1/23/2010 - Today we adopted a Shepherd mix (possibly Border Collie/Lab) puppy, named Quigley! After weeks of wanting to adopt a puppy, we stumbled across a listing of puppies on Petfinder.com. The puppies were at a foster home with their mom, awaiting adoption at the Home At Last Humane Society. Their mom, Carmella (adoption pending, now), was a Shepherd mix, and only about 40 lbs, but pretty tall.
We drove all the way out to The Dalles to see Quigley and his 11 brothers and sisters. There were so many people interested in the pups, we were worried that we might not get a chance to even see him. Luckily, we were the first to submit an adoption application for Quigley.
When we first saw the litter, we spotted him quickly from his color and markings. He was the 2nd smallest of the bunch, but sure didn't act like it. The trainer there let us hold him and play with him, but Quigley didn't seem to want much to do with us at the time. I think he just wanted to play with his brothers and sisters. Although we were told that he was a handful, we decided to adopt him after watching him play with his siblings.
Afraid of having a puppy accident in the car on the way home, we decided to make a few stops. Our first stop was the Koberg Beach Rest Area, just about 17 miles from the shelter. After that, we stopped at Rooster Rock State Park, where we walked down the parking lot a few times, until he peed. He saw a few people there, one guy actually barked at Quigley, so of course, Quigley let out his loud bark right back at the guy. Thanks guy, just let my dog want to bark at you. Great. After walking around the park some more, Quigley became more comfortable, and even played with his puppy Kong that we bought him, even if it didn't have any treats in it.
We stopped for gas in Troutdale, and of course Quigley didn't tell us that he needed to go to the bathroom until the next exit was 4 miles away. Poor Quigley was getting very restless and needed to potty so badly that he was whining. Finally, we found a place to park, near the Hollywood Pet Hospital, of all places. We started walking down the street and within minutes, Quigley both peed and pooped. Good thing we were prepared with doggy poop bags. We decided to let him stretch his legs some more and just walked down the street a little bit. He met a few nice ladies who pet him, and he was very well behaved when meeting them.
We finally got him home around 4pm, and showed him around the downstairs area. We fed him some food, and he was very good with eating from our hands, and even letting us take food from his bowl while he was eating. The rest of the evening was spent trying to show him where we wanted him to use the bathroom (not the carpet!), and luckily a lot of sleeping was in store for him as well.
Our first night came upon us, and we decided to try and wake up every hour or so to get Quigley to the bathroom. Wow, what a night. Bark, bark, bark, bark, bark. As you can imagine, it was a fairly sleepless night, having to make sure he goes to the bathroom IN the bathroom. His big-dog-bark functioned well as a second alarm clock that night.
