Well, my 17 days of dog sitting is complete. I have to say it was definitely a new experience, with a couple of out of my control snafus, but I have to say that I enjoyed it. Sure, it definitely shook up my normal routine and there was a whole lot of time spent away from home, but it was good. New things always mix up my normal routine, and that isn’t necessarily a bad thing.
I said goodbye to the girls last night after giving them their dinner and taking them out to go potty. I’m going to miss them for a bit, I think, especially the pit bull mix. She is such a sweetie with a really fun personality, and the chihuahua mix is somewhat of a bully to her, nipping at the pit bull mix’s mouth and face whenever the chihuahua mix felt like the attention wasn’t centered on her or whenever the pit mix came over for loving. She really is a brute, though sweet in every other way.
The radiant heating furnace went out a few times while I was there. This meant staying over with the girls a lot more than I had planned on so that I could keep a fire going in the wood stove to keep them and the house warm. Of course, the heater went out on the coldest days we have had so far this year, with snow. The couple I was dog sitting for had the heating guy come out and he did get the heater going for a couple of days by cleaning the ignitor, but then we had temps that didn’t get above 34 and went as low as the upper teens, and it went out, again. Bummer. Thankfully, there is a large ‘shed’ stocked full of wood. The girls and I stayed nice and toasty, though the mornings were super chilly to wake up to. We survived just fine.
I have to admit that being in a house was a bit weird, at first. I’ve been living the RV life for so long, coming up on 8 years now, that all the room was pretty uncomfortable for a few days. I did end up settling in and I am reminded, boldly, just how much I miss living in a house and all the conveniences that come with that. Sure, there is definitely a lot more to clean, but…well, more to clean seems like such a small thing in comparison to the conveniences. Eye on the goal completely refreshed.
I have given the pet sitting thing as a new career move a whole lot of thought over the past 17 days. There are some parts to it the I would need to either make peace with or figure out how to handle better if I am to do this. Mainly, being away from home, away from my dogs, Enzo mostly, for so much of the time. They missed me just as much as I missed them.
Enzo cuddled me all night last night, shifting closer to me any time I moved so that he was still touching me. Before going to bed, Achilles laid across my lap the entire time Lance and I were watching TV. Luna shoved her way in to me for loving as often as she could, regardless of whether or not whoever was cuddling me at the time had a problem with it. She can be so uncharacteristically bold sometimes. Silly girl. I was snuggled by the dogs and my husband well enough all night that I was incapable of moving. I love my family, though being able to move while I’m sleeping is a lot more important than I had realized before. It’s good to be home.
I have started researching what it is I need in order to make pet sitting my job. There really isn’t much to get it started – business license, insurance, marketing. I’ve been looking at pet transporting, too. I would need a better vehicle for that, but I’m not ruling it out as an option. I mean, if I’m going to go as far getting a business license and insurance to do pet sitting, I might as well round out available services. I honestly would love to do long distance animal transporting. I’d get to do a little traveling, see some things, maybe, take some pictures. Then there is always pet taxiing – taking people’s pets to the vet, the groomer, and stuff so they don’t have to take the time off of work or spend their valuable weekend time doing so. If I could get the damn van running right, it would be a great vehicle to do pet transporting with – more than enough room to put a few kennels in the back.
While researching pet sitting, I found a company (Home Business Forms) that produces all of the client forms I would need for pet sitting, and pet transporting. They offer different form packages, with one including 63 different forms for $130, or you can purchase individual forms. You receive the forms through email or a CD, then just print them out when you need them. I like this idea because I won’t lose the forms by putting them in a ‘good’ place.
I’ve also looked into dog training, as in going to school to be trained to be a dog obedience trainer. I’m pretty good at the whole training thing to begin with but this would give me some credentials to provide, help promote my services, and round out my knowledge in the area. The school that I spoke with also helps you with writing a business plan, for those that want to start a pet services business, and offers a bunch of other classes that you can add on after the dog obedience courses are completed, such as cat behavior training.
If my credit score was better, or I had a co-signer, there would be no down payment to start classes, and monthly payments would be $130 a month. With my current credit score, I would need to come up with $1000 down and the monthly payments would be about $180. I’m going to have to give this some thought and come up with a game plan on how I would make that work before I can completely commit to this. For now, it will sit in my head, circling, prodding me, until I do something about it.
Dragonfly Gypsy USA 