Being Kind to one of God’s Greatest Creatures!

We were expecting our first hard freeze in East Texas a few days ago, and most other people from other states would have considered it a heat wave!

My family and friends from Wisconsin would laugh at me and harass me if I would even dare to call 20 degrees ABOVE zero cold!

If I were to say it is going to be 20 degree with wind chill making it feel like the low to mid teens and a dog had to sleep outside with no shelter…   the majority would then agree that 20 is cold!

In my previous post I told you about Lucy and how she loves to run and play with the boys (Shadow, Shylo and Blue).     The days she spends running with the pack she has the time of her life! She has way too much fun and is way too tired to walk the mile to where her owners live at the end of the day!  Those are the nights that she will sleep under the RV and be waiting outside the door when we come out in the morning! This has only happened a handful of times since we have been here.

Anyhow, one day she shows up early in the morning and when she was still here after  lunch, I knew she would be mine for the night unless I had Dave drive her back to the office area. I knew this was the night of the first hard freeze and my first thought was to have her go home. After giving it some thought I decided if she stays up here, at least she has the camper to lay under, which would be better than no shelter at all. 

I decided to put some cardboard up around the bottom of the RV to help protect her a little bit from the wind. I  was lucky enough to find some appliance boxes that I could cut up and so my next project begun!

Todays high was 32 with the wind chill making it feel like 18 degrees, and even though I was cold, it was nothing compared to what Lucy would have to deal with if someone didn’t help her. So I got busy.

Dave got home around 5:00 and I was under the RV rolling around in the sand securing the cardboard so the wind couldn’t blow it and make noise and scare her out of the shelter, so I was using wire, clamps, stakes, tape and etc., whatever else I could find to attach it to whatever I could find! LOL

The temperatures were already dropping and the wind was picking up. It was now going on 7:00 and it wasn’t so much that I wasn’t done, but I just didn’t want to leave her alone! So I am laying under the camper on the sand while she lays in this nice bed that I made for her, ensuring that she was far enough off the ground that the cold ground would add to the coldness of the air! LOL

I put a few more cardboard panels up then put up the Outdoor Wireless Thermometer so I could see how cold it was getting by her, then I decided to add a nice fluffy warm blanket to her bed, then I thought I was going inside.

This is what we had so far:        Now all I had left to do was put up a wind block by her main opening.  

I bet it was close to 10:00 before I finally talked myself into going into the camper, it was killing me knowing she was outside. I put the Digital Thermometer in front of me and watched. she was staying five degrees warmer than the temperature outside. I was hoping for more than that, because even though I don’t always do math very well, I knew 18 would be 23 degrees and that wasn’t going to be good enough!

Dave bless his heart, knew what was happening inside of me, he said you might as well just bring her in the toybox (garage part of the RV)  or he would take her to the Maintenance building and lock her in the bathroom for the night. I thought how terrifying that might be for a dog who has never been in a building to be locked in a strange one with no one around! I told myself she is fine, she is a lot warmer than she would be if she were at home. So I cleared my conscience and went about my night.

I went out to check on her one more time before calling it a night.     

She looked just fine to me.

 

         I looked into the toybox to make sure she wasn’t freaking out, the minute she saw me, she started begging me for one more bedtime story!

      LOL    This last picture was taken around midnight, when I let the other dogs out in the morning, she had not even moved! She was sleeping in the same position! Cozy warm in the RV with her own heater, dog bed, bowl of water, and a bone  just incase she got bored!

  

        To Mandi and Linda… I can’t believe you actually thought I could leave her outside!