Little loaf of bread. Meet Toast Hawker, voted cutest dog in the Sacramento area
Toast Hawker otherwise known as her family’s social butterfly is this year’s winner of Sacramento Bee’s cutest dog contest.
Her large ears, magnetic smile and warm coloring has pulled the heart strings of Sacramento-area residents.
“She’s like a little loaf of bread,” Caitlin Hawker told the Sacramento Bee. “We say that she kind of looks like the perfect toast that has been toasted just the right amount.”
Hawker said Toast was added to the family after she got engaged to her fiancé Alec Whitney. The couple both adored corgis and decided to make the big step together in order to complete their little families that already included two cats, Turnip and Toffee.
Now Toast’s warm smile has brought joy to hundreds in the Sacramento area and is officially the winner of Sacramento Bee’s cutest dog contest.
The cutest dog contest launched in October, and Toast emerged as the winner through two rounds of voting. About a dozen dogs in and near the Sacramento area were entered.
Toast will now be entered into a second contest to determine the cutest dog in the country across more than 20 McClatchy newspapers, launching Monday, Nov. 10.
What is Sacramento area’s cutest dog like?
The energetic corgi is known by her family as kind and attentive.
“If she meets a group of people, she makes sure to give equal attention to everybody,” Hawker said. “Even when it comes to me and my fiancé, she doesn’t have a favorite. She just loves us.”
According to Hawker, Toast has pushed the couple to go out more as they get adjusted to their new home.
The couple, who moved to California from Illinois, said they’ve met new friends through Toast.
They attend Sacramento Corgi meetups through the Sacramento Corgi Pack, a group centered on creating community for owners and corgis a like.
“(Toast has) really gotten us to socialize and meet new people,” Hawker said.
Though Toast is a bundle of kindness, there is still an edgier side to the corgi.
“She is very serious about tug of war and she kind of becomes a little gremlin,” Hawker said. “She makes a lot of growling noises and acts big and tough and loud and rambunctious.”
Regardless of Toast’s edgier side, she has brought joy and warmth to her family, and Hawker says the dog has brought her and fiancé closer together.
Hawker encourages people seeking to adopt a corgi to look at their options such as a good breeder like Rees Corgis or to adopt rescue corgis from the Queen’s Best Stumpy Dog Rescue that finds homes for special needs corgis and corgis in need of rescue.
