In Between Foster Dogs Part 1 A Shout Out To Our Personal doGs

Both Nash and Sierra were adopted and went home in the same few days! We just never know how the timing will be with adoptions so in this case we ended up with a week with no foster dog and because our personal dogs, Birdie, Jenny-Boo, Skip, and Liza are such terrific sports about sharing their mom, dad, and personal space with all the foster dogs we wanted to really make it a week of doing special things with our dogs to thank them for everything they do to help us help the foster dogs. Each of our dogs brings something to the table in teaching us how to be better dog parents and in teaching the foster dogs how to navigate a multi-dog home.

AND don't forget Theo the cat! He is instrumental in our fostering en-devour as I will explain below.

Theo is the cat litmus test for our foster dogs. If the foster dogs can't get along with Theo then they get the "no cats" button on their petfinder post. Theo is a very dog savvy cat he deserves a big thank you for his dedicated work.

Ahhhhh Jenny... my little senior girl. Jenny teaches foster dogs the art of avoiding. She will avoid avoid avoid when they try to engage her and if they don't get it after all that she lets them know with a quick correction. She also teaches foster dogs that they can be resilient and heal from any tragedy they have endured as she has endured probably the worst of any of our personal dogs and we are happy to say she is doing great now! Jenny also LOVES to go for walks and hikes and she teaches foster dogs how to stay on your people's heels at all times and just go with the flow. Thank you Jenny, you are a wonderful teacher to us all.

Thank You Birdie for teaching us that deaf dogs rule! Also for teaching those male foster dogs what true love really is (Birdie hasn't met a male foster dog she isn't smitten with), and for keeping all the dogs in line by teaching them what a strong female is all about!

Skip is very good with foster dogs. He doesn't cause them any trouble at all. He even shows them how to fetch a ball, but he doesn't like it when they horn in. He lets them run after him or with him but would rather be the star of the "fetch the ball show". He also will play with foster dogs now and then and he teaches the younger more exuberant ones that more distinguished dogs like himself like to wake up slowly in the morning and don't like young whippersnappers in his space until after breakfast, this is something all puppies need to learn. Thank you Skip for being who you are and teaching us how to advocate for our dogs!

Thank You Liza for teaching all the foster dogs that Min Pins and Rat Terriers are not the same. Liza shows them all that trusting humans and getting pets is a very good thing. Liza also makes sure to supervise all play between dogs in the house and calls them out if things get too fun. Liza you are a funny girl and we love you!

Update to our foster free week! Liza and Birdie got to do an official NoseWork class. They were super stars and will continue sniffing in class for three more weeks!

All the dogs got to go for a Hike, blog post to come....

Skip got to have momma all to himself for a whole day at a T-Touch workshop for senior dogs. Stay tuned for his adventure.

Remember Isetta?

We got lucky this weekend! I decided to check in on Isetta to see how she was doing and I got some pictures and news back within 10 minutes of my inquiry! You might remember her adopter/mom flew all the way out to WA state from Maryland to get her new little bundle of joy. Isetta is now Setta and she is the love of her mom and big sister's life! They adore this girl, who could not, and say they can't imagine life without her. She got to go to the ocean for a vacation this summer and likes to dig in the sand with sis, and also people watch with mom. She has learned some tricks too and one is called "where's your belly?". I would love to see that! Here are a few pictures of Setta enjoying her forever life!

Setta relaxing with mom enjoying all the world around them

Awwwww what could be sweeter than Setta and her big sister?

Mom also tells me that Setta likes to take sis's pens and pencils when she is doing her homework and also she will get in between her sister and Ipad when she is trying to concentrate. So happy for them all!

Remember Sunbeam?

You might recall Sunbeam our little Rat/JRT mix puppy girl who had experienced a bump in the road with an adoption that didn't work out, she was returned to New Rattitude, (we of course took her back into our care as foster parents), and then she was adopted again within about a week and a half! She had suffered submissive and excitment urination and needed a quieter home with people who were willing to work on this with her.

Well she got just that! I decided to check in on the little munchkin today, her name is Izzy now, and I asked how she was doing. Her mom and dad are over the moon with her. They adore her, call her "their baby", and best of all they report that her "little problem" as they refer to it, is just about non existent. Wow! This is a true testament to the dedication they have exhibited to continue to keep calm around Izzy and also manage the problem in a loving, patient, and compassionate way.

This warms my heart so much and I am so happy for her and for them. What a wonderful happy tail for Izzy.

And don't tell anyone but they are considering adding to the family again sometime next year and I can think of nothing I would like to do more than help them find a perfect fit for them and Izzy. But until then they are enjoying their "baby" and living up to their promise of being her forever home.

Sunbeam now Izzy before she went to her now forever home. What a cute girl she is!

Sweet Sierra Has Found Her Forever Home!

Sierra has been with us for almost three months and she certainly has made big strides in her physical and emotional healing. She has been nothing short of amazing and is a testament to how resilient she is from where she came from and where she is going. I will admit I wasn't able to post about her as much as I would have liked because of her extreme camera shyness. I wanted to respect her aversion to having a camera in her face because my main goal with all my foster dogs is that they feel comfortable in my presence. Being someone who doesn't like her picture taken either I could relate to Sierra's feelings and so it went. I went about it trying to capture her spirit and darling personality throughout the weeks she was here and I always hoped I was relaying who she is on my blog, more than what she looked like, so that someone reading about her might be enchanted by her unique personality enough to want to give her a forever home.

I am happy to say that it worked out exactly like that! A wonderful and very special young couple did see her on this blog and they, "were smitten with her", their words. Sierra's new parents feel they can relate their own personalities to hers and so because of this compassion and empathy they have for Sierra we are just over the moon that they came into her life to be her forever family. This is everything we had dreamed for Sierra.

So without further ado I will help Miss Sierra announce......

To read about Sierra's journey from being rescued from Central CA, through rehab for her luxating patella surgery, to present day please click here.

Here are my favorite pictures of Sierra....Happy Tails sweet girl....

The credit for this pictures goes to Gretchen at Triple Dog Pet Services!

The credit for this pictures goes to Gretchen at Triple Dog Pet Services!

Who is Birdie???

I got so busy as a foster mom posting about my foster dogs the last few weeks that I completely skipped over introducing you to Birdie on her "Gotcha Day" which is May 6th. Birdie happens to be the first rattie we adopted back in 2008. Before Birdie Girl, as we call her, we had always had larger dogs, all "pound puppies", as I was taught from a very young age (by my grammie and mom) that adopting a rescue dog was the ONLY way to go. So when our large dog Maya was getting older we decided to adopt again while she would be able to tolerate a new dog, and so we decided to downsize. We came across Birdie on Petfinder and adopted her from another rat terrier rescue group. In fact many of the volunteers of New Rattitude are originally from the rescue group we adopted Birdie from.

When we got Birdie we knew little about the breed, little about terriers, and so the journey began. Another thing we didn't know when we adopted Birdie (and neither did her foster parents) was that she is deaf. We had her about a week when Dave said to me, "I don't think Birdie can hear!". We did some tests, clapping behind her head, whistling, clicking our fingers, she didn't respond. AhHA so that is why she didn't bark at the doorbell or seem to respond to us talking to her or calling her name. We just thought she was a quiet dog by nature.

Our daughter, Jill, and now son-in-law, Miguel, had come over shortly after we figured this out and Miguel was intrigued. He stood looking at Birdie who was across the room and pointed to the floor in front of him. She ran over to him and sat down! Just like that. Birdie being deaf has never been an issue, she knows hand signals and how to sit, down, stay, roll over, come. She is just like any terrier and if she doesn't want to come instead of conveniently "not hearing" us, she conveniently doesn't "see" us waving our hands to get her attention. <grin>

Birdie is a total character and a wonderful dog. She is a comic and she rules the roost when it comes to foster dogs. And any of you who frequent my blog know, she also has a thing for unfixed males, and male foster dogs in general especially Mingus....

Here are a few choice pictures of our little Tweet Tweet Birdie

Birdie was under a year old when we adopted her, still a little thing...

Birdie has the funniest personality and keeps us laughing. Here she is pre-cleaning a large soup pan for us.

This was taken on a hot day in Umtanum Canyon, Birdie LOVES the heat.

This is Maya, she is the dog we had when we first got Birdie, she was great with her and let Birdie attack her all she wanted and Maya would just lay there in ecstasy, Maya was one of those dogs who tolerated most anything.

What a face!

Birdie might be deaf but she is very clued in to what is going on around her.

Birdie (and Skip) loves to run on the beach and she is a super fast runner.

She also loves to snuggle in her blankets and will sleep all day.

Birdie has been a wonderful companion and because of Birdie we adopted Jenny-Boo, rescued Skip, and adopted Sage! Not to mention started volunteering for New Rattitude. So better late than never on introducing Birdie officially on the blog and Happy Belated Gotcha Day Birdie!!!!!

Nash Makes a Wish...and it Comes True!

Nash is no different than any of my other foster dogs, well he IS unique as are all my past, present, and future foster dogs, but they all have one thing in common, and that is they all make a wish to be adopted into their forever homes, where they will be loved for who they are and where they can truly shine!

But before the best news of all, I wanted to share a video of Nash working on a Kong Quest Wishbone Food Toy!He really loved the peanut butter, salmon skin, stuffing I put in it. Yum Yum! If you are interested in this toy, click here to see a close up picture and how to stuff it.

Nash has something to share with you!

Nash's wish came true!! He is going to be living with a whole family of four who love and adore him. Best of all they were looking for a dog just like Nash to bring them companionship, giggles, snuggles, and love. He will have a dad, mom, and 2 human siblings that he will get to play with and sleep with too! We could not be happier for our little Monkey Boy and look forward to all the updates and good news that goes along with having his wish come true.

This is Nash's shelter picture, I can't even think of him not making it out...so I won't!

This is how I will remember Nash, feeling the sun on his face, and in the arms of his forever family. Wishes do come true.....and so do happy endings....

Remembering Our Dear Friend Sage

Two years ago today we adopted our Sage, he was a very old rattie boy that I had seen on one of our weekly urgent lists....he was never going to make it out of the high kill shelter alive. We just could not bear this sweet old guy dying in a shelter after he had most likely been a loved companion of someone who maybe had died or for some unknown reason not able to care for him any longer. With the loving help of the New Rattitude network of devoted rattie lovers we were able to bring this boy home to live out the rest of his life in love, comfort and safety. I posted a story about it back when I first started this blog you can read all about it here if you'd like to. Love At First Sight.

When we decided to adopt Sage, we went in figuring that what we would be offering him was hospice care as he was very old, very sickly, and very fragile. But to our delight and bit by bit over time Sage got stronger and healthier and he lived for almost two years with us and our pack.

On April 30 of this year we helped Sage go to Rainbow Bridge. Sage was quite camera shy but over the last couple of years I managed to get a few nice pictures of this sweet boy who never caused one problem in our home whatsoever. He was a perfect gentleman and his funny ways and character will be remembered and dearly missed for years to come. I wanted to share this beautiful boy with you.

This was Sage's shelter pic. By the time we ended up getting him he was really skinny and really sick and not eating.