to understand me

   I've always loved having pets, growing up we (my 2 sisters and 1 brother) pretty well had every pet imaginable, it helped having grandparents that lived on a hobby farm and registered  pomeranian kennel. We also raised siamese cats before they became a fad.

   Skip ahead to my first year of marriage, my poor husband who wasn't a real animal lover, and a city slicker allowed me to have a terrier mix, a cat, an aqarium of miniature sharks, a cage of hamsters, two budgies and a white rabbit which had been presented to us at our wedding by a funny aunt.

   So here we are now, my first intimate encounter with rehabbing wild life was finding two baby "something" with cords still attached, a call to a rescue center in ottawa http://www.rideauwildlife.org/ and a helpful Donna, taught me to bottle feed two red squirrels for 8 weeks then to hand them over to be re released into the wild, many many wild animals have passed through our doors since then.

    Daisy, my lab/dane/rotti,....everyone has a soul dog/pet, she was mine, she's a story for another day, suffice it to say I lost her to a terrible disease, leptospirosis at the age of 5 and in part because of her the lepto vacine in eastern ont has been changed.  I thought she was my last dog but soon learned that I cannot be at home all day alone with my daycare children without a furry companion, Timothy my chinchilla just didn't cut it.

     Along came Brina, an irish name meaning "strong", we named her this in hopes that her spirit and health would be strong and she would be with us many years.  I found her in an on line ad, a back yard breeder no less, offering lab/sheperd pups for $250. I sent off an email thinking he meant 25 dollars and it was a "oop's" litter. Boy was I wrong!!! The fool, like many others thought he'd make a quick buck with 8 pups!! He sent back an email blasting me etc....two weeks go by and I recieve another email from him asking if we still wanted a pup to come get one because they were all on their way to the pound. Off we went, I have to be careful of dogs because of my daycare, he brought out the 4 females, one hid in fear (could end up a fear biter), one did bite...viciously, one was so hyper we couldn't catch her and the forth took a drink of water, had her back to us 6 adults and when she lifted her head she thought she was alone and cried loudly. We all laughed and I said "well she's not too swift!!" My hubby said she matched our family, so we had ourselves a new pup.

   Brina went through 2 yrs of obedience classes with a wonderful trainer who to this day is a great friend  http://www.shannoncourtdogtraining.com/       . We worked with her a lot at home to make her great with kids. I didn't bond with her at first, it was almost like I was betraying Daisy, I loved Brina , but it wasn't the same, at first. it took about two months before I realized she had squeezed herself a nice cozy place in my heart and in our family.

  And so our adventure begins.