We had a long holiday in our favourite place Skiathos. During August/September 2022, we were at the shelter for the second time that trip when my husband said " If we are taking a dog out today, it has got to be the big, loud one in the pen to the right", I hesitated being a bit wary around big dogs, especially ones that are barking and behaving in a stressful way. But since we had already decided to not take in a second dog to our home, due to our furbaby Basil who is a senior and used to not sharing his space, I felt it was okay to at least walk this dog once. 

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My husband who did dog training in the military and has a little bit of a "dog whisperer" way about him, felt that this was the only right thing to do. To at least give this dog a nice walk. 

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Once he came out from his pen, we could tell this dog was very scared and in need of some major TLC. He wouldn't walk away from the volunteer and even the smallest of sounds spooked him. 

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On a short leash and with calming voices, we started our walk and gave him time to really feel safe around us, about 5km later, he was starting to relax a little bit. He was a gentle giant and had a big heart.

To our surprise, we had already given him a new name and started to respond to ourselves as mum and dad while talking to him.  

 

When we spoke about this months later, we realised that we really had been picked by him and not the other way around!  The love he gave us was during that walk.... It took us about 2 weeks to decide to give him his forever home. We had to talk to the kids, parents (doggiesitters), and with all of them agreeing, it was a closed deal! 

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For 21 days, we drove up to the shelter to take him out for walks, cuddles and treats, by the end of our stay, he knew it was our motorbike coming up the road, his tail up high and greeting us at the door! 

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We had to leave him with the shelter for almost 3 weeks before he started the long journey to Sweden, but in that time the crew made sure to update us many times a week, which made the wait a lot easier. 

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Now Sture has been with us for eight months and it is like he has always been here, he loves his new life: the snow, the green grass, his toys, his brother, his grandparents!

 

All we can say is that our hearts are full and if you consider a new family member, please give the chance to have a forever home to one that really needs it! 

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