Jun 3

Abandoned Dogs: Ukraine

Have you seen the wonderful piece in the Washington Post about how the abandoned dogs in Ukraine are finding their forever homes?

After Russia invaded Ukraine, Kyiv’s top diplomat encouraged Ukraine’s Foreign Ministry staff to bring their dogs to work! What a wonderful concept.

Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has made the security of pets a national priority. The great lengths Ukrainian troops and volunteers have gone to rescue vulnerable dogs in need, has created an extraordinary dog-friendly country. Dogs are now welcome inside most restaurants, cafes, salons, grocery stores, and hotels in major Ukrainian cities. This is an act of profound compassion, and I hope all countries take notice of these amazing individuals, and this overall effort, helping many abandoned dogs in need during this wartime in Ukraine.

Further, the Washington Post article provides vignettes of dogs that have been left abandoned and have found new, loving homes with their adopters in Ukraine. My favorite quote from this article, summarizing the overall theme of this effort, is from an adopter living in Ukraine: “The way we treat animals is a marker of societal development, a reflection of our moral values.”

We must all step up and give our kindness, respect, and support to these people and organizations that are doing the important and valuable work to find these worthy dogs loving, permanent homes.

The above image featuring adopters with their rescue dog in Ukraine is courtesy of photographer, Serhiy Morgunov, via the Washington Post.

May 29

ABANDONED: IPPY BOOK AWARD

My first book, ABANDONED: Chronicling the Journeys of Once-Forsaken Dogs, recently received an IPPY (Independent Publisher) Book Award, a Silver Medal winner!

Additionally, I am donating a portion of my royalties, earned from the sales of this book, to the SPCA International, helping dogs in need around the globe. You can read more here and here.

And, if you have not ordered your copy of ABANDONED, I hope you will consider ordering ABANDONED today!

May 19

Seeing

“Find a bit of beauty in the world today. Share it. If you can’t find it, create it. Some days this may be hard to do.” –Lisa Bonchek Adams

There have been many hard things going on in our world, and I truly love the quote above, and it rings so true. A bit of beauty can lift us from the mundane, from the drudgery, from the crueler aspects of living. What sweet relief.

I also love Annie Dillard, a great teacher in learning to see.In Pilgrim at Tinker Creek, Dillard writes about how, as a young child, she would hide a penny in the roots of a sycamore or a gap in the sidewalk, then draw arrows in chalk toward it, sure that discovering the copper coin would make someone’s day. Years later she could see powerful symbolism in that innocent expectation. Below is an insightful paragraph from Dillard:

There are lots of things to see, unwrapped gifts and free surprises. The world is fairly studded and strewn with pennies cast broadside from a generous hand. But—and this is the point—who gets excited by a mere penny? If you follow one arrow, if you crouch motionless on a bank to watch a tremulous ripple thrill on the water and are rewarded by the sight of a muskrat kid paddling from its den, will you count that sight a chip of copper only, and go your rueful way? It is dire poverty indeed when a man is so malnourished and fatigued that he won’t stoop to pick up a penny. But if you cultivate a healthy poverty and simplicity, so that finding a penny will literally make your day, then, since the world is in fact planted in pennies, you have with your poverty bought a lifetime of days. It is that simple. What you see is what you get.

May 9

Happy Mother’s Day!

I cannot believe Mother’s Day is already upon us. All mothers and mother figures deserve to be celebrated on Sunday. Mothers that have been blessed with babies; mothers who’s babies left too soon; mothers who are waiting to meet their special baby; mothers who are yearning to become a mom; fur moms; and those who are mother figures. We need all types of mothers to help us through this life. The journey towards motherhood is not always freshly paved. The path towards parenthood, for us, was filled with unexpected twists and turns, which made for a long and complicated journey. I feel so fortunate to be a mom to our little human and our beloved fur girl, and I am very grateful for this season together, which I never take for granted. So wherever you are in your journey, you are worthy of every celebration held in your honor. Happy Mother’s Day, to every type of mama out there!

“In all the world, there is no heart for me like yours. In all the world, there is no love for you like mine.” — Maya Angelou

Below is Alex and I together on Mother’s Day together, and it is difficult to believe it is our seventh one together!

Apr 30

Spring Break: 2025

We recently had our spring break together, where we all had some time off together from work and school! It has been a crazy first quarter of the year, for sure, and we welcomed some time away together. We have always loved going to the beach, with Victory, a place of refuge, before Alex was born during the off season. So, we decided to go to Rehoboth Beach and Dewey Beach with our girls! We had so much fun together! Alex’s only complaint was that Funland was not open for the season, yet! Doug and Alex picked out a parrot kite, which they successfully flew pretty high, over the ocean!

We made it back home for Easter, and Alex made some beautiful eggs, which she loved creating! Alex and Victory had an Easter egg hunt left by the Easter Bunny, one of Alex’s favorite things she looks forward to on Easter! On Easter day, we went to an Orioles baseball game, which was fun, and the Cincinnati Reds won, to Doug’s delight!

We also received some good news, while we were away, about Victory’s recent health issue, which we are so grateful for. She is on a new medicine, and we are waiting to see how she responds.

It was nice to have some time off together and to be able to spend time together! A few photos of our time away together are shown below!

Apr 25

Nationals: Pups in the Park

Happy Friday! We were on spring break last week! A few weekends ago, we took Alex and Victory to Pups in the Park at the Nationals! This was our ninth time attending Pups in the Park at the Nationals with Victory, and our third time attending with both Alex and Victory! (You can view our previous trips to Pups in the Park: here, here, here, here, here, here, here and here.)

We had really nice weather for the game–it was a little overcast with really great temperatures, perfect for Victory! This is the second Pups in the Park game that Alex will remember, as she does not remember first going in 2019, prior to COVID, as she had just turned one. Alex and Victory got to meet Screech for the first time at this game! Victory was a little trooper and had fun as well. We all had a great time!

Below are several photos from our visit! We hope to return for another Pups in the Park game again this fall with our girls!

Happy Friday!

Apr 8

Moving Parenting Advice from Kahlil Gibran

In the final years of his long life, which encompassed world wars and assassinations and numerous terrors, the great cellist and human rights advocate Pablo Casals urged humanity to “make this world worthy of its children.” What is the worth of children, what are our responsibilities to them (when we do choose to have them, for it is also an act of courage and responsibility to choose not to), and what does it mean to raise a child with the dignity of being an unrepeatable miracle of atoms that have never before constellated and will never again constellate in that exact way?

A century ago, perched between two worlds and two World Wars, the Lebanese-American poet, painter, and philosopher Kahlil Gibran (January 6, 1883–April 10, 1931) addressed these elemental questions in a short passage from The Prophet, shown below, which I love.

When a young mother with a newborn baby on her chest asks for advice on children and parenting, Gibran responds:

Your children are not your children.
They are the sons and daughters of Life’s longing for itself.
They come through you but not from you,
And though they are with you yet they belong not to you.

You may give them your love but not your thoughts,
For they have their own thoughts.
You may house their bodies but not their souls,
For their souls dwell in the house of tomorrow, which you cannot visit, not even in your dreams.
You may strive to be like them, but seek not to make them like you.
For life goes not backward nor tarries with yesterday.
You are the bows from which your children as living arrows are sent forth.
The archer sees the mark upon the path of the infinite, and He bends you with His might that His arrows may go swift and far.
Let your bending in the archer’s hand be for gladness;
For even as He loves the arrow that flies, so He loves also the bow that is stable.

Mar 25

Victory: Pet Rover

Our beloved Hound About that we have used for over 13 years, with both Biscuit and Victory, is no longer working properly, which is a bummer. We got such good use out of it, and we kept it together in the final years with replacement parts, we kept on hand, and new wheels, but since the Hound About and its parts are not made any longer, we had to find a new option for our fur girl, Victory! After doing some research, we opted for the Pet Rover, and we got this model, Alex picked the yellow color because she liked the look of a taxi!

Victory absolutely loves her Pet Rover, and it has been a great substitute to our former Hound About, which we hold wonderful memories of our furry family members! Victory is thoroughly enjoying her rides in her Pet Rover, since the weather is getting a bit warmer, finally, which has been a great morale boost for her! Alex loves pushing the Pet Rover as well, and Victory loves her new wheels and rides in the fresh airl!

Below is a video of our beloved fur girl out for her evening ride!

Mar 18

To Be of Use

I love this poem, shown below, by Marge Piercy. It seems so timely. For me, this poem, celebrates people who find meaning and purpose in formidable, necessary work done with patience and dedication.

To Be of Use

by Marge Piercy

The people I love best
jump into work head first
without dallying in the shadows
and swim off with sure strokes almost out of sight.
They seem to become natives of that element,
the black sleek heads of seals
bouncing like half-submerged balls.

I love people who harness themselves, an ox to a heavy cart,
who pull like water buffalo, with massive patience,
who strain in the mud and muck to move things forward,
who do what has to be done, again and again.

I want to be with people who submerge
in the task, who go into the fields to harvest
and work in a row and pass the bags along,
who are not parlor generals and field deserters
but move in a common rhythm
when the food must come in or the fire be put out.

The work of the world is common as mud.
Botched, it smears the hands, crumbles to dust.
But the thing worth doing well done
has a shape that satisfies, clean and evident.
Greek amphoras for wine or oil,
Hopi vases that held corn, are put in museums
but you know they were made to be used.
The pitcher cries for water to carry
and a person for work that is real.

Mar 11

Tangibly Preserving Your Child’s Artwork

This post is a little late, but last year, I made a book of Alex’s Kindergarten artwork. I had saved so much of her artwork, from Kindergarten, and I wanted to find a way to save it without holding onto every piece of her artwork, if you know what I mean. So, I photographed and edited the pieces that I wanted to save, to include in this book. I made a 60 page book of all of her Kindergarten artwork, approximately 120 pieces of her artwork, via OnceUpon, and I selected the matte paper option. The book turned out well, it is simple in design, and not as expensive to print as compared to other places where you can make books.

The best part is—I printed one of these books for Alex, and she loves looking at her art via this book, and it is also a way to encourage her to keep making her beautiful art, which she loves to make, daily—she is very creative! The arts are really important, and we hope to keep fostering this love within Alex. I hope to continue to make yearly books of her artwork as a way of preserving her artworks! Here are Alex’s previous artwork books, which you can view here and here. I am still making our family yearbooks, and I am a few years behind due to my recently released book, so I will have to find a way to catch up, as these books are so meaningful to have and to share with your family!