Last week, I took advantage of STA Travel’s employee volunteer day and traded in my cubicle for some puppy love. Operation Kindness, the oldest and largest no-kill shelter in North Texas, was in need of some helping hands like most non-profit organizations. My good friend, Krystina, and I set off to do what we could to help as hard-core dog lovers ourselves.

Puppies!

There were tons to do before Operation Kindness opened to potential adopters. Dogs had to be bathed and walked, cats needed water, the lobby needed to be cleaned, and kennels to be changed. To begin, our volunteer coordinator led us to a shack in the back of the shelter where it was filled with wired kennels that needed to be reorganized. Due to low staff, it was a project that had been put on hold for over a year. We spent the morning hauling kennel after kennel in-and-out of the shack, and thus concluded my exercise for the day. After that, we walked and played with countless dogs and helped clean the shelter for visitors.

The last time I was at Operation Kindness, I adopted my second little furball and it took everything in me to not bring home a third. There were two labs that an owner was forced to give up due to the tough economy. The volunteer coordinator said he stayed with the labs for two hours crying over his loss. How could that not pull at your heart strings?

After my experience with Operation Kindness, I am very dedicated to volunteer this year. I made sure to grab a pamphlet of their volunteer guidelines before I left that day and I plan to sign up soon. Have any of you had amazing volunteer experiences?