Favorite Photo Friday: Meet Leo

Last Friday, I posted that my parents’ dog Chelsea had passed away, and explained that my mom and I got Chelsea as a Father’s Day present for my step-dad in 1996. Well, isn’t it just kind of a coincidence that Father’s Day is coming up?

I started thinking about finding a new dog for my parents. When Christian and I got our dog, Toby, from the Humane Society, he wasn’t necessarily a dog that we would have just picked out by looking at him. It was only after explaining what we were looking for in a dog and getting the opinion of one of their staff people that we found Toby, who is the best dog ever. (He was much larger than any dog we intended to get. He had a bit of a weight problem – he was 98 lbs when we got him, and he’s about 70 lbs now.)

Anyway, I just happened to reconnect on Facebook with a friend from high school who now runs an animal rescue with his wife. The organization is called Rescue Farm. I contacted him and told him the kind of dog that would be best for my parents: good with kids, loving, calm, housebroken, and 25-50 pounds. He told me to check out an Australian Shepherd mix named Leo, with whom I immediately fell in love. I was afraid that if my parents didn’t want him, Christian and I were going to end up with a third dog (and I’m pretty sure three dogs is too many for us since we have three small kids). Luckily, they decided they wanted Leo and got him today.

He is an awesome dog, but there was one small drawback. He has HAIR. He has LOTS AND LOTS OF HAIR, and it was in bad shape. I knew he had lots of hair from his photos, but he had even more hair than I had imagined, and it was a mess. He came to Rescue Farm as a stray, and he had burrs matted through his fur. They had managed to brush him out, but his coat was still in really bad shape and his hair was coming out in clumps. I thought  my mom was going to freak. Luckily, I had already scheduled vet and grooming appointments for him today. The groomer agreed that the best thing to do was to cut him short and start over.

So, here is Leo before:

 

And here is Leo after:

 

Isn’t he CUTE? I was so afraid he was going to look stupid after he was shaved, but I think he looks beautiful!

And he is so sweet! So far he is really good with the kids, and Noah and Zoe love “Weo.”

 

Zoe with Leo this afternoon (pre-grooming appointment):

 

Noah with Leo tonight (Leo wasn’t done at the groomers’ until 9pm, so Noah was already in his pajamas when we picked him up):

 

Welcome home, Leo!