harveyandsadie

May 21st marked one year since Momo came to be fostered with us. In that time he has only received 2 adoption applications, one for a situation that didn't work out due to no fault of his (which led into another almost adoption that ended due to no fault of Momo's) and the other put in by a teenager who is too young to adopt from our rescue 😭. . Everyone who has followed us for a while knows how in love we are with this good boy and how we'd adopt him ourselves in a heartbeat if we could get our extremely dog-selective Sadie to like him. . Momo gets along with cats, dogs, kids, strangers, and has even shown a healthy, non-drivey curiosity in other animals. He is loving and snuggly and goofy. He can be both an adventure dog and a couch potato. I take him everywhere with me to help get him exposure and in hopes of finding a potential adopter and he does so great in public, though he could use a little extra training to not pull on leash when he's excited . Momo would make a great family pet or even a great first-time dog owner dog despite being mostly American Pitbull Terrier, a breed I would generally not recommend to first time dog owners. . He's the best boy and deserves a loving home where he doesn't have to be on a crate-and-rotate schedule. Please share him so we can help him find his home. Our rescue, @mustluvboxersrescue, adopts to Washington state, Oregon, the Idaho panhandle, and the Vancouver/BC area of Canada. Check out their website or my linktree for adoption application info. . #rescuedogs #shelterdogs #fosterdogs #pitbull #pitbullsofinstagram #muttsofinstagram #rescuedogsofinstagram #adoptabledog #adoptabledogs #adoptabledogsofinstagram

Ripley turned 1 year old on Monday. My big dumb baby ❤️. And she finally gets her spay done this Friday. It was supposed to be last Friday, but Nick accidentally fed her breakfast just before I was supposed to take her to the clinic 🤦🏼‍♀️. . Ripley has made friends with our mail carrier and our baristas at the coffee stand. She is such a pretty girl, she's a huge hit everywhere she goes. . This Friday also marks the one year anniversary since Harvey passed. It's hard to believe it's already been a year. It still feels so fresh. Nick and I are both a little nervous about Ripley having a surgical procedure on this particular day, but we're trying not to be too dramatic about it lol.

Today is his shelter-estimated birthday. He would have been about 6 years old, and we got to love him for two and a half of them.

Mr. Mo's story

I've been bad at making actual posts lately, but I've been active on my stories! We just finished moving and the dogs are loving the new house and all the space available to run around and wrestle. . Sadie and Ripley snuggle more and more lately, and makes me more emotional than I like to admit. With everything going on and changing, it feels like ages ago since Harvey passed, but in reality it's only been about 10 months since he and Sadie were snuggling together on the same blanket.

I hope everyone had a lovely Halloween! . Nick took the kids trick-or-treating while I handed out candy (my favorite part of Halloween). I decided to use the constant door knocking and bell ringing as a training opportunity. . I've been working hard with both dogs on respecting thresholds and knocking/bell desensitization, and for the most part they do great. . But both of them LOVE people and attention too much to stay while I answer the door. So that's what we used Halloween night to work on. And they both made awesome progress over the course of the night, being able to sit and stay patiently while I handed out candy to several kids at a time. . Overall it was a good night and everyone had a good time! . How did your Halloween go?

This is just a friendly shout out to our friend Amy at @trustyourdog whose amazing custom sized vinyl muzzles. . Sadie had surgery on Tuesday to have a mast cell tumor removed, and has sutures on her belly for the next two weeks. In lieu of wearing a cone that she absolutely hates, she will be wearing her TYD muzzle, which she is much more comfortable in. . I've gotten the question before: "Why not just train her to accept the cone?" And the answer is simple. . It took months of consistent conditioning to get Sadie to accept the muzzle and be comfortable in it. I could spend that same amount of time working with her on accepting a cone, that is typically used for only one purpose. . Or I could use the muzzle that she's already comfortable in, and instead use that cone training time to work on other essential skills that I find much more useful. . Not only does Sadie get to be comfortable in this two week period before her sutures come out, but she gets to be stylish as well 😘 #reactivitybutmakeitfashion

Meet Cognac (kown-yak), our temporary foster through MustLuvBoxers Rescue! He was found as a stray in CA with fish hook in his mouth! . This guy is small at only 46lbs, and I'm pretty sure most of that is just muscle, actual size wise he's not much bigger than a large Boston Terrier. He's estimated to be about a year and half old and he has the puppy energy to back that up. . He has some minor excitement-based dog reactivity that he displayed when he was coming off the transport from CA, just pulling and leaping towards the other dogs while whining and wiggling his whole body. . He rides alright in the car, though if I didn't have him in a car harness and tethered, he would have definitely tried roaming while I drove. He was a little whiny at the beginning of the drive, but then settled and slept for the rest of the way. . He does mark. He has only tried once in the house, which I anticipated and was watching closely for, and I verbally corrected him as soon as he lifted his leg and he hasn't tried again. . He is a jumper. He leaps and hops and bounds and jumps. I can be standing straight up, and he'll jump high enough to headbutt me in the nose. But he's super smart and is already picking up that this particular behavior is not acceptable. . He's been friendly and playful towards all of our kids so far. He's a super sweet guy that loves to snuggle and give kisses. He sits immediately whenever he thinks he's going to get food, and is already picking up on the "down" command. . He does not appear to be crate trained. He is reluctant to enter a crate, even for food, and whines for a while before he settles. This is something we will work on as we will be on a crate rotation schedule (he's freshly neutered and Ripley isn't spayed yet. No oopsies for us lol) . That's what we know about him so far, stay tuned!

We've been allowing the dogs to sleep in bed with us, but they have to be below our waists on the bed. I guess Ripley has decided that this is too restrictive for her, and has instead been opting to sleep on the dog bed that we keep in the corner of our room. . She will however come join us in the bed in the morning after she wakes up for snuggles and to bug Sadie into playing with her. . Sadie still sleeps on the bed, but is usually curled up at the foot of the bed, out of the way. She's not about to give up this new found privilege lol.

I am so spoiled. . Every morning when Nick wakes up, he makes himself coffee and he'll make me coffee too and leave it on my bed side table for me to wake up to. Then, whenever he makes himself coffee throughout the day, he'll make me some as well. . So I pretty much never have to make myself coffee. . This is a problem at times like the last couple of days when Nick wasn't feeling well so he wasn't drinking coffee. Apparently if Nick isn't bringing it to me, I forget coffee exists, and I won't figure it out until I'm falling asleep exhausted with a gnarly headache. . My husband has me almost as spoiled as my dogs are.

Ripley and Sadie are doing great! . They play constantly, Ripley's resource guarding is making slow progress, they've started snuggling in bed together. They've both realized they are tall enough to jump over our baby gates, so they escape together 🤦🏼‍♀️ . Ripley does all the same annoying little sibling things to Sadie that Sadie did to Harvey, and the irony is completely lost on her. . Ripley is constantly nibbling on Sadie to get her to play, she grabs Sadie's collar and tries to drag her around, she sits on Sadie, she pushes Sadie aside to steal her attention, she smacks Sadie in the face with her constantly wagging tail. . The difference is Harvey would put up with all that with the patience of a saint. Sadie either gets grumpy or does it all right back 🤣 . . . . . . . And for those who were curious, Momo has officially been adopted. There was a little bit of an issue with the adopters elderly chi-mix, but the rescue is providing additional support and we're all very optimistic that it will work out for everyone ❤️

Meet Harvey, named after Harvey Birdman, Attorney at Law (and Harvey from Stardew Valley), and the humans behind the dogs, Nick and T. . Nick is an electrical engineer and I (T) have two degrees in Biochemistry and Biotechnology, but right now I work as a substitute teacher. We have been together since August 2017, married since March 2021, and we have four children (my nieces and nephews) that we adopted in Oct 2021. We try to take a scientific and evidence based approach to nearly everything we do. . Harvey was 42.2% American Bully, 19.6% Chihuahua, 10.9% APBT, 8.8% AmStaff, 8.0% Bichon Frise, 4.6% Lhasa Apso, and 5.9% Supermutt. He had an approximate birthdate of Jan 2017, and adoption date of Feb 20, 2019, and passed away on Feb 3, 2022. . Harvey was found as a stray on the streets of California, transferred to Washington State, and adopted from Sunny Sky's Animal Shelter. He was mine and Nick's first dog as adults and as a couple. . Harvey was stranger aggressive. He warmed up relatively quickly to new people, but he was a bite risk in the meantime. He had one recorded bite incident in Jan 2020, before we as dog owners began to take his behavioral issues seriously. . Harvey started us on our journey of muzzle training and becoming advocates for muzzled dogs, reactive dogs, and aggressive dogs. . Outside of his stranger aggression, Harvey was an incredibly loving and chill guy, that lived to nap on the couch with his people. He was amazing with kids, neutral to other dogs, and everyone's best friend once he warmed up to them. . Harvey passed away from Renal Failure. It turns out that he had early signs of Renal Disease since the day we brought him home from the shelter, but it was undetectable at that early of a stage. By the time we noticed something was wrong, it was too late. . We wouldn't be where we are today without the journey we embarked on with Harvey, and we miss him everyday.

Meet Sadie, named after Sadie Adler from Red Dead Redemption 2. . Sadie is 60.1% Boxer, 24.2% APBT, 8.5% American Bulldog, and 7.2% AmStaff. She has an approximate birthdate of July 2018 and an adoption day of August 31, 2019. . Sadie was found as a stray on the streets of California, transferred to Washington State, and adopted through MustLuvBoxers Rescue. . When we initially brought her home, Sadie was incredibly dog friendly and walked amazing on leash. Then about 6 months after adopting her, a neighbor saw us walking her around the block and opened their front door to let their border collie rush over to greet us. The dog was friendly, but being rushed by an off leash dog so suddenly spooked Sadie and she reacted aggressively. She has been severely dog reactive ever since. . Outside of her dog reactivity, Sadie has never met a human she didn't immediately love. She is playful and full of love and tries to melt into you when she snuggles. . Training wise, she is moderately food and affection motivated and we tend to take a balanced approach to her training in order to give her some gentle guidance when necessary. She has made amazing progress in her reactivity training over the years, to the point where she has been able to meet other dogs.