360°

it’s taken almost a full year but we’ve finally come full circle.  last year when we announced that we needed to find a home for violet we promised we would give another dog a home so we didn’t leave any footprint.  we remained in limbo until violet found a home and now that she has we’re no longer in limbo.  meet zig:

he’s the newest colella and he’s a pretty superb addition.  he’s a puppy mill reject who was dumped in a kill shelter and taken in by a local rescue.  he’s missing most of his front right arm which apparently in “mill” language means he’s of no use.  it seems like the arm (or lack thereof) turned out fortuitous for zig as it provided a ticket out of the damn mill. 

he’s probably about 9 months old and other than needing to gain some weight he’s in good health.  we’ve got some unique challenges with him that we’re learning about since he’s our first puppy mill dog.  right now if we can get him to sleep during the night we’ll be happy – but he remains fantastic whether he allows us to sleep or not.

as always dave & i were both so impressed with how the rest of the dogs reacted.  they really are an amazing pack and haven’t given him a bit of trouble.  no one’s really befriended him yet but each day they’ve warmed up a little more. 

when dave & i met i had two three-legged dogs so it seems we’ve come full circle in more ways than one.  we’ve had missing legs, seizure disorders, deafness and blindness and now we’re kicking it old school. 

dieciséis again

we got a call the other day from an acquaintance who had “rescued” a dog from a bad situation and needed some help figuring out what to do.  unfortunately “the dog” had a broken leg and now the rescuers had had her in their care for a week without providing any care for the leg.  not knowing what else to do and realizing that this dog needed help we told them to take her to our vet the next day and we would pay to find out what exactly was wrong with the leg and what needed to happen and then we would go from there.  at the time the idea was that perhaps if the care was to be extensive that we could set up a collection or something to get her what she needed.  the next day i spoke to our vet after she had seen the dog and it became clear that the situation she was in needed to change.  she had a badly broken leg that either needed (hopefully) pinning but possibly amputation.  dave & i talked about it and decided the best thing for us to do was to take responsibility for her both financially and emotionally so arrangements were made for us to pick her up the next day and go from there.

dave was away the day/night that this all went down and i am embarrassed to admit that i just felt an overwhelming sadness, both for this dog and the situation she was in but also for us.  i just did not want another dog and hadn’t planned on another dog (not that these things are always planned) – i’m just not a fan of change and this change was a little more than i felt i could handle at the time.  we have just really gotten  to a new normal since adding benny to the pack and things are settled and moving along smoothly so to throw a cog in that wheel really was not what i wanted.  there’s also the sad fact that dave and i have not been away together for almost 2 years (i actually haven’t left the house for even a night in that time).  we haven’t had a pet sitter in that time, although to be fair we haven’t made a real concerted effort to find someone up for the daunting task, but still…

i was feeling fairly downhearted when we went to pick said dog up and then we introduced her to the pack and everything was better.  i have to tell you that we have some amazing dogs…i am so proud of how they accepted this little bugger and they were all just so lovely it’s amazing. “the dog," in her own right, is equally amazing as she took all the introductions in stride and was completely unphased and completely loving.

so it’s probably time for the introduction of this little lady that i’ve been rudely referring to as “the dog” so i am pleased to present violet:

she’s a female pit bull who is probably about 5-1/2 months old and she has coped amazingly well with a broken femur for over a week now (evident in the video below).  i am happy to say she had surgery yesterday and our amazing vet feels very positive about the result.  because of the scarring present (due to the time the fracture was given to heal on it’s own) some of her long bone had to be removed but we are hopeful she will have a fully functional, albeit shorter leg.  we’ll have some tough weeks ahead trying to keep a pit puppy calm and quiet when she’s feeling better but we are thrilled to have her in our life and looking forward to a lifetime with her.  

cucucachoo

i’m happy to announce there is a new member of the earthdog pack.  he hails from georgia where he was pulled from a kill shelter and brought to nashville by a wonderful rescue group.  i became aware of him and fell in love with him at first sight.  when i found out he was deaf it was clear to me he belonged here.  without further ado i present benny…

holy crap, people, believe me when i say this is the most fantastic puppy.  we’ve raised many, many puppies over the years between fosters and our dogs, and while i’ve never met a puppy i didn’t like, i’ve also never met one quite like benny.  he is such a delightful dog; loving, amicable as all get out, and overwhelmingly sweet.  neither dave nor i really wanted a puppy (we weren’t really equipped for the old “can’t let ‘em out of your sight for 5 seconds” dealio) but at the same time i felt pretty strongly after the last few months we’ve had that we needed a young dog that would be with us for as long as possible.  let me tell you, the universe heard my plea and delivered big time.  

 

we were a little hesitant to bring in another dog because of carly being a hair's breadth from ferality.  since losing demeter she’s been trying to catapult herself to the top dog position and has been a bit of a lunatic to live with.  that being said, we also needed some new energy in this house and something about benny made him seem like the right guy.  we were a little worried about introductions but in hindsight all the worrying was a waste of time because he waltzed in here like this is where he belonged.  carly, in a surprising twist, fell in love with him and really showed why we adore her. she was his first friend and has been absolutely fantastic with him.  

we adore this little guy and for some reason have taken to calling him “egg.”  he was just what all of us needed and we hope we can be what he needs…he will be loved for a lifetime.