Meet The Family
Smokey: Smokey was our first addition to the family. He is the cutest, sweetest little rabbit you will ever meet. Chris and I got him while living in Hawai'i. Every day I would beg him for a dog and he would tell me no, not yet, wait until we move back to the mainland. So, after a failed attempt of raising ducks (a story for another day), I came home with a little rabbit. The idea was we would leave the little guy with a friend when we moved back to the East Coast, but we fell in love with this baby bunny. A $200 plane ticket, a wonderful grandma to take him back early, and an awesome friend (Sarah) to babysit him for a couple months until we moved, and Smokey was soon living the East Coast dream. My favorite thing about Smokes is how he just prances around the yard. He loves just running and jumping- it is the funniest thing ever!
Hank: Hank and Lady Byng (named by my sister, Emily...) are the babies of my mom's cat, Sydney. Sydney got knocked up while we were away at my brother Eric's wedding. She had 4 kittens, 3 black and white and one part Siamese-looking cat. Hank is the Siamese looking cat and is the coolest dude. He thinks he is a dog, likes to play with the dogs, has no fear, and at times is a total jack-a$$. His favorite activities include climbing onto the shower door, jumping onto the stairs to see if he can make it, unrolling the toilet paper, and sitting on Chris' lap. He loves being with people, being pet, and being loved.
Lady Byng: Lady is a typical cat- she wants to be pet when she feels like it but does not like to be picked up, pet the wrong way, or bothered at the wrong time (typical female?). She is black and white, picky about the litter box and her food. She will sit in front of you for hours and cry for you to pet her but also complain that you are petting her the wrong way. She loves cat toys though!
Hank and Lady get along great and will spend hours laying in the sun or in their cat bed together. Hank is protective of Lady (one of the reasons we had to take 2 cats from my mom not just Hank which was the original plan...).
Lana: We adopted Lana 2 years ago from the Anne Arundel SPCA. She was an 8 week old puppy. Once we moved to Maryland and bought our house, I was determined to finally get the puppy I always wanted. I (obviously) have always been obsessed with animals and raising a puppy was something I always wanted to do. I found out AA SPCA had some lab puppies available and we went there to check it out. By the time we got there, Lana (Lona at the time) was the only one left! They told us we would be able to fill out the application, but there was a waiting list for puppies, especially lab puppies, so most likely we would just be called next time they had lab puppies available and we would be pre-approved. We left the SPCA sad (we had already bought the cage, toys, leash, etc... I told you I was determined). I started looking at rescue places all over the state to see if anywhere else had puppies available. Nobody had what I was looking for. I even went as far as looking at breeders (shame shame Karen). They were the only people at the moment that had little lab pups. I was not willing to spend the money or willing to go to a breeder. I was willing to keep looking until a perfect rescue pup was available.
I was at a training about a week later and the SPCA called me to ask if my cats had rabies shots. I assumed they had (they had come from my mom). At the same time, I was confused as why they were asking. They told me they were processing my paperwork for Lona. I was beyond happy!! We got the necessary shots/paperwork for the cats and within a couple days Lana was ours!!! She was so cute/scared coming home with us that day. She was shaking the whole ride. We put her on the ground at home and she would just sit there, not knowing what to do.
It has taken Lana a good 2 years to overcome a lot of her anxiety and she still has work to do!! When we first got her, she was scared of anything that moved!! She is still scared of thunderstorms, if you raise your voice, loud noises, and sometimes other dogs barking. We put her in agility and it has helped increase her confidence tremendously. She is like a whole new dog. It has also helped her out by getting a new pal- Ginger. She no longer spends her days hiding in closets or under the beds!
Lana is the sweetest dog. She is a people pleaser and very smart. She is an extremely fast learner. She loves being around people, cuddling next to them, laying with her mommy, running, and playing with Ginger. It has taken a great deal of work, but Lana is a great girl- sweet, smart, and very well-behaved.
Gi
nger: We adopted Ginger this past June. She was rescued from a kill shelter in Georgia by a rescue organization based in NY- Mutt and Lab Rescue . I was ready for Lana to have a playmate. She was becoming bored during the day.
I was very picky about the type of dog I wanted to adopt. I did not want another puppy. Reasons: There are so many older dogs out there that need to be rescued. We didn't want to deal with the whole training a puppy again. We wanted a dog close to Lana's age so they could be playmates. I was also very picky in the breed: I didn't want a hyper lab- Lana is very mellow and laid back- this suits our lifestyle very nicely. She doesn't require a lot of walks/runs. She doesn't run all over the house like a crazy dog EVERY day. We wanted a dog that would balance her in this aspect. Therefore, I did not necessarily want a rescue Lab because you could get a wonderful one or an extremely hyper, high maintenance one. We think that Lana is mixed with Greyhound or Whippet (which is the mellow/sweet part of her). I started looking for dogs that were mixed with that to see what I could find. Sure enough, I found Ginger, what they think is a 2 year old Whippet Golden Retriever mix. She is the sweetest dog with a little bit of spunk.
We drove up to New York to pick up little Ginger. She did great in the car- and bonded instantly with Chris! The two of them still have a daddy's little girl bond. He protects her and thinks she is his tiny little baby. Ginger comes with a whole new set of issues. She comes from a traumatic past. We do not know too much, but she was either abused or neglected. Prior to us picking her up, she was treated for mange- a skin condition caused by stress. This is probably what landed her in the kill shelter to begin with. Luckily they picked her up, treated her, and she is as good as new today. She still has lots of trust issues. It took her a long time to trust us enough to allow us to reach out to her. She is doing much better with that- she is even going up to some strangers!! The bathroom issues are the worst- she must have had some traumatic bathroom experiences because she associates going to the bathroom as bad. So she will hold it in as long as she can, until she cannot hold it any longer which leads to an accident in the house. It took a couple months for her to trust us enough to let us watch her go to the bathroom. We had to start by letting her go in the backyard and have finally led up to going on the walk- which sometimes she still looks at you like why are you staring at me?? We have gotten her on a pretty good schedule so that she has to go pretty badly by walk time but there are nights we have to walk for 20-30 minutes or risk an accident in the house.
Hank and Lady get along great and will spend hours laying in the sun or in their cat bed together. Hank is protective of Lady (one of the reasons we had to take 2 cats from my mom not just Hank which was the original plan...).
Lana: We adopted Lana 2 years ago from the Anne Arundel SPCA. She was an 8 week old puppy. Once we moved to Maryland and bought our house, I was determined to finally get the puppy I always wanted. I (obviously) have always been obsessed with animals and raising a puppy was something I always wanted to do. I found out AA SPCA had some lab puppies available and we went there to check it out. By the time we got there, Lana (Lona at the time) was the only one left! They told us we would be able to fill out the application, but there was a waiting list for puppies, especially lab puppies, so most likely we would just be called next time they had lab puppies available and we would be pre-approved. We left the SPCA sad (we had already bought the cage, toys, leash, etc... I told you I was determined). I started looking at rescue places all over the state to see if anywhere else had puppies available. Nobody had what I was looking for. I even went as far as looking at breeders (shame shame Karen). They were the only people at the moment that had little lab pups. I was not willing to spend the money or willing to go to a breeder. I was willing to keep looking until a perfect rescue pup was available.I was at a training about a week later and the SPCA called me to ask if my cats had rabies shots. I assumed they had (they had come from my mom). At the same time, I was confused as why they were asking. They told me they were processing my paperwork for Lona. I was beyond happy!! We got the necessary shots/paperwork for the cats and within a couple days Lana was ours!!! She was so cute/scared coming home with us that day. She was shaking the whole ride. We put her on the ground at home and she would just sit there, not knowing what to do.
It has taken Lana a good 2 years to overcome a lot of her anxiety and she still has work to do!! When we first got her, she was scared of anything that moved!! She is still scared of thunderstorms, if you raise your voice, loud noises, and sometimes other dogs barking. We put her in agility and it has helped increase her confidence tremendously. She is like a whole new dog. It has also helped her out by getting a new pal- Ginger. She no longer spends her days hiding in closets or under the beds!
Lana is the sweetest dog. She is a people pleaser and very smart. She is an extremely fast learner. She loves being around people, cuddling next to them, laying with her mommy, running, and playing with Ginger. It has taken a great deal of work, but Lana is a great girl- sweet, smart, and very well-behaved.
Gi
nger: We adopted Ginger this past June. She was rescued from a kill shelter in Georgia by a rescue organization based in NY- Mutt and Lab Rescue . I was ready for Lana to have a playmate. She was becoming bored during the day.I was very picky about the type of dog I wanted to adopt. I did not want another puppy. Reasons: There are so many older dogs out there that need to be rescued. We didn't want to deal with the whole training a puppy again. We wanted a dog close to Lana's age so they could be playmates. I was also very picky in the breed: I didn't want a hyper lab- Lana is very mellow and laid back- this suits our lifestyle very nicely. She doesn't require a lot of walks/runs. She doesn't run all over the house like a crazy dog EVERY day. We wanted a dog that would balance her in this aspect. Therefore, I did not necessarily want a rescue Lab because you could get a wonderful one or an extremely hyper, high maintenance one. We think that Lana is mixed with Greyhound or Whippet (which is the mellow/sweet part of her). I started looking for dogs that were mixed with that to see what I could find. Sure enough, I found Ginger, what they think is a 2 year old Whippet Golden Retriever mix. She is the sweetest dog with a little bit of spunk.
We drove up to New York to pick up little Ginger. She did great in the car- and bonded instantly with Chris! The two of them still have a daddy's little girl bond. He protects her and thinks she is his tiny little baby. Ginger comes with a whole new set of issues. She comes from a traumatic past. We do not know too much, but she was either abused or neglected. Prior to us picking her up, she was treated for mange- a skin condition caused by stress. This is probably what landed her in the kill shelter to begin with. Luckily they picked her up, treated her, and she is as good as new today. She still has lots of trust issues. It took her a long time to trust us enough to allow us to reach out to her. She is doing much better with that- she is even going up to some strangers!! The bathroom issues are the worst- she must have had some traumatic bathroom experiences because she associates going to the bathroom as bad. So she will hold it in as long as she can, until she cannot hold it any longer which leads to an accident in the house. It took a couple months for her to trust us enough to let us watch her go to the bathroom. We had to start by letting her go in the backyard and have finally led up to going on the walk- which sometimes she still looks at you like why are you staring at me?? We have gotten her on a pretty good schedule so that she has to go pretty badly by walk time but there are nights we have to walk for 20-30 minutes or risk an accident in the house.
Ginger and Chris are starting behavior classes this week. She learned how to sit over the summer (after a month!!). Hopefully we can get some tips on how to build trust, strengthen our relationships, and learn basic commands! Ginger is a doll and is just so happy to be alive and in a loving home. She is always smiling and excited. She loves going on walks, playing with Lana, standing on the deck, playing with toys, running, being with us, and trying to play with Hank.
So that is the whole family... hopefully no new animals for a LONG time. These guys are PLENTY to deal with.
So that is the whole family... hopefully no new animals for a LONG time. These guys are PLENTY to deal with.
get a fish!
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