10/12/2006
Katie is on board our volunteers group now. Katie, welcome aboard.

The babies continue to grow, to delight and to enchant. Bunny, you should have seen Frenchie (black toy poodle mix) today. The babies were going over to try to play with her. To give you a perspective, she’s at least 5 years old and these guys, at 4.5 weeks old, are about 2/3rds of her size already. Big puppies!

Today, we started free feeding dry food and I’ll cut out the 3 times per day feeding of most food and go to 2 times per day and then 1. They are drinking water freely and are getting really good about going to their papers to do their business.

I admit to being slack about cleaning up behind them so today, I got out the Wintergreen disinfectant that Carol Voyles brought me to use and got to work. I let the pups run around while I cordoned off their two exercise pens and scrubbed and scrubbed ‘til everything was spotless. I can’t have adopters coming with the place looking like that! It’s much better now, and it smells absolutely wonderful. After I finished cleaning, I played puppy police and got everyone back into the ex pen and laid out dinner. Then I counted heads. Whoops…I only counted 11 so I counted colors. One brown – check; four white – check; seven black…whoops, six black. One little black boy was missing. I panicked. As much stuff as is stored in the building on that side, he could have gotten stuck anywhere. I searched and searched and couldn’t figure out why Arizona wasn’t concerned. Finally, I found a little black boy curled up on a midnight blue comforter in plain sight. No wonder Arizona had no concerns. He was right there all the time! Whew….

Today was vet day for Chadwick and Gracie. Chadwick is a white mini poodle. He had his last heartworm treatment and is now ready to go. He is an absolutely drop dead gorgeous mini poodle. I hope we find his home soon. Gracie is an older silver toy poodle, in for blood work in preparation for a dental. She has been urinating frequently so I suspected diabetes but everything came back normal. Thank goodness!

I try to do as many errands while I am out as I can so I can minimize my drive time. It’s 45 minutes to Westside Vet alone. So, I went by Sam’s and picked some food donations, then scooted over to Target to use a gift card generously donated to pick up some puppy food.

Then it was off to meet with the husband of Julie Bentley, one of our foster homes, and pick up Taylor, a white SP. Taylor is only 2 years old. His owners didn’t realize the high energy requirements of a standard poodle and after 2 years of antics, couldn’t take it anymore. He’s a wonderful dog, he just needs an energy outlet. That put us home after 1 pm so I called Wayne and he agreed to pick Chadwick and Gracie up, saving me a second trip into town. Thanks sweetie.

Now…a note to adoption counselors. Today I got one of those emails you hate to get: “call me, please. I have to get rid of this dog and I have to take her to the pound if I can’t find something quick.” I called and found myself talking to a very nice but very distraught mother of 3 boys ages 10, 10 and 12. One of the 10 year old’s has cerebral palsy and has a kidney disorder that makes any sort of cut or scrape a serious damage to his system. This little miniature poodle had recently bit this child after a struggle over a chicken bone the dog had found on the floor. The poo kid had become increasingly aggressive (snapping and growley) recently towards all the boys although she remains loving to the mother. Because the mother now does not trust her poodle, she puts the poodle out on a chain when visitors arrive. It’s a recipe for disaster.

I told this lady that, had she approached us 2 years ago when she bought her dog about adopting from CPR, that we most likely would have turned her down. Children that are victims of CB do not have the same motor skills as others. The body language he is sending out is far different than mine or yours. In addition, they are boys and they are getting louder and more boisterous every day. I explained to her that it sounds like it was a good home and a good dog but that both together were not working. We would most likely have sent her to lab rescue to get a dog that was large enough to be able to enjoy her growing boys. She was so relieved. She had spent the day on the phone talking to other rescue groups and being pretty discouraged. When I told HER she had three boys (I knew she had three children but not the sexes) before she told me, based solely on the actions of the poodle, she decided I was a mind reader. I explained that I was not – but I knew poodles and I knew one of the behavior paths a poodle took when they had had enough of young and rowdy/loud boys.

So…yes, we treat every applicant like they’re going to be able to adopt. But, when you turn down an applicant, not because they are bad people but because a dog in their home is a bad fit, remember that you may be saving them a lot of grief down the line.

We have so many adopters coming this weekend. It’s truly a blessing. I’ll spend tomorrow spiffying pups up to meet their new moms and dads.

Oh…I’ve been invited to speak to a class at a local college. The class topic is non profit organizations, especially “grass roots” organizations like our own. Special thanks to Karen Martin for recommending me to her friend who is the professor for this class.

The sky is clear and it is chilly here tonight. Winter is coming. We make a final decision on our heating system tomorrow. Good night and sleep tight – from Dreamweaver Farms
Wayne and Donna