We adopted a greyhound!

Dylan hanging out in the yard.

It’s been a while since I shared anything on my blog, so I’m trying to get caught up a bit here. As some of you know from my social media posts, we had to let my sweet Donnie girl go in mid-February. It was a very difficult loss that came far too quickly, hence why I’ve taken some time off from worrying about posting here.

We knew that we didn’t want to have only one dog for too long. There would be no way to replace Donnie, but Dylan (our pit/lab mix) would be happier with a friend. It also feels like the best way to honor Donnie is to get another dog in need out of a shelter or rescue and into our home. Dylan would be our biggest hurdle in this process since he is very scared when meeting new dogs and that can cause him to lash out initially if the process moves too fast (and slow is even too fast for Dylan sometimes).

We met a couple of dogs initially — both really fantastic dogs. One was a pitbull and the other was a shepherd mix. I’m certain we would have adopted both had Dylan not been a factor, but in the end, we felt the pitbull was incredibly sweet, but probably too rambunctious for Dylan (keep in mind that Dylan is easy to fall down). As for the shepherd mix, he seemed wonderful and very trainable, but we had concerns about his energy levels based on what the foster family described. There was no trial period possible, so we made the difficult decision to not adopt him and to pursue an adoption through a greyhound group, where a 3-day trial period was standard with all adoptions. We felt more confident we could find the best match for Dylan this way, which was the most fair option for both dogs that would be in our household.

So, along came Molly/Juniper.

Juniper a few weeks after we adopted her.

We were contacted pretty quickly about a greyhound that had been pulled from Florida, had just been medically cleared, and was now available. Her foster mom (who has fostered over 100 greyhounds in the last 20+ years) told us she was incredible with other dogs and that she was always very respectful of their space, so we felt it sounded like she might be a good fit for Dylan. We met her the following weekend and she has stayed with us ever since! Her foster parents were fantastic at helping us lighten the mood when Dylan would get scared and shockingly, Dylan decided to lie down with her on our guest bed within the first hour or two of meeting her! He still got nervous if she moved quickly or suddenly in those first few days, but that pretty quickly dissipated once he realized she wasn’t interested in hurting him.

The muscles of a retired racing greyhound are amazing!

This goofy girl is 6 years old and raced for a while before being bred one time. She is now spayed, healthy as ever (including amazing teeth!), and is happily learning how to be a pet in a home with cozy beds and lots of attention. We have named her Juniper (Molly, her racing name, also happens to be our niece’s name) and we are just really excited to have found a dog who was such a good fit for Dylan and for us. We like to think she’ll be happy with us also and with each month that passes by, we can see her relax a little bit more in her surroundings.

Welcome home, June.