Hampton the Puppy

In May 2009 we had to put our dog Bo down. He was 14 and almost completely incapacitated so it was time but that didn't make saying goodbye any easier. Bo was the perfect dog and my husband and I always joked about cloning him. Little did we know we would be fortunate enough to come very close to doing so... We have always loved dogs and we knew we would eventually welcome another dog into our family. We also are very aware of pet overpopulation issues and irresponsible dog breeding. We adopted our last 2 dogs at county animal shelters. After several months of mourning Bo, we realized it was time to enlarge our family, however, I did NOT want a puppy. We are a busy family and I didn't want to struggle through the first few months of puppy hood...We had adopted Bo at about 10 months and that worked very well for us so we thought finding a dog around a year old would be perfect. We searched for weeks at local shelters, county animal control, PRBJ and online but never found "the one". We saw so many deserving dogs but we knew we had to find the dog that would fit with our family. One night, I was online once again checking websites and came across a picture of an 8 week old puppy named Hampton on PRBJ's website. We had been at PRBJ that weekend but never saw him because Hampton was being fostered by a wonderfully kind woman named Nicole and her daughter Abigail. What struck me was how much Hampton looked like Bo! A black fur ball with sweet brown eyes...I knew right away we needed to meet him. I registered online and indicated my interest in Hampton and Nicole contacted me to set up a meeting at PRBJ that week! We knew the moment we saw Hampton that he was "the one" and we have not been disappointed or had one moment of regret. We renamed him Boo after Bo (Bo with an extra O). He is so very sweet and playful and has folded right into our family from day one. It really is uncanny how much Boo reminds us of our old dog Bo. He LOVES playing with the kids and swimming in the pool! Nicole had warned me he loved the water and it took us a week or two to train him not to play in his water bowl but that was easy once he discovered the pool! We are fortunate to live on a very dog friendly cul-de-sac so Boo has several dog friends he sees daily. He also loves car rides and the dog park. He is about 5 months now and doing very well. Yes, we struggled through a few weeks of potty training but all in all it was not nearly as bad as we anticipated. Boo is a quick study and so very eager to please. By the time he was 4 months, my 9 yr old son (Boo's best friend) had already trained Boo to sit, stay and down. We feel very fortunate to have found him. Our former dog Bo left some big shoes to fill but Boo is well on his way to doing just that... Our most sincere thanks to Nicole, Abigail, Amanda, Jessica and, of course, Judy for all you did for Boo and all you do for so many other animals.