BELLE

(2/24/02-10/21/16)

Sympatheque's Ms Behav'n Bell CGC TNN NJC NAC CL2-F CL2-H

While working for "The Animal Clinic Inc" in Grand Rapids, there was a man who came in with his two shelties, Morgana & Sheldon.  Both of them were healthy and happy dogs.  I found out that the two of them had produced a litter of puppies and I asked my husband (well, fiancé at the time) if I could go look at them.  I knew I had wanted a female for my next Sheltie, and I really preferred the sables.  I brought our roommate, Mike, along with me in case I decided to bring one home.  I had a hard time deciding between one sable and one tri girl.  I picked the sable, and I already had the name decided on - "Belle" since its means pretty/beautiful in French... Unfortunately, while Belle was growing up and in her "puppyhood" I did not have a digital camera, and therefore, have very few pictures of her during those stages.

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With Belle, I learned a lot.  I learned that females can be extremely different temperaments than males and how not to raise a Sheltie, lol.  We babied Belle quite a bit more than we should have, and she destroyed our apartment - eating holes in the walls and eating the molding. . . . This girl has a goat's stomach though, she even ate pop cans through her crate and she rarely gets an upset stomach. 

Just before she turned a year old, we left the apartment and moved back into my parents house for a transition before moving to Lansing in a few months.  It was during this time that Belle had her litter.  We moved her and the litter to Lansing a couple weeks later.