I can’t remember a time when we didn’t have rescue animals. My sister (now a veterinarian) had a lot to do with that!

I have lived all over the world and have almost always had a rescue dog. But when I met my now wife, Andi, I did not and was so happy to meet her rescue, Roxy. Roxy was around 45 pounds and 4 years old and she climbed onto my lap and got as close to me as possible and looked at Andi as if to say, yes, I like this one! (Thanks, Roxy!)

Celie was found on the streets of NE, DC where we were living and posted on Nextdoor. The guy who found her was trying to find her home but couldn’t keep her so said he would have to take her to “the pound” soon. Well, I jumped in the car and went and got that adorable pup! I took her right to the vet and found out that she had no chip and was about to go into heat. I made a spay appointment but her adoption was up to Roxy.

Well, Roxy said: here is my food, my bed, my toys, and I love you! So, she is now part of our family! She was a challenge to train since she isn’t food motivated but we figured it out. Celie, now around 5, has a lot of energy so I wanted another rescue because Roxy wanted to nap more and play less. But, not convinced we should adopt a third dog, we started fostering with Lucky Dog!

Soon after we were approved, we had two 6-7 month old puppies from Hawaii running around. It was crazy sleep-deprived fun!

Moving forward, I knew I wanted to help more and have been in fundraising for almost 20 years so I reached out and said I wanted to help pro-bono with fundraising and am thrilled with helping on this front but still wanted to do more! So, still pre-pandemic, I started to help pre-approve potential adopters and fosters. This includes doing virtual home visits, vet checks, and landlord checks. We also took on 4 more fosters before the pandemic. On the 6th, however, we failed (we adopted her). Not knowing a pandemic was around the corner. Virtual puppy training is hard but we are managing. Riley is food motivated which helps but we really want to thank Roxy and Celie for helping us train and especially tire out Riley (fka Gucci). It takes two dogs and two humans with this one, easily. I thank Lucky Dog for letting us help find homes for 5 amazing pups and adopting our adorable Riley. I want to do whatever I can do to help Lucky Dog.

During the pandemic, all of the Lucky Dog volunteers and especially the small staff have been called upon to do so much more. The silver lining is all the dogs and cats that have been adopted and fostered (I love new fosters!) during this time. I have done a minimum of 4 virtual home visits on most of the days I can do them and even transported a pup from upper MD to Arlington, VA. Lucky Dog is an organization I love helping and I look forward to being even more involved in the future! To volunteer with Lucky Dog, email [email protected] or visit luckydoganimalrescue.org/volunteer.