One of the perks of working from home is that our 2 dogs don’t need to be kenneled all day anymore. Since they are such a huge part of my at home life, I figured I’d share them with you!
Nelly came to us per fate. It’s a long story… want to hear it?? When the stay-at-home order began, our dog Max left us suddenly and tragically. We were completely heart broken. We lasted a week saying that we would never get another dog because the loss hurt too much and then we realized how empty our home feels without one.
We started searching for Labs. We typically always get Labs because my husband uses them for hunting. With it having been the start of lockdown, and so many people being at home, puppies were getting EXPENSIVE and hard to find, they would get listed and then be purchased SO FAST!
I decided to create a “WANTED” post saying that we were looking for a friendly Lab or Lab x under 2 years old. I got a response from a guy who was having to move home to Ireland as he was out of work due to COVID. He had taken her in as a foster when the dog shelters suddenly had to close and then he ended up adopting her and naming her Nala. Ireland has laws about bringing puppies over before they are fully vaccinated so he was having to leave her behind. He didn’t want much money for her (which was great cause people were selling puppies for over $1,000 at this time!). We had made arrangements to meet one Saturday afternoon when I finished work (ugh! Yes, I was working weekends during the beginning of the pandemic doing patient screening at the hospital) when I suddenly got an email simply saying “I have decided to keep her - sorry.”
Well, thank goodness the hospital isn’t busy on a Saturday because I sat there and sobbed. I hadn’t even met her and I loved her!
We slowly began searching again and the following Friday evening, I found an ad with a puppy that looked strikingly like “Nala”. I showed my husband the photo and said “oh my god! Do you think this is Nelly?” He agreed and so I messaged the lady to inquire.
I said we were interested in getting her and said we could pick her up that evening. Out of curiosity, I asked her about the puppies background. Her response was “a friend of ours had to go home to Ireland on Saturday and we thought we could keep her but we just can’t.”
It WAS her!!!!!!!
I caught the next boat and we brought her home - a couple days later than we had originally planned but, she was home!! Now Nelly is a 1 year 5 month old...mixed breed?? When we got her, we were told she was a Labrador Retriever x Border Collie but, the more time we spent with her the more we realized that she didn’t seem to have the usual traits of those dog breeds (we had a few labs and border collies in the past) so we decided to order a dog DNA test.
The results came back saying that she is a Great Pyrenees x Corgie - umh, WHAT!!!?? We laughed because we thought it was completely unbelievable. Then I started doing some reading on the character and physical traits and almost everything I read matched how she is. Let me know what you think based on her picture!!
Because Nelly is not a Lab, we still needed a hunting dog for my husband. Before we got Nelly, we had joined a waiting list with Double Diamond Labradors for a male chocolate Lab. Dre was born in November and we got to follow him every day with online pictures and videos from the breeder. He came home early January and Nelly just adores him!!
Stay tuned for more on Kallie’s office dogs and keep up with these two cuties on Instagram