Our New Puppy by Alicia Kasson

On the Saturday of December 27th, my dad was searching through the pets section of the Syracuse classified ads and found goldendoodle puppies for sale in Canandaigua, NY.  My dad called the number and asked if we could visit them that day at around 3:00.  The lady said that that was find and gave him her address.  She had an accent that my dad couldn't place.

My sister and my dad left the house to pick me up at my track meet in Cortland. Between my events my dad called me and told me about the puppies and cleared everything by me.  I asked for pictures but there wasn't any connected to the ad.  I decided to call the number and ask about it.  The same lady with the accent who my dad told me about answered and said that her friend took some pictures of the puppies and she would see if she could send them to me.  I received a picture of our soon-to-be new puppy and her 4 siblings. 

After my event, my dad, sister, and I followed the GPS to the address from the ad.  As we neared the end of our trip, we found ourselves in the middle of farm country.  We weren't surprised when we pulled up to a farmhouse with a barn.  We noticed a very nice cart in the driveway and no cars in sight.  We parked and got out of the car.  A golden retriever was running around the yard who we assumed was the mother of the puppies.  The door opened and a woman in a bonnet and a long dress greeted us.  We went inside and saw two puppies curled up next to each other on the door mat.  There were also three girls and a one year old boy in the living room.  The woman told us that she gave the puppies a bath and they were still drying off.  She told us that she has 12 children, all of whom still live at home.  Her oldest son is 19 and a carpenter.  He bought the cart outside because he wanted a nicer one than the one they had before.  They don't own any cars and the kids ride their bikes to a private, Mennonite school.  The family makes a living off their dairy farm.  They sell the milk they get from about 30 cows.  The family also had horses like us so we showed them pictures of our horses on our phones.  They were so excited to see our phones!

After our nice conversation about their Mennonite way of life, we got the female dog's paperwork and asked about the puppy's parents and other basics. We learned the puppies were born in a hay mow and the kids named her Friendly because she was the friendliest of all the puppies.  She was born on October 14th, so she was about 2 1/2 months old.  Her mom was the golden retriever outside and her dad, a poodle, was located in Penn Yan.  She had nine siblings, one of which died at birth.  There were three girls in the litter and six boys.  There was only one girl and one boy left.  I wanted a girl so we decided to get the girl dog.

We wrapped her up in a towel that we brought, paid for her, thanked them, and then left.  She slept the whole ride home.  When we got home, we realized she was very sensitive to sounds such as cell phone alerts or the TV.  After two days of having her home, we finally decided to name her "Macey" after a long debate.  It recently snowed and we found out that she loves to roll in the snow and eat the snow.  We were surprised to learn that she was nervous in the barn around the sheep and horses.  She does barn chores with us every night so she is getting used to the other animals.  Macey really likes the chickens...chasing them, that is!!!  

We are so happy to have Macey in our lives and can't wait to see how she will grow!