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We got a dog!

Wow…those are 4 words I didn’t expect I’d ever say. Here’s what happened…

Wow…those are 4 words I didn’t expect I’d ever say.

When I was little, my brother and I always wanted a dog. Our parents worked a lot, and they never felt they were home enough to fairly commit to a pet. We had a couple failed and short-lived goldfish attempts and a memorable school guinea pig experience, but that’s it!

So, as soon I graduated for college and lived on my own, I adopted a kitten from a shelter in Brooklyn (where I was living at the time). And, ever since, I have been a cat person—having had 4 cats (between myself and Bob) since my early 20’s. I got so used to cats and the chill life they lead that I never expected to get a dog.

However, once we got closer to finishing up our house last year, Bob kept mentioning how great it would be to have a family dog now that we’d have a house and yard space. I didn’t give it serious consideration for a few reasons:

—We were just moving into a new house, and I wanted to get settled in.

—A global pandemic had started, and I was just trying to survive each day (both personally and professionally).

—We had an 18 year old cat, and we wanted her to feel settled in before introducing a new pet.

So what changed?

Once the holidays came, we had gotten through almost a whole year of living our new house, living in pandemic times, and our senior cat got settled in (and is still with us!). We spent a lot of time over the last month seriously considering how our lives would change, how we could all be responsible for the pet (I made my kids write essays on the topic), and making sure this wasn’t just a pandemic decision.

We felt ready, the kids seem old enough to help, we finally have a yard, we felt it was amazing time to give extra attention to training a puppy, and we were ready to commit 10-15 years to a new pet. It all happened very fast as we started getting serious about the idea around Christmas and then started watching various Los Angeles rescues as dogs were available for adoption.

Welcome Sticky!

So please join me in welcoming our new puppy…Sticky Rice Cho! She’s currently about 8 weeks old. Since she’s a rescue we don’t totally know her mix—but she’s possibly a pit/lab/heeler mix. She was the smallest one of her litter, and we expect she’ll be a medium-sized adult dog based on her current size. We adopted her from The Labelle Foundation—a foster based animal rescue devoted to rescuing, rehabilitating, and advocating for dogs.

If you’re local and looking to rescue, here are few other amazing organizations, too:
MaeDay Rescue
Love Leo
Wags and Walks
Mutt Scouts

Special thank you to Sticky’s foster mom, Stephanie, who fostered her and bottle fed her before she was ready to find her forever home with us!

23 comments

  1. Seriously Joy, you could/should be a professional baby namer. Sticky Rice Cho is the cutest name I’ve heard since Coco Cho. Congrats to all and this new chapter of your family life!

    1. Hi! Our kids were eating cinnamon rolls for breakfast one morning and talking about how sticy the frosting was. Coco started calling out STICKY! Come her STICKY! (this is before we got her). And so it just stuck! We added the “Rice” as her middle name because I am Thai and Sticky Rice is just the best 🙂

      1. Haha! Fellow Thai person here! Khao Niew is my fave! I was wondering if your Thai -ness had something to do with the name choice!

      2. Haha! Fellow Thai person here! Khao Niew is my fave! I was wondering if your Thai -ness had something to do with the name choice!

  2. Oh So cute! Congratulations with her. Welcome Sticky! 🐶 she even has her own emoji! (Almost) 😂
    We recently also extended our family with a Weimaraner puppy (Bonnie). Short nights and a lot of training now but a forever friend already.

    1. Thanks Lilian – it’s been fun (and exhausting) already. Forever friend indeed! Send our love to Bonnie 🙂

  3. Joy,

    Sticky is so cute! I love how intentional and thoughtful you came to the decision! And having your girls write essays?! Genius!! No way momma’s gonna do all the work and upkeep.

    Xo, Melodee

    1. Thanks Melodee! We reallt spent a ton of time thinking about it to make sure everyone was ready. It’s still all new for us but it’s a happy commitment!

  4. Sticky is adorable! Can’t wait to watch her grow up with you guys. Jackpot on both sides of the deal. 🙂

    Ps. Fingers crossed we find out the source of this glorious couch soon. Swoon!

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