You wouldn’t know it from the front of this quiet Oak Park home, but on a recent Sunday morning, Shelly Uslenghi was throwing her 13th annual Bernese mountain dog breakfast in the back yard.
“I wish I could tell you exactly how many dogs were here, but I don’t know because they don’t stand still,” said Amy Spencer, Uslenghi’s daughter. “How are you supposed to count them when they all look the same? It’s a zoo!”
The crowd estimate, according to George Uslenghi, Shelly’s husband, was 45 people and 30 dogs. All were enjoying one another’s company and Shelly’s Uslenghi’s extravagant assortment of food and drink, including 12 bottles of champagne. Occasionally, the Berners helped themselves to a treat or two.
While Michelle Melyn of River Forest was chatting with a visitor, Morning Star snuck a piece of chocolate cake from someone’s plate. “Oh no, she’s going to have diarrhea tonight,” said Melyn, a breakfast regular for 10 years.
Most of the guests were from Oak Park and River Forest, a few from Chicago. News of the party travels by word of mouth, says Shelly Uslenghi, who does send out invitations. Thought for the breakfast came to her from a local breeder and veterinarian, Dr. John Hanover, when she got her first Berner, the late Bandit.
“It sounded like a good idea to bring the original litter back together,” said Shelly Uslenghi, an Oak Parker for 30 years.
Berners used to be rare around the village. “When we first started breeding them, they were hard to find, but now you see them everywhere,” Hanover said, “… on ads and in commercials. It’s because they are so good and nice with kids and other dogs.”
Hanover, who now lives in Kenosha, Wisc., was at the breakfast Sept. 21 with his wife, Joan, their two Berners, Shadow and Goldvasser, and their Great Pyrenees, Big Boy.
Monie Burns, an Alden resident and first-year attendee, found out about the breakfast from the Oak Park pet store where she got her two Berners, Captain and Morgan.
“This is great,” Burns said. “All these dogs and no fighting.”
The Uslenghis walk their three dogs-Honey, a Berner, Mandy, a black Lab, and Fletcher, a Border collie-downtown every morning from their N. Taylor home. On the way, they meet a lot of dogs and dog owners.
“She actually knows the names of all the dogs in Oak Park,” George Uslenghi said. “But I’m not so sure she knows the names of all the owners.”