Ahhh! A day off from school here is in the U.S.! Teachers always treasure these days! So do the kids!

My preschoolers still talk about the day ‘the other Miss Pam’, from Valley Animal Haven Shelter came to school and brought a dog and cat to visit. They loved being able to donate food and other items to the shelter. A couple of weeks ago, Pam, the director and our friend, had a Volunteer Appreciation Open House, so of course, our whole family was there!

I took care of the decorating, since that’s what I love to do! I drew the design on the chalkboard above and made the banner below from dog scrapbook paper. Lauren and I had gone to the 99 cent store for tablecloths and found these awesome pawprint balloons!

Remember the burlap pieces we stamped with pawprints? Here they are decorating the food tables. This is the ‘sweets’ table.

Yummy! The cookies on the bottom are some of my favorite!

There were also chips and dips, and fruit and veggie trays.

The sign-in table was full of paw-prints!

Aren’t these beautiful! Love all these bright colors on a dreary day! These were given to some of the volunteers who had donated more than 300 hours of time in the past year!

Each volunteer also received one of these special pins with a wonderful thank you!

There was also a drawing for door prizes. Haley won the sign ‘You Had Me At Woof” and Steve won the ornament.

Pawprints and kisses!

Here is one cutie, Hannah, to say hello and thank you! She even dressed up for the occasion!

Here is the whole group. There are many more volunteers out there too, but these are the ones who came for this special occasion. Pam is the 6th one from the left in the royal blue shirt.

This was an incredible year for Valley Animal Haven. There were so many special people and businesses who gave time and donations to give the shelter a great first year. There were portable buildings, kennels, food, pet supplies, a trailer and many more items donated. There were several grants awarded to the shelter and even a money award for a contest that was entered. The most important part was the adoptions and saving the animals. There were 385 cats and dogs (and 2 rabbits) placed in ‘fur’ever homes in 2015! It is so amazing and such a wonderful thing Pam and all the volunteers are doing for animals! We are so blessed as a family to be part of such a great and amazing organization.