This may be a little late of a post since Bo is all over my social media. How could she not be with that face?! But I wanted to record my thoughts on the process of being ready for a pup and choosing Bo.

Jaime and I are both planners. We can be spontaneous, but it’s usually because we’ve built in time for spontaneity in our lives. Hah. So we’ve been talking about getting a dog for years, and finally, this past May we did it. We researched the type of dog we wanted, a male Blue Tick Hound or possibly a Treen Walker, we chose a facility that had puppies available in similar breeds to adopt and found The Humane Society in Greenville, SC. We even had a specific dog chosen and hoped he’d still be there for us.

When we walked in we immediately met eyes with our desired pup: Fidget. We walked right to his cage and saw he was the one! We quickly reserved him… and then a shelter employee came towards the cages with food. Fidget and all the pups went nuts. I mean, totally crazy… except one, a little red female dog called Tabbie. For whatever reason, I felt compelled to stick my finger in Tabbie’s cage and she immediately began to play with me. I looked up at Jaime and he knew. We told the lady to please reserve Tabbie. “Are you sure?” she asked. We could lose Fidget, the adorable dog who was the specific breed and gender we wanted.

“Yes,” I relented looking at the calm, sweet dog before us.

When we went into the bonding room, she was scared. Our research had told us that dogs in a shelter aren’t their true selves. A dog can be calm in a cage, yet totally outgoing outside, or vice versa. So we weren’t ready to give up on Fidget just yet as the poor pup was excited about being fed. But as we spoke to each other ignoring her for a bit, a tactic we also read was helpful in determining a dog’s personality once you’re in the bonding room, we were done. She melted our hearts as she tugged on us to play jumping around excitedly. There was no way we were putting her back in a cage.

We took her home and she slept the entire two hour drive… snoring loudly. It was adorable. Since then, we’ve gotten a few theories on her breed. Mostly we get Rhodesian Ridgeback mixed with some kind of hound, maybe even a Treen Walker.

I’m so glad we chose to adopt, though I do respect folks who choose to bring a dog into their home any way that’s right for them. I must say, nothing I read could have prepared me for the heartache of seeing all those puppies and only taking home one. I felt guilty that we didn’t adopt Fidget, his little face had been on our minds for a week before we drove up. But, in the end, we can’t plan and research everything. We chose the dog that was perfect for us… and then changed her name to something better: Bo.

Later, we came to find out Bo is a way of saying bro in North Carolina, which is hilarious and totally fine. For the record though, we were inspired by bombshell Bo Derickson!