Puppy Love

It's time to introduce the 5th member of our merry band: our awesome puppy!

I grew up in a dog family. We'd always had one, and it was something that I'd always wanted for myself when I "grew up." Hubby didn't grow up as a dog person, but became one in college (thank goodness!). When we got married, getting a dog was an agreed-upon eventuality, but it took us a while to get the timing right.

Finally, Thanksgiving Weekend 2012 rolled around. My sister-in-law and her boyfriend had been looking to adopt a puppy much more actively than Hubby and I, and they'd found a litter at a shelter they wanted to go check out. Hubby and I decided to tag along, with no thoughts of acquiring a dog at the time; we just really wanted to play with puppies.

We behaved ourselves very well at first. We saw lots of cute puppies, but weren't in love with any of them. Until we saw HER. Hubby and I still disagree over whose idea it was to ask to see her, but we both agree that her complete adorableness won us over. As soon as we held her, it was a done deal. We stayed until they weren't doing any more adoptions that evening, to make sure that no one took her, and then went home to "sleep on it." Yeah, right. We were picking out names on the car ride home.

The next morning, we showed up right when the shelter opened, to be sure we no one got to her before we did. We sat through the informational video on adopting pets, filled out all the paperwork, paid our adoption fee, and then finally got to leave with our puppy in tow! The past few years have had a lot of good days, but this one ranked right up among the best of them.

L to R: Adoption Day, How can you not love that face?

 Mischa has been with us through some bad times, and a lot of really good ones. She's a wonderful big sister to the Things, and we can't wait to see how much fun they'll all have together as the Things grow up. It may have taken a while to get there, but I'm so glad we finally have our dog! Nothing says love like having a dog run to greet you when you get home (and lick your face to show you how much she's missed you).

Can you say photobomb?

Just to give them a shout-out: Wright-Way Rescue is where we found our sweet Mischa. They're a wonderful organization, and we had a great experience with them. Visit them here: http://wright-wayrescue.org/ and then go adopt one of their awesome animals!