I did this piece for my Mother in Law of her dog, Bunny. She is an Italian Greyhound/Chihuahua mix and full of vim and vigor and vinegar. She is feisty and pampered and so of course she now hangs in pride behind glass upon the wall of family paintings and portraits.
Here is a preliminary sketch.
She is special to us because She, that is to say Bunny, was made by our dogs, Monty and Sophie. She is a much loved mistake.
I used to breed Italian greyhounds. Not for very long, but my pride of that time was our Sophie the Italian Greyhound, who just past recently. She was nearly twenty.
So the story of how Bunny came to be goes as follows. We had Sophie, the Italian Greyhound (an I G for those in the know) and had not had bothered to get her fixed. We had a new dog, Monty the tiny chihuahua. He was also not fixed yet. We were moving house and just hadn't time. He, however, was small enough that we thought there was no problem and that he would not be able to breed with our Sophie through one more season.
We were wrong.
When nature called, he found a way. We laughed at him at the time, as he was doing his hardest to mount our Sophie and he'd get a leg and slide down and we'd all laugh. But, one morning, all of us in bed, a well placed pillow was our downfall. Monty, genius that he is, hopped on top of the pillow which happened to be next to Sophie and he was on and that was that. We could not stop it.
We later came to realize it was the best mistake. The puppies she had were the healthiest sweetest ever and certainly someone should breed these two breeds together on purpose as they made the best dogs.
Out of this litter, the most sassy, pushy in your face puppy became "Bunny" pictured here in the painting. When My MIL chose her, I said, "Are you sure you want this one? " As she was the most 'trouble'. She always pushed the other puppies out of the way at feeding time, bossed them all around, but no she would not be swayed. And Bunny to this day is lord of Her house. And she was named for my MIL mother, who was known as Bunny.
Another set of friends took one of the puppies, the sweetest shyest one, and he is still in our life. Ronald. Where Bunny was bigger, he smaller, where she was bold, he quiet.
We still have our Monty now, he is very old as well, but it was indeed a happy accident.
Here is Monty (the black one) Sophie in her favourite position, laying in the sun, and our cat Puss for size determination.
We miss our Sophie and she is buried out under the old hydrangea where we scattered some of Granny's ashes, who was Bunny's namesake. They can keep one another company in the Valhalla.