Ilene Fine’s life has gone to the dogs. And, for a special 8-year-old boy named Zachary, and children everywhere, this is a good thing.
Fine is the mother of two rescue dogs - Brandy (a 7-year-old lab & viszla mix who had a traumatic first year of her life) and Val (an 8-year old yellow lab Hurricane Katrina survivor).
She has documented their life struggles and the happiness that now fills their days in Brandy and Val: Real Dogs with Real Tales, a whimsical set of children’s board books and plush stuffed animals. A portion of sales are donated to animal rescue organizations throughout the United States.
The rugged board books - recently named to About.com’s "2010 Guide To Great Toys" - are perfectly designed for toddlers and fun for the entire family. Tabbed pages make it easy for little fingers to maneuver and the books are sized (4 1/2" x 6 1/2") for easy traveling.
Colorful pages are packed with real photos of Brandy and Val in their daily lives. Children learn about their favorite toys, foods, friends and how they came to be brother and sister.
Both were adopted by Ilene and her husband, Jay, from Fortunate Pooches and Lab Rescue, Inc., a suburban Chicago not-for-profit.
Brandy was rescued after being shuffled between three different homes before the age of one. In one home, she was locked in a small cage with another dog for up to 10 hours a day. Val (short for "Valenti") lost his family in Hurricane Katrina in 2005. When Ilene and Jay adopted him, he weighed only 40 pounds had a malformed wrist that was broken while he was wandering the streets in the immediate aftermath of the storm and that had improperly healed.
Today, Brandy and Val are happy, healthy siblings, bringing happiness through their board books and stuffed animals.
Fine credits her friend’s son, Zachary, as her inspiration for creating the books. Zachary suffers from Prader-Willi Syndrome, a genetic disorder with numerous symptoms, among them, weak muscle tone and intellectual impairment.
Zachary’s cognitive reaction to the dogs was so positive that Fine returned to Chicago and realized that her beloved pups had a larger role to play in the lives of children. Thus Brandy and Val: Real Dogs with Real Tales was born.
A portion of sales of Brandy and Val: Real Dogs with Real Tales are donated to help abused and abandoned animals around the country.
