Movie Stars

The Movie Mutts are here! I’ve been dying to tell you all about this project and these puppies!

Being a believer in jinxes, I’ve kept it mostly to myself but not anymore! This is happening and it’s terribly exciting and the bonus is it includes adorable puppies!

Where to begin?

It all starts with my book, 100 Dogs & Counting In the book, I recounted not just my foster dogs, but my trips south to figure out where all these dogs were coming from and why. I was shocked and saddened by what I saw and motivated and inspired by the people I met. I was certain that if more people knew what was happening in the shelters, rescues, and most especially—the dog pounds, they wouldn’t stand for it and something would be done to change it.

I believe in people like that; I’m an idealist. I am convinced that the problem of dogs suffering and dying in the south was not because people didn’t care, but because they didn’t know.

So, I set off to tell them.

I blogged about, created the initiative, Who Will Let the Dogs Out, and I wrote my book. In that book, I mentioned that I wished I could make a movie about the situation because too many people don’t read and if they could just see what I was seeing….

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Fast forward to this summer. The book is released and I am stuck home NOT touring for it, but luckily a few people did read it. One of those people was Melissa Armstrong, a writer herself (whose gorgeous book, Catching Dawn was released this fall—highly recommend!). Melissa contacted me and said that if I was serious about my comment in the book regarding making a film, she wanted to help.

Turns out Melissa lives just northwest of Nashville and works for the National Hot Rod Association producing their live broadcasts. She along with her husband (who also works for NHRA) and another friend (who works as an editor at ESPN), were willing to work on this film project and make it a reality.

We talked about the message, the story, and where to start. We decided to start with the dog pounds of western Tennessee, partly because those were some of the saddest and most shocking situations I saw, but mostly because Melissa lived within a few hours of many of the dog pounds.

I introduced them to one of the most incredible rescue heroes I met on my trips—Amber of Halfway Home Animal Rescue. Amber travels every week to the dog pounds all over western Tennessee and pulls dogs many times hours before their impending deaths. She works with another rescue rock star, Laura, to move those dogs northward to safety. OPH takes some of these dogs, along with rescues all over the Midwest and northeast. Since last January, Amber and Halfway Home have saved over 2000 animals!

The plan was for the southern film crew to spend a few days with Amber following her into the dog pounds and look for a good story. We knew that simply showing the pounds would be hard for viewers and as Amber pointed out, the one thing that kept her going was hearing about her dogs’ happy endings. We needed to show exactly what was happening, what Amber saw on a daily basis, but we also wanted to follow a rescue from its start in the pound to its adopted home. This would give the film a storyline.

This is where the Movie Mutts come in. They landed in one of the pounds where they would have most certainly perished if not for Amber. Amber arrived with film crew in tow and pulled them and made sure they got the proper vet care they needed. Melissa fostered them temporarily (ridding them of their flea infestation and starting the process of deworming them) until they could catch a ride north a week later with an OPH transport and come to my house.

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And here they are! Their journey will be documented in the film and shared on Who Will Let the Dogs Out website, Facebook, and Instagram. I hope you’ll follow along and support us as we raise money to produce this film and to enter it in the International Dog Film Festival (among other places).

Nancy stopped over to get some pictures of the pups and try to get a litter picture, here are a few outtakes that produced the final picture (at the top of this post)-

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The first fundraiser is this year’s Another Good Dog calendar which goes on sale today. All of the proceeds from the calendars will go toward the film and the work of Who Will Let the Dogs Out. If you’d like a calendar, see the info at the bottom of this post and on Facebook.

The other way you can help us build momentum and support is to like/follow us on Facebook and Instagram and subscribe to the Who Will Let the Dogs Out blog where I will share not only the stories of other rescues and shelters, but the journey of this film.

And now, meet a few of the stars of this show: The Movie Mutts

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Thanks for reading!

Cara

For information on me, my writing, and books, visit CaraWrites.com where you can also find more information on my new book, One Hundred Dogs and Counting: One  Woman, Ten Thousand Miles, and a Journey into the Heart of Shelters and Rescues, (Pegasus Books, July 2020). The book even has its own  Facebook page where I post information about signings, but also host an occasional LIVE on Tuesdays called, “Let’s Talk Rescue” where I welcome special guests to learn more about the world of rescue and we continue the conversation started by the book.

If you’d like regular updates of all my foster dogs past and present, plus occasional dog care/training tips from OPH training, be sure to join the Facebook group, Another Good Dog.

And if you’d like to know where all these dogs come from and how you can help solve the crisis of too many unwanted dogs in our shelters, visit WhoWillLetTheDogsOut.org where you can follow the blog that shares stories or find the link to our brand new podcast!

Our family fosters through the all-breed rescue, Operation Paws for Homes, a network of foster homes in Virginia, Maryland, D.C., and south-central PA.

If you can’t get enough foster dog stories, check out my book: Another Good Dog: One Family and Fifty Foster Dogs. It’s available anywhere books are sold.

I love to hear from readers and dog-hearted people! Email me at carasueachterberg@gmail.com.

Many of the pictures on my blog are taken by photographer Nancy Slattery. If you’d like to connect with Nancy to take gorgeous pictures of your pup (or your family), contact: nancyslat@gmail.com.

ANOTHER GOOD DOG 2021 CALENDARS!

Support the film Who Will Let the Dogs Out with your purchase of a 2021 Another Good Dog calendar featuring the animals we have fostered this year and Nancy Slattery’s incredible photography.

Calendars are $25 (which includes shipping) and will arrive before well before the holidays.

To order yours, email me (carasueachterberg@gmail.com) or message me via Facebook. You can pay with paypal or Venmo or by check.

Here is a sneak peak of a few of the pictures and THANK YOU FOR YOUR SUPPORT!

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