My (then) boyfriend and I had just moved into our first apartment.

Having had dogs all my life, after a few months I started really missing coming home to a dog, and started asking (begging really) for my boyfriend to let us get a dog. He just wasn't ready for one, and gave me reasons as to why we should wait. After awhile I put it out of my head and figured it would be a lot longer (than I wanted lol) til we could get one.

In October of last year (2013) was one of the best months of my life. A mega pet adoption was going on in our downtown. We decided to take his mother (she had lost both her dogs within weeks of each other earlier in the year).

Once we got to the adoption we walked around and looked at all the dogs, his mom leaned over to me and said "We are here for you! This is your birthday gift!" (my birthday was the following weekend). I didn't believe her, no way did my stubborn boyfriend finally agree to let me have a dog. I looked at him in shock and the look and smile on his face said it all. I started crying of pure happiness, I was about to find my furbaby.

After walking around and about to give up I looked over into a kennel and saw this sad/depressed dog hunched over in his cage. He wasn't barking or whining, even though the place was full of barking dogs. We locked eyes and my heart melted.

A volunteer let us take him outside out of the noise to see how he was. You could see every rib, and he just stood there, happy to be away from his cage and noise. We had to take him back in, my boyfriend didn't want a big dog (Treeing Walker Coonhound mix), but he saw how much I already fallen in love with this big boy.

He agreed and we went and filled out the paper work. As we were walking out Copper tried to pull me out of every door we passed, like he knew he was going home. On our way home we stopped by the pet store and my boyfriend's family bought us everything we'd need for him, new collar, leash, toys, food, etc.

The following weekend my boyfriend purposed.

Copper was my birthday/engagement present, the best present I have ever gotten! When we got him he weighed only 45 lbs, and now weighs a healthy 61 lbs! He absolutely loves my 3 year niece. She climbs and crawls over him, pulls his tail and they even cuddle together. He will even readjust himself to make sure she is comfy.

Since we have gotten him his personality has made a complete 180. He is no longer the scared skinny dog, he is full of life and greets us so happily at the door, he knows we are is furever home and I smile every time I look at him.

We included him in our engagement photos! I found the shelter he originally came from and asked for his story. He came in as a stray in late June of 2013, he went to a foster home for about 3 weeks in Sept but the lady could not handle him because of his size and he went back to the shelter, he was then adopted by a family who already had dogs and when the family took him home the others dogs did not get along with Copper and he was returned to the shelter the very same day. They said they couldn't believe it took so long for someone to adopt him because he was such a sweet boy! He has made our little family complete, and he is spoiled rotten by all of our family. When we need a dog sitter they argue over who will watch him!