Well, our story is both short and long. The short story is we adopted a vivacious little dachshund girl from the local SPCA and she wanted nothing to do with any of the store bought treats we had for our three other pups. Wanting to make her new home extra special and needing a quick little treat to use as training incentive; I had the idea to try to make a simple puppy treat. Taking a hint from my other dogs love for pumpkin and peanut butter I combined them and punched them out into handy little treats. My dogs seemed to enjoy them so I started sharing them with friends. Their dogs loved them so I kept expanding my circle of taste testers. It's only been a short while, but it's become quite clear that I've stumbled upon something that make me and our canine family members quite happy.
The long story is about why we were even looking to adopt another dog. We lost two of our dogs to a sudden and tragic bacterial infection in August 2012. The first was our 7 month old Australian Shepherd/Pit Bull mix puppy, Willow, who was a litter mate to our surviving puppy boy Brooke. She went from walking around and just starting to show signs of a tummy upset to in the vets office having seizures that ultimately ended her time with us in less that 8 hours. It was sudden, shocking, and heartbreaking.
That same day our 1 year old miniature dachshund, Lavender, who was my puppy pride and joy and the center of my puppy world, starting not acting herself also. After Willow's sudden passing I immediately took Lavender back to the vet and she too was suffering from the same infection. She fought for 6 days, in and out of the hospital, before she finally gave up her fight and passed over the bridge to be with Willow. I held her I'm my arms as she took her last shallow breaths. It was the most humbling and powerless feeling I've ever felt to have two young souls ripped from our lives as we watched and tried to do everything in our power to stop it. We grieved hard. Harder than anything I've ever known. Even now, the loss I feel for them still overcomes me and I get the disbelieving looks from people over my upset of "just a dog."
Lavender was more to me. After 7 years of secondary infertility, she was my baby. She was my second child. She made us complete when we felt we were missing something in our family for so long.
We decided shortly that we missed the dachshund in our life and that when we got another pup that it would be a doxie. We searched high and low in rescue groups, local shelters, and ethical breeders. We eventually found our Vivienne with a breeder in Ocala, FL. Vivienne is the sweetest, most non-mischievousness, little angel I've ever met. She is a calm and easy spirit and ended up being just what we needed. But, we weren't whole yet. Lavender was the feisty, crazy, high energy little girl and everything that Vivienne was not. If we had ever intended to replace Lavender we had failed with Vivienne, but that was perfectly okay.
When Vivienne was 4 months old we knew we wanted her to have a playmate her size since her trying to play with the big dogs just wasn't working out in her best interest. Two days after we discussed it, Vera's picture poped up on my Facebook newsfeed. Instantly I knew I had to meet her. I called the Hubs and raced across town to the SPCA to see her. I took her home less than 2 hours later. She is Lavender reincarnated. She has SO MANY of the same temperament and personality traits that it amazes us and helps us keep Lavender alive in our hearts.
Vivienne and Vera, together, put our hearts back together. It's now our duty to make their lives - no mater how long or short - the best they can be. Wholesome, love filled, healthy treats are my way of not only loving them, but sharing the joy they bring me, with the world.
Please enjoy.
