Rossi, the therapy dog, goes to Integris Baptist Hospital and Belle Isle Library
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Rossi, the therapy dog. (Photo provided).
Judy Savage and her therapy dog, Rossi, visit a patient in Baptist Integris Hospital. (Photo by Jim Beckel, The Oklahoman.)
Three–year-old Rossi gets around. She has quite the social life and knows a lot of people. On Mondays, the bushy-headed standard poodle socializes with children and parents at Belle Isle Library. On Wednesdays, the registered therapy dog makes hospital rounds at Integris Baptist Medical Center.
Actually, people are socializing with her. At the library, the children are reading library books or books they have brought from home, or they are telling Rossi a story. She listens intently whether the children speak English or Spanish. She brings out the best in the children who might not want to read out loud to parents, teachers or their peers.
Rossi is uncomplaining. She doesn’t care how long it takes to hear a story from a child.
Rossi also visits sick patients. She brings laughter and smiles when her owner and handler, Judy Savage, knocks on a patient’s door and announces their arrival.
“She’s a big hit at the Jim Thorpe Rehabilitation Center,” Savage said. “She motivates patients who seem a little depressed. She’s now adding visits to heart patients to her volunteer workload.”
After Rossi passed her American Kennel Club’s Canine Good Citizen (CGC) test, she became a member of HALO, Human Animal Link of Oklahoma Foundation.
Rossi loves people. Staff, visitors and patients smile, chuckle and laugh when she is around. She intuitively knows how to help and seems to love what she does.
“When patients meet Rossi, it’s as if they forget about their medical condition or why they are in the hospital. They seem to focus on the present, and the present is in the form of a therapy dog,” Savage said.
The calm black dog sports a bouffant-style hairdo and a bushy tail; on the job, she wears a yellow HALO vest with her name on it, plus her ID tags.
“Rossi is one of the gentlest dogs around,” Savage said.
She said owning a pet therapy dog has been a responsibility and a commitment. Rossi is routinely walked twice a day, constantly interacts with people and has learned to live a quiet, obedient lifestyle.
“She understands. She listens. She’s tolerant. She’s poised. She’s unique. She’s intelligent. She’s happy,” Savage said.
Judy Savage and Rossi were at the Belle Isle Library where children read to the Standard Poodle. (Photo by Helen Ford Wallace).
Judy and Rossi and the children. (Photo by Helen Ford Wallace)
Rossi, a therapy dog, visits patients at Integris Baptist Health Center.
Gardening Tips to cut costs
Here are some excerpts from Judy Savage’s article that ran in The Oklahoman on October 26th, along with a video about her ideas. She is really a neat and creative landscape designer. HFW
Landscape designer Judy Savage is subtly turning over a love of growing things to her children and grandchildren. Every Thanksgiving, she gives everyone a prepacked amaryllis kit with instructions to bring the plant back on Christmas Day for a competition to see whose plant has grown the tallest. Prizes include fast-food gift certificates.
And especially since people are trying to cut costs this year, the kits serve as an inexpensive party favor and decoration during the holidays, and they have a “green” environmental value of being of the earth. Savage said people can find the kits for $4.
For other decorations, Savage prunes her pine trees and broadleaf evergreens, gathers magnolia leaves and uses the natural decorations indoors in basket displays and as accents on wreaths and swags. She uses simple baskets filled with pine Tipscones.
She has a keen appreciation for nature’s gifts and a bounty of ideas for using them at home. These skills have helped her in her landscape business, which includes creating arrangements in containers for clients
“I don’t throw away pots that are cracked, either,” she said. “I keep using the authentic ones. It is more European. European people use everything they have.”
Savage has been on the job 20 years.
“What started out as a search for myself resulted in a career that is more like a joy and less like work. I create landscape designs for my clients which reflect their tastes and attitudes,” she said. “There’s a serenity to a garden which has a place in this stressful world. Flowers are what they are: beautiful, simple, positive.”
Pansies are Savage’s favorite flowers because they provide plenty of color in winter, when people emotionally need it the most. She also likes the Knock-Out Rose. “This plant does it all: constant color from spring through late fall, low maintenance and attractive foliage. I also like the Encore azaleas. Not only do they afford a gorgeous display of spring color, but, hence the name Encore — more color in the fall,” she said.
Click here for the link to The Oklahoman’s story and the entire story about Judy
To contact Judy Savage about her landscaping business, send e-mail to judysavage@cox.net.
NewsOk’s Grayson Cook interviews Judy.
