Petlife logo

My Name is Kia

I Love Treats and Walks and My Ball

By Patricia KrzystekPublished 3 years ago 11 min read
Like
Kia April 2021

My name is Kia and this is my story. I was born on April 3rd 2018 in South Indian Lake, Manitoba. I was born with 2 sisters and 4 brothers. My birth mother is a dog. I don't really remember what she looks like, but I remember the smell of her warm milk and the feel of her furry warm body.

I don't remember my dog dad either....I don't even know if I met him! I do know that all my sisters and brothers and me look different. I wonder why that is?

Kia's Litter

When I was 10 weeks old I was brought to Calgary, Alberta with my brothers and sisters by Pause4Change. I guess they are a "rescue" that saves animals. I heard there was a big fire where I was born and we were in danger from it. I don't really remember that though. It was a long time ago.

Here I am at 10 weeks old! Aren't I cute??

Kia 10 weeks old

When I was at Pause4Change I got my name, Kia. I was named after a car...humans are weird. My brothers and sisters were named after cars too. While I was at Pause4Change I got stay with my brothers and sisters for a bit longer and then I was moved to a house by myself. I was sad to leave my brothers and sisters but I still got to see them once in a while. I got to go to a Birthday Party with my brother Mack and my sister Lexus. I also got to learn new stuff too, like how to sit. I got lots of treats for sitting and walking on a leash.

Kia and Sister Lexus

I got my furever home in August 2018. I got to move in with 2 cats! I never saw a cat before so that was interesting. I got hissed at a lot by the big gray one and then the little gray one just ran away from me a lot. My new mom and dad kept this gate up so I couldn't go chase these cats. But they did give me a ton of toys and more treats.

Kia and Princess

My mom has more of a story to tell I guess, so now its her turn. FYI she talks a lot. If you get bored of reading all she has to say, just take a look at all the cute pictures of me!

Kia and Human Sister 2018

____________________________________________________

You heard Kia's story above and now for my point of view. Kia may have joined our family on July 28 2018 but that weaseled her way into our hearts on July 25th 2018. She was an adorable 3.5 month old puppy that we met through Pause4Change; An organization based out of Calgary that rescues animals. They don't normally rescue from Manitoba but they got a call when the wild fires in Northern Manitoba threatened the lives of countless dogs. They found a litter of 7 puppies and brought them all to Calgary.

They were very young, 10 weeks old. They were all named after cars. Tonka, Mac, Tesla, Lexus, Chevy, Kia and Shelby.

In all honesty Lexus was our first pic based on pictures, then Shelby and third, Kia. But don't tell Kia this, I will never hear the end of it!

Kia and sister Shelby

We applied for Lexus, but she was adopted right after our application. So we applied for Shelby, but she became a foster fail. So it was on to Kia.

She was adorable. Her pictures did not do her justice. We met at the foster home on July 25th. This adorable puppy met us at the door, jumping excitedly. She was small, her height to our calves. As we sat down she jumped up on my boyfriend and accidentally gave him a bloody lip with her hard head. My kids were with us to meet her and Kia gave us tons of kisses and then found a small plastic water bottle to play with. My youngest played fetch with her while we talked to the foster family. They told us she had lots of energy as all puppies do. She was crate trained and potty trained with only 1 accident a week. She knew how to sit and they were working on her lie down. She even walked well on a leash. During our visit she settled down after about 2 minutes and stopped jumping on us. She was being raised with 2 other small dogs and got along quite well with them. She hadn't been exposed to cats, and we had two at home.

Princess and Katie. We thought since Kia was so young, they would all get used to each other without any major problems.

After our visit we decided that we wanted to go ahead with a home visit at our house. It was scheduled for July 28th. Kia was to be dropped off at 10am and we were to bring her at 4pm to the Pet Expo at Eau Claire Market in Calgary.

The home visit didn't start off well. I will explain, the issue wasn't with Kia or the cats. For the home visit, one of the workers from the organization comes and inspects the house before the foster parent and puppy show up. That part went great! We had been told before to make sure cords are put away as they are a chewing hazard and to have a baby gate to keep the puppy contained. We had all that in place.

The foster parent came with Kia and brought her in. That is when the "problem" arose. The foster parent thought our home was not a good placement for Kia. We had a small yard and we lived in an OK neighborhood. It was a very "judge a book by its cover" type of situation. We had only met the foster parent a few days before in their neighborhood, which was a newer neighborhood in Calgary and the foster parent had a larger house and larger yard than we did.

The Pause4Change worker decided to proceed with the home visit though. I was extremely happy! First order of business was to introduce Kia to Princess.

Princess was a fat gray female cat that lived up to her name. Her favorite pastime was sleeping in the kitchen cupboard that housed the kitchen towels. She also loved chicken! Especially the hot and ready hens from Safeway. They were her favorite. Needless to say she was less than impressed with the bundle of fur that wagged her tail excitedly and barked at her. The meeting went like this:

"Princess, meet Kia" I said while opening the cupboard door a crack and looking in at her. Kia pushed her nose through the crack excitedly. Princess started hissing like a snake and growling like a lion. So I closed the cupboard.

Next came the meeting with Katie. Katie was a slender cat. She more of a loner and much more agile than Princess. One look at Kia and Katie ran away and hid under the bed. We didn't see her again till after Kia left.

Fist Halloween - Jailbird

After that we were very impressed with how well behaved Kia was. We got her a bowl of water and some food that was brought with her. We played with the toys that were delivered with her. We went to the backyard and attempted to play fetch. She wasn't very good at it since she was so young, but she enjoyed running around. We went on a walk and were impressed with how great she walked on a leash. No pulling at all!

I hate bananas!

At 3:30 pm it was time to head over to the Pet Expo to take her back to Pause4Change. Time to get in the car. Kia couldn't jump up into the sedan so we lifted her up and placed her in the backseat with my daughter. Off we went. Kia was great on the ride downtown. No issues at all. We got downtown and parked and we all got out of the car. As we walked towards the pet expo and more and more people got around us, we noticed that Kia was getting a bit scared. Her tail went in between her legs and she walked slower and slower and slower until she stopped walked at all and lied down. So we picked her up and carried her. She was happy with that, safe in my arms. We got to the Pause4Change tent and her sister Tesla was there. Tesla was a bit bigger than Kia and they didn't look like siblings at all. Tesla saw Kia and started barking. Kia didn't bark back and we were impressed! We decided in that moment that Kia was the puppy for us!

Where's the squirrel?

She was so well behaved! She didn't bark a lot, she didn't have any accidents during our home visits, she walked great on a leash and she didn't get into anything that she shouldn't have. She was a great puppy!

That night a couple of hours after dropping her back off we got a call that we could come and pick her up and take her home with us for good! We excitedly piled into the car and drove to get her. While we did the paperwork, my daughter played with her and we learned how to do training and we were given toys, treats and food for her as well. We took Kia home.

We hadn't realized just how smart Kia was at this point. We knew she was smart but we didn't realize she had been pulling our leg that whole day with her amazing behavior.

Merry Christmas!

Kia's first night at home with us was sleepless. We set up her crate in the living room and made sure it was cozy with blankets and some toys. We took her for a walk before bed and she had her pee and then it was bedtime. We said goodnight, and went to our bedroom. That is when the crying began. We could hear her through the walls, crying as if she was in pain. We listened for about a half hour, hoping she would stop and go to sleep. Nope! She just kept crying. So we decided to get up and go to the living room and check on her. She was so excited to see us...her tail wagging uncontrollably. We thought maybe she's thirsty, so we took her out of the crate, gave her a drink of water, took her outside for another pee and then tried again. Kia cried for another half hour. We decided at this point that we are sleeping in the living room on the couches.

We moved her crate closer to the couches, kind of in the middle and put our hands through the crate bars. That was our fist night with our new puppy Kia.

Sleeping In

The next day we decided to put a collar we bought for her on with a name tag that we had gotten for her. It was like she knew at that moment that she was home for good! She became a different dog! We took her for a walk and all she did was pull and try to eat every piece of garbage she could find! She started to bark at the cats! She tried to get into the garbage! She peed on the floor! She growled when she played with us! But it was too late! We all loved her by this point.We abandoned the crate on the second night and she ended up sleeping in our bed, tucked in between us.

They took me camping and it was so cold!

Fast forward 3 years. Kia is a bed hog! She takes up half of the bed every night. She has a routine and even though she can't read clocks, she knows when its time for breakfast, walks, and dinner. She is also a picky eater. We used to be able to buy a big bag of dog food for the month and she would eat it happily. Now its a new flavor every week. Chicken, beef, boar, venison, duck...you name it she's had it. She still loves treats! She still loves to look for garbage to eat on walks. Her dad tells her, "Its a walk not a buffet, Kia" on our walks. We walk 4 to 5 times a day. At least a half hour each time. We go to the dog park on weekends. She trembles during car rides, so she sits up front and needs a hand on her at all times. Kia hates rain and has her own rain coat. Kia hates the cold and has her own snowsuit. She is a demanding pain in the ass....but we love her with all our hearts!

I hate the rain!

Kia makes us laugh daily with her silly antics. She is a constant companion and comes with us almost everywhere we go. We take her camping, hiking, to stores where dogs are allowed, to grandmas house, everywhere! She may have tricked us but we are very glad she did!

Kia Kisses

dog
Like

About the Creator

Reader insights

Be the first to share your insights about this piece.

How does it work?

Add your insights

Comments

There are no comments for this story

Be the first to respond and start the conversation.

Sign in to comment

    Find us on social media

    Miscellaneous links

    • Explore
    • Contact
    • Privacy Policy
    • Terms of Use
    • Support

    © 2024 Creatd, Inc. All Rights Reserved.