Welcome to where our
hearts are...
Our beloved children
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| Stephen and Claudia with Max and Nita |
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This page is dedicated to our beloved canine children
Nita,Max and Velcro
and their feline
brother and sister
Merlin and Tula
Rest in peace Rico and Lucy
We miss you like crazy
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PLEASE
spay or neuter!!!
The number to the
Santa Fe Animal Shelter
Spay and Neuter Clinic
over next to the
Outback Steakhouse is:
474-6422
THANK YOU !!!
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In Memoriam
Our beloved boy Rico passed away on August 29, 2009.
I will not remove him from this page.
You will see lots of things about him as you scroll down...
He is forever deeply in our hearts
Rico, I miss you every single day,
Your mom
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| Meet our beloved boy Rico, 2001 - 2009 |
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| Hi ! I'm Rico |
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| Rico and Miss Lady Bug |
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| Rico and his Dad |
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| Nita, Spring 2007 |
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| Proud Mom and daughter Nita, August 2007 |
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| Nita April 2008 |
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| Max and his proud dad Stephen |
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| Merlin is happy |
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| Merlin and his new Mom |
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| Max playing Mister Mom to Merlin |
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Our Lucy Girl
We lost our beloved Lucy to cancer in April 2009. She was only 10 years old.
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How Rico came to America…
Once upon a time.....
We traveled to Puerto Rico for our belated honeymoon in December of 2002.
Stephen’s parents own a house there.
We arrived in San Juan, Puerto Rico on Christmas Eve 2002, very late at night. The house is about an hour from San Juan up in the rain forest, El Yunque. Stephen’s parents are already there, because they spend their winters in Puerto Rico to escape from the cold long winters in their
primary home on Cape Cod, Massachusetts.
We checked into a motel in San Juan, unwilling to try to find the small road to the house in the rain forest so late at night. The next morning we take off in our little rental car. What an adventure! The further away we got from the Tourist Mecca of San Juan and drive inland, the more primitive it gets. Stray dogs everywhere.
Starving, skinny and covered in mange…
We finally arrived at the house, warmly greeted by Stephen's parents.
Later that afternoon, I see a small food bowl on the porch. I ask my mother-in-law, well known for her love of animals, what she is feeding…
Oh, a small, very shy and skinny stray dog, she replies.
She quickly adds…Don’t even try to pet it, it will run away…
A little while later, I look down the steep driveway and there comes this adorable little dog, tail tucked between his legs…he’s making a bee line for the food bowl.
I start talking to him, saying Puerto RICOOOOO and his ears wiggle…
20 minutes later he’s in my lap.
Stephen and his parents are in the house looking out,
rolling their eyes at me…
(I am also known for being an avid animal lover)
To make a long story short, we were there for 7 days and I fell INSANELY in love with this dog. I drove down the hill to K Mart and bought him a bed and a collar and chew toys…
His name was RICO, no doubt, he loved that name
and came to being called that from the get-go.
Our visit was over, I am on the porch in TEARS, clinging to the dog…Stephen is adamant…
He says…have you EVER been with a man who has told you NO? And I said: NO!!!!!
He said, well, I am telling you NO.
NO ! We are not having a SMALL dog
NO ! We are NOT having a MALE dog
NO ! We are NOT having a Chihuahua, they bark all the time !
And further more…are you NUTS bringing a dog from Puerto Rico?
As soon as we get back to Santa Fe you can adopt one at the shelter….
The plane lifts off, I’m SOBBING…
We get back to Santa Fe…..I’m on the Internet within minutes of getting home...google.com...
Puerto Rican Animal Rescue...SEARCH...
Save a Sato
(Sato is Puerto Rican Slang for homeless street dog)
I write them an email, describing the situation….I get an answer within 30 minutes…
Do I know where the dog is? YES!
Do I have someone to bring him from the rain forest down to San Juan to their main office? YES!!!!
(Ha…….Mom-in-law loves that dog, would love to see me have him!)
Where there is a will there is a way!!!!!!!
Never underestimate the willpower of a woman in love!
BUT…….how to get him from San Juan to Santa Fe ?
Enter Rose, a friend of ours from Albuquerque….
A flight attendant for American Airlines!!!!
Woohoooooooooooooooo! She hears of Rico, VOLUNTEERS to fly to San Juan on her day off and meet a Save a Sato volunteer at the airport to receive Rico and bring him HOME to me !!!
All is arranged! Stephen’s Mom drives Rico to San Juan, meets a Save a Sato volunteer…I had sent them $100 to cover a rabies shot and a health certificate, the ONLY thing required to bring him to the USA…
The volunteer takes Rico to a vet, gets the necessary paperwork and keeps him overnight.
Rose arrives in San Juan the next day, late afternoon…I have made reservations for her at an airport hotel that accepts dogs…she meets the volunteer and picks up Rico, spends the night with him in the hotel and hops on first flight out of San Juan to Albuquerque.
January 15, 2003…..
Claudia stands at ABQ Airport at 6PM….like an expectant mother….and there they come,
Rose and Rico…..
And, as they say, the rest of the story is history
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| Rico with his Mom and Rose, who flew to Puerto Rico to get him for us. |
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| Rico and his Dad |
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Rico has become the apple of his Dad's eye. We laugh all the time about how I was not supposed to bring him to the USA. Now, we cannot IMAGINE our life without him
(or of course Nita, for that matter)
Below, the first picture ever taken of Rico and his new mom, out on the porch in Puerto Rico, the little shy dog who wouldn't let anyone near him....and a few pictures of Rico still in Puerto Rico...
To go to the Save a Sato website, click here
We will be forever grateful to them for their help in bringing Rico to us.
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| First picture ever taken of Rico and his new mom |
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A little bit more about our little boy Rico....
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| Our brave boy Rico, after being hit by a drunk driver on Oct. 11, 2005 here in Santa Fe |
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On October 11, 2005, Rico was ruthlessly and purposely run down by an apparently drunk driver in our Santa Fe neighborhood, Tierra Contenta, about a block from our house . He had bolted out between Stephen's legs by accident and was running down the street with Stephen in full pursuit less than 10 feet behind him.
A truck was coming down the street.
Stephen reported that the driver floored the gas pedal when he saw the dog in the street.
The driver only came to a stop when he saw Stephen closely behind the dog. By then it was too late, Rico had been hit. Stephen could just as easily been hit at that time and he reports that the driver had bloodshot eyes and was visibly intoxicated. The driver then sped off, leaving Rico in the middle of the street in a puddle of blood.The incident was reported immediately to 911 with a full vehicle/driver description. Unfortunately, the driver was never found. The fact that the driver ACCELERATED
when he could have easily avoided the dog is SICKENING.
Rico's right hind leg was totally stripped of all skin, called degloving and is one of the worst kinds of injuries to treat. After the leg was healed enough to be treated, he underwent skin graft surgery where a large piece of his own skin was removed from his side and then grafted to the leg and foot. The skin on his side was then pulled together and sewn up. It will be a long healing process.
September 2006 Update:
Rico has recovered very well. The skin graft took well and the grafted skin is even growing a few patches of hair. His leg will always look kind of weird, but we were able to save it from having to be amputated. From the day of the accident until nearly 3 months later when the frequent veterinarian visits were finally over, we had accumulated vet bills totaling $7,000.
Our families, friends and customers were enormously supportive during that time both emotionally and financially and we would like to thank everyone who has helped us
in paying off bits and pieces of this huge amount of money.
Rico is a very special dog, from the miraculous way he entered our lives to the courageous way
he handled this horrible injury.
We feel fortunate each and every day
to have this special little dog in our lives.
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The video clip below is dedicated to my beloved little boy Rico, to his perseverance, his loving heart and his enduring spirit in spite of all the odds against him.
What a special little guy!
This clip is a MUST SEE,
especially for Chihuahua Lovers!
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How Nita came to America
Well, I hate to sound like Britney Spears….But….
OOOOPS! I did it again!!!!
Another child from Puerto Rico for us!
As I mentioned in my story about Rico, Stephen’s parents own a house in Puerto Rico and they spend their winters there.
While there again during December 2006, someone dropped off a little puppy on my mother-in-law’s doorstep…
She took the puppy in and named her Juanita.
Soon after, I started receiving vivid reports and baby pictures of this adorable girl.
What can I tell you? Look at the baby picture of Nita below!!! Who could say no to that little bundle of muscles?
Stephen’s brother Jon, who also lives here in Santa Fe, flew out to Puerto Rico to see his parents and returned to Santa Fe with Nita. At that time, she was small enough to fit in a soft pet carrier under the seat of his return flight. And we knew what it takes to get a dog here from Puerto Rico as far as paperwork.
Our friend Rose, still with American Airlines, was involved in the process again to some extent. We needed to get a pet carrier to San Juan for Jon to bring her home in and Rose personally gave it to an American Airlines pilot who took it with him on his next flight to San Juan where Stephen’s brother then picked it up to bring Nita home in.
American Airlines is my hero!
We received Nita on February 17, 2007.
Nita is a joy!
For more pictures of Nita and GREAT video clips, please go to THIS link….click on VIDEOS….
the "Nita in the snow" is a MUST see, be prepared to laugh!
Do I sometimes feel guilty for "importing" my 2 beloved children instead of adopting at the local shelter? YES! But….they were homeless as well! And love is blind, it didn’t matter that they were from so far away.
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Look at this baby picture, sent to me by my mother-in-law Sylvia from Puerto Rico! How could I say no to this precious dog? And look at pictures of her NOW!
She has turned into a sleek, blonde beauty!!!!
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| Baby Juanita in Puerto Rico |
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| Juanita's first night at our house, February 2007 |
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| Baby Nita and her new Mom |
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| Santa Fe New Mexican, Sunday, February 15, 2009 |
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Click
HERE
to read about the result
of Nita's DNA test
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Click
HERE
to read about who won the contest
about Nita's DNA
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Click on the link below for Santa Fe Scoop,
a great local web site for all of animal lovers,
a wonderful site because it is LOCAL !!!
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For lots of laughter, please view the video below. It is posted at Santa Fe Scoop and it is to date, 4/12/2008, the most often viewed video there!
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And below, all of our pictures posted at Santa Fe Scoop.
What a fun site! Join today!
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| The whole family December 2008 |
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| Your Toy Auto Man Stephen, aka Doggie Daddy |
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Baking for the kids
In January of 2008, Nita became very ill from dog treats made in China. She is fine now but to make a long story short, I started baking my own dog biscuits. Below is the recipe, a combination of several recipes I found on the Internet, this is my favorite. I have been giving them away at work to customers/friends with dogs and I have yet to find a dog that didn't like them. Even some of their human owners have tasted these and loved them.
Caution: They are kind of hard for human teeth, this is on purpose to give the dog teeth and gums a good work out.
The wheat flower can be eliminated totally if your dog has wheat allergies. Just use more of the other flours instead.
Homemade Dog Treat Recipe
Parmesan Herb Biscuits
1 package dry yeast
1/4 cup lukewarm water
2 cups chicken broth
2 tablespoons olive oil
1/2 cup parmesan cheese
1/2 cup non-fat dry milk
2 tablespoons dried parsley
2 teaspoons dried minced garlic
1 cup whole wheat flour
1/2 cup rye flour
1/2 cup rice flour
1 cup cracked wheat
For the egg wash - 3 eggs, 1/2 cup chicken or beef broth
Directions:
Preheat oven to 350°F
In a large bowl, dissolve yeast in water. Add stock, oil, cheese, dry milk, and parsley. Gradually blend in the flours and cracked wheat.
Add enough wheat flour to form a stiff dough.
Transfer to a floured surface and knead until smooth (about 3-5 minutes). Shape the dough into a ball and roll to 1/2-inch thick. Using round or crescent-shaped cookie cutters, cut out treats. Place on ungreased baking sheets.
I have found that you do NOT need to space them apart at all.
Gather up the scraps, roll out again, and cut additional biscuits.
Bake for 45 minutes. Remove from oven.
In a small bowl, whisk together the eggs and chicken or beef broth for the glaze.
Take each cookie off the sheet and dip thoroughly in the egg wash, bottom and top.
Place back on cookie sheet.
Bake for an additional 30 minutes. Let cool/dry out overnight.
Makes about 4 dozen 3-inch treats.
Tips from Claudia:
The very first time you make this, it is a little tedious to find all the different ingredients, especially the flours.
I found everything at Albertson’s except the cracked wheat and the rice flour.
Those are readily available at Vitamin Cottage.
For the chicken broth I used the Swanson’s in the carton on the soup isle. 99% Fat free, low sodium, I always have that in my fridge anyway, they love that on their food. Beef broth from Swanson's is good too for a variation.
Even though you do not need to grease the cookie sheets, lining them with aluminum foil is a good idea because the egg wash at the end is VERY hard to clean off the sheets
and aluminum foil you can just toss out.
The egg wash at the end is VERY IMPORTANT. It makes the biscuits smell even better, makes them shiny and yummy looking.
And wait until you smell your house while these things are baking, makes YOU want to eat one when they come out of the oven! (Go ahead, they’re delicious)
I looked all over town (or so I thought) for dog bone shaped cookie cutters and ended up ordering a set on line at Amazon.com, then a customer told me she found hers at Michael’s (craft store) in the cake pan department, it never occurred to me to look there.
Ultimately, I don’t think the dogs care what shape they are,
so use what you have for cookie cutters or just cut with a pizza cutter
(the round wheel) into strips.
Have fun! These are so easy to make and the dough is fun to cut out!
!!! *Woof Woof* !!!
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Click on the above illustration for a link directly to the VPI Insurance web site. We insured Nita when she was still a puppy and recently had some major vet bills.
This insurance was GREAT to have and covered a large portion of our expenses!
Check it out!
Veterinary care is so expensive anymore!
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***PLEASE ***
Do NOT bring your dog(s) along for your appointment.
Dogs are no longer allowed inside our customer or shop area
due to too many incidents of marking and damage to the business.
We appreciate your understanding |
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