They say with Chow Chow’s that they pick a family and inside that family they pick a person.  Angel had picked Art.  Gabbie has picked me! It’s really a new experience for me.  I have never had a pet choose me like this dog has.  Just the sound of my voice will make her stop what she is doing with anyone else and come running to me.  It really touches me to see her playing with someone else and when I call her she comes. She has been missing me when I am gone, due to work.

So, let me give you a typical day with Gabbie!

First of all, she sleeps in our bed!  She is getting bigger and we know there won’t be much more time for her to be sleeping in the bed with us.  She cannot jump down yet.  One thing that seems to be bad right now, (I feel like there is a newborn in the house again), is while we are snoozing away at 2 a.m., the cat will walk in the room or one of the other dogs and she will start barking! Waking me up, scaring the crap out of me, thinking someone is in the house! So, I guess you could say she is a great security alarm!  At 6, she gets to go outside, once I have put her on the floor.  She is the first one up and when she is done using the bathroom, she wants back inside.  She will sit at the door and wait.  She won’t bark.  Then she comes into the kitchen and starts drinking the fresh water I have put out, then puts both front paws in the water and does a quick soak and runs all over the house getting my hardwood floors all wet.  She does this about 3 or 4 times a day!  Once that is done and she sees her friends up and getting around, she starts hopping around them like a bunny.  Wanting to play, she bites Taffy’s tail, which makes her do this horridence bark/cry, like she is dying and Gabbie just keeps on and on.  When it is time for getting a treat, which is a dog bone, she goes crazy.  I have to give one to her first because if the others get one, she will go after their bone, which starts a fight. Ughhh!  She is already taking control.  None of the other animals have stood up and taken her under their wing, like a “mother” figure.  They won’t even play with her.  It’s pretty sad but I think they will eventually come around, but maybe not.  I wonder if we got her too soon for them. 

During the day, when I am on the computer, she will come in my office and sit under my feet or lay on the air condition vent.  If I am in the living room she is right there beside me or laying on an air condition vent.  She loves the vents.  She seems to always be hot and having that part of her tummy on a cool spot is great for her.  Maybe that is why she soaks her paws!  Oh, she loves ice cubes!  What a mess that is.  We will put ice cubes in the water bowl outside and she will take her paw and hit them, causing them to come up out of the water like a fish jumping around, and she will grab one with her mouth and chew it!  That is a huge water mess. She loves it.

We will be getting her fixed soon and while that is being done she will also have her eyes worked on.  Her eye lashes are growing inward, causing her eyes to constantly water, leaving the tear stains on her face.  She is getting bigger and pretty soon I will be trying the walk around the block.  My son has already tried it and only got about a quarter of a mile and had to call me to come get her because she wouldn’t go any further with him!  We will see just how far she goes with me.

She likes to go into the bathrooms and empty the garbage or better yet, she likes to get the toilet paper and run with it!  It is reminding me of the scenes from the movie “Marley and Me”.  Our other animals just don’t have the energy that she does.  The one playmate she has, believe it or not, if our cat, Fez.  Poor Fez!  As soon as Gabbie sees him, she runs and play-attacks.  Fez sees her coming and just lays on his back waiting for the pounce.  It is something watching the two of them.  A cat and a chow chow playing!

So these are the days with Gabbers…

It was a long trip to Ava, Missouri to pick Gabbie up. Art drove over 1200 miles since Friday. When we got to the home where she was at, we were surprised at how many chow chow’s there were.  It was very overwhelming but we all knew when we saw her that it was going to be all okay and just thrilled to be bringing her home with us.

We were expecting her to whine or throw up on the LONG curvy roads that we were on for 4 hours! Nothing happened.  She was as if she already knew us and was home with us where ever we were.  She didn’t whine, she didn’t get car sick (even though Art and I were getting a little whoosy from those hills!).  She was content in our laps and slept almost the whole way home.  We made stops every 2 hours so she would be able to walk and use the bathroom and she attached herself to us right away.  It was all so very….weird.  She didn’t try to run off from us.  She wanted to play with us.

Here, she wanted to eat the grass at one of the rest stops we were at.  She has such a wonderful personality and looks like a little polar bear. When we got home to the house, we first introduced her to our front yard before bringing her inside and then she met the rest of our clan.  There was no barking, growling or whining.  They all welcomed her and left her alone like she has always been here.  She did make a stand with our biggest dog, Taffy.  Kind of shocking to hear her growl and Taffy backed down! It was like, woah.  The only time we saw that was with Angel.

When we came inside, there was a package waiting for us on the kitchen table.  I was told we wouldn’t receive this package until May, so when I saw it on the table I just broke down and cried.  When Angel passed away, I got online and ordered a tomb stone for her grave.  When we came inside with our new addition, it was like a finality with the tomb stone being here.  I couldn’t help but break down and cry…again.

So we gathered the whole family, dogs and all, and made the walk to where our Angel lies to put her tombstone in place. Placing that stone down and then looking at the life that was born 30 minutes after the life of Angel was exhaled, was so real to me. It is amazing that this new girl of ours is exactly the age minus 30 minutes of how long Angel has been gone.

So, today was a day of closure for me. I know there will be days of crying still but today, in a bittersweet way, I feel I am to move on and enjoy this new life that God has blessed us with.

She is already home and peaceful with where she is and that makes us happy to see.  Each hour that goes by, it only gets better. So, as I say goodnight, Lord I pray it won’t be a long night like with a new born, I am happy to see her running around and becoming tired to want to sleep between us all as if she belongs…

Welcome home Gabbie!

She is going to be a beauty. The owner said he had to move the whole family for more room and they are all very playful.

I went ahead and printed out a huge picture of her and put it on the bottom of the refrigerator and our other animals walk over and sniff it. So funny.  Trying to introduce without smell, just site and on their level.

Can’t wait till she is here. The kids have started a count down on our dry erase board, hence the title “17 Days and She’ll be here”. We are all just so excited.  Let me know what you think of her now….

I know this is totally off Real Estate but for those of you who have been following me about the loss of our Chow Chow, Angel, I wanted to share the growth of Gabbie.

I am getting excited about bringing her home. Isn’t she a cutie?! She is a chunky thang.  Look at her belly! She is definitely getting her meals.

This breeder is really a great guy.  He is emailing me her pictures as she grows. Thank you Bob!  Anyone that wants to meet my Gabbie when she gets here, let me know and I will make my rounds.  Anyway, I just wanted to share.

Friday night, while we were waiting for our son to get home, my husband and I were sitting near the fire, each on our own laptop.  He asked me to look at this site that had a puppy chow chow.  Not too excited about viewing other chow chow’s, I typed it in and saw an adorable puppy but felt I couldn’t do it right now.  The pain is still too fresh in my heart.  He asked me to email the owner and see if the puppy was still available and if he would meet us halfway if we got her.  I was on the computer a total of maybe 5 minutes.  After I emailed the owner, I thought to myself how it would be wonderful to find a puppy that was born on the day that our Angel passed.  (That would be like finding a needle in a haystack to me.)  So, I went to bed with no excitement, not like I would have if the situation was under different circumstances.

A brief history of our Chow Chow experience…

We bought our first chow chow, Cassie, while I was pregnant with our 2nd child.  I was very nervous around this dog because of my past with large animals.  When she was around a little over a year old, I had already had our son and we wanted to drive from Texas to Indiana to let Art’s family see him.  So, we needed to get a house sitter to watch our two dogs, Cassie and Cocoa (our chihuahua).  We were gone for 2 weeks.  When we came home, it was around 3 a.m. in the morning and unloading the car we smelled a bad odor outside and I made a comment that something died around our quarters where we lived on post.  We walked in the home and there were stains all over the home from our chihuahua throwing up.  We called Cassie and she didn’t answer.  Art went outside and he found her dead.  The man who was suppose to watch our animals never came over.  Where we put her outside, she died.  It was inhumane and we contacted the post to ask why, when our neighbors called about Cassie, didn’t they do anything or someone contact us?  They said they didn’t see an animal! Our neighbors told us when she passed but they didn’t do anything, just left her there in the Texas heat, they said they tried to give her water but… 

Well, this man felt really bad and gave us money for our suffering to purchase another dog.  After a month we decided to find another chow chow.  That is when we found Angel.  The litter she was part of was born the day that we lost Cassie.  So we called her our Angel. 

I guess that is why I silently prayed it would be nice to find a litter born the day that our Angel passed because that was when and what made us get her; the date she was born. What happened to our life after she entered it made us who we are with our animals today. To find a puppy born on the day she passed would be a way to honor her life and give another one the chance at a wonderful life in our home like she had. It was so good for her that she didn’t want to leave us. I mean, she lived a long, healthy life to just a couple of months shy of 16 years!  She waited for us to fall asleep before she did.

I thought for sure I wouldn’t find that litter. It made me sad and guilty to even look for it. I felt I just would grieve a life time.  I didn’t even want to look.  Well, the email that came back from the owner said that the puppy we saw had already been sold but that he has 2 other litters. One born on 1/31 and the other 2/9.  He continued in his email but I stopped midsentence and let my eyes go back to the date 2/9.  It was slowly registering that 2/9 was actually February 9th and I got up, running to the calendar to make sure I was seeing things right.  It was the day that Angel passed.

I immediately emailed the owner back asking to see the 2 girls and that I would want one of them. I didn’t know which one but I would choose.  He was so nice and considerate and emailed me that day, pictures of the 2 girl pups and allowed my family to choose which one we felt was to be part of our family.  I had each teenager, child of mine, come into the room and I would pull up both pictures and say, which one?  All three pointed to the same one without knowing their siblings picked the same one.  Then Arty came in and he said the same one everyone else did.

I feel I must say that we didn’t do this to replace our Angel.  She could NEVER be replaced! I thought, “Could this be too soon to bring another animal to our home?”, but the fact we can’t get her until April tossed those thoughts aside.  That is over a month away.  I truly believe our Shih Tzu who was the closest to Angel will be awakened from her mourning to start taking care of a puppy.  She is such a good groomer/cleaner and would always clean Angel’s ears and face when Angel would be sleeping.  This puppy will help heal the loss, or lesson the hurt for her.  The life of a young one in the home will bring joy and laughter, where for the past 14 days straight has been tears and mourning. 

The fact that our Angel was born on Cassie’s day of passing and now this little one was born on the day of Angel’s passing, brings me such a comfort in moving on with life and not staying in the depression of death.  We know that one day we will see her again. The “child” she was for us, being such a big part of our family, makes it so hard to move on.  I know as much as she loved us and lived as long as she did to be part of our family that she felt like one of us and would want us to be happy.  Yes, she is an animal but she cried, she whined, she smiled, she demanded our attention, she told us when she was hungry, when she wanted outside, when she was ready to come inside, when she missed us.  She even started licking my hands and face. I knew then that she really loved me. The only thing that made her different than us is she didn’t speak english.  Her love for us was unconditional.  She couldn’t tell us her disappointments and happiness in words but she expressed it in other ways.

Our oldest always said that Angel was her “guardian angel”.  So, looking at this little puppy who will be coming to live with us for a long time, the Lord willing, I thought about Erikka and how she felt.  So I did some research.  In the Word of God, there is a guardian angel named Gabriel.  His name means “God is my strength”.  Lord knows I am needing Him as my strength to get through this death.  So, I decided to name her the female name of Gabriel: Gabriella.

If you are interested in a chow chow, I highly recommend this owner: RHR Chow Chow.   We are driving to Missouri to pick up our Gabbie in April.  He also will ship them to you.  Read what they have to say about their pets and how they feel.  God led me to this family in less than 5 minutes.  Maybe He is leading you to them through this post.

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