puppy | Styled Milk

Our sweet, mischievous, LOUD puppy (or turning out to be not-so-puppy-anymore) turned two this June. It’s only fair to pay him his birthday tribute he undoubtedly deserves. We rescued Wyatt from Oregon Human Society (OHS) in August of 2011 during one of their puppy adoption days. Every time new puppies would arrive, they would be adopted before you could see them online and drive there – so when this event publicized that over 100 puppies would be available on the same day – we were SO excited. They posted all of the puppies at 10p.m. the night before the event and Sam & I chose two that we would ask to look at first. Gus & Armando.

The event started at 11 and we got there around 9:45 to which we found a line forming already. The couple ahead of us were talking to each other and were going to request Gus. (shoot). We thought for sure we would end up second in line for each of the two puppies and would miss out on our puppy. Surprisingly, when the doors opened and we rushed to the counter, we were the first to see Armando (meaning we could adopt him if we wanted!) We went into the visiting room and they brought him to meet us. LOVE AT FIRST SIGHT. Armando (I bet you’re wondering why we didn’t leave Wyatt as Armando) was the cutest puppy alive. We had visited OHS before and had placed application for adoption for one other dog. They told us the process if we were to be accepted, the puppy would have come home with us three days later, so when we decided to take Armando home, we thought we’d have the three day time period. OHS had prepared for these puppies to go fast so they took care of all of the typical things that they do over that three day time period and they handed him right over to us to take home THAT SAME DAY! Our small apartment in downtown Portland was definitely not puppy proof, we had no puppy supplies, and we were absolutely clueless but HEAD OVER HEELS IN LOVE WITH THIS PUPPY.

We got in the car, Armando in my lap and we just looked at each other like WHAT DID WE JUST DO?… they just give away puppies?…. how do they know if we’re prepared for this?…. WHERE’S THE CLOSEST PUPPY STORE!?…. In that moment, we first became parents. We had played around with a couple of possible names prior to going to OHS and Wyatt had never entered our minds. Within 2 blocks from the humane society, I mentioned Wyatt and it was a done deal. (Sam and I are pretty decisive when it comes to names :: Evelyn was named when I was only 6 weeks pregnant).

Although we were not mentally, physically or monetarily prepared to parent a new puppy (8 weeks old), Wyatt was the greatest thing that came into our relationship. Seeing Wyatt prance around our apartment, pounce on butterflies in the park, cuddle to the morning news, and even nurturing him while he was sick (more about that, later), Wyatt stole our hearts. Over the past two years, we have loved taking Wyatt to the beach to chase Seagulls, to the dog park to socialize with other pups, on (pdx) family vacations to annoy all of our friends with his barking and needy-ness, on endless walks where he tries to carry oversized sticks, to the river to go swimming, to ANYWHERE AND EVERYWHERE we go! He is the sweetest, most loving, most gentle puppy. He demonstrates this with little miss e daily. She loves to tug on his fur and even his ear (which in most cases, always has some sort of ear infection -poor pup), and he never snaps at her. He will turn around to see her, and though he’s obviously annoyed, he gives her kisses. There’s no doubt that Evy and Wyatt will be best friends. Wyatt was our first baby and we treat him like any other member of our family. We are so lucky to have Wyatt in our family & can’t wait to celebrate many more birthdays (maybe he’ll start to slow down… in another year or five). Until then, we celebrate his energy, his slobbery kisses, his clumsiness and his always-wagging tail.