TORONTO -- Whether they’re dressed up as Winnie the Pooh characters, long-haired yaks, or simply wearing tutus, Reta Byvelds' three dogs are bringing smiles to the faces of residents waiting out the pandemic in a southwest Ontario long-term care home.
The two older dogs – nine-year-old Devo and eight-year-old Seamus – are trained therapy dogs with the St. John Ambulance branch in Stratford, Ont.
For the past few years, Byvelds has brought the dogs to the Spruce Lodge long-term care facility and Cedarcroft Place retirement home for regular visits with the residents and staff. Because they’re certified to work with children, the dogs have made occasional visits to the local library as well.
All that changed, however, in March 2020 when COVID-19 began to spread in long-term care homes throughout the province.
Because she wasn’t allowed inside the buildings anymore, Byvelds said she and the dogs would stand outside so the residents could see them through the windows.
“At that time it was more of me trying to make sure that they were safe and wanting to see them than anything else,” Byvelds recalled during a telephone interview with CTVNews.ca.
Because the Cedarcroft Place retirement home didn’t have an area where Byvelds and the dogs could visit through the windows, she said they have only been able to do the window visits at the Spruce Lodge long-term care facility.
On April 12, 2020, which was Easter Sunday, Byvelds said she decided on a whim to put a hat that resembled a flower and another one with bunny ears affixed to it on Devo and Seamus for their weekly visit.
The reaction?
“A mixture of people really enjoying it and to be brutally honest, some thought I was crazy,” she said with a laugh.
That was the day Byvelds came up with the idea to dress her dogs in costumes on a weekly basis. It also happened to be the day her third dog, Pieter, was born. And it wasn’t long before he, too, was dressed up in silly costumes for the amusement of the seniors and staff at the home.
Since then, Byvelds and her dogs have never missed a week to greet the residents through the windows – usually on Sundays – for a total of 56 weeks.
‘THEY REALLY ARE VERY SPECIAL’
The dogs have been dressed as superheroes, dragons, characters from The Wizard of Oz, and even as the late The Tragically Hip frontman Gord Downie.
Perhaps the most popular costume was when Byvelds dressed them up as Elvis.
“One of the PSWs (Personal Support Workers) in one of the dining rooms started singing an Elvis song and some of the residents joined in, which just sort of warmed my heart. It was a fun one.”
“Got a lot of ‘Hound Dog’ jabs as you can imagine,” she said in reference to the popular Elvis hit.
The worst costume, according to Byvelds, was when she dressed the dogs up as corn on the cob.
“They were heavy. They kept sort of sliding off and then there were pieces of yellow foam golf balls cut in half, and they were flying all over. It was a bit of a disaster,” she said.
Thankfully, the dogs are good sports about it, Byvelds said.
“One of the things about Whippets is they have to wear a coat in the wintertime so they’re somewhat used to having something on, so I think that's a part of why they can tolerate it,” she said. “But they really are very special.”
Byvelds, who works full-time as a general manager for an animal nutrition company, said she makes most of the costumes and that she has even learned to sew as a result of her new hobby.
Impressively, she has never had to repeat a costume in the 56 weeks she’s been doing it. However, Byvelds said she expects she’ll stop dressing up her dogs when they’re allowed to go back inside to visit the residents.
As much as the dogs in costume have brought joy to the residents and staff of the home during a difficult year, Byvelds said the undertaking has helped her too.
“I had some really dark times because for anybody that has spent a lot of time volunteering in long-term care, it was a really, really tough time for us,” she said. “I lost some people that were dear to me… but at least being able to see some smiles… I think it really has helped.”
The rest of her community seems to think so too. Byvelds has become something of a local celebrity these days with people approaching her to ask if she’s the woman who dresses up her dogs.
“It’s become something where people really realize that anybody trying to do anything just to put a smile on people’s faces is really welcomed,” she said.
