Ahh, Cresties! They came into my life twice...

Hi Everyone!

This is a blog to which I truly hope you will contribute. At the request of Shirley, a FB friend, I am starting this blog and I think she has a great idea! There are SO MANY of us Crested staff out there, that talking about living with them is well worth the time and effort.

Before Cresteds, Bill and I raised Poodles - toys and minis, red and silver - I never was one to take the "easy path"...

Then came the Cresteds. I saw my first one at a Detroit dog show in the dimly lit fairgrounds and fell in love. I saw one being carried and simply walked after it, leaving my husband standing there with half a sentence spoken. While that was the beginning of the love affair, I saw no way to add Cresteds to my already full home, so I resigned myself to a "love affair from a distance".

I was very engaged in Poodle rescue at the time, and that actually led to Berrie, my first Crested. We got a call to see if we could pick up a small black Poodle "with a little white on it" - ah, a parti-color. We arranged to have them bring the dog to my mother's shop and we would retrieve her from there. We would later learn that my mother had tried to reject Berrie because she was not a Poodle. We typically placed about 2-3 Poodles a month and that was about all the time and resources we could give to rescue, so we limited ourselves to the breed/varieties about which we knew the most. My friends, who had "run the intercept" for me to bring Berrie to the shop told her that I knew all about Berrie and that it was OK. At the time, I was working at Goodyear, and my Mom was not able to connect with me, so Berrie stayed.

She was a frailish black "puff" with what I would later learn was a veil coat. My friends (professional handlers) knew I had this secret love affair and so they arranged for Berrie to become a pet, knowing I would not have moved forward on my own. Despite Bill's weak objections, Crazy Berrie was there to stay....

Then came Skippy. We were at the dog show in Lexington at the Horse Grounds. The show was over and we were tearing down our booth. Sandy, the hat lady, was also tearing down her booth next door. All of a sudden, I look down and there is a Crested dancing around my feet. I scooped her up and went to Sandy and told her that something had wandered into my booth and if she wasn't careful, I was going to have a new member of my household. Sandy laughed and returned Skippy to her place and tear down continued. We were just pulling out of the campgrounds and getting on the highway when my cel phone rang and it was Sandy. We talked for a awhile and then she asked if I WOULD like to become Skippy's mom. The next show, Skippy came home with us, became a solid owner of one corner of my pillow and then became the mother to Freckle, a crazy black HL, who took BoB his first time out at 6 months (TOO crazy to be a Special) and his younger brother Harley, our group winner. Both of them are now retired - Harley loves his Dining Room chair and Freckle is still as crazy as he ever was.

More tomorrow!

Thanks for reading! I appreciate you!

Candy