Three Dogs?

It seems that after our two dogs passed away in November that all the stray animals in the neighborhood knew!  First, Countess the cat showed up - while the dogs were still alive but on their last legs so to speak.  Then a few days after we'd actually buried the dogs, the little stray that we ended up calling Wishbone appeared.

Stray dogs and cats are a big problem in our little city and all over Brazil and many third world countries.  In a place where there isn't even enough money to help people, it's hard to find funding to help animals.  Added to that problem is that many individuals give food to stray animals that roam the streets, but they don't invite them into their homes or take care of them.  People are very hesitant to consider the good of making sure that there are no strays.  They think it's a problem for the government and not their own.  I hope as you boys study more about government and history that you will see the need of the individual in society to do his own part to do good.  But that's another lesson and story to another day.

One day while we were all out in the front yard we heard our neighbor on the corner give a yell. Someone had just driven up near her gate, opened their car door and thrown out three puppies.  She ran towards the car shouting - Don't do that!  Stop! Come back here and get these dogs!  Uncle Byron heard her yelling.  He said she also yelled some Portuguese words that he had never heard before.    Her husband jumped in his own car and took off after the people but they were fast and gone.

Now you need to understand that our neighbors think more like we do culturally and politically because they were raised in the more modern part of Southern Brazil.  They are very responsible and see the need for each person to do his part to make a city or country work.  That's why they were concerned about this person just dumping dogs out of his car.

After the neighbor man came back home, he and Byron looked around for the little dogs.  It was already dark by then.  They saw them but the dogs ran away from them.  Not really sure what to do next since it was dark, our neighbor put on some water on his front porch and we all tucked in for the night in our homes.

Early the next morning one of the little dogs showed up at our house...

We were very happy to let it in as we thought that our new dog could really use a friend.

The day after that another little dog that looked just like the little black puppy showed up at our gate.  She must have spent the time hiding out somewhere or another and heard our new puppy, her sister's bark and found our house.  We weren't really sure what to do, but we let her in!  Then Uncle Byron said, what will we do if the third of the three dumped dogs shows up?  But no one has seen hide nor hair of that last dog that our neighbor thinks was lighter colored.

The three dogs seemed very happy together but I wondered if one of our missionary friends or maybe another neighbor might like the dog and I posted a picture of the two on Facebook.  Our missionary friends in Petrolina decided to adopt the extra of the two sisters and she went to live with them this past Thursday.

So far the dogs and cats get along okay.  Countess is obviously the owner of the house as she must feel that she was here first!  Sometimes she lays in the doorway and won't let the dogs come or go!

Job 1: 21 says... "the LORD gave, and the LORD hath taken away; blessed be the name of the LORD."  Seems God took away Girl and Tiny but quickly replaced them with animals that had no homes and needed a family!

When all three dogs were here, 
Greyson suggested we had a dog laying under every chair, 
and if we got any more dogs, 
we would have to go out and get some more chairs.

Ah, the one we kept is here in the front of this last photo.  
We named her Spunky.