It's National Pet Sitters Week - Shout out to the best one ever!

DIxie
Beaufort
There are people in your life you trust with important things like your house key, your alarm code, your kids. Then there are the people you trust with your dog.

They just fall into a whole different category.

This is National Pet Sitters Week, so it only seems appropriate to give a huge shout out to our pet sitter extraordinaire. Linda has been taking care of our dogs since the first puppy, Beaufort, came home more than 25 years ago.

Since then, Linda has also loved Dixie and Flossie as her own. Her kind attention and unconditional love for our animals has allowed us to travel with complete peace of mind that our fur babies were in the best possible hands.

Sure, she has all the great attributes of trusted and loving dog sitter. She loves her canine charges as her own. They get hugs and walks and kisses and treats galore under her charge. We always get pictures and texts so we know all is well back at home. But I’m convinced she also has a pair of angels wings she keeps in her back pocket. The day I met Flossie proves that.

Several years ago, Linda got me hooked up with volunteering at PetsInc to walk evacuee dogs from a shelter at the beach during a hurricane. I’d been back several times by the time I went out there during Hurricane Florence to walk evacuee dogs in September 2018. Long story short (read it here), that’s when I first laid eyes on my now much-loved Flossie. As I walked Flossie around the property quickly falling in love with her, I ran into Linda who was there walking dogs also (good sign right there).

I asked for her help in evaluating this dog who had quickly stolen my heart. Linda walked Flossie around for awhile. She looked into the dog’s eyes and got a couple of slobbery kisses before giving her seal of approval.

Seeing Linda at PetsInc that day was a God-wink that surely meant Flossie was the one for me. As Flossie and I were leaving to head to her new home, I ran into Linda again who told me she and the friend who was with her had made a bet I’d be taking this dog home. Can’t remember which of them was betting on Flossie, but I’m the winner in that for sure!
Flossie on her "gotcha" day at PetsInc

So here’s cheers to Linda and all the great dogsitters out there who are the angels who love our animals like their own.

Unfortunately, I have no photos of Linda with our dogs because we are never home when she is at the house. So, I’m just posting photos of these three much-loved dogs who knew instinctively that Linda was one of their people.

 






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