Great News!!

I just heard back from the Animal Trustees of Austin, and it turns out they'll be able to do the surgery for a lot less!  Our new estimate is between $300-$900, plus followup costs over the next six weeks after the operation.

The low end is if it has to be amputated, which, although a last resort, sounds kind of likely due to how old the injury appears to be.  They'll try to repair it, though, if it looks like they can once they open up her leg - due to the equipment needed (a plate and an FHO) this would be the more expensive option.

This means our new goal is $1,000 - much better than that first number!  Thank goodness for shopping around and awesome recommendations!  If you can donate anything at all, please do on the right hand side of the page.  Anything we raise above the ultimate price of the operation will go fully and directly to God's Little Creatures in Bryan, TX.

About her surgery:

They won't know which option to take with her leg until they actually do it, so we will all have to be mentally and financially prepared for either direction.  If it can be repaired she'll receive a plate in her leg and an FHO - something to do with the femoral head (I really don't know much about that at all - but Google does!)

She'll need six weeks of strict confinement after the operation, with followups at 1-2 weeks, 4 weeks, and possibly 6 weeks.  She won't be allowed even short walks until one month!  For this reason we have to plan when to do the operation carefully, so that at all times one of us will be present to care for her.  The soonest we can do it is December 6th or 7th, but for fundraising and care reasons we may have to wait until the first Monday or Tuesday after Christmas - we haven't yet decided what would be best.

Since the clinic is in Austin, we might have to make special arrangements to figure out how to best make the appointments, and how to get her home again afterward.  We have a little time to figure it out, though!

Some new pics and vids of Penny:

She's really rounding out nicely!  She's only a few pounds shy of being a good, healthy, normal weight, which is important both for building up compensating muscles in her three good legs, and for better health during anesthesia and recovery!  :)

Playing with AJ while we fished at a local river

I'm happy because I'm getting my surgery sooner!

If that isn't the goofiest face, I don't know what is!

Penny's favorite thing to do is chew!

Smiles!

Here are a couple somewhat-blurry phone pictures of her pretty smile:

She's such a happy girl!

About Penelope!

Penelope, or Penny for short, is a beautiful, year-old pit bull who was found wandering around half-starved and limping.  The awesome woman who found her took her in, fed her, got her scanned for a microchip, and posted ads to try and find her owner - but no one claimed her.

She took her in to a local shelter, God's Little Creatures, to speak with the owner about getting some help finding her a home and fixing her up.  That's when my fiance and I met her for the first time.  She was so sweet and so perfect for us - we knew right away we were going to help her.

Step One was getting her to a vet for an X-ray.  We needed to know what the problem was in her leg.  They took her in and called us back several hours later.  The vet said she'd been shot.  The bullet went in her right hind leg, shattered the bone just below the hip joint, and scattered pieces of bone and bullet all over the place.  Luckily no vital organs seemed to be injured!

The vet said there were two options.  First, a surgeon could try to pin the bit of bone that is still in the pelvis joint to the bone below the break, but he didn't seem too optimistic about it.  The other option would be to remove it.

No matter which option she has to have done, she now has a TON of love to help her get through it - both from her new family and her wonderful rescuer.  One way or another we're going to fix that silly leg, forget about gunshots and hunger, and make the rest of her life the happiest any dog's ever had.  Great big pit bull smiles from here on out!

The estimated cost of surgery is somewhere between $1,900 and $2,600.  I would like to humbly ask your help in raising this money with us.  Anything you can spare will help Penny get her leg fixed up and start a new life.

If we are very fortunate and manage to make our goal, extra donations will be passed on to God's Little Creatures.  She's been the most extraordinary help, and is the most giving person.  It would be the absolute least I could do.

I'll be posting photos of Penny as we go, and news on how she's doing.  Hopefully we'll be able to afford her surgery sooner rather than later!