Last month I announced my pregnancy. This month I will tell you about my fur-st baby, Dixie.

When my last dog Roxy died at age 17, I grieved and waited the appropriate time for my heart to heal before I started to look for another dog to love. Through a rescue, I found a Roxydog look-alike named Dinah and I knew from her photo that she was the one. When I went to the rescue Dinah clearly didn't feel the same way about me. A friend of mine was holding a little 3 pound, rat looking thing and said: "try this one" while putting the scruffy little dog on my shoulder. I passively held the rat-dog and still persisted to get Dinah to love me, which she never did. After about 30 minutes, I realized the rat-dog had fallen asleep with her nose in my turtleneck and her front paws attached to my shoulder. She wasn't letting me go. She chose me and despite my preference for big dogs, I took home the little ratdog wearing the tiny cat collar labeled with the name "Dixie".

The rescue told me that Dixie was saved from Michael Vick's dogfighting operation where her fate was to be bait. There is a special place in Hell for people who do that to animals and it brings tears to my eyes even all these years later to think of the terror my dog and others when through.

Dixie became my new best friend and we were inseparable. About 8 months after her adoption, I started taking her to horse shows when my horses were competing. Dixie had double canine teeth in her crooked, toothy grin, which enhanced her big personality. When people asked what kind of dog she was, I got tired of saying, "Heinz 57", "rescue dog", or "Michael Vick bait dog", so in one bold moment when someone questioned, I replied with "Croatian Squirrel Terrier" and it stuck. I elaborated that the double canine teeth were breed standard because that is how they catch the squirrels by the tail when they hunt and they only breed once every 10 years (under the full moon), and of course, only in Croatia. Shockingly, people believed me. It wasn't long before her extra canines fell out and she looked more like a normal dog, but to this day she is a rare, Croatian Squirrel Terrier.

My father gifted me a sitting with a "Pet-ographer" when Dixie's looks matured and the photographer absolutely fell in love with her. Little did I know that he sold her images to Hallmark where she still graces the covers of greeting cards and posters. My mother -in -law actually found a framed poster of Dixie at a shop in Maryland. Dixie is famous.

Dixie has to sleep on the bed, loves her Dad and her best friend Dazey (who has a equally colorful story), thinks every toy is either called a "frog" or a "squeaky fish" and only has one trick, which is to twirl on her hind legs when a treat is presented. She has a bad habit of chewing bed sheets and will crap on the floor after being let out in protest if she feels we were away from home too long. I sing silly songs to her and love every hair on her body, even the ones that have already shed on the floor. She is 13 this year and I want another 13 with her at my foot and in my heart.