Proud Parents

You're looking at the newest member of the Godfrey family, and her name is Annie Hall!

She's a toy fox terrier mix, and we adopted her last week from an animal shelter.  I've always told Ellen I wanted a dog, but we'd been holding off because we both are gone all day.  Well, if you saw my last blog post, I'm working from home now!  That shoved me over the edge into major dog-wanting territory.

I did a whole bunch of research on breeds and their temperaments, grooming requirements, etc. and determined that a toy fox terrier would be perfect for our lifestyle.  Then I did a search of animal shelters in LA, and I only found one toy fox terrier.  She was in a shelter right by our house.  The next day on Ellen's lunch break we went down and met her.  She was trembling and scared to death to be in that loud shelter, but she was so sweet and calm with us.  We took her home about 30 minutes later, after finding out she had been in this high-kill animal shelter for 30 days.  She didn't have much longer, and it seems we came to her (or she came to us) at exactly the right time.

She's 11 months old and weighs about 10 pounds.  She needs to gain 4 pounds though because she had been underfed.  Clearly in our house she doesn't have anything to worry about.

The first two nights with her were rough.  We're using crate training as a method of housebreaking her, and she would whine and whimper throughout the night.  Ellen slept in the guest room and I slept on the floor next to her crate to take her out to pee in the middle of the night.  It took about 2 seconds to realize how terrible this was, and we are very blessed that on the 3rd night she decided to keep quiet, hold her pee until morning and sleep in her crate.  She still has a few accidents in the house, but we're well on our way to being housebroken.

Ellen and I take watching television and movies seriously, and I cannot describe to you how perfectly Annie fits with our family.  Currently she's been asleep on my lap for about 2 1/2 hours, and that's nothing.  Her favorite thing to do is curl up on the couch with her head in your lap and sleep for hours.  She is literally the most calm, low maintenance dog I've ever met. We have yet to even hear her bark. She's perfect - and perfect for us.

LA is a beautiful city, and below is a picture I took today at the dog park.  Can you believe our dog gets to hang out in spots like this?

So now you know her.  If we don't answer our phones it's because we're snuggling on the couch with Annie Hall and if we get up she would have to move.  Yeah, she's spoiled.