VHS Adoption Spotlight

Boonville's Barb Byers knows all about the business of rescuing animals; after all, her daughter Laurie serves as the Development and Public Relations Coordinator

for the VHS. Predictably, the Byers family had a number of furry friends running

around throughout Laurie's childhood, primarily cats, but now that Barb lives alone in a big farmhouse, she's got two adorable dogs to keep her company - a Chihuahua and a Chihuahua Rat Terrier mix. And, up until last year, Laurie's cat Suki also called the

farmhouse home before passing away from cancer at the age of 15. The loss inevitably left

a void, but that empty feeling has recently been remedied.

For those who keep tabs on all the action at the VHS, it will come as no surprise that the

shelter is currently swimming in cats - hundreds of them. One in particular, a feline that was pulled from Animal Control, had been hanging out in the

VHS office due to overcrowding. Laurie suggested that her mom come

down and meet Cici, a four-year-old tiger-striped cutie that reportedly arrived

overweight and with matted fur from a questionable living environment.

That's all Barb needed to hear. "I said, you know, I could foster her because Cici

needed to get the weight down," she says. "But when I first brought her home,

everything scared her. Any little noise she heard, she was in a panic - and the dogs freaked her out, but luckily, they aren't cat chasers."

That was back in September. Thankfully, over the last few months, Cici has acclimated to her new surroundings and become a beloved part of the family. "She likes to play, loves to play fetch," Barb says. "I'll go upstairs [where Cici prefers to stay]

and throw a little toy mouse or a little fluff ball and she'll run and go get it and drop it

at my feet - she's still got a lot of fun in her." And the best news of all is that Barb has

officially adopted Cici. "The reason I made the decision to go ahead and adopt her is

because it's just me in the house and I have plenty of room," she says. "And the idea of sending her back to the shelter to be adopted and have her go back through all that again... She might as well stay and join the clan [laughs]."