Roseau Times-Region - Serving Roseau County for over 100 Years - The Official Roseau County Newspaper

Supporting our Roseau School Students.

A peek into their lives in print.

by Katherine Kennedy, English 7, Mrs. Didrikson

It was a cold Friday night in October 2016, my dad had just arrived home from a nursing conference and my sister and I were playing with Legos downstairs. My mom was upstairs, relaxing with a book and watching the Gilmore Girls on Netflix. All of a sudden, my parents called my sister and I upstairs for a "family meeting". We don't normally have family meetings, so we were quite curious as to what they wanted to share with us. We headed upstairs, and gathered around the kitchen table.

My parents were smiling and rather quiet. They told us that they were thinking about getting a puppy for the family! Needless to say I was in total shock as my mom had always said we would never have pets.

My dad then took out his iPhone and showed us a Facebook post about a litter of white Miniature Schnauzers for sale near Wannaska. They looked adorable. Lizzie and I instantly fell in love with them. The funny thing is, it turns out that my mom had previously looked at the litter online while my dad was out of town. She had texted him and said, "what do you think about getting a puppy?" He replied to her that the owner of the litter was traveling back to Roseau in the same car as him and had inquired if we would be interested in one of their pups.

We decided we were going to take a leap and become dog owners. After the initial shock and screams of joy, we headed to Shopko and strolled around the store looking for puppy essentials. We decided on a fluffy, gray dog bed, pink water and food dishes, a bag of puppy piddle pads, a green, squeaky rubber bone, and a tiny light blue leash and collar. We knew we wanted a female so the color choices seemed appropriate.

Afterwards we headed back home and started suggesting names for the puppy. My sister was set on the name Stella, but I wanted the name Willa. It took us a few hours to finally decide on the name Willa Rose Kennedy. Falling asleep that night was a struggle. I couldn't stop thinking about how wonderful it would be to finally have a pet. We were scheduled to go the next morning to pick out our little fur baby.

The next morning we were all excited and ready to go when my parents told us we would have to wait until the afternoon. The dogs' owner who happened to be a nurse was called into work. I was disappointed and really sad, but of course I understood because my dad is also a nurse.

Around 4:00 in the afternoon, we finally all got into the car and drove south towards Wannaska. When we arrived we could hear loud barking. The owner met us at the door and we went upstairs to meet the momma schnauzer and her puppies.

Getting upstairs, we saw 5 little Miniature Schnauzers jumping and tumbling around on the floor together. Lady, the momma schnauzer sat and watched carefully. After snuggling and holding each one, we decided on the tiniest one. She was the runt of the litter and had curly, silky, white fluffy fur like her momma.

On the way home with Willa, she snuggled in my Mother's lap on a blue and white patterned blanket in the front seat of our maroon van. Once we arrived at home, we brought Willa out to our big, fenced in backyard. There were piles of colored leaves scattered all around. The grass was still green and soft and the sun was shining. The flowers were still in bloom, giving the air a sweet flowery scent. Willa hopped around, chasing after us as we ran and played with her. She loved to pounce on our hair while we were all lying in the grass. Willa was instantly loved. We always joke about her being our "little sister". 

About a year later, the same family had a 2nd litter of Miniature Schnauzers. This time it was a litter made up of 6 girls. My Nana Renee decided she was going to get one, as she loved our Willa. Nana Renee has always had pets and her old dog Chesley needed a friend.

It was a warm day in June 2017 when my parents and sister went with Nana Renee to pick out her puppy. They drove south towards Wannaska, again while I stayed home with Willa. Little did I know there would be a surprise for me when they got home.

  When they came back to our house, I was very excited to meet Nana's new puppy. She was similar to Willa but had wiry, coarse hair.

As we were playing and admiring Paisley, my mom came into the house carrying another dog. She was tiny, just like Willa was. We decided to name her Sophie. Now we have 2 fur babies which complete our family. My parents often talk about their 4 girls; me, Lizzie, Willa, and Sophie.

The ironic and funny thing is that they both were runts of their litters, so yeah, that's my story about how I got my dogs!