Friday Fix (9/7/2012) - Volunteering

By Christy Hess

I found out last night that I have been volunteering for Colorado Puppy Rescue for 5 years now. It is such a wonderful organization, I can't even imagine my life without CPR.

So for today, I thought I would put together my top 10 reasons for volunteering at Colorado Puppy Rescue and sprinkle in some photos of puppies that are available this week, taken by Kristen, Jill and myself.

Number 10 - Food! CPR always has great snacks for us to munch on including a bin of snacks at the adoption event. On Thursdays snacks are setup after all of the puppies have been brought in and we are waiting for fosters. The cherry tomato BLTs are my favorite.....yummmmmm!!!!!

Number 9 - Exercise! I guess this is most important to counter balance number 10. I can get my steps in to work off all of the food and snacks. I am working on getting 10,000 steps a day. Depending on what area I am working, I can usually get about 3,000 - 5,000 steps in!

Number 8 - Have Fun! You get to volunteer where ever you feel most comfortable. Sometimes, I like to carry in puppies on Thursdays, so I get some time with the puppies one on one. Other times, I like to volunteer as an adoption counselor to talk to the adopters. There is a place for everyone.

Number 7 - Time with friends!!! Over the last 5 years I have met a number of people from all walks of life and am happy to be able to call them my close friends. The puppy girls (as I lovingly refer to the volunteers at CPR) are my closest friends. They are always there and I treasure the time that we get to spend together.

Number 6 - Rewarding! With this organization, you get to see the entire cycle of puppy rescue. Seeing those vulnerable little puppies being carried in, marketing the puppies on the website, seeing a more confident puppy at the adoption event because they spent time in a great foster home, and then seeing the adopters fall in love with their new puppies. Awwww!

Number 5 - Fun events! In addition to the Intake and Adoption events every week, we also have Horrifying Day of Scrapbooking, Book Swaps and Dinners. You can even contribute to this very blog!

Number 4 - Inside scoop! You get to see what puppies will be available before anyone else, and you get to play with them too!!!!

Number 3 - Breed Identification! You get to learn about new breeds of puppies, because most of our puppies come in as Aneedahome breed. We look up dog breeds in books and on the internet based on some of the distinct puppy characteristics (ears, coat, coloring, size, eye coloring) to find our best guess. Everyone gets to vote.

Number 2 - Puppy Time!!!! Really one of the main attractions is that we are encouraged to cuddle and snuggle with a puppy. Puppy kisses and puppy breath!!!! My dogs at home get upset when they smell the other puppies - but they forgive me faster when the puppy doesn't come home with me.

And finally the Number 1 reason that I love volunteering for Colorado Puppy Rescue is......listening to Brook's stories. Like the one about.................I really need to have her tell it!!!!! My favorite is about her witch doctor!

Happy Friday everyone!

P.S. Please leave a comment with your top reasons for volunteering. I would love to hear from you!

Kim's K9 Korner

Writen by Guest Blogger
 Kim Ortega, Executive Director of Colorado Puppy Rescue

I know I’m getting older, but really, where did March and April go? 

I’ve lived in Colorado since I was 10 years old.  The saying “April showers, bring May flowers” has always been wrong here.  My experience is that we get wind in March and April and big storms in May.  Along with the storms comes the thunder and lightning.  My dog Raisin is terrified of loud noises to the point that I wonder if her head will explode.  She is now 14 years old and there isn’t much I haven’t tried to make her more comfortable.  Recently, I noticed that PetCo carries a new item called ThunderShirt.  The packaging says that it’s the best solution for dog anxiety.  I’ve decided to give it a try.  I’ll let you know how it goes.

Speaking of wind, I have been worried about the volunteers and fosters that come to my house for intake.  Last year my husband hired a tree trimming service that was doing a lot of work in our neighborhood.  They seemed to do good work till it came to our house.  The end of the story is that they left a large hand saw very high up in our tree.  I have always worried about that saw falling out and seriously injuring someone.  Today, we hired a company that finished the job.  Our tree looks bare but I feel so much better knowing that we wont have limbs crashing through our roof or a saw decapitating  our friends.

A few weeks ago CPR launched a new credit card system.  It’s the type that plugs into your cell phone and swipes the card.  It’s awesome!  We no longer have to pay for an internet service, or have a dedicated printer (with the expense of ink & paper), or a laptop dedicated to the job.  It seems to be a bit more expensive for the merchant account but the ease and mobility is nice.  I think that in the long run, we will be saving money.

We are down to our last couple of bags of puppy food.  I know, how could that happen?  But, every year about this time we have an issue.  I understand that we have made an appeal to the PetCo foundation for a donation and I am hoping to hear a positive result soon.  It may not come soon enough.  So… if we need to make the expenditure of puppy food we are looking at other ways to make up the difference.  One way is that Pfizer a manufacture of vaccines and animal health products has a shelter program that we are trying to qualify for.  If we are accepted, we can purchase our vaccines for a much reduced price.  Also, we qualify for a Colorado sales tax exemption.  I am working on our exemption so that when we do have to make purchases, we can save on the sales tax. 

Our travel expenses have increased also.  Really? You say.  I know our fosters and volunteers are feeling the burden also.  We have some outstanding volunteers that have had to cut back or discontinue working with us because of the costs.  Last month, Volunteer Regina submitted for a grant from PetCo that would fund transportation expenses.  They asked for new and innovative ideas from organizations.  We think that in these hard times and expensive fuel prices, supporting the costs of volunteers and fosters travel expenses would be a great service.  We shall see if they are interested in supporting our efforts.  Thank you Regina.

Last year Volunteer Rhonda was instrumental in helping us acquire a large donation of pet supplies.  Collars, leashes, etc.  Now, we need to make that donation work for us.  Please let me know if you have contacts for garage sales or flea markets that we can attend to sell these items.  I’m open to all suggestions.

I understand that Volunteer Christy has been hard at work updating our data base.  It won’t be long now that we can launch our empty plate dinner fundraiser.  In the past the empty plate dinner has been a great source of donations for the rescue.  This year I would like to see those funds used to replace both our plastic travel crates and our black wire crates.  As your know they are well used and the harsh cleansers that we have to use have taken there toll.  Thank you Christy.

Finally, I would like to thank everyone for a great year so far.  Everyone of you are such a great joy in my life.  It was a year ago this week on the 28th that we lost one of our dear friends Linda Griess.  Many of you remember her, as I do.  Please know that you are a part of something important.  You are wanted and needed.  You have a purpose and by being a part of Colorado Puppy Rescue you are making a difference.

Friday's Fix

Is there anything cuter than puppies climbing over each other for food?

From the 2008 Foster Calendar

Week two of vacaction and our second week without puppies. I thougt I'd start Friday's Fix. Normally I'd share some of the best photos (and volunteer puppy favorites) from the week's adoptable puppies. Today  I'm going to share some of my All-time favorite CPR foster photos. Enjoy!

This pup was working hard with his foster mom at the Wings Over the Rockies Museum.

After a hard day of play.

CAR RIDE!!!!

What hole?

You want it? Come and get it!

Changing Things Up A Bit

That's a pic of the web design before our current one.

Vacation. For one whole month CPR is on vacation. We don't have any puppies in our system and it's a much needed break for our staff, volunteers, and fosters. Not me. I'm redesigning our website. It's been a while since I've updated our look and information. We need to stay ahead of the game.
 I asked for some suggestions on FB and came away with lots of ideas and contacts for graphic designers. Now to figure our my direction.
*New logo (maybe) I like the logo we have because it has the cutsy, mom and pop look that I think describes our company the best. But, I'd like to look at new colors and something more professional looking. A few of the volunteers made a good point about "brand recognition."
*New website look- I'm looking at new colors and cleaner pages
*Updated information

My deadline is February 22nd. I hope to have everything together by then. But one of the best things about being the boss is the flexible deadlines. ;)

I'm open to suggestions. Feel free to write me.