Get to Know Us
Hiiiiii everyone! If you’re from Instagram, hello friend! I am so happy to have you here. First of all, thank you for even reading this far and supporting us. If you’re new to the @finleyandsadie world, welcome to our crazy life; thank you for even giving us a chance. For those who don’t know, my name is Maggie and I am a 22-year-old living in Vancouver, Washington. You probably already know I have two dogs; Finley and Sadie. However, you probably didn’t know that I’ve always been very passionate about animals and specifically dogs. There has never been a time in my life in which I didn’t own a dog. When I was born, my parents already had a Golden Retriever and a Dalmatian. After our golden Chloe passed away there was a huge empty space in our family.
When I was four, my dad came home with this sad, scrawny, scary looking dog. He owns his own electrical company and found her while working in some pecan fields pretty far from our house. He lured her into his car with a burrito and brought her home to us. He swears he didn’t want to keep her, but I think after he gave her the burrito, he was hooked. We found out she was around one-year old and I named her Zoey because I really liked that Sesame Street character at the time. She was a mutt; we think mostly Australian Shepherd and Queensland Heeler. She was a merle with colors similar to Finley’s. That may have been why my four-year-old brain made her middle name “rainbow” lol.
From the day he brought her home on, she was my absolute best friend. She made me laugh, cuddled me when I was sad, protected me when I was scared and comforted me when I was anxious. I brought her to preschool for show and tell and showed her off on every single “Student of the Week” poster I made throughout elementary school. I dressed her up in all my clothes and definitely annoyed her like crazy, but she loved me so much through everything. Even through middle school and that phase was not the best for me lol. She taught me real unconditional love in a way that no person ever could.
When I was twelve, my parents got divorced and Zoey stayed with my dad. I split my time with both of my parents. My twelve-year-old brain was very excited that I would be able to get another puppy at my mom’s. When I was thirteen, we picked him up from the humane society. I named him Zayn, yes after the One Direction member. Yes, I’m still obsessed. Yes, it’s weird. Anyways; a year later we brought home a second puppy from a different recue organization. They named him Woody, you can probably guess why. We decided to keep the name because how could you ever change that. I quickly fell in love with them just as much as I loved Zoey and they loved me right back in return.
When I was eighteen, Zoey passed away at the old age of fourteen. She quite literally was with me through every part of growing up. It’s almost like she knew when I was an adult and that it was okay for her to go. Zayn and Woody still live with my mom and stepdad in Tucson, Arizona and I get to facetime them often. Sadly, they wouldn’t let me take them with me in the move, rude. Finley got to meet them when we flew home for Christmas last year and it was the best thing getting to see them all together. I always knew the first thing I wanted to do as a capable adult was get my own dog. Finley has been a dream for quite some time and then Sadie quickly became a part of that dream too. So, I’ve always had a passion for dogs, but why So Fetch?
Well before getting my own dog, I thought I knew everything there was to know about dogs. I watched The Dog Whisperer as a kid, read a few training books and thought I was a professional. I thought because I always had dogs that I knew everything there was to know. It turns out that my parents did a lot more work than I gave them credit for. A lot more goes into raising a puppy than just occasionally picking up their poop, taking them on walks and teaching them to sit. Before Finley came home, I dove headfirst into everything puppy and I have learned so much in raising a crazy pup like him that I would love to share with you all.
Another thing you may not know, is this whole thing is my dream come true. There have always been three things that have been consistent dreams in my life. Dogs, writing, and owning my own business. I came out of the womb wanting to do things on my own terms. I have an “Emory hard head” as we call it in our family.
When I was little and someone asked me what I wanted to be when I grew up, I would say a waitress. I know, real big dreams. My three-year-old self would be proud because I was a server for over two years. After that dream, I wanted to be a veterinarian. But then I found out I had to see hurt and sick animals and I definitely couldn’t handle that. From there, I wanted to be a writer. I wrote my first short story at the age of five or six about a box full of puppies showing up at a little girl’s door. I would write little short stories all the time. My teachers and parents would help me bind and print them. I swear I would start writing a chapter book every other week throughout elementary school and never finish them. I dreamt of being a fiction author like J.K. Rowling, but I always just knew it was something that would never happen.
Throughout elementary school I thought of small “businesses” that I could make money from. I loved how my parents owned their own business and could work on their own schedules. My mom could take breaks to come do art projects with me and my dad could bring me with him to job sites (I only wanted to go with him if I could get an ICCEE though.) I wanted to have my own business like them one day, but I didn’t know of what, so I experimented.
In second grade, I put glue in the little circles on top of my pencil box, let it harden and then colored them. I sold them to my classmates for ten cents. In third grade, I took a pencil sharpener to crayons. I put the scrapings in bags and sold them to my classmates as “confetti.” If you’re wondering, I did indeed make money on both of those and yes it was spent at the student snack store. In fourth grade, my friend Savannah and I took fake tall wheat grass from a craft store and sold it to our friends and called it “weed.” Our parents quickly discouraged that business. In fifth grade, I gained an obsession with Duct Tape. I made purses and wallets out of it and sold them to my friends and family as “Maggie’s Baggies.” Creative.
In sixth grade we had a school project to come up with a fun community service idea. I thought of a tutoring club where the older students could tutor the younger students at our school. After making the whole plan, my friend Sarah and I decided that we might as well actually do it. For over two years we ran our own tutoring club called “A Little Extra Knowledge.” We “hired” other tutors, worked with teachers to conduct meetings in their classrooms, built our website, participated in fundraisers, made flyers and graphics, and tutored over one hundred students. Although we didn’t make money, I loved having something I was in charge of and that was all my own.
In late middle school and high school, I became a little lost. It became clearer that these dreams of mine were more unrealistic paths to take. It would be much smarter of me to find a stable career. I tried to lean into other interests while still writing on the side. I loved keeping up with my Tumblr account and editing my HTML code till two in the morning.
When I was seventeen, I started cosmetology school. After a year of that, I realized that I did not want to cut hair. I loved makeup and the creativity of it, but it was not something that lit my fire. I wasn’t really into school at this point, but I knew going to college would be the smartest thing for me to do. I first went to community college and loved all of my English classes as well as developed a passion for psychology. When I was nineteen, a poem I wrote got published in a real book that was sold at Target and Bookman’s. However, I submitted it anonymously because I was too scared of anybody reading any of my writing.
During my time at community college I would start many different blogs, YouTube channels, books, but would never finish or publish anything due to my fear. By the time I was a sophomore I declared Psychology as my major. I switched to University of Arizona and moved my focus to Psychology. I always have wanted to help people and knew that it was the subject that I liked the most. But I could still never picture myself in that role. I couldn’t imagine my life ending up that way.
I still wanted my back-up plan to be business. I knew it wasn’t realistic, but I decided to make Business Management my minor *just in case. * My dreams of owning my own business revolving around dogs and writing lingered in my head. I dreamed of all these things that I didn’t know how to combine. And somehow, they ended up just combining on their own.
I made an Instagram for my dog because I knew my friends would get sick of how obsessed with him, I was and am. I had no idea that there was a community of all of you behind it. I had even more of no idea that it would lead me here, to you, writing this. Allowing me to make my biggest dreams come true. When I look back at my life now, I know there was a plan all along to lead me here.
So, thank you. Thank you if you read this novel. Thank you if you even opened my website for a second and then closed it. Thank you for every like on Instagram. Thank you if you bought my presets. Thank you for teaching me. Thank you for sharing your lives with me. Most importantly, thank you for making my dreams come true. I truly feel like the luckiest girl in the world to have you.
Mags xx
