. They will need vaccinations, and rabies shots, and deworming, and spayed and micro-chipped before they will be ready for adoption. So if everything goes perfectly, they may be ready in three weeks. Already one of the dogs has kennel cough, and the other one may have it as well - so hopefully that will clear up quickly. It was hard to leave the other dogs behind. There is one in particular that I love, and he isn't ready to go yet, but he does have names on his list, so I really hope that one of those people who's interested in him will adopt him and give him a good home. So many other dogs there don't have a chance. They euthanize most dogs after six days because they have to make room for all the new dogs coming in. Sometimes people dump their dogs because they just don't want them anymore. Other times they let their dog run loose, then don't want to go to the shelter and pay the fines to pick the dog up so they leave them there. One person had two dogs at the shelter - she came and picked up one of the dogs and left the other behind. He is a pit bull mix and will be euthanized. I was amazed at how many dogs were there at the shelter, and really sad to hear that it was a low number then, because we went on Monday and they'd just euthanized many dogs on Friday. I don't blame these shelters for having to euthanize dogs - but I blame all the owners who are not responsible - who don't care for their animals, and don't spay or neuter their pets. It causes so much unnecessary suffering.