We don’t always expect that tiny things will have a huge impact. And at less than four pounds, BooBoo the poodle was just about the tiniest dog I’ve ever known. This week, the Kerby family said goodbye to BooBoo. She had become sick at the ripe old age of 15½ years, and she leaves behind her a Great Dane-sized hole in many people’s hearts.

Some of you may remember BooBoo as a regular fixture at Kerby’s back in the early 2000s. She would come to work with Vicki each day and had a shelf behind the counter that was all hers. She would sit there and hang out, occasionally barking at customers or staff members that walked by. As the day would go on, she would curl up in a bed on her shelf and take a little afternoon nap. Many people stopped in the nursery just to see BooBoo.

Our girls were especially attached to BooBoo. Although she was middle-aged by the time they were born and not as fond of rough and tumble playing, she was a good sport through dress-up sessions and attempts at fetch. And while both girls were attached to her, Maddy is our animal whisperer. (She recently told us that she was going to be an animal-saver when she grows up.) Over the last few months, she took to carrying BooBoo everywhere around Nana and Papa’s house, treating her like a little baby. The picture below was taken on the day before BooBoo passed away. And we are so glad that Maddy got a chance to have one more snuggle with her. Because, as you might guess, Maddy was crushed when we gave her the news. The words had barely escaped Kim’s lips when you could see a sob welling up in her and what followed can only be called an explosion of tears. It was a sad day for both girls as they processed the loss.

So bye-bye, BooBoo. We will all miss you, and we hope you know that even though you were small, you had a huge impact on lots of people’s lives.