Happy Birthday Bluto

Today is Bluto's first birthday! Happy birthday you big goofy puppy!

Before we came to Hawaii, we opted to find homes for our cats. As much as I LOVED my cats, the flight and 4-month quarantine would have fundamentally altered the cats. Anya (the cat) probably wouldn't have even survived as she was 15 years old and growing sicker. Hawaii may not have let her come in anyway. Shadow, who is 10, probably would have handled the trip okay but I don't know who she would have dealt with the quarantine. She's a very, in your lap and face, needs attention kind of cat. Finally there was Rajah, who was only a couple years old and probably would have handled it all just fine - but she was also the easiest one to find a new home for given her age, health and temperament. She went to live with friends of ours which is nice for us. Anya passed away before the move and the other two were placed in good homes.

So anyway, after we got to Hawaii, Robby said IF I wanted another pet I could since I gave up my kitties (Anya and Shadow came with me pre-marriage). I decided on a dog because, while I love kitties, I don't love litter boxes. So at 6 months pregnant and brand new to Hawaii, I started looking into dogs. I wanted a puppy because of the kids - I wanted to know the dogs whole background. Also, most of the dogs listed on the shelter website were Pits or mixed Pits. I have no problems with Pits but Housing does. They had some adorable Pit mix puppies listed when we were looking that I oohed and aahed over. I found a website with Hawaii breeders for various dog breeds. I knew I wanted one from Hawaii due to the quarantine thing so after looking into ALL the available breeds and breeders I could find, I decided on an Australian Shepherd and found a breeder on the Big Island who would ship him over to us. As it turned out, her pups were already pregnant when I contacted her. In March the puppies were born and oh so cute!


In May the breeder emailed us updated pictures and we started talking about sending him over to us. Here he is as 6 weeks old:
And then a couple weeks later, I picked him up at the airport. He whined in his carrier the whole way home and he didn't even have his name yet. We had a whole list of possible names for him and when he got here NONE of them seemed quite right for him. It took a couple hours before we picked Bluto.