Elvis and Reese were adopted!

It was a strange weekend, but a very good one! Both Elvis and Reese, my two hardest to place fosters, found homes on Saturday. Elvis went home to a great young couple who decided they were ready for their first pet. He should be perfect for them, since he's already such a well mannered dog. Since he is so timid, it will take him awhile to settle in, but he seemed very comfortable around the couple at PetSmart so I am hoping it will not be a difficult transition for him (or for them!) Reese also found a home, and was chosen by a young girl who saw her and fell in love. It sounds like Reese will be a happy dog in her new home. The family agreed to let me go visit her in a couple weeks just to make sure everything is working out for everyone but I am hoping that everything will work out perfectly.

None of my kittens were adopted, and Lacy was not adopted either. I took Lacy to the Juvenile Diabetes walk in Forest Park on Sunday, and she had a great time. I was afraid I was going to have to carry her on the last part of the 3 mile walk though - she got very tired! She wore her adopt-me vest, and a couple people asked about her, so it was good advertising for Heartland, in addition to being good for Lacy to go out and meet new dogs and new people. She did very well with everyone, and enjoyed the post-walk hot dog that they provided.

I'm also happy to report that Lana, another one of Kiya's puppies, found a home. Her five puppies lived at my house for a few weeks when they were very young, so I am always extra-concerned about them. We're down to just two - Cody and Scout - that still need homes! It was very surprising that Lana was chosen because we also had the nine lab/border collie puppies there, and they are so cute. I thought if anyone was looking for a puppy they'd want one of those, but surprisingly, none of them were adopted. It was kind of sad to load up all 9 puppies again and take them back to their kennel. I hope next week we have better luck getting them homes.

New Pictures

I came home tonight and found all three kittens sleeping on different levels of the cat tree, so I just had to take a picture and wake them up! :-) That's Astro on top, Buttercup in the middle, and Blaze in the hammock on the bottom.

This next picture is from about a week ago. I apologize for the poor photography, but once I get the camera out, the dogs always seem to think that means they should come stand directly on my feet to make sure I don't get a decent picture of them. So I had to take this quick, before Bailey moved. This is her and Astro curled up together in the crate. Both Astro and Blaze like to take naps in the dogs crates on a regular basis, so I think Astro was probably there first and Bailey decided to go join him for a nap. They were so cute together!

It's those cute moments, which happen several times a day, that make me put up with the not so cute moments. In this next picture, this is what I found when I got home from work one day last week. There was nothing else to do about it, so I just had to laugh!

My husband had left the animals upstairs while he went down to work in the basement, and the animals kept themselves busy deconstructing a dog bed! At first I thought it was probably Reese's doing - but then I realized the truth...

It was BLAZE!*

My friend Julie says that Blaze gets a bad rap, and that he's actually a wonderful cat. But now that you've seen the proof for yourself, can you really believe that?!

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*Of course, I joke about this, but with my luck someone will visit my blog who was thinking about adopting Blaze, and decide not to because of my idea of humor! :-O

Busy weekend ahead

It's been a pretty busy week. Monday night I took Lacy to visit some people who saw her at the Dardenne Prairie Days event last weekend, and see how she did with their dog. She did very well, and got along great with the other dog, but the family wasn't sure they were ready to make the commitment of having a second dog just yet. I'm glad they were willing to give it some thought, because the impulse decisions that people often make for something that will be a 10-20 year commitment is always scary. But I think this family decided they weren't ready for a second dog, so this weekend Lacy will be back at PetSmart, trying again to find a home.

I also received an application from someone interested in adopting Astro this week. They're coming to see him on Saturday, so hopefully Astro will be going home!

Yesterday I visited another foster mom and helped to take care of some of the dogs. I got to play with these adorable puppies - aren't they cute?! They're making their first trip up to PetSmart on Saturday. There are actually NINE of them, and they all look almost identical!

Tonight I'm going to help get ready for our Heartland garage sale on Saturday. I have a lot of donations to drop off and will hopefully gather a few more things from my house to add to the list. All the proceeds of the garage sale will go to support Heartland.

Saturday I will be at PetSmart all day, hopefully getting a few animals adopted, and then Sunday I'm going to the Walk for Diabetes in Forest Park to benefit the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation. After that, I'm going apple picking, a family tradition, in Grafton, IL. It should be a fun weekend!

Remi, Bailey and Smitty

A lot has happened in the past week! But the story with Remi actually goes back several months. My stepdaughter was visiting for the summer, and she had these three magnetic bouncy balls, slightly smaller than a raquetball. They were fun to play with, and Remi thought so too. He grabbed one in his mouth and ran off with it. I ran after him into the living room, and asked him to "drop it". He likes to play a game where he refuses to drop something once he gets it. But this time, he immediately opened his mouth, and had nothing in it! I was right behind him, and didn't see the ball anywhere, but it was too big for him to swallow (wasn't it?) so I figured it must have rolled away. I checked under all the furniture, and everywhere it might have disappeared but couldn't find it! I was slightly worried, and told my husband what happened. He agreed with me that it was too big for Remi to swallow and I must just be overlooking it somewhere. I was still a little worried, but I kept an eye on him and he was fine. Well, it should be no surprise what they found in his stomach when they did the surgery - the missing ball! It took a few months to make him sick, but it appears that was the cause of his being ill. So they removed it, and he went home to recover. He's had a tough recovery - he had to go back to the vet on Friday because he had an infection and still wasn't moving or eating. But I'm happy to say that he's doing much better now. He is eating and walking around and appears on his way to a full recovery.

I only went to PetSmart for a short time on Saturday since Remi wasn't feeling well, but it was long enough for Bailey to find a home. I knew she would be adopted right away - we had several applications on her as soon as she was put on the website. She's just an adorable puppy! She went home with a family that has two other dogs and some very cute kids for her to play with.

I'd also like to introduce my newest foster, who's already been adopted. Weird, isn't it? I brought him home on Wednesday night, and he was adopted on Saturday afternoon. His name is Smitty, and he's an orange and white tabby cat. He's been on our website for awhile, and I just loved him from the moment I met him. He is one of those ultra-friendly cats that likes people, other cats, dogs, and pretty much everything. I thought he'd fit in perfectly at my house, so I asked his foster mom to let me take him home for awhile. It turned out to be a very short while, since we received a phone call on Saturday asking if someone could meet him. The lady who wanted him has several dogs and another cat, and also thought Smitty would be a perfect fit. She met him on Saturday afternoon, and just like me she fell in love and adopted him right then! So I only had Smitty a few days, but I want to add him to my blog so I never forget him. This is Smitty...

He did great at my house for the short time he was there. He got along great with the other kittens and with all the dogs. And I think my husband even liked him a little bit! Or at least he didn't dislike him as much as he dislikes the kittens. :-)

Speaking of kittens, I still have Blaze, Astro and Buttercup. Blaze is always the problem kitten - although I love him anyway! Now he's into his hair pulling stage. The more experienced cat foster moms advise me that he will outgrow this - I can't wait! But still he's ultra friendly and so laid back - I love that nothing ever phases him. Astro is my perfect kitten. He has the best expressions, and is just so cute! He likes to sleep in the dog crate on the fleece pad. He also has been known to curl up with Bailey on the dog bed. He's turned into a cuddly little guy, and I adore him. Buttercup is still very shy, but she's improved so much. She'll roam the house now and not worry too much about the dogs, but she is the first to run if a noise or something else startles her. She also loves to be petted but is still insecure about being picked up. I have to let her come to me on her terms in order for her to stick around and be petted. All in all, I have three pretty great foster kittens at the moment.

Update on Remi

Well, the vet just called, and Remi apparently ate something he shouldn't have. Whatever it is has metal on the inside, so it showed up on the x-rays. Its stuck somewhere in his digestive tract, so now he's going to have to have surgery to remove it. I was afraid to ask how much it was going to cost, but I'm glad that at least they can make him better. They have to get him hydrated first, and then he's going to have surgery this afternoon. Poor dog. I can't imagine what he ate - maybe a cat toy or something like that. He is so big, that he can fit really large items into his mouth!

Everyone to the vet!

At least that's the way it feels today! I took Bailey in to the vet this morning to get spayed, microchipped, vaccinated, etc. I also ended up taking my dog Remi in, because he's sick. I won't gross you out with the details, but let's just say my husband spent a lot of time cleaning carpets yesterday, because Remi couldn't make it outside in time. Lucky me, I was at work and got to miss all that! The vet fit him in even though I didn't have an appointment for him, so I'm anxiously waiting to hear what they find out. In addition to the dogs, I am taking in my own cat and one of my foster cats this afternoon to get checked out. I also might take in Lacy since she needs to get her stitches out from her spay surgery last week. I might as well get everyone in and out at once!

I finally broke down and bought a Gentle Leader head collar for Remi. I heard about these a long time ago, but wasn't too sure about them. The books I originally read about dog training and dog care had mixed reviews, and I'm not usually one to try the newest fad (even if they have been around for a few years!). Since Remi is stronger than I am, I can't walk him on a regular collar and leash, so my husband and I opted to get a prong collar for him when we first got him. Those are more of a classic training collar, and it allowed me to walk him and hold him back if he saw another dog or rabbit or something he wanted to go after. He responded well to it, and it worked so I kept putting off trying one of the head collars even though I kept hearing good things about them. Well, I finally decided it was time to at least try a friendlier method of walking Remi. I got the Gentle Leader a few days ago - along with some other very fun training supplies - and tried it out the same night. It is AMAZING! I am so happy I bought it - it works great! I've only used it on a couple of short walks so far, but so far he has been perfect - he doesn't pull me around, he seems very comfortable with it on, and when he's seen something he wants to go after, I've been able to redirect him without having to yank on the leash or cause him pain. I am a huge fan of this collar. I will stick to the flat collar on most of the dogs, but on dogs that are too strong for me to walk easily, this will be my first choice of training collars from now on. It actually makes me look forward to taking Remi for walks again!

One of my other fun training supplies I bought is called a clicker+. Clickers, just like head halters, were one of those things I felt like hadn't been around long enough to be proven. People have been training dogs for decades without needing a little box that makes a clicking noise. Besides, I have enough to worry about with a leash and treats! But once I started learning more about clicker training, I changed my mind. There are several scientific studies (those always help convince me - something measurable and proven to work) that show how much better animals respond to a consistent noise made right at the time of wanted behavior. And while I was doing the same thing with a verbal cue (saying "Good" each time the dog did the desired behavior), a mechanical noise that sounds the same each time is clearer and easier for a dog to understand. So, I started shopping for clickers. And one of the problems with training more than one dog at a time is that the click can be confusing since each dog isn't sure when its "being clicked". So since I like gadgets, and since I am usually training more than one dog at a time, I just had to buy this clicker+, which is an electronic clicker that makes four different clicking noises! It's easier to use than a typical box clicker because I don't have to worry about holding the clicker backwards or upside down and not being able to click at the right time. And its fun because I can give each dog a different kind of click. It also has different volume levels which is nice since Elvis is scared of loud clicks (surprise), but loud clicks are better for outdoors or when there is a lot of noise in the house. So I'm having a great time playing with my new dog training supplies. I've heard you can even train cats with a clicker, but I've got to figure out dog training with a clicker first.

Poor Elvis...

Elvis, my wonderful scaredy-dog, is having a rough time at my house. He is such a wonderful foster, but I feel bad for him because he is scared of almost everything. With all of the dogs and cats at my house, plus my husband, he just doesn't seem very happy. Keep in mind, this is the dog who is scared of cute little fluffy kittens - so it doesn't take much to worry him. He spends most of his time running away from the cats, the other dogs, and mostly my husband. I have tried to ask Dave (my husband) to work with him, but he's a stereotypical male who thinks showing fear is a sign of weakness (he proudly admits this) and therefore he doesn't like Elvis. It doesn't help that Elvis howls and barks non-stop whenever Dave comes into the house. I keep telling Dave that he's supposed to be helping Elvis to be more adoptable - not making him worse!! And sometimes he tries, but that actually makes things worse instead of better. His idea of helping is to walk directly toward Elvis saying "it's okay" - following him into a corner when he runs away and then leaning over him and petting him. The reason this is so bad is because dogs see someone approaching them directly as aggressive. They also see someone following them when they try to get away as aggressive. They also see someone leaning over them and touching them when they don't want to be touched as aggressive. In other words, even though Dave THINKS he's helping, he's actually scaring Elvis even more. I've tried to explain this to him, but haven't quite gotten through to him yet.

It's amazing how much I've learned recently about dogs and body language. They respond more to how you move than they do your voice. There was a customer's dog at PetSmart that got out of his collar on Saturday and ran out into the parking lot. Six months ago if I saw that, I would have started walking toward the dog, doing exactly what Dave did, and saying "it's okay, come here puppy", and chances are, the dog would have bolted. Instead, I bent down into a crouch, turned my body away from the dog, looked back toward him but not directly at him, and called him in a high-pitched happy voice "come here puppy!" and he came right to me! I've asked Dave to do that, in conjunction with some really good treats, and I think Elvis would get over his fear of him pretty quickly. But so far I haven't convinced him. Sigh. Elvis really needs a quieter foster home. He still likes to play with Lacy, but he's back to only playing out in the backyard and hiding in the house all the time. The only time he gets excited is if I pick up a leash. I take my time before I put it on him because I love to see him all excited and bouncing around looking forward to a walk or a car ride. I want him to be like that all the time. He sleeps on the floor right next to the bed, and if the other dogs aren't around he will climb up on the bed with me. But as soon as another dog comes in the room, or a cat, or a person, he's back down in the corner next to the bed. He won't eat unless there's no one else around - he runs away from his food if another dog comes over to it, or a cat. I feed him in another room often because otherwise the other dogs get his food before he ever eats it. Even when I bring out the really good treats for training, he'll hang around in hopes of me going to him, but he won't come to me with all the other dogs around. (He has learned to sit for a treat as long as no one else gets too close to him.) I hope he finds another home soon, either a foster home or a permanent home, that will be good for him. He's such a good, well-mannered dog and he will make someone a great pet, if I can just find the right person. In the meantime, I'll keep trying new things to help him be less worried all the time, and I'll keep working on my husband too!

Slow day today...

I'm so weird - every week, around Wednesday or Thursday, I start looking forward to going to PetSmart on Saturday. By Friday night, I'm so excited that the next day is a PetSmart adoption event! And then by the end of the day on Saturday, I'm just tired and usually want nothing to do with dogs or cats! I start thinking "I really need to take a week off" - but then by Wednesday or Thursday, I can't wait for Saturday again! Weird, I know.

This week, we had two dog adoptions - one was Teddy, an adorable Pomeranian. He had an old injury that caused him to not use one of his back legs anymore, but he gets around just fine on three legs. He went to a home that sounds like it will be perfect for him. Our other dog that was adopted was Heidi, a dachshund mix puppy. Overall, it wasn't a great day for dog adoptions. Only two adoptions, and none of my fosters went home. It was Lacy's first week at PetSmart, and she did great, just as I had expected. She is happy to greet everyone, and very friendly and easy-going. Noah (oops, I mean Elvis - thanks Lisa!) was scared as usual, and hung out at the back of his crate wishing everyone would go away. Reese was her normal quiet self. She usually just naps the entire day. She seems to be saying to me "you can take me here, but you're wasting your time because I'm going home with you again at the end of the day, so I might as well ignore everyone and nap until its time to leave". Granted, she probably doesn't think in those terms - but that's definitely the impression she gives to people while she's there!

In happier news, one of my cats was adopted - sort of. I mentioned before that I was cat-sitting for another foster home - a kitten named GiGi. Well, she got adopted! This is a Very Good Thing, because last Saturday I also brought home her identical twin sister Buttercup. However, my husband didn't know this, and since Buttercup was shy, she spent most of her time hiding under the bed in the kitten's room, so there was really no need to tell him. The thing is, in the past few days she's become much more comfortable in the house, and has started not only coming out from under the bed, but actually coming into the rest of the house where I usually am, and the dogs are, and my husband usually is. So far I had been lucky because she looks just like GiGi, and they were never in the same place at the same time. But it was just a matter of days until my luck ran out and he realized there were actually four kittens here instead of three. He's already been complaining quite a bit about having three kittens, so I am VERY happy that GiGi got a home and he'll never need to know that Buttercup isn't actually GiGi. :-)

You may have heard me talk about Kermit in the past - he's one of the foster dogs from Heartland that I am crazy about. Believe it or not, I actually do have a few favorites other than my own foster dogs! He's been in foster care for a long time, and I really want him to get a home. So I helped him write his own web page, and I'm going to post some flyers in the area to try to reach a few more people and tell them about this great dog. I think I am drawn to him so much because I can sort of relate to him - I'm pretty clumsy myself. :-) He deserves his own home with his own family, and I just can't believe that there isn't someone out there who would be perfect for him. So please check out his web page, and pass the link on to anyone you know who may be able to give Kermit the great home that he deserves! http://www.hhsrescue.com/kermits-page.html

My Blog

I've been writing this blog for awhile now, and while it started out just as a record for me to keep of all the dogs I fostered, it appears that other people actually read it from time to time! So because of that, I'd like to know what YOU like to read about. I created a poll at the bottom of the page (scroll ALL the way down), and I will try to gear more posts to whatever it is that you're interested in. And of course, e-mail comments are always welcome as well - as long as they're positive. :-)

Update on my fosters

The good news is that Leonard was adopted! The bad news is that I took 7 dogs and 3 cats (not all mine!) to PetSmart on Saturday morning, and left at the end of the day with all of them. It was rather depressing that none of them found homes. I am hoping that next week goes better. Lacy will be ready for adoption next week as long as everything goes smoothly at the vet, and I hope she will be a quick easy adoption. Right now my other fosters are turning out to be longer-term fosters for various reasons. Elvis is so scared of everything that he needs a very special home to work with him. And Reese is great except that she resource guards, which means if she gets a chew bone, she doesn't want to share, so that limits the families that can adopt her (no small children). Even Bailey, my adorable little boxer puppy, should get adopted quickly once she's ready, but she still has to wait for two more weeks before she can get her next vaccination. So at the moment I have four fosters, and another dog that I'd already offered to take as soon as I have room. Is there anyone out there who wants to foster?! We'll find the perfect dog for you - you only have to foster one - the part where you become insane and foster 3 or more at a time comes much later. :-) If interested, visit http://www.hhsrescue.com/ or e-mail me at dogfostermom@aol.com

Here are some new pictures of Lacy that I took this weekend.

She is such a great dog - very friendly and loving. She is definitely a basset mix of some sort - notice the shorter ears? She also doesn't have that typical basset hound bark - I was slightly disappointed about that, but it might actually make it easier for her to get adopted. :-) I love the zig-zag pattern on her back. She is doing well with her house-training and gets along great with all the other dogs and cats.

Pictures!

My husband took these pictures one day last week while I was at work. The dogs seem to be comfortable...

Bailey sleeping.


Remi sleeping - good thing he gets the loveseat to himself - no one else would fit!


Reese sleeping?!

I'm starting to wonder if he drugs them when I'm not there! :-)

Here is a picture of my newest foster - Lacy!


And here is another picture of Bailey - she's just so cute, I can't help but love her! We think she's a boxer mix, and almost 11 weeks old now.


This is a picture of my new toy. I bought it for the cats, but I have more fun watching them play on it than they probably do actually playing! :-) It's the coolest cat tree, with hammocks and ladders and hidey-holes and dangling mice, and its almost 7 feet tall!. All the kittens seem to enjoy it too!


Here is a new picture of Astro, my flood kitten. I love his expression in this picture!


Here is Blaze, being "king of the world".


Here is my newest kitten - GiGi! She is actually from another foster home, but they haven't had as much luck as I have getting their kittens adopted recently, and since I was down to just two, I offered to keep this one at my house until she finds a home. Isn't she pretty? She's the same age as Astro, and she's sooo friendly. She's brave enough to come out around all the dogs and cats, and just wants to lay in my lap and purr.

Introducing Lacy

Okay, I don't have a new picture yet, but I just couldn't wait to tell you about my newest foster dog. I wrote about her last week, and picked her up yesterday. Lacy's story is all too common, and yet it still makes me sad. Her owners lived in a mobile home that they rented, and they left town and left Lacy behind. She lived outside until some neighbors called the landlord and reported the dog being left. Now in most cases, a landlord would call the city to pick up the animal. Since this took place in a small town in Lincoln County, the dog would most likely have ended up at a small outdoor pound for a short time and then been euthanized. However, Lacy was lucky. This landlord cares about animals, and instead of just calling the city to deal with the problem, she started making phone calls on Lacy's behalf. She had a neighbor of the people who abandoned Lacy provide Lacy with food and water until she could be given a home, and she put out the word with rescue groups that Lacy needed help. I posted about this, trying to find someone to help her. Another foster mom read the post and said she could make room for Lacy at her house, even though she has several other dogs right now. So Lacy was going to escape the fate of so many other abandoned dogs. The landlord didn't stop there - she picked up Lacy, took her to the groomers to get her cleaned up, and then made a donation to help with Lacy's medical care. Lacy couldn't have asked for a better human to help her out - a far cry from the humans who were supposed to be caring for her but left her to fend for herself instead! Now Lacy is a Heartland dog, and she's temporarily living at my house. She'll go to the vet and get spayed, microchipped, vaccinated and all that good stuff, and then be ready for adoption. She'll go to a new home where she will never have to worry about being left again! This is the happily-ever-after that so many dogs don't get. And I love being a part of making it happen - its the best thing about fostering!

One interesting thing about Lacy is the effect she's had on Elvis. It's always a little bit scary to bring home a new dog, because I never know how they will react to my other dogs, or how my other dogs will react to them. The "correct" way to do it, according to some dog training experts, is to take several weeks to introduce the dogs gradually. Let them be aware of each other but never close together to start off. This is fine when introducing a new dog to your own family, but it doesn't work so well for fosters. I might only have a dog for a couple of weeks, and if I keep them separated from my own "pack" the whole time, they might not get any attention at all! So I think, even though it is stressful on the dog to just join in the pack right away, it is more stressful to be left alone for so much time. Dogs are pack animals, and while they crave social contact, they especially crave contact with humans. We've bred this into them, and I think the worst thing you can do to a dog is to lock it away and ignore it. This is what many people do when they have "outside" dogs. I'm not against dogs being outdoors, but if you spend your life inside, your dog is most likely going to want to be inside too! Anyway, for most dogs, the one thing they want is to be with people. I think this is especially true of the dogs I've brought home because they've been locked away in shelters or cages or left outdoors alone in most cases. So I just introduce them to my pack right away, and so far its been fine. I'd like to claim it is because I'm a strong "pack leader" but actually its probably just because I've had all good well-socialized dogs so far! Besides, my dog Remi wouldn't hurt anyone, but he is very intimidating to other dogs because he's so big, so that usually puts a stop to most dogs thinking they want to start trouble. Anyway, back to Elvis. I introduced Lacy to Bailey first, because she's small and definitely not threatening. Of course, Bailey is a 10 week old puppy, so the one thing she IS, is annoying! :-) Immediately she started jumping all over Lacy and trying to lick her face, and Lacy didn't like that! She growled at her to warn her off. So, with that introduction not going quite as smoothly as I hoped, I put Bailey back in the house and brought out Remi and Elvis. It went surprisingly well - within about 5 minutes she was running around the yard with Elvis playing! The VERY surprising part, is that when they all went inside, Elvis still wanted to play -- he even picked up a toy!! I know this sounds silly, but he has never ever touched any of the dog toys since he came to my house. He'll go outside and play chase/tag with the other dogs in the back yard, but he doesn't touch the toys out there, and he doesn't want to play or touch the dog toys inside either. Until Lacy - now he's running around inside, barking, smiling, playing with a ball, and generally acting like a fool - I think he's in love! Lacy seems equally taken with him - its great to watch!

Oh, Reese hasn't met Lacy yet because she got adopted on Wednesday, but she's being returned tomorrow because it turns out the guy who adopted her lives in a condo and they changed their rules recently to not allow pit bulls. Sigh - it was such a good match, so I'm sorry for both Reese and the guy that it didn't work out. Anyway, she'll get to meet Lacy tomorrow night I guess. Tomorrow I'm leaving Elvis home from PetSmart because he doesn't like it there, and I'm going to take some dogs from one of the other foster homes. Their foster mom just had a baby so she is quite busy at the moment! Hopefully we can get a few of those dogs adopted and maybe even a few of my kittens!

Gidget was adopted!

Gidget, and several other dogs and puppies, were all adopted at PetSmart this weekend. It was a great day for dog and cat adoptions! The best news of all is that two of Kiya's puppies were adopted! I was so worried about them ever finding homes. They're cute, but going to be such large dogs, and many people don't seem to want large dogs. This was their third or fourth trip to PetSmart and no one had ever been interested in them before this week, so getting two of them adopted is wonderful! I'm happy they will have their own families now. Only three of Kiya's puppies are left without homes. The other great news is because of all these adoptions, one of the other foster homes has room for Lacy now! So Lacy the basset hound will be saved!