Pet Projectz

Nothing can hurt or help more than words and they are something that’s truly priceless.

I was checking my LinkedIn page today and saw that a few people had given me recommendations including Sam Weidner Jr who was the VP of Patriot Homes and who had written the following:

“I have had the honor and the privilege to see a true artist at work. I hired Suzanne Felber to help Patriot Homes take a new, innovative, and aggressive role in helping redefine manufactured homes as people knew them. Without question she tackled that task with enthusiasm, and a creative vigor unlike anyone had seen in our industry at the time. Suzanne has a brilliant mind for knowing design trends and how to present her designs in a way that attracts buyers from all walks of life. With her help Patriot was able to win over 9 housing design awards including an award for best marketing campaign awarded by the NAHB. If you want your products to look the best the hire the best, Suzanne Felber.”
Service Category: Professional Lifestylist
Year first hired: 2002
Top Qualities: Great Results, Good Value, Creative

It’s one thing when you think that you have given a job your all, but when you receive something like this out of the blue it makes you want to go out and work that much harder, and give that client a big hug!

I’m honored to have worked with Sam and his company, and I’m looking forward to working with him even more in the future!

Homearama in Rochester, NY is showing off a new trend in architecture this year – Barkitecture. Something near and dear to my heart, builders at the show this year not only built show houses for people to tour, they also did an outstanding job of building dog houses that are now being auctioned off with all proceeds going to Lollypop Farm.

David Riedman and @home Builders as always did an outstanding job and I see from the auction site that their home already sold. Daisy is going to be very disappointed – she had her heart set on lounging on the porch and eating the flowers in the window boxes.

Your Life. Your Style. Your Way. This is what the Lifestylist® philosophy is all about, and pampering your four legged family members with a home that benefits less fortunate pets is a great way to live with style!

This has been a great week – we got 3 kittens adopted and have a wonderful neighbor that’s willing to adopt a German Shepherd! It feels great to find loving homes for these animals and to educate people about adopting instead of buying pets from puppy mills and pet stores.

While I was looking for a dog for my neighbor I was shocked at how many purebred animals there are out there looking for a home – even more of a reason to get the word out about adopting.

Lily is one of our rescue pets, and she loves walking the neighborhood and seeing all of the kids. She’s a big ham and is always up for dressing for the occasion!

Tucson will always be my home away from home, and one of the reasons I love Tucson so much is the people. They tend to call things like they see them, and they don’t back away from a controversy.

Tucson Weekly is a wonderful publication that talks about all things Tucson, and I was thrilled to hear about a great story that Time Vanderpool wrote recently about Petland and how they buy their puppies from puppy mills and keep them in inhumane conditions.

Be sure to read this very unbiased account of how Petland continues to do business and what Petland and the Hunte Corporation’s ratings are with the Better Business Bureau. One of the readers also directed me to an interesting area on the Consumer Affairs website – over 40 pages of complaints about Petland!

Nothing warms my heart more than hearing about people like Oprah who can pretty much buy any animal they wanted to but instead choses to adopt a shelter soul and save them.

Oprah’s precious new baby Sadie was shown in this article on MSNBC and I can see why she fell in love with the four-legged angel. Thanks Oprah, for being such a great role model for all of us.

I have a favor to ask of all of you that really doesn’t have anything to do with this blog but it does – my 10 year old nephew is learning an important lesson about marketing and the power of the internet.

Sam lives in Oklahoma City and is the ultimate sports fan – he is crazy about the OKC Thunders and goes dressed to show his support to almost every game. His parents have always been wise enough to let Sam find his own calling, so his enthusiasm (and his outfits) are all his idea. Because of this, Sam was nominated to be part of the Ultimate Fan Finale.

He is also a great well rounded child (and I am a proud aunt!),does very well in school and loves to cook with me – we entered the State Fair of Texas Cooking contests this year and Sam won two 2nd place ribbons!

If Sam wins this contest he gets to go to Boston and see his team play there as well as learn some valuable history lessons when he gets to tour the city.

Please help me encourage Sam to follow his dreams. The link for where to vote on the NBA site is here, and you can vote was many times as you would like. Most of the others that are up for this honor are adults so I’m even more proud of what he’s accomplished. Please vote for Sam Davis and vote often!

I read about a great organization the other day – Global Gardens Foundation. They are using art to raise funds to help rebuild the 9th ward in New Orleans and are using dog images as their medium.

Why dogs? The quick answer is because they embody what we aspire to achieve… unconditional love!
A dog doesn’t care about your choice of political party, your color or creed…
They just love you!
We chose the dog, or the dog chose us…because they inspire us!

Another great reason to visit a local shelter or rescue group to find teh love of your life.

I was out running errand the other day and noticed a Petland store – I had heard about them in the past but hadn’t been in one in a long time, so I decided to stop in and see for myself what they offered.

The slogan that Petland uses is “Pets make Life Better” – maybe they should think about making life better for those pets that they have housed in horrible containers with an open grate floor and the only water source for most was a rodent waterer which you can see in the back of these cages. No blankets – the only place for these babies to be able to lie down is on a plastic grate or a plastic blue container. The holes in most of these grates were larger than the paws of many of these babies and they were continually having their paws slip through the grates.

By the time I left I was shaking and wanted to buy every single one of these babies and take them home. But at least I had the sense in an emotional situation like that to know that any animal I saved would be quickly replaced by two (or more) babies that I had subsidized by my purchase. These stores prey on parents and kind hearted individuals by trying to get you to hold a puppy the moment you start looking at the cages, and they are hoping that you become emotionally attached to that pet and have to have it. This often comes before the buyer has given any thought to where they are going to house this animal and that it’s not only life changing for the pet, it will also be for you. My own daughter fell into this trap and ended up with two energetic dogs that never were house broken and one had a genetic disease where all of her teeth fell out and they have had thousands of dollars of vet bills because they do consider it a purchase for life.

Something that doesn’t seem to be talked about much is the physiological damage spending their early years in a cage behind glass with people banging on their glass to get their attention does. I think trying to get these animals housebroken has got to be an issue because they are taken away from mothers and siblings and put in a cage with no where to go.

There is nothing better than bringing an animal into your life, but it is a commitment of time and finances and should not be entered into without a lot of thought and discussion. Most rescue organizations spend a lot of time helping individuals find the perfect pets for them and their lifestyles. Puppies are adorable, but the whole housebreaking and teething thing had me adopting three adult dogs who are the loves of my life. I can never repay them for what they have brought into my life, and there’s something about the attitude of a rescue animal that is very special. We all feel very grateful that we found each other.

If you need information about where to find a rescue group in your area, please feel free to contact me. You would be amazed to know that there are rescue groups out there for almost every purebred breed as well as “pound puppies”. The wonderful efforts of organizations like the Humane Society of the United States (HSUS) to shut down puppy mills has made it possible to rescue many of the animals that you see in pet shops instead of obtaining one from a shop that will use your money to increase the business for these places.

Put your yourself into the place of what some of these animals are having to go through and I’m sure you will think twice about where you find the new love of your life.

Today I decided to take a stand about something I feel is wrong, and even though it was cold and windy, it felt really good to be there. Over 120 individuals gathered in Plano Texas to protest against Petland and the fact that they support puppy mills.

The rally was well organized by the Humane Society of the United States. Those of us taking part in the rally were much better behaved than the Petland store employees and the vet who does the vet work for the store, and it was very rewarding to have lots of people hinking and showing their support for us – one individual who wasn’t even a part of the group brought her dog back so we could meet the love her life who was a rescue dog.

The media attended as well and gave us very positive coverage. Even the police that were asked to be there thought we were very well behaved. I had a lovely conversation with an officer and was able to educate him on why we were there as a Petland employee that looked like he was the manager gave us a “one finger salute”. Obviously they couldn’t have been very busy because there seemed to be plenty of their staff outside of the store watching us.