Graphic Geekiness

Today was a day of deChristmasification (or whatever) at the Luce household, because I finally got the tree and other holiday decorations taken down and put away. Now before you start judging me, let me just say that a) the tradition in my family was to leave the tree up past the New Year because it was so festive and pretty, b) with a live tree it's much easier to wait until the tree totally dries out before taking it down, c) I'm not the only person who takes their tree down this late because the city is still picking trees up tomorrow, and d) I like how our house looks all decorated for Christmas. So there--I like keeping my tree up longer than most people!

Anyway, while I was dedecorating the house I thought it made sense to change the blog up as well so that it was no longer sporting a Christmas theme. I spent a few minutes making a new wintery banner since it's finally feeling like winter here--we actually have a tiny dusting of snow on the ground. I changed up all the colors and the fonts as well, because Blogger now has a billion fonts to choose from, which I love. I could sit there and look through fonts forever. I love fonts!

While I've gotten fairly quick at creating new headers for my blog (partially because I know I can just change them whenever I want to, so I don't fret over the details), my graphic design skills haven't evolved so far that I'm this successful with my other design endeavors. Yesterday I spent the entire morning trying to create a logo for my friends at Crossroads Dog Rescue, since they're having a contest for a new logo on Facebook and have asked for submissions from their supporters. Starting next week they will have their Facebook friends vote for a favorite, so I wanted to submit an entry just for fun! Although my end results are never very professional, I have fun playing around with making graphics and it's definitely good Photoshop practice. Here's what I came up with for them!













Truthfully, I kind of hope mine doesn't get chosen--only because I want them to have tons more logos from way more professional people than me to choose from!

Crossroads Dog Rescue

Since I'm on the subject of dog pictures, I wanted to share a few pictures I've had the pleasure of taking in the last couple of weeks. I mentioned back when I quit my job in November that I was looking forward to volunteering for a new local dog rescue I'd gotten connected with the year before. When they were just starting out they didn't have much that I could help with, but now that Crossroads Dog Rescue is a growing organization, they have lots of foster dogs who need good pictures for the Internets! I'm super excited to be able to help them in that way!

So a couple of times in the last two weeks I've gone to meet the founder/president to do pictures of their adoptable dogs. It's been so much fun to meet the pups and so exciting to feel like I'm contributing to the world of dog rescue again! They specialize in neonatal rescue, mostly taking in pregnant or new mothers with full litters, since newborn puppies have such a hard time staying healthy in shelter environments. The pups are raised in a healthy and safe home with lots of human interaction, and they generally get adopted as soon as they are old enough to leave their mom, who eventually gets adopted as well. In the less that two years that Crossroads has been an official rescue organization, they've saved and adopted out almost 100 dogs already!

As Crossroads continues to grow and add foster homes to their network, they'll have more and more rescue puppies and dogs to choose from, so check out their blog or Facebook page to keep up with all their adoptable furry friends. You can also contact them at crossroadsdogs (at) gmail.com if you're interested in becoming one of their licensed foster families. Oh, and check out my recent pictures of their adoptable dogs! Most of those pictured have already been adopted, so hopefully they'll have more pups for me to photograph soon!

Jacket for Two, Please

It's been a slightly stressful and very busy week, and with no time for blogging there's a lot I need to catch up on! First, I have to share a little about last night's activities, which involved driving to Overland Park to the Johnson County Home & Garden Show. I'm not much into home and garden shows in general, and especially not home and garden shows on Saturday nights, but I volunteered to man the booth for No More Homeless Pets KC at this event and got assigned to the 5:30-9:00 shift. I'd been wanting to volunteer with NMHPKC for many months now, and this was one of the first weekend opportunities available, so I took it despite the less than perfect hours.

Overall, my first NMHPKC event was rather uneventful, as the home show attendance really started to slow down in the evening, and the booth was manned with at least twice as many volunteers as it really needed. There wasn't really much for us to do, unfortunately. In my 3 1/2 hour shift, I talked to two interested people about the organization's low cost spay/neuter services, handed out a couple of brochures, talked to one guy about Petfinder, and received one donation of a few dollars. I guess maybe if two more unaltered animals get spayed or neutered or one gets adopted because of the education I provided, then my trip was worth it. Overall though, the experience wasn't quite as fulfilling as I had hoped.

Since there were so many volunteers and so little to do, we took turns walking around the booths at the show, checking out all that was available. At first I was a little less than impressed, as the first floor of the Overland Park Convention Center was filled with quite a few ultra random displays, some of which didn't really have much to do with homes or gardens (like the nail stamping lady that was across the way from us). When I went to the upstairs level, however, I was amazed at the crazy huge demonstrations! There were hundreds of vendors of every type--it would have taken hours to view everything. There were entire outdoor entertaining areas complete with fireplaces, huge gardens and landscaped areas, and entire kitchens, to name just a few. I quickly realized that the small room downstairs that we were in was clearly filled with the oddball products and non-profits that didn't really fit in with everyone else at the show! About the only interesting thing in our area was the booth of beautiful rescued, rehabbed birds from Operation Wildlife.

While the weirdness in our area didn't offer much in the way of useful education about your home or garden, it did offer a little in the way of entertainment. In one of my first tours around the area I saw this.

I really thought this was a joke at first, but then I realized that the "display" was sandwiched in between two serious vendors and was apparently completely real. There was no one manning the booth at all, which was nice for me because that made it easier to take a couple of pictures. Just as I was scratching my head and wondering about where in the world you and your loved one would wear such a garment, I realized that their info banner had answered all of my questions.


Wow. Just wow. As much as I love my husband, I cannot imagine any circumstance in which I would want to wear this monstrosity with him. Ever. Even if it wasn't completely ridiculous looking, it's the most impractical article of clothing I've ever seen. Plus, I just checked out the website, and it actually costs $140. Seriously.

So the evening may have been a bit of a bust with regard to my volunteer gig, but I think it was worth the trip just to have witnessed the Jacket for Two!

Midnight

Tonight we went over to our friends Bill and Lindsay's house in Topeka to hang out and watch the KU basketball game. Evenings with our good friends are always entertaining, but tonight was especially so because their Great Dane, Midnight, was especially playful. This loving, adorable, 140 pound sweetheart was added to their family earlier this year when they adopted him from a Dane rescue in KC. He's so awesome, and I can't even explain how big he is! People always comment about how big our 70 pound dog is, but Midnight is twice Fresco's size! Check out Lindsay with her big baby in her lap.


I know this picture isn't very good since it was in a dimly lit room and taken with my iPhone, but you get the idea! Here's some great video of Midnight playing with Billy, albeit poor quality as well!




I'm so glad Bill and Lindsay chose to rescue instead of buy when they were ready for a new dog. Midnight is such an awesome (and massive) guy who has been a perfect addition to their family!

Never A Dull Dog Moment

So here's the funny, coincidental story of my day yesterday. As I was driving home over the lunch hour, I came up over the top of a hill on Bob Billings Parkway and this little white, very wet doggy almost stepped out into the street in front of me. Thankfully he saw the car before stepping off the curb and he headed back onto the sidewalk. I pulled over onto the next side street and jumped out of the car with Hope's leash (which was still in the car from dropping her off that morning), half afraid that I would scare the poor little puppy and he would run away into oncoming traffic. Thankfully, I crouched down low and gave a whistle, and the little munchkin came running right into my arms! I leashed him up and walked him to the car, where he jumped in like he'd known me forever!

I got him home with the intention of leaving him in the garage while I ate, so that I wouldn't have to do doggy introductions or monitor his activity in the house or yard. He wasn't having any of that though. He was determined to go in the house with me, so I left him in the laundry room while I let Fresco out, but Celtic was completely aware that there was a strange, wet dog in our house. I let them sniff each other through a crack just to make sure my little stray was friendly, and since they seemed to like each other just fine, I let him out into the kitchen and then shooed him out the back door. Thankfully Fresco is super friendly, because the little white dog had marked about 10 places before Fresco even realized he was in the back yard. Fresco was slightly alarmed about the strange dog peeing all over the place--he sprinted straight at the little guy with his hair on end, but then stopped and sniffed and made friends as soon as he reached him. It was probably not super smart on my part to trust Fresco so much since I didn't know the little stray at all, but thankfully Fresco was very welcoming to the stranger!

I monitored them all from the deck for a while, and since things seemed to be going well I went back in to scooped up a bowl of cottage cheese (my new favorite food) that I could eat while watching them through the window. Pretty soon Fresco had decided he wanted to start wrestling with the little guy, which didn't work so well since there was at least a 50 pound weight difference! I went out to settle everyone down and took a few pictures of our visitor. He was a pretty cute little guy!

Celtic gets to know our visitor a little better.

He was such a little cutie!

Fresco kept batting at him, trying to get him to wrestle and play. Fresco tries so hard to be gentle, but the little dog wasn't having any of it!

I put the little guy in the laundry room for a few minutes so he could dry off while I finished my lunch, and he barked just once or twice before he laid down and relaxed. As soon as I was finished eating I loaded him back in the car and headed to the shelter. He was pretty good about riding in the car and only got into my lap on one occasion. Unfortunately, when we got to the shelter, there wasn't a lost report on him and he didn't have a microchip. For the first time since I'd met him, he seemed shy and scared when I took him into the building. I felt so bad, but since he had no collar or tags it would have been difficult for me to go looking for his family! I know the shelter will be the best place for his family to come looking for him. Plus, I knew it wouldn't be good to keep him at home once Hope got home from the hospital. She usually thinks small dogs are toys and probably would have started swinging him around by his tail. He definitely picked the right Hope-free day to be a visitor at our house!

Stop Petland Puppy Sales

Last year I started a blog specifically for the purpose of sharing my views and experiences within the realm of dog rescue. I thought it would be good to have a place where I could get on my soapbox so that my family and friends who read this blog would be spared from my rants. A few of my friends are kind enough to check out Save A Dog Blog on a regular basis, but for the most part it isn't visited nearly as much as Luce Chatter.

Last week I posted some information about a campaign by the Humane Society of the United States on my other blog, and even though it's kind of lame to just re-post it here, I'm going to do it anyway. I think this is such important information that everyone should know and should share with their friends and family members. In a nutshell, buying puppies from stores such as Petland and Internet sites such as Next Day Pets is a horrible practice that supports horrendous breeding facilities called puppy mills.

Please check out the details and watch the HSUS video here. Pass it along to your friends!

The Shelter

As I mentioned the other day, two weeks ago I had no interest in living in the country. Now, it's all I can think about. My change of heart came very abruptly and completely by accident, as a result of a seemingly unrelated event in my life last week. Here's the whole story.

Last Tuesday, I had on my calendar that the Lawrence animal shelter (where I've been volunteering for the last 10.5 years for anyone who doesn't know) was supposed to have a fundraiser at Vermont Street BBQ, where the restaurant would donate a percentage of their proceeds for the evening to the humane society. Since Chad and I didn't have anything at home for dinner and he was on his way back into town from a meeting in KC, I called to see if he wanted to meet me at Vermont Street directly after work. I didn't have the flier though, so I went online to see if I could download it from the shelter's website. The event wasn't listed on the website calendar, so I called the shelter to see if it was still on, thinking that Chad could pick up the flier on his way into town from KC.

So when I called, one of the staff members (who shall remain nameless) answered, and here's how the conversation went:

Me: Hi "R", this is Kim Luce. How are you doing?

"R": Oh, Kim. Petfinder.com.

Me: Uh, what about it?

"R": Sally, Clover, Lei Ah, and Lemon Pie have all been adopted...well, actually they were transferred.

Me: Actually, I know. I've changed their information, but since they are all still available for adoption elsewhere I want to leave them as adoptable so that if people are searching for those breeds they will still be picked up in a search. (Which, by the way, I already told "R" on the day that she told me they were transferred, but I didn't remind her that we'd already talked about this.)

"R": (silence)

Me: I'm not sure what you want me to say about those, since I've left them that way for a reason.

"R": Well, I just know that every time I go to look at Petfinder on Mondays when we need to talk about a dog on the radio, I look at the website and see gone, gone, gone, gone, gone all the way down the list.

Me: Well, every weekend when I'm there I find out who has gone home and who has been put down and I update it generally on Sunday night as soon as I find out.

"R": Well, this week it wasn't as bad, but--

Me: You know what "R", just forget it. (click)

For 10 years I've dedicated virtually every weekend that I was in town to taking pictures of adoptable dogs and uploading them to Petfinder and the LHS website. I've spent, on average, about 6 hours a week maintaining these two websites. Yet, the only time the staff generally bothers to mention Petfinder to me is to complain about something. Now I've certainly never expected some some grand recognition for what I do--I do it for the dogs and for the dogs alone. However, it would have been nice if the staff had at least acted as though they wanted my help.

It's not just their inconsideration that's the problem. There are loads and loads of other problems at the shelter that have frustrated me for years. Mostly, it's about the way they purposely deceive the public about the number of dogs that they euthanize there and why. The fact is that dogs are put down there every week, and yet they are constantly telling people they are a no-kill shelter. It has always made me crazy. I mean, how in the world will our community know they need to change their behaviors and attitudes towards homeless dogs if they have no idea we have a terrible overpopulation problem?

It's not that I fault the shelter for having to put dogs down in the first place--I know there are not enough homes and too many animals. However, I have major issues with the way they almost arbitrarily choose which dogs to put down. They are constantly picking perfectly adoptable dogs that the volunteers know and love and labeling them unadoptable because of "temperament." This can mean anything--barking or jumping in their kennel, nervousness around other dogs, stepping in their own poop too much--whatever. They rarely take the dogs out of their kennels to see what they might be like outside of the stressful shelter environment. They look for the worst in every dog instead of seeing each dog's wonderful potential.

I could go on and on, but basically the conversation above was just the final straw piled onto the massive heap of my long list of frustrations that's grown ridiculously large over the last 10 years. I just cannot deal with the horrible attitudes of the staff, with all the ridiculous lies, with the constant criticism of my help, with the lack of appreciation for my years of service. I've put up with all of it for all this time because I wanted to do everything I could to help those dogs that I love so much. I just don't think I can do it any more. It's so hard to turn my back on those dogs, but I just can't continue to support the organization when I disagree with so many of the decisions and all of the deception.

So last Tuesday when I came home, first I cried to Chad for a while because I just felt like my entire purpose in life had just been taken away from me. I can't imagine not doing something to help homeless animals. I can't imagine seeing all the new little faces at the shelter each week. I also can't imagine having my weekends free to relax and do yardwork and housework! I was completely distraught, and I was at a major crossroads.

So the next day I spent lots of time thinking and trying to figure out how I could continue doing what I'm the most passionate about. I researched all types of animal shelters, rescues and other facilities in the area trying to find someone who could use my services. I've emailed a few to see if I can start volunteering for them, but in the midst of my searching I noticed that the nearby Lecompton area didn't have any sort of shelter or rescue. I started pondering the possibility of actually starting a shelter in the area, which led me to look at available property, which led me to the house, which happened to have a HUGE horse barn, which would be relatively easy to convert to a dog rescue. Suddenly, all I could think of was living in the country so that I could start a rescue of my own.

Obsessions

You'd think that since I've been off work since Wednesday afternoon I would have been blogging up a storm the last few days. Instead, I've gotten more and more behind somehow. Despite the fact that we were on vacation, we managed to stay steadily busy with basketball games, a trip to the airport, engagements with friends and a couple of volunteer days at the shelter, among other things. Some of those "other things" that kept me otherwise occupied for about 4 of those 6 days were the 3rd and 4th books in the Twilight series. I think I started the 3rd one on Tuesday, and then finished it by about 2:30 a.m. on New Year's Day. I started the 4th at about 10 a.m. that same morning, and then finished it on Friday afternoon. I was completely obsessed, just like with the first book! I swear I think I might have OCD--at least when it comes to ridiculous fiction books and jigsaw puzzles. I have no self-control at all with those things! The really sad thing is, ever since I finished the last book on Friday I've had the urge to start reading it a second time. I have to admit I loved it!

I managed to fight off my reading urges over the weekend and instead spend some time at the shelter, where I have almost gotten caught up with pictures of all the new dogs. Thankfully, on Saturday I had an assistant photographer who helped me take out all the pairs--my dear husband! Chad used to go to the shelter with me fairly frequently, but in the last several years he's instead stayed home on the weekends to do all the laundry and housecleaning and grocery shopping that most normal wives would probably be doing on their day off. It was so nice to have him there to help on Saturday, and he actually enjoyed the day as well since the weather was so unseasonably nice. I think the dogs enjoyed his company too.


Isn't that the sweetest? Little Betty the Bichon mix was obsessed with Chad almost as much as I'm obsessed with teenage vampire books!

Buddy

A few weeks ago my good friend Amber shared a blog with me that is right up my alley. It's the blog of a dog photographer in the Seattle area who takes amazing pictures of puppies. Her name is Erin Vey and she also happens to be the sister of Amber's brother-in-law!! They're practically related (much like my coworker's daughter Neha is now famous)!

The other day on Erin Vey's blog she shared a story which had been entered into a contest she's currently having for a free photo session anywhere in the country. This story brought me to tears. It was so incredibly sad, incredibly touching, incredibly moving--just incredible. Even though I already shared it on one of my other blogs, I couldn't resist sharing it here as well. I highly recommend you read it.

The author said it so well:

"...you never forget that selfless complete love that a wonderful dog gives you back. I guess only a dog lover could understand how deeply a dog can impact, enhance and shape your heart and your life… Like Buddy did for us."

Those dogs like Buddy--those shelter mutts with no pedigree or papers but with hearts of gold--they are the reason I've spent over 3,000 hours volunteering at our animal shelter during the last 10 years. Every dog at the shelter has that potential--the potential to be a live-saving, love-giving, heart-filling Buddy.

Pawsible Dream 2008

Last weekend Chad and I attended the biggest fundraiser of the year for the Lawrence Humane Society, the 14th annual Pawsible Dream Benefit Auction. We pretty much go to the auction every year as long as we're in town, and it's always a lot of fun (although this year I missed my friends JoAnna and Brenda!). Most of the time I usually bid like a crazy person on the less expensive but still fun silent auction items, but after I won a bunch of things last year that I have yet to use, Chad made me promise to be a little more responsible about bidding--as in I could only bid on stuff that I would actually put to use. This time I only bid on 10 or so items, and I came away with only one: a black hand-knit scarf made by none other than our former mayor. She donates bunches of lovely scarves for the auction every year and this year I finally got one!

Normally we're not actually active participants in the live auction portion of the evening, but this year there was so much really cool Jayhawk memorabilia from the Orange Bowl and National Championship that we actually bid on quite a few big ticket items. One of them was this huge digital collage of basketball pictures that was like 6 feet by 4 feet. Since our basement is decorated with a KU theme, it would have been perfect for our house. We started bidding, got into a war with one other bidder, and when we had the high bid the auctioneer egged and egged the other people to keep going up--which they finally did after much prodding. Chad and I gave in, and only after that did Chad realize the collage wasn't of the 2007-2008 championship team--it was the year before! I had kind of realized that right as we started bidding, but still thought the collage would be neat. Chad, on the other hand, would have never bid that high had he known it wasn't from our winning year!! When we lost and he realized it was the wrong year he about had a heart attack knowing that we came about $50 from getting it! I think it was a definite blessing that we lost!!

I also bid on a framed cover of Sports Illustrated, with a picture of Mario's miracle shot, signed by Mario himself! I had taken Chad home and come back to bid on it without him, hoping that I could get it for a Christmas present. When the bidding went up to $175 over the listed value, I decided to bow out. I was bummed! I guess at least my bidding wars upped the total dollars for the shelter a little!

Speaking of total dollars, I don't even know how much money the event raised this year. I was at the shelter on Sunday and Tuesday, but I never even thought to ask. Strangely, the newspaper doesn't seem to have run a story on it either (besides the one before the event), which I think they usually do. The auction usually raises around $30,000, but it really felt like this year people were much more reserved in their bidding. Understandably so, since the economy is totally in the tank!

Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr

For any of you who actually clicked the link to my new blog this morning, you might have been completely confused if you were using Internet Explorer and not Firefox. When I got to work this morning I tested out my new blog in IE (6.0) and couldn't see any of it!!! ARGH!!!! I'm not sure how to fix this problem, so be patient--hopefully I'll get it figured out soon. Maybe I just need to upgrade to 7.0.

If you don't have Firefox and can't see what the new blog looks like, here's a screenshot. You might have to click on it to actually be able to read anything!

While the screenshot isn't exactly the same thing as visiting the blog itself, at least you can see that there is something there and I'm not completely insane! :)

Save A Dog Blog

Thanks to the almost 20 of my loyal readers who voted to help me decide on a name for my new blog. It's still under construction, but I've at least made it available for the world to see now! You can check it out at saveadogblog.blogspot.com. There isn't really any content yet, but my goal is to post once a week eventually. Hopefully, unlike this blog, it will actually serve a purpose within the blogging community! :)

Let me know what you think!!

Blog-A-Holic

I'm sure this will sound completely insane, but I've been thinking for quite some time now about starting a new blog. It's probably painfully obvious that I like blogging, but the fact that I'm a blog addict isn't really the reason I feel the need for another one. In actuality, I've just found that what I feel like talking about a lot of the time is related to one of my life's major passions--dog rescue. While I often post dog-related content to my personal blog, there are so many other dog-related articles, pictures, links and rants that I end up not posting, so as not to overwhelm my blog (and the few family members and friends who read it) with one particular subject. Obviously, not all of my friends and family members are as passionate as I am about saving dogs and educating the world about pet overpopulation. I don't want to bore my few loyal readers with articles and websites they don't care about or speeches they've heard from my soapbox a million other times.

With that said, I want to do everything I possibly can to save the dogs at our shelter and the thousands of other shelters around the country. I want to educate the public about the plight of shelter dogs and the problem of pet overpopulation. I want to provide resources for those wonderful people who choose to adopt dogs instead of buying from a breeder. I want to be an advocate in every way possible for dog rescue. While my personal blog might be semi-interesting to people who know and care about the Luces, it most certainly isn't going to attract any visitors outside of our family or friends. I need a forum that's appropriate for and accessible to the outside world. I need a dog blog.

My first step is picking out a name for my new blog. There were a lot of names I thought of (including dogblog.blogspot.com) that were actually already taken, but most don't actually have any content. It appears that several other people started dog blogs and then quit after just one or two posts. Hopefully my dog blog will continue on for many years to come!!

So here's how you can help me get my dog blog started: vote in the poll below for your favorite blog name! I've compiled a few that I came up with that are still available, all of which I'm hoping will convey the overall purpose of my blog--to save dogs!



Thanks so much for your vote!! :)

Fresco's Adoption

I almost added the story of Fresco's adoption to my post about Mutt 'n' Strut yesterday, since technically both of these things happened on Saturday. We've actually known about Fresco's adoption for quite some time, but it didn't become official until this weekend.

I guess the story of our foster dog Fresco actually started over a year ago, when I took him to an adoption event in Kansas City after getting to know him at the shelter during the previous four months. I completely fell in love with him, so I was very pleased when he got adopted about a week later, and devastated when he was returned to the shelter about 3 months after that. We brought him home as our foster dog last August in order to save him from being put down, and then found a home for him in early October. In December, Fresco was returned to the shelter again, after having problems with the other dog in his new home. After another month at the shelter (in which he was supposed to be working on his behavioral issues with the trainer), we once again brought Fresco home with us to keep him from being euthanized.

During his last stint in doggy jail, the trainer who was supposed to be working with Fresco insisted that he was in need of years of professional help (clearly she was not a fan of Fresco), so we didn't immediately start marketing our foster dog like we'd done during his previous visit. We decided we would instead try to honor her wishes and get Fresco into a training class with some other dogs to work on his social skills. Our plan was to start the marketing campaign after he graduated, which we never actually got around to doing, because his future family became interested in him a couple of months prior to that.

While his adoption didn't become official until a couple of days ago, last weekend the process actually got started. Here's a picture from last Sunday:


Notice anything different about him? Here's a close up in case you missed it.

If you can't read it, that's Fresco's new tag, with his new last name. We bought it last weekend and then signed the adoption contract yesterday. We are officially Fresco's forever family. :)

To most of our friends who've seen Fresco at our home, this is not a huge surprise. It was obvious to everyone that we had bonded tightly to our little foster boy. The staff at the shelter joked about us keeping him long before we actually planned to, even suggesting that he purposely got kicked out of his previous homes in order to come back and live with us. I actually realized very soon after his arrival in January that we were going to have a hard time parting with him, but I had every intention of us doing so until the day in mid March when Chad took this picture:


How could we separate these cute little peas in a pod? This closeness of the dogs was really the major difference between Fresco's first stay and his second. During the first foster-go-round, Celtic was very unhappy. We loved Fresco then and often said we would keep him if it weren't for our "firstborn" Celtic. Hope and Fresco bonded through hours of wrestling, but Celtic was usually left out. He lost attention from us and attention from his sister because of the new puppy, and he was clearly depressed about it. This time was different, and strangely enough, I think it had a lot to do with the weather. Since Hope hates the cold, while she was snuggled up in bed the entire winter, Fresco and Celtic were outside sniffing around together and really bonding. They became such good buddies, and Fresco always let his older, smaller brother be in charge and be the leader. I began to worry as much about Celtic missing Fresco as I did about us missing Fresco!

Chad took a little bit longer to come around to the idea of keeping our lanky boy. It wasn't until Fresco was about half way through his training class that Chad asked me one day, "So when Fresco's done with his class are we going to start looking for a home for him?" When I replied that this was, in fact, the plan, Chad said "I don't know if we can do that." For a while after that we just ignored the subject, but by the middle of April we'd come out and admitted that Fresco was where he was meant to be. It just didn't seem fair to ship him off to another home when he'd already been in so many in his short 18 month life!

So we are once again a three dog family. While we're very happy about our new addition, it's also a little disappointing that we failed to find homes for our last two foster dogs! :)

Puppy Love

I just had to share a few of the adorable puppy pictures that I took on Sunday when I was at the shelter. There have been so many litters of tiny babies there this winter it's just unbelievable. They are so amazingly cute.

This is little Ray taking a nap. He was born at the shelter and his mom was a Beagle mix.

Ray is looking a little disoriented because I woke him up to take his picture.

This Ray's brother Chug.

This is Ray and Chug's brother Smooch, who was just too tired to wake up for pictures!

And the holy grail of puppy cuteness...




This precious little Pit Bull mix pup isn't even available for adoption yet. His whole litter got very sick and now he's fighting pneumonia. He was outside for a little fresh air on Sunday, but of course he needed his little sweater to protect his little baby body from any chills! That sweater is about the cutest thing I've ever seen!

How stinkin' adorable are they? Their ridiculous cuteness doesn't change the fact that I wish they'd never been born. There are just too too too many of them and not enough good homes. Why don't people just get their dogs spayed and neutered?

No More Homeless Pets

This morning I'm getting ready to head over to the Lawrence Humane Society. I'm especially excited about going to exercise dogs and take their pictures today because it's actually supposed to be warm outside--around 60 degrees!! With that said, there are definitely weekends that I don't feel like volunteering: when the weather is bad, when I don't feel good, when there's stuff around my house that needs to be done, when I feel bad about leaving my own dogs to spend time with other dogs, when I'm tired from a long training walk (during the 3-Day season), when I haven't spent enough time with my husband during the week--the list goes on and on. For the most part, I generally go anyway.

A lot of people don't really understand why I spend so many weekend hours at the shelter. I can't tell you the number of times people ask me if I still "work" there, as if it's my second job for which I'm actually paid. When we're talking about weekend plans, my friends frequently ask if I "have" to go to the shelter. I never have to go. The shelter won't close down if I'm not there, although I will catch some good-natured flack from the staff if I don't show. It's more like I need to go. I need to go because the dogs need me. They need exercise, they need companionship, they need training and they need socialization if they're ever going to get out of that place. While many of them will meet their forever families just by hanging out at the shelter and being cute, many, many others will first be introduced to a family through their Petfinder ad. I want every dog to have that opportunity. That's the main reason I need to be there--to take their pictures for Petfinder. My short-term goal is to have every available dog and puppy have their own little space on the web so that their forever family will find them.

My long-term goal is much different. Eventually, I'd like to have my weekends back. My goal is to not go to the shelter every weekend. My dream is that there won't be hundreds and hundreds of homeless animals who've been discarded by their original families living in tiny cages. My hope is that our society will become better educated about spaying and neutering their pets, so that there won't be 10 litters of adorable yet unwanted puppies growing up at the Lawrence Humane Society at any given time. My desire is that families who are thinking of adding a four-legged member would think first of rescuing a homeless animal instead of buying a puppy from a breeder. My wish is that people would become educated about how many purebred, well-behaved, well-adjusted dogs there are available from breed-specific rescues around the country. My dream is that our society would start thinking first about saving a life instead of thinking about their own selfish wants when it comes to owning a pet. My hope is that people would someday realize that somewhere around 7 million animals are euthanized in U.S. shelters every year. To me, this is heartbreaking. To me, these animals are worth saving and worth being memorialized. To me, it's a cause worth giving up one day of my weekend.

There are other people who share my hopes and dreams. Hundreds of shelters and rescue organizations exist in our area alone, and each organization has its own list of dedicated volunteers. One such organization which is new to the KC area is No More Homeless Pets KC. This coalition of vets, shelters, rescues and individuals is working towards the goal of (you guessed it) no more homeless pets in the KC metro area. They are leading a cooperative effort to end pet overpopulation in Kansas City. It's a big job and a big dream, but the goal is achievable. There are other areas of the country that don't have the overpopulation problem that we have here in the Midwest, because their communities have become educated about spaying, neutering and adoption.

So check out the No More Homeless Pets website. There is tons of good information about spaying and neutering and about pet overpopulation. You can make a donation or find a place to volunteer in the KC area. You can pass along this great information to your family and friends, some of whom might need to get their pets spayed or neutered. You can help educate our communities and be a part of the solution. You can dream of a day when maybe, just maybe, I won't feel the need to get on my soapbox and deliver ridiculously long lectures on my blog. :)

Happy Endings

My friend Brenda sent me a link to a great article a couple of weeks ago and I'm just now getting around to sharing it. It's a long one, but definitely a good read that will open your eyes to the worlds of dogfighting and subsequent dog rescue. The article is specifically about a group of Pit Bulls who were rescued from Michael Vick's property last year and all of the terrific people who are giving them a second chance at a joyful, comfortable life. It's a sad, sad, sad story with a happy ending. When you have a few minutes, check out the story and the slideshow of all the wonderful dogs waiting for new homes.

One of the dogs featured in the article is Uba, the little black and white girl pictured here with her foster sibling and foster mom. She reminds me of one of the sweet Pit Bulls at the Lawrence Humane Society right now who's waiting for that perfect family to come along. His name is Tony, and he's one of 3 male Pits in the adoption area at the shelter right now. It's so hard to find suitable families for these sweet dogs, so they end up waiting at the shelter forever. Good families often don't understand the breed and just aren't interested, while other families are interested, but for all the wrong reasons. These poor little guys have such a rough time because their breed has been so maligned in the news over the past few years. Good boys like Tony and his friends Kash and Busta are paying the price because of the actions of terrible breeders and terrible owners. The good news is that people in rescue groups like BAD RAP in the San Francisco area and Mid-America Bully Breed Rescue here in our area are working hard to save these terrific dogs!

Blankets and BBQ

For those of you who live in the Lawrence area, I want to share a couple of very easy ways you can help out my favorite worthy cause--the Lawrence Humane Society.

The first LHS need is probably one you've already heard about. This week there was an article in the Lawrence Journal-World written by one of the shelter board members, as well as an email on the topic that I'm pretty sure was forwarded all over the city (I received it from three different people). In a nutshell, the shelter used to receive 20 to 25 bags of towels and blankets from Goodwill every week. These linens are used as bedding for the animals since they have to sleep on concrete floors. The blankets and towels are changed daily and laundered if possible, but many are contaminated with viruses or destroyed by nervous dogs and teething puppies, so this means the shelter goes through a lot of towels and blankets each week. Unfortunately, Goodwill changed management and now has some arrangement to ship all their linens to somewhere in Texas, so the shelter no longer has a source for their bedding.

So if you have any old blankets, sheets, comforters or towels laying around your house waiting to be taken to Goodwill or some other thrift store, please please please save them for the shelter instead! You know I'll be going there each weekend, so if you want to leave them with me, you don't even have to make a trip to deliver them. The shelter is also in the process of setting up Planet Aid boxes that will be strictly for shelter use and will be labeled as such, so you'll be able to drop your bedding off in several other locations around town as well. I can't tell you how much the animals--especially the dogs--will appreciate this. That concrete is so cold and so uncomfortable! One of our first foster dogs, a Whippet mix named Cheyenne who didn't have much meat on her bones, slept on that concrete floor for almost a year before she came home to live with us. She had huge callouses on her knees and elbows as a result of constant rubbing of concrete on her joints. Please donate your leftover bedding so that the sweet dogs at LHS will be a little more comfortable in an unhappy situation!

The second way you can help out the shelter this week isn't quite as easy as the first. This Sunday, the shelter is having a fundraising event at Abe & Jake's. There will be food catered by Bigg's Barbecue, and entertainment provided by Les Gilliam & the Silver Lake Band, who are apparently "nationally acclaimed western swing entertainers." Let me just say that Chad is extremely unhappy (sighing and groaning next to me as I type) that I've asked him to go to this event with me. He is not a fan of either country music or swing dancing, so this event is pretty much his biggest nightmare. I'm trying to convince him that the $4o ticket (for the two of us) is going towards a good cause, and that he'll get a large meal out of the deal. He's trying to convince me that even free food wouldn't be worth sitting through this music, which will likely make him very cranky. While it's not my ideal evening out either, I'm willing to make the sacrifice to support the shelter, especially since a couple of weeks ago they'd only sold 3 tickets!!

If you're interested in coming to the event with us (or me) to eat some food and keep us (or me) company, please let me know! If not, please pass this along to anyone you know who might be interested. You can download a flier with more information here. Thanks, everyone!

Slinkyness

It's probably pretty clear that I'm mildly insane, based on the fact that this is my second post about a dog who stayed with us for barely over 24 hours. I just can't help it--Slinky was such a doll! In that one short day, with just a few hours of loving human contact, she made such a huge amount of progress. She was almost like a normal house dog, as opposed to the terrified little runaway we'd captured the night before. She started following us all over the house, and while still skittish and nervous, she would allow us to pet her, give us lots of nose kisses and even come when she was called. She had no accidents in the house, although clearly she hadn't been a house dog before, since each and every piece of furniture, counter and tabletop became a climbing apparatus for her! It was hilarious to watch her explore the house, and I wish I'd captured pictures of her standing on the coffee table and climbing over the firewood rack! Of course, I quickly told her "no" in those situations, so there wasn't really time to grab the camera! I did, of course, take a few other pictures of her yesterday evening.






The neighbors who are going to train her and find her a permanent home came to pick her up last night, and she seemed very comfortable with them, as she laid right down in the middle of the living room while we all discussed her care. Tonight I saw Slinky and her foster family walk by the house, so I went out to say hi, and she walked right up to me without fear! I didn't get to talk to them much because I was on the phone (sorry, Kelly), but they said she is doing well! I'm so happy for Slinky!

Operation Save Slinky

A couple of weeks ago, I saw a cute little stray black and white dog running around a few blocks away from our house. A couple of days later, I saw her again. I stopped the car to see if she'd come to me, and she bolted in the other direction. A couple of days after that, she was in our front yard, but as soon as we went out the door, she went running. We went out to walk the dogs the next night, and we spotted her in a neighbor's front yard. She came right up to sniff Celtic, only to take off as soon as we tried to get near her. The entire walk we discussed how we might corral her, since we were so worried about her being hungry, being out in the elements, and being hit by a car. So many of the days we'd seen her, she was very near or even in the road. As we neared home, we were plotting how maybe we could get her to follow the dogs, since she seemed to like Celtic so much. Seconds later, Chad glanced over his shoulder and was startled to find that she was walking about 10 feet behind us! We stopped to see if she would come closer, but instead she quickly disappeared into the night. It was at that moment that we dubbed our little neighbor stray Slinky.

That was the first night we started leaving food out for Slinky. Each day, we saw her at least once, sometimes two or three times, often across north Iowa Street, which has lots of heavy truck traffic. Every time we came home we were so afraid we would find her lying on the side of the road after being hit, but every time we left the house we'd leave food out for her anyway. About the second day that I left a snack for her at lunch, I started getting nervous when I got nearer to home, since I hadn't spotted her on any of the blocks approaching our house. As I rounded the corner onto our street, I found Slinky standing in our driveway eating. She jumped when the garage door opened, but stood there cautiously and watched me as I pulled in. By the time I got out of the car, Slinky had disappeared. It was fascinating that she could always appear and disappear so quickly!

A couple of nights later the temperature was supposed to drop down below freezing. I was so worried that Slinky wouldn't survive the night. I left some dinner out for her, but she didn't come to get it before we went to bed. When I woke up, I ran to the door and her chicken scraps were gone, but I had no idea if she'd gotten them or if I'd lured a raccoon to our front steps. As I left for work, I scanned the neighborhood carefully and saw no sign of her, and then backed out of the driveway only to find her standing in our flower garden. I jumped out and grabbed the bread I'd just thrown down, threw her a piece, and watched frustratingly as she grabbed a bite and took off in the other direction. I jumped in the car and followed her, and made desperate hand signals to a neighbor who was out walking as Slinky approached her dog. Before she realized what I was saying, Slinky was gone again, halfway down the next block. I talked with the neighbor only to find that her family had been feeding and trying to capture Slinky as well. She said other people on her block had also made efforts to no avail. That night my next door neighbor also called to say she'd been trying to tame and capture this very smart, very wary little girl!

Yesterday morning, as Chad headed out of the neighborhood, he called and said Slinky was right in front of a building on the edge of the industrial area near our house. He's stopped and tried to lure her in, but of course she took off. He came back to the house to grab the dogs (our bait) and we drove back to the industrial area and started our search. We drove through several parking lots and saw nothing, and just as we were about to head for home we saw her walking out of the K-Mart distribution center lot. We parked and jumped out of the car with the dogs and some tasty ham, and tossed Slinky a few pieces as she approached her fellow canines. As soon as I moved, however, she took off into a lot where TWO semis were trying to back into their respective stalls. We watched in horror as she actually walked under one of the trucks while it was moving, thankfully very slowly!

We followed Slinky through this lot of parked trucks and watched her slip through a hole in a fence--she was clearly very familiar with the area. She marched over to an office building and laid down, cleaning her wet and muddy paws and rolling around in the grass trying to dry off from the recent sprinkles. We jumped back into the car and drove to this lot, where we parked at a safe distance, trying to figure out our next move. Finally, I got out and walked to one end of the lot while Chad drove the dogs to the other end. We were hoping to herd her in my direction so that I could catch her as she went by. Chad got out with Celtic (Hope gets much to crazy around new dogs) and they started walking near Slinky, but then quickly walked away from her, which definitely piqued her interest. She followed, then sniffed with Celtic for a moment, unfortunately just out of Chad's reach. As soon as he made a move near her, she started jogging away. At this point it was sprinkling again, so we decided to give up our chase for the day.

We left food out again overnight, this time not as worried about the weather since she'd made it through two freezing nights and one rainy night with no problem. Today as I left for the shelter at about 1:00, Slinky was sitting on the corner of Iowa and River Ridge right in front of the inconvenience store. She started rolling around in the grass like she didn't have a care in the world, apparently completely unaware that she was lost or in danger at all. I pulled into the parking lot, knowing that I hadn't a chance in the world of catching her, but as soon as I stopped the car in her vicinity she took off across the road, prancing along like she was just out for a morning romp. I had to laugh because she was just so adorable!

Later this evening, Chad and I were downstairs watching the Jayhawks game against USC (which we'd recorded since we weren't home to watch it earlier). Suddenly Hope jumped off the couch and tore up the stairs, because she heard Celtic barking at something outside. She was going crazy with her hysterical bawling, so I ran up to see a little black and white body slinking around the corner. Chad jumped into action (since I was wearing slippers) and got Celtic's leash on and walked out the door. As he left I suggested that he try and lure her into the backyard. Hope and I stood and watched out the front door, and a few minutes later Slinky came walking back into our view, stopped a moment, and then took off around the corner again. I stepped out to follow her, not knowing if Chad realized where she was. As I rounded the corner I saw her standing in our neighbor's backyard, so I started to slowly approach with some treats. Suddenly, Chad walks out of the back yard gate and takes a few steps towards her with Celtic, then turns around and runs right back in through the gate, and she followed! I started to run to close the gate behind him, but he was already on top of it. When I heard the gate slam behind him I literally started screaming, "I can't believe it!! You did it!" I was so thrilled!! My husband is my hero!

It took about another 2o minutes of chasing her around the backyard in the freezing cold darkness with flashlights until we finally cornered her and got a leash on. She was so terrified, but even in her scared state she never tried to bite, even with strange people grabbing at her. The weird thing was when we went to put the leash on her, we noticed she was wearing a collar, which we're almost sure she wasn't wearing when we chased her yesterday. It's almost as if someone else finally caught her today and then lost her again. Regardless, in the few hours she's been with us, she's already doing better with walking on a leash and even coming back to us when we let her off in the backyard. She is still very scared and will need a lot of work before being adoptable, which is why one of the other neighbors wants to keep and train/socialize her before finding her a permanent home.

So tonight we have a very timid little visitor sleeping with her own little blankets in the warmth of our garage. Operation Save Slinky has been a success!