Foster Friday: From Alumni to Foster, Valerie Wilner

Welcome to the June edition of Foster Friday! This month we’re featuring our long-time foster, Valerie Wilner, who most recently took in three pittie puppies! Read on to learn why Valerie got involved and why she continues to foster pups in need with Wags & Walks!

What got you started fostering for Wags & Walks?

I think that the work that the rescues and shelters do is so important and I wanted to contribute in some way. I chose to work with Wags and Walks because we rescued our dog Avery from them and my parents rescued from them as well. You could tell that their staff really cared about all the dogs they rescue and finding them good, loving homes.

To date, how many dogs have you fostered for Wags? Do you have a favorite? (Don't worry, we won't tell the others!)

So far, we’ve fostered 23 dogs from Wags and Walks. Our favorite, of course, is the one we adopted, Willa . Besides Willa, it’s REALLY hard to say…they have all been such great pups and we’ve enjoyed having all of them stay with us!

What has been your biggest challenge fostering?

Our biggest challenge was discovering that our dog Avery didn’t do well with another bigger dog in the house…at first we thought we would have to give up fostering but W&W gave us the option to just foster small dogs or puppies, which is much less stressful on Avery.

How has fostering affected you?

It’s brought so much fun and joy to my life. I can really understand now that cliché about ‘them saving us more than we save them’. I’ve struggled for many years with infertility and being able to nurture and care for puppies has been a wonderful distraction from that. There’s nothing better than puppy therapy!

What has been your biggest surprise as a foster parent?

The biggest surprise has been that I haven’t adopted every puppy we’ve fostered 🤣.

Do you have any advice for someone who is interested in becoming a foster?

DO IT! I know that one reason people hesitate to foster is because they think it would be impossible to say goodbye to their foster once they’ve been adopted, and while it’s always sad to say goodbye, it really helps to know that Wags and Walks will find them a good, loving forever home to live a happy life!

If you’d like to start fostering with Wags & Walks, please begin by filling out our foster application!