My husband and I were one of the original volunteers for NEAAR when it first began, and although we can not commit a lot of time anymore like we used to, we check the site often and are so pleased at how much the organization has progressed. We also want to give you an update on our dog, Chance that we adopted back in 2001.

While we were volunteering one day for a NEARR event, we fell in love with Chance (at that time he had 3 names, Buster, Sydney and Jack – we don’t know why). We weren’t sure if we were ready to add another dog to our family since we already had a Black Labrador named Midnite but due to Chance’s sad history (he was neglected and abused by his original owner out in western MA), we couldn’t get him out of our mind. Plus NEARR had indicated that he is half pit-bull and some people were scared of that, so NEARR was having a hard time getting him adopted. We talked to his foster mom and she had nothing but great things to say, only to end it with if she didn’t already have a houseful of her own dogs, she would keep him herself as she became very attached to him. We couldn’t resist and renamed him Chance (as in second chance) and he became a part of our family.

Fast forward to our life now; we still have Midnite who is now 8 yrs old and Chance is 6 yrs old. We also have a 3 ½ year old daughter, Kaitlyn and a 1 year old daughter, Melea and our dogs are great with them. Chance likes to hang around with the kids and just tolerates whatever is given to him and although our daughters are young, they treat the dogs very well and often smother them with hugs. Chance sometimes gets the brunt of the kids being too rough on him but I think due to his history of neglect, in some way he enjoys the extra attention! Chance is very much a lap dog and my husband and I still laugh at the fact that the minute he gets home from work, he will not even have his shoes off and right at his feet are our two daughters and Chance waiting to play. It is just the funniest thing. Chance loves to sleep and as you can tell from this photo, we can do anything to him – we often get a good laugh and my girls love dressing him up when they can. Our daughters really love the dogs and we can not be more thankful to have such great dogs that tolerate our crazy house full of kids. And with him being half pit-bull, that does not scare us at all because he is such a gentle dog and many people often admire his beauty.

Chance thanks NEARR for saving him from a bad situation and for allowing him another chance to live in a good home. Thanks NEARR for everything and keep up the great work.