Meet Cameron and Carly! RASKC is super happy to award Outstanding New Volunteer recognition to Cameron Garside and Carly Beard, who are married to each other. Foster Care Coordinator Lori Mason said, “They work magic with the hissy kittens! They wave that magic wand, and POOF hissy to purring!” Since Cameron and Carly began fostering for RASKC last year, they have already contributed over 1,200 hours.

“Our family life is pretty laid back since we have no kids. We usually just like to garden, watch TV, and relax at home,” said Cameron and Carly. “We focus our attention on our two cats MuMu and Meep who we adopted from the Animal Talk Rescue which is now Seattle Area Feline Rescue. They are about 12 years old.

“Our two cats are complete opposites. Meepers is shy, quiet, laid back and slow, while MuMu is loud, fat, and constantly seeks attention. They both, however, love to take over the bed as soon as we get up in the morning.
Literally two minutes after we get out of bed, they are in it.

“We love helping out RASKC’s cats and kittens, but most of all, we would say our favorite thing about RASKC is the staff and the volunteers. They have helped us out so much through all of our fostering needs, shown us how to do things we never thought we would have to do while fostering kittens, and have shown us that people really do care deeply about every animal that goes through there. Foster Care Coordinator Lori Mason has been a great teacher and mentor to us, as we try to tame feral kittens into adoptable kittens.

“We originally started kitten taming with FCAT (Feral Cat Assistance & Trapping) in Burien and then progressed into fostering for RASKC, FAF (Friends of the Animals Foundation) and SAFE (Seattle Area Feline Rescue), we also work with Whole Cat and Kaboodle in Redmond.

“As foster parents, we get scratched, bit, and peed on a lot, but some of our best memories from volunteering are the kittens and cats that we foster and then get adopted. Mostly because we end up falling in love with them and must fight off the urge to adopt them all. We then come to our senses and let deserving families have a new fur baby.

“Cameron is a proud Canadian, but he has lived in the United States for most of his life- Hawaii, Colorado, California, Texas, and here. Carly has lived in the Seattle area all of her life. We now live in Burien and have been together since 2007.

“Cameron has an art education background, including two degrees in Graphic Design and Illustration. He works with custom graphics for office interiors and other vinyl film applications, while Carly is a stay at home pet mom. Cameron would like to do more illustration work, perhaps a children’s book or a comic book, something that involves more drawing and digital painting.

“We both enjoy electronic music. Carly’s favorite musician is Donald Glaude, a local DJ from Tacoma. Cameron wants to promote Warren Dunes, a local trio that everyone should check out. Support local music and artists!! Our favorite actor is Melissa McCarthy; she is hilarious.”

Fun fact: Cameron once met David Hasselhoff in an airport!