Puppy Fun Day 2018

One of the funniest days of the year for Guide Dogs for the Blind volunteers and staff is Puppy Fun Day when we honor the selfless puppy raisers.  These devoted people love and train a cute little puppy knowing that he will eventually leave them to be trained to be a guide dog.  This day is all about them.

Last year 1000 puppies were born at Guide Dogs for the Blind's campus in California.  Of those puppies, 300 went all the way through their training to become guides.  50 more were selected for the breeding pool.  The rest were career changed to become therapy dogs or search and rescue dogs or service dogs or autism dogs....or really wonderful pets.

They say it takes about 251 volunteers to raise one Guide Dog!  I'm glad I get to be one of them.

Each year has a theme and this year it was "SPACE ROVERS"

The vet clinic where I volunteer each Wednesday morning was "Sick Bay 3018" featuring lots of Vulcan doctors and various aliens!

Darth and Yoda were the welcoming committee to the pedigree area where puppy raisers could get information on their dog's blood line.  

I talked to one raiser who had raised 15 puppies.  Some of her puppies were the grandchildren of others that she has raised.  There is an entire department devoted to the breeding program.

A fun new attraction this year was the chance to make pawprint art! The puppies just looked at the volunteers like, "Humans are so weird!"  But they are cooperative and didn't seem to mind too much.

George and I manned the "Poo Toss" game.  Participants could throw bags of 'poo' into buckets for a prize or into the monster mouth for a 'grand prize.'  And less you worry, no real 'poo' was involved! One funny thing was when I was talking to a mom and her 8 year old son and mentioned that my wig was itchy.  The little boy said, "That's a wig????"   I so badly wanted to tell him that it was my natural color!