Sasha
I remember the first day we saw her. It was 2000; we were living in Florida, and planning to move to Connecticut in just a few weeks. We decided to wander into that pet store, just to browse. All my life I'd wanted a dog, and Tony was a dog-lover, too, so I knew someday we'd have a dog. I just didn't know it would be that soon.
It was a pet store, yes, but the animals they sold were not the pricey purebreds in a lot of pet stores. They were rescues, and when you bought them, all you had to pay was a $100 adoption fee to cover their basic shots and such. There was a whole litter of black puppies, some with white markings, that had been rescued, each of them in separate cages. And Sasha... she caught our eyes immediately. I don't even know why. But we were both in love. We managed to talk ourselves out of it on that first visit, and did that whole "well, if she's still here next time we come, then maybe" game, feeling sure that a cutie like her would be snatched up immediately. But the next time we came (I don't know how many days later it was), she was still there, and according to Tony, we played this little game a few times, our resistance wearing thinner each time. And somehow we got the crazy idea to adopt a puppy less than a week before moving over 1,000 miles away.
I remember those first few nights--trying to keep her quiet because we weren't supposed to have dogs in our apartment, trying to crate-train her and failing miserably. I remember her nipping me constantly and me finally breaking down and crying one day because I was sure she hated me. She was my first dog, and though I had bought and read a few books about raising a puppy, I really had no idea how puppies acted, and couldn't help taking it all a little personally.
And then came the day we were going to leave. The truck we rented had a little sliding door in the cab that opened into the back of the truck, and Tony somehow managed to magically pack the truck to create a little space for Sasha. There was a couple feet of floor space, and then our armchair, so she had a soft place to hop onto. And surrounding all that were various bookcases and dressers and such (I think our mattress was on top) to keep her from getting anywhere else in the back of the truck. We laid newspaper on the floor and hoped for the best. And to our complete surprise, she only peed one time in the truck.
I should mention, too, that we didn't drive straight from Florida to Connecticut. Our first stop was New Orleans (to visit friends); then Atlanta, Georgia (again, friends); then Pennsylvania/Maryland (to visit Tony's family); and then finally Connecticut. And we were in Connecticut less than a week before making a 12-hour road trip to Prince Edward Island to vacation with my family. Poor pup probably had no clue where her true home was for a while.
Us with Sasha, Prince Edward Island, 2000
It didn't take us long to settle on a name for Sasha, though I'm not entirely sure what led us to that name. But I later found out it means "defender of mankind" and thought that was pretty cool.
I don't remember a lot of details of Sasha's puppyhood. She was your typical puppy, though... nippy and always destroying something, etc. She especially loved to dig holes, but we did a little reading and learned that if you put cayenne pepper on the edge of a hole, the dog won't keep digging there. Of course, that didn't stop her from just making new holes.
When we potty-trained her, we trained her to ring a set of jingle bells by the door, which was a "trick" that always impressed visitors. It wasn't my idea--I read it in a dog book--but it was brilliant, and easy to implement. All we had to do was ring the bells like crazy every time we took her out, talk excitedly about going potty, and soon she put it all together and realized that ringing the bells meant it was potty time. Because of the way our first apartment was situated, you couldn't see the door from anywhere in the apartment (it was kind of in its own hallway), so it was a great way to know she had to go out. She caught on so quickly, too... she was always a smart dog.
We did take her to obedience school, and though we struggled at first (especially when I had her), she did beautifully. People were always impressed by how well she listened to us and obeyed commands.
Sasha's first home, our apartment, late 2000 or early 2001
It wasn't all good times when she was a pup, though. She and I had quite a few power struggles and I tried to teach her that I was above her in the pack. She never had any issues with Tony, and I'm sure the fact that he is a guy with a deep, commanding voice, is the reason. But me... we had our moments. But once she learned her place in the pack, things were beautiful. But we always had to be careful with her around other dogs. She was never one to back down, and wouldn't take any other dog trying to dominate her. She put Ivan in his place more than once after we got him...
Ivan
I don't know when exactly we decided we wanted a second dog. Probably because it wasn't some big "decision" we wrestled with. We just adored Sasha, and kids were nowhere in the plans, and we knew we wanted another dog. A perfect opportunity presented itself when Tony's sister's dogs had a litter of puppies. The mother was a black lab and the dad was a chocolate lab (both purebred), so the litter was a mix of both kinds. Before we ever met the puppies, we both "agreed" that we'd get a chocolate one, and a male, just for variety's sake.
I don't remember if we decided on a name before or after we met the puppies (I'm thinking after), but we knew we wanted a name that "went" with Sasha's name, so I started researching Russian names. Most felt too long and complicated for a dog, and I leaned toward "Boris" for a while (mostly because I found it amusing), but we eventually agreed on Ivan.
When we met the puppies, during a visit in Christmas 2004, we did find a male chocolate one that we both liked. But then there was this scruffy little black one with wavy fur that just loved me. He would come to me when I called him, struggle to get to me when the other pups were scrambling all over my lap. I remember looking across the room at Tony one time, and Tony just smiled at me. We both just knew. So much for our chocolate lab. Ivan had picked us (me, specifically), and that was that. We figured his extra playfulness would be a good match for Sasha... little did we know that he would NEVER calm down.
He wasn't quite old enough to leave his mother yet, so Tony drove back down about a month later (January 2005) to pick him up. I remember Tony texting me a picture of Ivan, hunkered down on the front seat of the car, looking scared. Tony had a crate in the backseat, but said Ivan just kept whining, so he finally brought him to the front seat.
Ivan in his first home with us, our apartment, 2005
We quickly learned that Ivan was a big chicken. In all fairness, I know, he was a puppy, so the whole world was new to him. So maybe it's unfair to call him a chicken. But even as he got older, he was still afraid of a lot of random things.
Ivan had lived in a one-story apartment and was paper-trained, so our two biggest obstacles were getting him to pee outside (and once snow covered the ground, we had a new challenge--teaching him that it was OK to pee on the snow... Tony even scraped snow away to reveal the grass, to prove to Ivan that it was fine to pee there) and teaching him to manage the stairs (he was terrified of them at first, then learned to go up but was scared to go down, and finally got the hang of them).
One of the first pictures of them together, 2005
As for how he and Sasha got along... well... I mentioned that Sasha is a pretty dominant dog. And based on "pack mentality" she was obviously the alpha. And Ivan was just a dumb puppy. She had to put him in his place many times, resulting one time in a gash on his nose that left a permanent scar, and resulting another time in him losing a baby tooth because she knocked it loose. And we knew all this scuffling was to be expected, and that we had to let them work it out. And they did. Though we often got the feeling, through the years, that Sasha was merely tolerating Ivan. But Ivan adored her. He adored everyone, actually.
You can see a couple marks on his nose here, from scuffles with Sasha, 2005
You would be hard-pressed to find a more loving dog than Ivan. I don't think I ever once saw him be mean. Oh, sure, he'd bark up a storm when someone came to the door (and being a huge, male dog, he had quite an impressive bark), but as soon as the door was opened, his tail was wagging and he was eager to make a new friend. We always joked that if someone ever broke into our house, he would love them to death.
As for his fur... like I said, both his parents were purebred labs. But as he grew, his wavy coat turned into longish, wavy and almost curly fur. I really don't know how to explain that... recessive gene? I don't know enough about genetics to wager a guess. I never wanted a long-haired dog because I knew grooming would be a pain (and it was), but I had to admit his coat was gorgeous. Everyone always commented on it. We used to joke that he was a "dumb jock"... pretty to look at, but totally stupid. We said that lovingly, of course.
When we decided to have a baby, of course the dogs were a concern, as far as how they would adjust to this new creature, how we could prepare them, etc. We did all we could do, but ultimately, we knew time would tell. We were more worried about Sasha, since we knew she had an aggressive streak, and less worried about Ivan, since he was just a big dumb lovebug. Sasha was great, though. Again, it seemed like she "tolerated" Ari in the same way she tolerated Ivan, but we never had any "scares" with the 2 of them. And of course we taught Ari how to behave with the dogs and kept them supervised, so we weren't putting all the responsibility on Sasha.
But Ivan, he was fantastic with Ari. She could do ANYthing to him (and I have pictures to prove it), and he wouldn't mind. He was almost desperate for affection... we joked that you could beat him, and he would still nuzzle you and beg for more. Again, we taught Ari how to handle him, and would scold her if she pulled his fur or sat on him or anything like that, but it didn't matter to Ivan. It was almost like he was thrilled to have a playmate who adored him as much as he adored her, since Sasha wasn't quite that into him. He really was Ari's dog, and the perfect dog for a kid to have.
My favorite picture of Ivan and Ari together, November 2008
I could go on and on about the 2 of them, but this is plenty long enough, and like I said, I just wanted to tell the basic stories of how they joined our family. I'll end with a couple more pictures...
Fall 2009
The last picture I have of them together, July 2010
