Bred to retrieve birds, Stella was the pick of her litter. Her breeder planned to keep this English Labrador Retriever to carry on their long line of bird dogs. But lucky for Ellie Priester, this dog wouldn’t hunt. “I think they realized right away that she was a diva,” says Stella’s owner, laughing. “She would never make it in the hunting world.”

Ellie began suggesting a new dog soon after she and her husband, Davis, were married. “I begged for six months,” remembers Ellie. On the couple’s six-month anniversary, Davis agreed to start looking. It was not a long search. Ellie had been following Stella’s parents on Instagram. The next morning, Ellie called the breeder, hoping to get on a waiting list. Instead, they offered her 12-week-old Stella. “My poor husband thought he had a year. Little did he know. The next day I drove to Arkansas to get her,” says Ellie.

Davis had only one request. “He wanted a fat, lazy lab,” Ellie says with a smile. “She’s an English Lab, so she’s both those things.”

Stella spends her days napping on the Preisters’ bed, lounging on the sofa in the window, or laying on the front porch, keeping watch over her West Montcrest home. “She might bark, but she wags her tail aggressively while barking,” says Ellie.

Stella stays close to home but will occasionally wander off. “She’s really social,” says Ellie. Just the other day, when Ellie called for Stella, she came running from a neighbor’s house. “And I said, ‘Stella! That’s not your house!’ And my neighbor hollered back, ‘No, but that’s OK!’”

Stella loves people, other dogs, and food. For a treat, she’ll give a high-five. She is the quintessential lab — minus the bird chasing.