January 2026

Everything Doggie

By Judith Ray
Posted: 10/28/2025

Janie Heinrich is well known in the Village and the community as the founder of MobilityDog. As a person who suffered a spinal injury at the age of 53, she found it difficult to secure her second dog for herself at the age of 59. Out of that experience, she founded MobilityDog to assist people with mobility problems like herself to become more FUNctional (note the emphasis on fun) and extend the parameters of what they were able to do.

In early September, Janie embarked upon a new project. She conceived the idea, along with Brigid Crane, to just have some doggone fun. They created a Village small group called “Everything Doggie.”  The first meeting had about eight people and four or five dogs. A few folks who had sadly either recently lost their dogs or had dogs too aged and frail to participate even came, just to be around their favorite “people.” The doggies were all on their best behavior and so were the people.

The group talked about a lot of things, either fun things - like possible field trips for us and our dogs - or things of concern. Eventually the conversation moved to coyotes, and we all had a special added bonus of having Jane Brackman among us who is a scientist and an expert on coyote behavior. She gave us an off-the-cuff crash course on coyotes. It was fascinating, and we really felt lucky to have Jane in our midst.

Our second meeting happened to be the day of torrential rain, so we met via Zoom. My dog, Bella, was quite disappointed and sulked around all day since she had been very excited about seeing her new doggie friends again. We did have a productive meeting, though, learning some recipes for healthy snacks and telling some dog stories. One particularly fascinating one was about a dog who was found in a refrigerator after the Eaton Fire, who subsisted on charred hot dogs and raspberry smoothies. 

Another topic of conversation was why we wanted to join the “Everything Doggie” group. By and large, most of us were looking for socialization for our dogs, tips for ourselves, and just having a special activity for our dogs to enjoy. As my dog said, “Sometimes I get so bored, just laying around sleeping, hoping a squirrel will run by, and once it does and I rouse myself, it scampers up a tree and then makes fun of me.” 

If your dog has a person who would like to see him or her have some new kind of fun, watch the PV bulletins for the next get together or contact Janie Heinrich. She is in the Membership Directory.

In the meantime, see if you can resist these beauties:

Tamanika's Granddog Casper

Judith's Dog Bella

Brigid's Dogs Peanut & Brittle

Janie's Service Dog Beckett