Capri & Sasha ~ Sasha & Capri

Sasha, The Story: It was a cold day in October, the year 2000… ok seriously… I was at Target with some friends and there was a family selling their litter of Akita-Dalmation puppies out front for a mere $10 a pup. I immediately fell in love with this little yellow mix, the only one without black and white markings (we later found out she probably had a yellow lab dad). We decided to get her and purchased all of the necessities at the store before taking her to Ryan’s work as a “surprise”. He was currently working at Garts just across the street so I brought her in all bundled up in my coat. Of course the other girls in the store swarmed and by the time Ryan made it over he was surrounded by not only the puppy, but 6 girls giving him puppy dog eyes as well, how could he say no!?! Well, he loved her too but the fact was we weren’t allowed to have pets at our current apartment. She spent the night with us and we devised a plan, we were sure Ryan’s parents would love a new puppy right!? With only Michael left at home it seemed like the perfect solution. We were hopeful and made sure she looked her best, bow and all. We went to his parents with Sasha following close behind as we walked into the house, she didn’t have a name yet but Ryan’s sister was on a mission in Russia at the time and Sasha was chosen as a good Russian name. Ryan’s brother and mom rushed over to play with her while his dad kept his distance, giving us a “what have you done?” look. It was decided that joint custody would be the best solution and as soon as we could take her we would, little did we know that would be 7 years… She happily became the family dog and over the years everyone loved her, the neighbors, the family, especially our little nephew. When we purchased our house in 2006 it was quickly determined we were finally in the perfect position to take her, now they have visitation rights and when Ryan’s dad is here you will nearly always find Sasha at his side.


Capri, The Story: As we moved all along the Wasatch Front over the years we determined it would be nice to have a dog, well mostly me especially when Ryan was traveling, even if it was just a little one. Our first little pup was a Toy Poodle named Bender (after the robot in the cartoon Futurama). He was the best dog!! Such a sweetie and very smart, actually too smart. He was acting out (accidents on the carpet, chewing on things, etc.) and we hoped a friend to play with him while we were at work would help, that’s when we got Capri. She is a Miniature Schnauzer and was only 1 pound when we purchased her from Bird World. To wrap up the Bender story, this didn’t help and he now lives with a wonderful family with three kids to give him plenty of attention! Back to Capri… We got her in January of 2006 and she has been my baby ever since. She is very playful and territorial, she gets jealous of Sasha easily, but she is a good friend and loves to pick on Sasha for attention. It will be very interesting to see how she responds to the new baby, she is pretty good with kids and keeps her distance but this will be different for her. We named her after the beautiful Italian island of Capri, one of our favorite places!