Remi likes balloons...

I found a balloon in the junk drawer, so I blew it up and grabbed the camera. We went outside and shot this video. The balloon only lasted three seconds, but for those three seconds, Remi was Very Happy.

Pitter Patter

Pitter Patter is a blog that shares fun pictures of pit bulls with funny captions. I submitted a few pictures of some of my current and previous foster dogs, and one of them was picked to be on the Pitter Patter blog last Thursday!

That is Zara, a pit bull puppy who was adopted recently. She is Ziggy's sister. Check out the Pitter Patter blog more funny photos!

Flashback Friday

THEN:

In February 2008, I fostered Benny - a senior hound mix.  He loved being petted and just relaxing on the couch.  I expected to foster him for awhile since he was an older, large dog.  But someone came into PetSmart the very first week I took him there, and they fell in love with him and adopted him. 

NOW

It's been two years since I've seen or heard from Benny, so I recently checked in with Benny's family to see how he is doing.  His mom says he is doing well, and is still a very big baby who likes to spend most of his day sprawled out on the sofa and most of the evening going in and out.  He sounds a lot like Remi.  I wonder if Benny likes to bark at school buses. 

Benny's mom says he "definitely has his forever home." Thank you, JoAnn, for giving him so much love and a great home!

Babette was adopted!

The beautiful Persian cat that liked to glare at me has now been adopted. I wanted to find a picture of her looking really happy to show how excited she must be in her new home.  This is the best I could come up with.  

"Yippee" 

You Guys are Awesome

Thank you for the kind words and supportive comments you left on my post yesterday. I did not mean to sound like I was ready to quit, although I can see how saying "I hate fostering" could be misconstrued. Actually I just wanted to post about the mundane details of fostering, and I just happened to have a day with more "downs" than "ups". Yesterday started off the same way - with two phone calls from previous adopters who couldn't afford their vet bills. But by the end of the day, it was totally an "up" day. Because Shadow was adopted!!

"I'm outta here..."

She was my foster dog for only 24 hours before she found a home. I spent two hours with her new family last night, talking about what she needed and answering their questions. It'll take a few days for her to adjust to yet another new home, but in the end I know she will be really happy and very much loved. And that is why I love fostering.

And just to keep it an "up" day, I shut all the cats in the two cat rooms, and made Remi sleep in the living room last night.

"Don't mind me - I'll just sleep here all alone and stay out of your way."

Fostering is a roller coaster

Or maybe it's more like bungee jumping... it yanks my emotions up and down, day after day.  Here was my day yesterday:

6:00 AM – Ziggy barks to let me know he needs to go outside. I get up, take him out, then tell him it’s too early to stay up and put him back in his crate. I deliberately don’t notice the torn up cardboard mess scattered among the dog toys on the floor, and I go back to sleep.

I believe Noelle made the mess then framed the cats.  It was not a good start to the day. 

7:00 AM – Remi barks to get me out of bed. He uses his “I need to go out” bark, but when I try to let him out, he runs to the kitchen and stands by his food bowl. So I feed Remi, Noelle and Ziggy, then go get ready for work.


8:00 AM – I can no longer pretend to ignore the living room floor, so I let the dogs outside and clean up the living room in relative peace and quiet. Then the dogs come back in and Ziggy is crated while Remi and Noelle are lectured to behave while I’m at work.

11:00 AM – I receive an e-mail that one of my previous foster dogs is very ill and medical treatment is not helping. She may need to be euthanized. I am very sad and decide I hate fostering.

6:30 PM – I leave work and head straight to PetSmart to pick up another foster dog. Shadow is Emma’s sister. She is sweet and a little bit scared to be going to a new home with a new person. She pants loudly and drools all over the car on the way home.

7:00 PM - I get her home and leave her in the basement where my husband Dave is watching TV. Then I go upstairs to take care of the rest of the animals.

8:00 PM- Dave comes upstairs and asks why Noelle’s food bowl is sitting by the stairs, filled with food. I told him she didn’t want to eat. He said maybe that’s because he already fed all three dogs before I got home. I realize I’ve been duped by Remi and Ziggy who both pretended they had not yet been fed. Dave asks me to keep the dogs quiet since he’s going to sleep. He works a 3:00 AM shift. I say I will do my best.

8:05 PM – Shadow, who is in a crate in the basement, begins barking. Remi, Noelle and Ziggy begin wrestling LOUDLY. I cringe, then go downstairs to see what Shadow wants. She is lonely and wants me to stay with her. I give her a rawhide to chew on and go back upstairs. I then give Ziggy, Noelle and Remi rawhides to chew on in hopes that will keep them quiet. That works for awhile. I take care of some cat chores, and eat a quick dinner of potato chips.

9:15 PM – Everyone has finished their rawhides. Noelle goes sniffing around Ziggy’s area of the couch, and suddenly a fight breaks out. I should have known better – apparently there were some rawhide “crumbs” left behind when Ziggy finished his treat. I separate them, and notice that Noelle is not hurt but Ziggy has a small cut on his face. Its not deep, but it looks awful. I worry how it will look to potential adopters. I worry what people will think if I post it on my blog but decide to do it anyway, because fights happen with dogs and rawhides when foster moms are too busy eating potato chips to see the warning signs. Let this be a lesson to us all.

10:00 PM – Shadow begins barking again. We’ve been outside several times – we’ve been for a walk – she has water and a comfortable dog bed in her crate – I think she’s just lonely and scared in her new surroundings. Dave asks me to PLEASE make her be quiet. The barking goes on for almost an hour, and I want to cry. Finally she quiets down.

11:00 PM – I am ready to go to sleep, but Remi is on the bed which doesn’t leave much room. I lay on the edge of the mattress and try not to fall off. Noelle is also on the bed, but she decides this would be a great time to chase the four cats who have followed me into the bedroom. Chaos ensues. I capture three of the cats and send them out of the room. I close the bedroom doors and get back on my sliver of mattress.

 

11:10 PM – Scribbles the foster cat leaves her hiding spot in the bedroom and Noelle spots her. More chaos. I somehow get Scribbles out of the bedroom without letting any other cats back in, and without any serious injuries. I go back to bed.

11:25 PM - My cat Merlin who knows how to open the door comes back into the bedroom, followed by two other cats. Rudy the foster cat jumps up on the bed with me, which is fine until he climbs over me and starts climbing on Dave. Dave does not like cats. He really does not like being woken up for the eightieth time that night by a cat climbing on him. I get out of bed again and put all the cats except Merlin out of the bedroom. I finally fall asleep.

1:00 AM – A dog begins barking. Dave wakes me up and asks me to do something about it. I get up to see if it is Shadow needing to go out, and find out it is actually Ziggy needing to go out. I sigh. Then I let him outside. Then I let him back in and put him back in his crate. I go back to bed and find out my sliver of mattress has disappeared. I cry.

The End

Okay so yesterday was mostly filled with the “down” emotions. But this morning I got a call from someone wanting to adopt Shadow. I’m meeting them tonight after work. I have high hopes that today will be filled with all “up” emotions. 

Ziggy is a typical little brother...

"Hey Noelle, whatcha' doing?"

"I can help watch for Dad's car!"

"Where are you going?  Hey, wait for ME!"

Sampson and stuffies

I've had cats for many years.  I've fostered over 50 cats.  I should be somewhat knowledgeable about cats.  But I'm not.  This has been demonstrated to me by Simon and Sampson.  These two boys are littermates, and they're teaching me many new things.  First they started with the drooling and wiping their drool on my face.  That was new, and I learned it meant they liked me.  Great.  Then there was this other behavior that was new to me as well. 

So I asked a cat-savvy friend what it meant when Simon or Sampson would grab his brother's neck in his mouth, bite down, stand over him and start kneading and purring loudly.  I thought it was weird but cute.  Then my friend told me it was mating behavior.  Ewwwwwwwwww.  Sometimes I think I'm better off NOT knowing anything about cat behavior. 

There is one other thing that Sampson does that I have not seen before.  He carries stuffies (stuffed animals) around the house.  They end up on the floor, on the bed, or in the shower.  I don't know what he does with them.  We've recently adopted a "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy around my house.  It's better that way.

Ziggy and the Romp-N-Roll

Here is a one-minute video of Ziggy enjoying the Romp-N-Roll. You may notice at one point a school bus drives past our house. You can hear Remi barking in the background, and Noelle pauses to watch the bus go by, but Ziggy never even knew it was there. Deaf dogs are the best!

Romp-N-Roll

This is what the Jolly Pets Romp-N-Roll looked like when I first bought it over a year ago:

This is what it looks like today:

It is the dogs' favorite toy.  They demonstrated how to use the Romp-N-Roll during their morning play session. 

Noelle started out with the ball, but quickly ran into a much bigger opponent. 

Remi tried to take the ball away, but Noelle refused to relenquish possession so easily. 

Ziggy decided to get in on the action. 

Somehow Ziggy outmanuvered the other two dogs and came away with the ball, with Remi and Noelle in hot pursuit. 

On the sidelines, the photographer placed bets (with herself since no one else was around) on who would ultimately gain possession of the ball. 

Remi tried barking as a distraction technique, but since his competitors are both deaf, it had no effect. 

Resigned to the temporary loss of his favorite toy, Remi gave up and left the playing field. 

But with typical terrier determination, Noelle and Ziggy continued to tug. 

And tug.

And tug.

And tug some more. 

Until finally the photographer got tired of waiting for a winner and left the playing field.  At which time Ziggy and Noelle both dropped the toy and ran to follow the photographer.  It's a good feeling to be more popular than a Romp-N-Roll. 

Cat-O-Lympics

In honor of the Winter Olympics, one of my blogger friends is hosting her own Cat-O-Lympics - and even better, she's allowing dogs to compete!  So of course we had to enter a few of the events.  Since some of the pets pictured here have since been adopted, we do not expect these to be official entries, but thought it would be fun to share these pictures anyway. 

For the Bare Paw Fighting event, hosted by Milo and Alfie, we have Sedna attacking Venus:

Sadly, Venus was blinded by the flash of the camera and was unable to retaliate. 

For the Competitive Napping event hosted by Huffle Mawson, we have two entries. 
First is Reese, sleeping on the couch.

She's a most serious competitor, and enjoys sleeping in odd positions just about anywhere.

Second is Bear, the Puppy Bowl star, sleeping with his foot in the water bowl, on the floor of the car.

It's not that he wasn't supposed to be there.  It's just that there was a very comfortable dog bed on the back seat above him, and a human willing to cuddle him in the front passenger seat, and yet he choose to sleep on the floor in the back.  While the car was in motion.  Perhaps my mom's driving scared him. 

Our next event is the Synchronized Snoozing event hosted by The Island Cats. 

Our first entry is submitted by three previous foster cats - I think it was Astro, GiGi and Blaze.  They awoke right before I took this photo - just in time to glare at me for disturbing their rest. 

The second entry is Pepsi and Ginger, two previous foster puppies who often performed synchronized snoozing in various locations around the house.

The following entries would more appropriately belong in an event called Synchronized Sitting.  Since as of now this is not an officially sanctioned event in the Cat-O-Lympics, and I'm too lazy busy to set it up myself, I'll just post these pictures as an idea for future organizers to consider. 

Cute puppies - who can resist?  And who can get them to all look at the camera at the same time... with no assistant... and without breaking their lineup?

I'll give you a clue how I did it...it involved a hot tub and a laundry basket.

Another example of Synchronized Sitting is exhibited by George and Taffy. 

And the final event we'd like to enter is the High Jump Event hosted by Cats in Maryland.  I'm about 5' 6", so I estimate here that Remi jumped to over 6 foot.  Of course, his back feet were only a few inches off the ground - but he did the best he could. 

Update on my Pets

Yep, it's that time again.  Time for you to catch up on what all animals are at my house, and what they've been up to lately.  First are my own pets...

Remi - a four year old Harlequin Great Dane.  We adopted him when he was one and a half.  He'd already been through several obedience classes, and came to us well trained.  He gets along great with other dogs, and lets the cats walk all over him (literally).  He is my dog and prefers to be with me as much as he can.  Until 8pm which is his bedtime.  Then he goes and waits to be let into the bedroom so he can go to sleep.  I don't know how he knows what time it is, but he always knows. 

Noelle - Totally a Daddy's girl.  She follows Dave around the house, and he lets her get away with anything she wants.  She is the most loyal, loving dog I've ever met.  She loves to cuddle, and loves to show how much she loves us.  Lately she's taken to climbing up onto my lap while I type on the computer.  All 60 pounds of her.  And of course I let her, because I love her too. 

Merlin - The last official member of the family.  I am crazy about this cat, and Dave is going crazy because of this cat.  It's a nice balance, I think.  I let Merlin get away with anything he wants, and Merlin thinks he owns the house.  He meows to get attention or to have a door opened for him.  He jumps on counters and steals people food.  He follows me around and sleeps on my pillow at night.  And I encourage him in all of it.  I love this cat.   





Now for the foster animals... in order of arrival at my house. 

Scribbles - arrived Jan 2009. This is Her Fluffiness when she takes on one of the dogs.  Scribbles eventually got tired of living in our spare bedroom and has joined the rest of the family.  She now usually hangs out in the living room or the kitchen.  And what is great is if any of the dogs decides to bother one of the other cats, Scribbles jumps to their defense.  And ALL the dogs keep their distance from Scribs!

Simon and Sampson - arrived Dec 2009. These two have made themselves at home.  Usually one or the other is sitting on my lap, and they both enjoy drooling and then rubbing their face on my face.  Someone told me its a sign of affection in cats.  Its one I could do without.  But I am glad they like me.

Ziggy - Arrived Dec 2009.  Ziggy has improved greatly since I brought him home.  He gets along well with all the other dogs, and loves to wrestle with them.  All those possessive behaviors he exhibited when I first brought him home are gone, and other than being so mouthy, he's turning into a very good dog.  Which means he is sure to get adopted soon.  Because as soon as I get them trained, they get adopted and I have to start over again.  It's the curse of a foster mom.

Rudy - Arrived February 2010.  This is my newest foster cat.  He kept trying to sneak out the door at his previous foster home, so I offered to let him come to my house.  Three or four large dogs trying to come in or go out whenever I open the door have prepared me to handle door-darting cats.  Rudy is a sweet cat.  He's very affectionate and seems to be fitting right in. 

And that's it right now for fosters!  Only one dog and four cats - its like a vacation at my house!  Duke the Beagle/Coonhound is still at my friend's house.  He's still doing well, and up to his usual antics (more on that later).  Babette the Persian cat went to stay at PetSmart, and she appears pleased with the change in environment.  I am hoping to take Kermit the Heartland dog home, but have to wait for approval from his shelter caretakers.  So my next foster dog is probably going to be Emma's sister, named Shadow.  Another black lab - hopefully this one doesn't mind baths so much!

Adoptions!

It has been a good weekend for adoptions. 

My orange cat Gandalf who has been living up at PetSmart found a home last week.  This also means Babette, the Persian cat who always glares at me, got to go stay at PetSmart so she can hopefully get more attention and find a permanent home soon!

Michaelangelo and DaVinci, two brothers who have been waiting for a home for awhile, were adopted together!  If two big black cats can find a home together, it gives me hope that someday Simon and Sampson, my two foster cats who need to stay together, will also find a home!

Four other cats were also adopted this week - Gidget, Sweetie, Toby and Cody! 

And most surprising of all is that Emma, my Labrador Failure Extraordinare, was also adopted!  She's on a two week trial adoption to see how she gets along with her new sibling cat, so I'm cautiously hopeful it will work out for her. 

Ziggy, on the other hand, was not adopted.  He had two different families come to see him, but he was not on his best behavior.  I am afraid Noelle got to him without me realizing it.  Not only was he extremely mouthy and difficult on Saturday, but he was extremely cuddly and sweet with me all day on Sunday.  That's exactly what Noelle used to do to make me fall in love with her and adopt her.  But this time I'm wise to their tricks - I'm not falling for it.  So Ziggy goes back to an adoption event next Saturday to try again!

Being a big sister is not easy!

Noelle takes her job as a big sister very seriously. She is eager to teach Ziggy all about being a good dog. Unfortunately, her idea of being a good dog is a bit different than most.

First Noelle teaches Ziggy how she makes her scary snarl face. She explains that scary snarl faces are very good for intimidating other dogs who get too close to her food.

Ziggy still needs some more practice.

Next, Noelle teaches Ziggy the art of furniture destruction. She watches proudly as he attempts to destroy the futon.

Finally, Noelle teaches Ziggy how to look adorable so her dad will let them into the bedroom when he goes to sleep.

Another hard day's work at being a big sister is behind her. Tomorrow, Noelle plans to teach Ziggy how to scare away potential adopters so he can stay with us forever.

(Don't worry, tomorrow I'm going to take Ziggy to an adoption event and foil Noelle's plans - One permanent dog like Noelle is all I can handle!)