This is a story of a one-eyed senior rescue dog name Cricket Noodle Soup. Okay, really her name is just Cricket but I tend to add things to the end of her name every single time I say it: Crickey-Doodle, Crickey Doodle Doo, Cricket Noodle Soup. Thankfully she responds to any of them.

Cricket is 12-years-old and was found wandering the streets in a nearby town. She was skittish and someone was finally able to catch her. She was so matted that they didn’t even know that she was missing an eye until they were able to cut her fur back. This is our first meeting at the shelter:

She jumped right in my lap:

I wasn’t sure we were ready yet for a new dog and I was talking to the shelter about fostering her for a while when a car drove up.  I could see the couple sitting inside the car with the windows rolled up, both smoking and cigarette smoke swirling around them. The doors opened up, they both flicked their butts next to the dog yard, and then the woman screeched, “Is THAT dog available? I want that one!” At that moment I pulled Cricket close and said, “Oh, I’m sorry…she’s already taken.” And that’s how we ended up with Cricket!

Ok, technically we were still just fostering, to make sure she was a good fit for our family. But she settled right in like she’d always been a part of our little menagerie. Sienna took right to her and Cricket to her. Cricket even chose to sleep in Sienna’s bed day and night:

When I woke up one morning and saw this I knew we were most likely a foster fail (or success! whichever way you look at it):

Cricket loves to walk…but she only has pep in her step when the leash is on. I put on her collar and leash each morning and she drags me around the neighborhood like she’s on a mission! And that’s when you see her smile:

Look at that grin!

We think she looks a little bit like Cookie Monster when she’s smiling:

She’s way too snuggly…it’s hard to get anything done when this face is looking at you:

She’s just made herself right at home:

Max is okay with her too:

Here’s a recent pic of Max just so he gets some air time:

We officially adopted Cricket on May 3. I signed the paperwork and Sienna signed it too. The same day Cricket decided to eat a doormat. It reminded me of when Sienna was in Kindergarten and I asked her why she was so good for her teachers but not so much for me and her answer was, “Because I hold all my bad behavior in all day and when I get home I just can’t hold it in anymore.” But she hasn’t done it again since…maybe she just sensed that something was different:

We were able to find out some of her backstory too. She has a microchip but her previous owner passed away and then she ended up homeless. She lost her eye a few years back when she was put in a yard with other dogs that turned on her. She’s not very trusting of other dogs right off the bat which is understandable…but she wants to be friends! My favorite thing is how vocal she is. Cricket talks to us constantly to let us know what she needs. And sometimes she just purrs:

 

A post shared by Ashley Hackshaw (@lilblueboo) on May 20, 2018 at 4:53pm PDT

As I write this today Cricket is outside in the sunshine. She never wanders off. She barks at anyone that drives by but never goes after them. When she wants to come back in she barks at the door. 

Happy used to do the same thing! We miss Happy so much but so thankful she opened our hearts to senior dog adoption. Senior Dogs 4 Ever Ya’ll. That should be my new Cricket hashtag. Here’s a photo of Happy just because she always makes me happy:

This year Happy’s sunset maple got its new leaves. It was the last of all our trees to lose its leaves last year. That almost exactly 251 days of sunset leafiness. We had Happy for 251 days. I feel like she sent us a sign. P.S. Can you spot Max?

The biggest difference between Happy and Cricket is that Happy always had a “resting smile face” and Cricket has more of a, well, “resting grump face?”

But she’s so sweet and we love her. To read more about all our animals click here! 

We lost our sweet Fo this last week, but the good news is that all Foshizzles go to heaven:

It was really sudden and unexpected. About a week ago I found her limping and found that she had broken a claw off and her toe was swollen. I put some antiseptic spray on it regularly but it turned into an infection. I soaked her foot in epsom salts a few times a day, each time covering it in salve and then fashioning a little bandage on her foot.

Her foot seemed to be getting better but Fo overall didn’t feel any better. We aren’t exactly sure why she went so fast but all of the sudden she started to have trouble breathing. We might have been able to go to extremes to keep her alive but every new thing we tried just seemed like it was making Fo uncomfortable, and she didn’t understand why we were doing it. It was a cool morning and the rain was so peaceful so I moved her right to the edge of the garage on a towel so that she could feel it. Sienna laid down with her and talked softly to her, telling her it was going to be okay. Fo had the most beautiful crimson red wattles, and that’s how I knew she was going to die, when her wattles began to turn an ashy color. So we just stopped trying and prayed that if she was going to suffer that she would go quickly. And she did. Foshizzle didn’t suffer for very long and we did everything we could for her to keep her comfortable at the very end.

The hard part about loving animals so much is that I love animals so much. I become really attached to each one and I know every little thing about them. Fo was no exception. She brought us so much joy.

Fo captured our hearts from the very beginning with that little heart on her forehead and the intense way she always stared at us:

Even in her awkward phase she still kept that stare:

And she loved her human from the very beginning:

They were very attached:

She started growing that beautiful heart out when she was just a few weeks old:

She turned into such a graceful hen:

Except for when it rained and she wilted:

Fo got lost more times than I could count in our neighborhood,  it was so easy for her to take a wrong turn because she couldn’t see very well. Our neighbors always brought her back. One day she wandered all the way up to the main road and was brought home on a Segway. She might be one of the few chickens in the world to ever ride on one. 

I loved digging up worms in the garden for her. I’d save them until the other chickens weren’t around. I shouldn’t play favorites but how could I resist this chicken?

She would even ride on Sienna’s handlebars as long as she didn’t go too fast:

All I had to do was whistle the mockingjay call from Hunger Games and she would start walking towards me.

She tolerated our dog Max and then, when we adopted Happy, Fo decided they could be best friends:

When the other chickens were fighting over the nesting boxes to lay their eggs Fo would just quietly make her own nest anywhere that was comfortable. She would have made the best mother (except for not being able to find her chicks when they wandered off). 

None of the other chickens ever picked on Fo, even though they all pick on each other relentlessly. It was like they knew she was extra special.

She was just so beautiful, and coupled with her quirky mannerisms, we could watch her for hours. 

There will never be another chicken like Fo. 

I wrote a lot about her over the last year and half and I’m thankful we have all our memories saved. 

We buried her right in front of our large picture window and ordered a beautiful red weeping maple to go right on top of her, just like we did for Diesel. 

We miss her so much but we feel really lucky to have called her our chicken. 

Foshizzle Forever. 

(Note: You can read about her and our other animals here.)