Meet The Newest Member of The ‘Hayes’ Family Koira

My wife has been asking me for the last decade for us to get a dog. The timing never seemed right. We were raising our little kids and had enough on our plates. So just when our life seemed to get simple, in a moment of weakness, I caved in and said we could get a dog.

It needed to be a shelter rescue dog. I didn't want a pure bred. That's about all of the criteria I had. She immediately was searching across the globe trying to find the perfect dog for our family. How do you even decide? She found some dogs and showed me tons of pictures. Then we came across this little girl:

Sold. She was described as being a gentle puppy that's good with kids, dogs, cats, you name it.  My wife filled out the application with the rescue shelter and we waited.

The next day I was out of town fishing on Mille Lacs when my wife told me to go pick her up. I didn't know it was going to be that quick! I stopped at a pet smart and got some essentials and within a couple of hours, here I was: a dog owner.

So far she's super calm. She rode in the car on the way home and didn't make a peep. We didn't know if she even could bark until it was bed time. But she had a pretty uneventful first night. This is my first time having a puppy since I was a little kid, and something about it makes me feel young again. We named her Koira   (pronounced more like Koiva) which is Finnish for "dog."My family background is Finnish and we use Finn words for dogs. She's a mutt but she's got some border collie/ shepherd mix in her. I think she's got another smaller breed in her too, but we'll see how big she gets! Her paws aren't all that big so here's hoping she won't hog the couch.