The Whole Dog-gone Story

Back in May/June Israel had the brilliant idea of getting a cute little mix puppy from the Humane Society here in town. I thought it was an o.k. idea until we really started to see her true personality and well, frankly, her mental issues. She's a smart dog, but must have been kicked around and seriously abandoned as a pup. Anytime Israel would just walk by, she would cower like he was about to kick her. She peed anytime someone new was around, not the excited kind, the fear kind. She refused to pee anywhere outside of our yard (tough traveling) unless someone new walked by and "feared" it out of her. She constantly nipped at the girls and put holes in their clothes. She could be really sweet at times, but required so much more patience than we are able to provide with our distracted lives. But we didn't want to just send her back to the pound and we knew the girls would miss the dog, so we continued to "deal", but I was sad that we weren't really enjoying her and she didn't seem to really enjoy us. Which brings us to PART II of the story...

I was running a little late getting some take home goodies together for a cooking show for my good friend, Juleen, a few Saturday's ago and was in a big rush to gather everything together. I literally had about 10 min to get out the door and was not paying attention to what Israel and the girls were doing outside. Then Maggie comes in the kitchen and says, "Mom, come meet Hannah". And I say, "What? Who's Hannah? Did you make a new friend?" "No, Mom. She's our new puppy." "WHAT??!!" Of course, Israel comes in with this adorable little puppy like nothing new had happened and explains that some little girls from down the street had gotten her free from some people at Walmart and when they got her home their Dad said, "NO WAY! Find that dog a new home". Like this sob story's really going to make me want another huge responsibility in my house. I look away and have to walk out the door because I'm going to be late. I just didn't have time to deal with it and wanted a "good" mood for the show.

PART III... Pepper and Hannah do NOT get along. Pepper smothers the poor thing and tries to drag her across the backyard. When Hannah had to pee Pepper would not stop mauling her long enough to give her time to do her business. This little 8 wk old pup was actually growling at our 8 month old pup because she was so irritated by her. It was UTTER CHAOS!! So, thus it is truly my fault that Pepper is no longer with our family, because I'd had enough and I turned to Israel and said, "We are a 1 or 0 dog family. Period. I can't do this. You pick a dog and find the other one a new home this week, I'm done". Now, I don't put my foot down all that often, but this was just too much for me with my schedule right now. After a couple of weeks with Hannah we realized (me too) that this was the dog for our family. So with tears in our eyes we gave Pepper a new home. I was really surprised by my own reaction. I truly cried for her. I felt so bad that we couldn't make it work, but I knew we were all better off for it. It was just a sad day.
Now we are a one dog family again. Hannah is now 12 weeks old. We're not sure what she is to be honest, other than just about the sweetest dog you'll ever meet. She's friendly to new people. She is great with the girls. She's quick to learn commands and to be redirected. So far she is truly fitting right in. I'm even considering letting come on the carpeted areas once she is fully house trained. And anyone who knows me knows that's a big deal. Maggie asked just this week where Pepper was and I had to explain to her that she had a new home because 2 dogs was just too much for Mommy in this house. She expressed her sadness for Pepper's absence but then shared her solution which was to buy another house so we could have two dogs. Gotta love her logic.