It’s a day to celebrate puppies and the pure joy they can bring to a family. Below, NBCLA users submitted their favorite puppyhood photos and the stories of how they met their best friends.
Click here or email [email protected] to share a photo of your puppy and the story behind how you met. If your dog is all grown up, dig into the photo collection from those days gone by.
Brienne Witt
Wanda is a 12-week-old rescue. She is a Hound/Husky/Pointer/Velociraptor. She loves to play with her brother Hagrid, nap and eat.
2/12
Tracy
Zag, our 2-year-old Pit/Boxer mix, watches our newest addition, Zumi, when we first brought him home in November 2020. A friend couldn’t keep him and called us, since we have 2 other rescue dogs, Ziggy and Zag. We went down to check him out and to see if Ziggy and Zag would be accepting of him, and found him in the garage alone in a crate. He was tiny, almost 2 pounds when we brought him home, and so hungry! Needless to say, he came home with us that night. Zag was glued to Zumi the moment we brought him home, and one day decided to crawl into the kennel to nap with Zumi! I couldn’t be a prouder mama!
3/12
Tanya Claros
A quick San Diego getaway for 2, we returned as 3!
4/12
David Garcia
A dapple Dachshund.
5/12
Michele Mckinney
This is Thor.
6/12
Dale Maas
Here is CoCo aka our Master Gardener. CoCo is a rescue from abandoned mother that was found alongside a rural road. The angel that picked up the mother did not know at the time the abandoned mother was pregnant. Six pups later we got CoCo. Happily the other five also found forever homes.
7/12
Otto
Introducing Nina (Woltke), who joined our family in March. After many tears and prayers from my daughter Nataly Joy Woltke, and two long trips to the Helen Woodward Animal Center we got our first family pet, our beautiful Nina! She is a shepherd cattle blend, and she loves belly rubs.
8/12
Dina B
It’s a bird, it’s a plane, it’s Astro! The star of my life joined our family last month on my birthday. It was so unexpected, until my application was reviewed a couple days prior and I was offered to meet him. We met and clicked right away! Since then, I have received lots of laughs, snores, cuddles and smiles from him. Even when he holds my shoe for a treat/ransom, I am so happy to have rescued him!
9/12
Rebecca Gloudeman
This is my Baba Yaga, my 15-week-old Alaskan Malamute puppy. Although I have only had him for a short time he has quickly found his way into my heart and is following into the footsteps of his big sister Aang who is 10 months old herself. They are both I’m training to be pack dogs for hiking and service dogs to visit elderly care facilities in the future. Baba Yaya was born in Texas, but is loving the SoCal lifestyle lounging by the pool and the great weather while Aang was born right here in SoCal and comes from Brea. They are definitely best friends and complete our little pack.
10/12
Ray Ashby
Sasha wearing a Terrible Towel knowing that dad is a Cowboy fan.
11/12
Kim Henderson
I was Timber’s dog walker. I fell in love when I first saw her face. I adopted her in March 2020 because her original owner didn’t want her anymore. She turned 2 in October 2020.
12/12
Claudia Seplulveda
Maximus is a black Labrador retriever who has stolen my heart and is a very special part of my family. Max likes to run, play, chew and splash in the water. He also loves to eat shoes!