Aspen the yellow pup's new adventures.

     Aspen the yellow pup joined our life on July 5th, 2018. It was crazy the way it all came into being. Here is the story.

     We are the Herrera Family. We have had dogs pretty much since we first got married. We have had all different types. Heinz 57 to pure bred. Our breeds have been Schnauzers, Boxers, Siberian Huasky, Wolf hybrid, Boxer/pitbull mix, Miniature Daschund, and finally our Yellow Lab.

     All the dogs were amazing and touched our lives in special ways. Each loss was felt deeply as they are our fur babies. Our most recent loss was our Daschund Gracie Mae Herrera. She was a very unique daschund who was adventurous, and happy. She brought such joy into our lives.

     Grace entered our life in February of 2014. She came all the way from Georgia. She was the sweetest little thing. It wasn't long before she was a part of our family, and our hearts. She did have some issues, like not listening, running the other direction when you called her, and thinking she was a Great Dane, not a daschund.

     She was also my best friend. She followed me everywhere I went, to the consternation of my husband. On Saturday's it was Grace and I. We would get up before anyone else, make coffee, go out to the porch or sit on the couch together and welcome the morning. She was such a snuggler.

     We moved to the mountains 3 years ago and Grace was in her element. She was all over the place. All of our neighbors knew who she was. She was a barker and that's how we always knew where she was. Of course, being in the mountains is not the best place to run all over when your a little dog.

     In February of this year we suffered 2 tragedies. First my aunt Phyllis passed away. We were gone to her funeral all day long. Our son was home and was taking care of our dogs. When we got home close to midnight, I asked our son where grace was. He said he tried to get her inside but she wouldn't listen.

     In the morning, I went our and looked all over for her. I thought I heard her barking far away. When my husband and son got up, our son told us that the neighbor had come up last night and told him that they had seen a mountain lion come up our driveway.

     That's when we started looking for Grace in earnest. We went out the back gate with our lab to look for her. As we started down the path, we noticed our lab Zuni was acting funny. She would go in front of us, whine a bit and come straight back.

     My husband went ahead of me and as we walked down the path I spotted blood on the ground.  I began to cry and called my husband back. We tracked to blood for a ways but found no other blood after a while. He finally turned to me and hugged me. That's when I just sobbed. I knew then that my Gracie Mae was gone.

     I told my husband I was done with dogs. My heart just couldn't handle the heart break of losing another baby.  We decided that we would just have Zuni until she passed and then we would be done with dogs. So the fact that Aspen come into our lives is such a miracle story

     Our daughter in law had decided to have a yard sale. We had just moved into our new home and we had stuff we needed to get rid of. We took all of our stuff up to their house. During the yard sale, an older gentleman arrived. He had 3 yellow labs in the back of his pick-up. I commented that we had one and we loved them so much.

     Some time during the conversation, I mentioned that we would like to have another lab puppy, but that they were so expensive that we couldn't afford one.  He mentioned that his niece had just had a litter of puppies and was looking to get rid of the last 3 she had. She was selling them for $200.00. 

     He called his niece, we talked, she sent pictures of the puppies and boom, we got another puppy. We made arrangements to pick up the puppy. On Thursday July 5th, we picked up our new baby. She was so playful and sweet. We named her Aspen and brought her home. Zuni was a little unsure at first, but they are now friends. Zuni even tries to mother her.

     Aspen is working her way into our hearts, and healing the missing part where Grace left a big hole. She will never replace Grace, but she will help heal the emptiness. She has been having adventures with us.  We have been to the mountains with her, the lake, and to the college to look for Pokeman. We hope she will have many adventures with our family for years to come.