Kaia was 6 weeks old when she was snatched from her mom/siblings and thrust upon a single-dude who had never had a pet before by a friend convinced single-dude needed a puppy to make his single-dude life better.

Yeah. Don’t ever do that.

We swooped in when single-dude alerted (and good for him, he did the right thing) our local rescue and we rescued Kaia at 10 weeks and now, 2 years later, she has passed away from chronic kidney disease, most likely from toxins she was exposed to hanging out in single-dude’s garage every day while he was at work.

Kaia was a high-energy mix of German Shepherd, Pit, and Belgian Malinois, followed by husky, chow-chow and malamut. Never having had a high-energy dog before, we learned how to access our deepest levels of patience, training skills, how not to panic when Kaia barked at moms pushing strollers, how to consistently train, train, train. There were times we wondered if Kaia was supposed to be on a farm or ranch, maniacally running free every day–but the more we learned about her, the more we loved her and invested our hearts and knew she was ours and just as she was responding to the 2 years of training and love, her kidneys gave out and she passed away.

My magnificent, powerful, stubborn, SUPER SMART, precious, cats-loving, affectionate best girl. Morning walks are meaningless without her.

Yours in heartfelt memorials and sobs,

PB