Introducing Our New Puppy Mr. Blues Jr.

Well, Spring time brings lots of things, baby birds, flowers, sunshine, green grass...and for us, we rescued a new puppy. We named him Mr. Blues, Jr. He was going to be killed in a gas kill shelter in Ohio. We call him Blues for short. He is half German Shepherd/Half Husky and has the bluest eyes you've ever seen. He is 16 weeks old and is so funny. I don't know why, but I always seem to get dogs with funny ears!! I don't know if his ears are going to stay that way, but looks like he might end up with one ear up and one ear down like Josie.

Enjoy!!!
Much love to you all.
Josie and her mom


A bit of kibble from a Phycolliegist:
Sometimes you just have to give up on chewing the same old bone. 
Know when to start on a new one.

Wordless Wednesday! Well, Sort of...

I'd like to start off by thanking everyone for their prayers for "Rescue". I will hopefully have an update about her tomorrow. Word is that she is in critical, but stable condition.

But for today, Wordless Wednesday, Sort of..., we are in the process of a "white out". The snow started last night and has been hitting us pretty much non-stop since. Here are two pictures, taken this morning at 10:00 am. One of our Redwood, (not normal in our area) and one of our brook.

The rest of the pictures are of Josie and her BFF Lily playing in the snow together this morning. Josie is wearing a her first sweater. How do you think she looks? Mah-velous!!!!

And for those of you who are wondering. My patient John is still in the hospital and in stable condition. His wife Gertrude is keeping the faith bedside. I was able to visit them with Josie this afternoon during a slight lull in the storm. But we had quite a ride getting home. Good thing for Subaru's!

Much Love to all of you. Woof Soon!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY JOSIE!!!

HAPPY 3RD 
BIRTHDAY JOSIE!
I guess that means in dog years she's legal to drink! LOL. I got out of work an hour early and am going to take her for a walk since it rained "like cats and dogs" all day today. I also wanted to put some cute baby pictures up for those of you who wanted to see her growth over the past 3 years. That's ALWAYS fun, eh? As my British Columbia Vancouver friends would say, eh? LOL! The first photo is the day we adopted her, April Fool's day 2007. And then there are a few more pictures of her first year. I will post more in upcoming blogs, but I can't post them all at once. Just look at that puppy belly. It's just calling to be kissed. God, I miss that puppy belly. I used to give her raspberries all the time, well, I have to admit, I still give her raspberries on her belly!! In the one picture, she's sleeping with her best buddy Sophie. Pictures of the Pussycats coming soon. And as you can see, the famous ears are doing their own thing. What until I post a few where they are both going out to the sides. Talk about the awkward months. Just like a teenager.








Please leave comments to wish Josie a VERY HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!!
That is, if you can. ;-)  Much love to you all!

Pediatrics and Germany! What a Great Day!!

We had a Pediatric visit today, Saturday, January 23. But first just a quick note about the photo. This morning, Josie was lying on our guest bed looking out the window and the sun was shining in on her. And the contrast of the orange and pink against her black fur was just gorgeous. I tried to capture it with my camera, but I'm not sure I did it justice.

So back to our visit to Pediatrics. We had a visit at 1:30. It went very well. One little girl, Jennifer, really thought Josie's ears were the best. She just kept playing with her one "up" ear and giggling. Her mother is scared of dogs ( because she was bitten by a dog as a child), but Jennifer kept looking at her mother and saying "touch the dog, touch the dog" really slowly. It was funny. But her mother just kept looking at Josie and kept her distance. She warmed up to Josie at the end of the visit, but I kept Josie a safe distance from her to respect the fact that she had a fear of dogs. I had a really nice talk with Jennifer. She was a really nice, cute kid.

All-in-all, I believe we visited about 11 children. They were all very special in their own way.

The really neat thing about visiting the kids in Peds is that the child can be hooked up to all kinds of machines, but as soon as they see Josie walk in the room, they just smile a huge smile. A lot of times the child gets quiet and just bonds with her, but sometimes the child starts to talk a lot and gets really excited and we just talk about all different kinds of things. What they like to do, do they have pets at home, anything really. Like talking to your kid sister or brother or niece or nephew. And all the time, they are petting Josie. Then when we leave, Josie does her signature "good-bye wave". Everyone loves that. I can always tell when Josie is getting tired by how enthusiastic she is with her wave. It's my meter.

The visits to Pediatrics only happen once a week. The hospital has to have the parents sign a release form or permission form that the Therapy Dog can visit the child, since the child is under 18 years of age. Also, on any of my visits to the hospital, I am not allowed to take any photographs of the patients with Josie. I have taken pictures of Josie with Nurses and Doctors. But this Blog is more about how we cheer people up and about Josie than the people themselves.

I would like to post a picture of Josie in her little Therapy Vest though. I will do that soon.

Now about the Germany comment. And I've been meaning to talk about this. But I've just started this Blog and there is just so much to say, but just so little time to type.

We first started visiting the hospital back in October 2009. In November, We were in Oncology and visited a patient named John and his wife Gertrude, whom Josie and I got very attached too. We visited John and Gert almost every day until he left the hospital right before Christmas and went into a Rehab Center. John would ask for Josie almost every day. They are the most amazing couple. I will write more on them later. All I wanted to write today was that John got out of Rehab in January and I was able to go visit them at their house after the visit to Pediatrics yesterday which was really nice. I did so, because Gert's brother and sister-in-law and her cousin were in from Germany and I wanted to meet them. And they were leaving today. Like I said, more about them in another entry.

Spread the love! It's catchy! Oh tomorrow is Josie's birthday......

The arrival of my puppy into my life...she has changed my life forever. How great is that?

As I child I was always lucky enough to grow up around all kinds of animals. I always had a cat (there were many, but only one at a time) and a beautiful German Shepherd named Hans. All of them, to this day, still hold a special place in my heart. But, nothing could prepare me for the love that I was about to encounter when my husband and I rescued a little puppy named Cassandra, who we quickly renamed Josie. We decided on Josie, because when we got her, we already had a family of 3 rescued cats, so in our home we have “Josie and the Pussycats”.

Josie and her brother and sisters were the products of two farm dogs in the Myrtle Beach area and she was the last of a litter of 5 puppies up for adoption on Mustardsandwich.net to find a home. Her picture was blurry and I wasn’t sure if she really had Border Collie in her (like they claimed), but I had quite a few good phone conversations with the woman who ran the rescue and had rescued the litter and felt she was caring for them exceptionally well.

My donation to adopt Josie went not only to have her delivered to my door, but also to have the parent dogs neutered and spayed, so I had no problems with the monetary donation to adopt her. And, remember, I still had not even met Josie.

On April 1st, 2007, she was hand delivered to our home at 1:00 in the afternoon. I will never forget that moment. She was 8 weeks old. She was sleeping as she was placed in my arms. She was calm. And she was so beautiful. She opened her eyes and met mine and my husband’s, sighed and went back to sleep. We never once had any potty accidents with her. She doesn’t bark or growl. She is the most loving, sweet, gentle, smart, sensitive dog and she rescued me and my husband. And she has the cutest ears ever. One ear up, one ear down.

Because of her, my life has opened up into a whole new world where I give my time voluntarily and I belong to a group of wonderful people called the Furry Angels. I have met some people I know I can call them BFF’s already. And they have dogs I love dearly who are just as kind and loving as their owners. When I bring her on her Therapy visits, she always makes people smile. She loves going on visits and is the consummate Therapy Dog, but she is always learning and can always improve. And so can I and we will do this together, we are a team. I love sharing her with people. And she loves being with people.

It has only been almost 3 years since she came into my life, but I cannot imagine my life without her. I plan on spending every moment I can with her because unfortunately these Furry Angels don’t live as long as us humans. Besides my husband, she is my soul mate....only wrapped in fur.