We are a Foster Family!

It all started last Sunday. We were invited to our neighbors house for a Christmas Open House and while there we got talking with another neighbor. She was telling us how they are fostering a liter of 6 rotweiler puppies, only 12 days old. We asked a lot of questions, told her we thought it would be cool to do that and she invited us to come over and see them. Well, Monday night she came to our house and asked if we were serious about the possibility of fostering. We said we hadn't really discussed it, and then she told us that the Rescue she was working with was looking for more families to foster more dogs/puppies. She told us that there was a liter of chocolate labs, a liter of chihuahua's and a few others that needed homes. Unfortunately the labs and chihuahua's were scheduled to be put down the next day if they couldn't find someone to take them. We said we would take the labs. Unfortunately, we were too late. So on Tuesday she showed us a picture of a liter of black labs that were just dropped off at a local shelter that needed someone to take them. We said YES!! But, once again... too late. I'm not really even sure why they were put down, they were only at the shelter for a day! They were only 3 weeks old. :( So the lady called us today and said she had just pulled 7 dogs out of the shelter and had 2 boxer mix puppies. We said YES again. Well, about 2 hours later she delivered our little foster puppies! They are so stinking cute!!! The kids are so excited to have these little guys.







The black one is male, the brown one is female.


The brown one likes to get in the bowl to eat!

So, what does fostering mean? Well, we are still learning, but basically you agree to take on a dog/puppy or a liter of puppies and care for them until they can adopt them out. They have puppies as well as older dogs. While we have them, we can try to find people to adopt them by word of mouth or craigslist. The potential owner then is screened and if everything checks out, they get to adopt the dog. Sometimes there is a re-homing fee of only $50-$100, and they have to agree to spay or neuter the dog before a certain date. As a foster family, we care for the dog/puppies. Basically just love them and make sure they are healthy and fed. The Rescue pays for all the vet visits and will reimburse for dog food (or you can pay for the food and call it a donation). You keep the dog/puppies until they are adopted, or until you feel you can't keep them any longer. We felt like it would be a great experience for the kids. They want a dog so bad, but we don't really want the long committment of having one, paying for vet bills, food and all the things involved with having a dog. We have had dogs before and know they are expensive and a huge committment. So we thought this would be a great way to get a puppy fix and teach the kids how to care for animals and help rescue them. So if anyone out there -locally- wants to foster a dog or puppies, let me know. The rescue is called Helping Orphaned Hounds. Or, if you want to adopt one of these little guys, let me know. Besides the 7 she pulled froma local shelter, she had 17 more coming in from So Cal. All of them needing a foster home.

I'm sure we will be posting more pictures of these two cuties, as well as others yet to come!