A couple of days before Christmas this past December while I was down at Project Hope, Doll went to talk to a man about three donkeys of his that she had rescued. The donkeys had escaped his property and were on their way to Interstate 55 – which would have been disastrous. Fortunately, Doll and her two sidekicks, Lauren and Elizabeth, were able to wrangle the donkeys back to Project Hope and into a secured fenced-in area.

The man wasn’t in a hurry to get the donkeys back to his property since Doll was caring for and feeding them. And frankly Doll wasn’t in a rush to give them back either. She didn’t consider him an animal abuser, but he had certainly proven himself to be neglectful over the years.

When she returned from her trip down the road to his property, I walked out of the office to meet her in the driveway. As I approached she looked visibly upset and was yelling something at me that I couldn’t quite make out. Once I was within sight of the passenger seat, it became clear. There in the passenger seat were three of the most pathetic looking puppies I had seen in a long while. Bellies distended to the point where it looked like each of them had swallowed a football and it was sitting sideways in their stomachs – nearly hairless from mange – terrified.

Doll had asked this man to bring her a pregnant momma dog that was on his property over the previous summer for a free spay surgery. He never did. These puppies were her puppies. They had been living outside with little to no shelter. On this day, the day they finally made it to Project Hope, it was in the 20′s in the daytime and near the single digits at night.

Doll had been yelling for me to get the camera, which I quickly did. We snapped a few pictures and took some quick video and rushed them into the quarantine room.

That afternoon we drove them to the vet for a quick check-up, shots and a wormer. Their recovery was underway, but it was by no means swift. Doll cared for these puppies over the last three months and nursed them back from certain death. Wednesday morning of last week two of the three, Larry and Itamar, left for Every Creature Counts in Denver. They’re absolutely beautiful now and will surely be adopted to a good home quickly.

Below are some before and after photos and a short video from the day they arrived.