About Safe Keeps Pet Sit

Our strong belief in animal welfare is based on a big foundation of voice, backed by action in the world of community animal welfare. For her lifetime, Safe Keeps owner Drema, has thrived on sunshine and a deep connection with nature and whether domesticated or wild, helping living creatures. She has mutually and unconditionally loved dogs, cats, birds, guinea pigs…and for laughs but totally true, a pet snake…albeit imaginary at the age of five. 

Drema has been both a foster and board member with St. Mary’s Animal Welfare League; co-founder of Give Me Shelter St. Mary’s, an animal welfare advocacy group; co-founder of Real Estate to the Rescue, where her income is used to support high-priority animal abuse, neglect, or abandonment cases; founding member of the shelter planning committee for St. Mary’s County; member and chair of the St. Mary’s County Animal Control Advisory Board; fierce advocate for rescues, animal control officers, shelter staff, and veterinary professionals; and for the last 12 years she (and her teammates!) has strategically and successfully recovered hundreds of dumped or lost animals in four Southern Maryland counties as a purely volunteer, professionally trained missing animal detective, safe-trapper, and 'Safe Keeps' educator. 

When she is not working hard in her entrepreneurial enterprises earning money to support animals in need (and college tuition), you will find her at the other end of a leash or cat toy; in a courtroom showing up for the voiceless in animal cruelty cases to be a presence for holding abusers accountable and responsible; tromping through the woods, rolling out of moving vehicles, jumping creeks, stopping traffic and army-crawling on pavement for animals in fight/flight, and setting and baiting traps to recover them safely; or most importantly, loving on her own family and friends – humans and pets! 

Drema is married to her animal-loving husband Tom and has six children, six grandsons (with a grandson on the way!), three pets, and seven grand pets! Topper, her black lab, was part of a court-ordered seizure (Thank you forever, Allison Budd and Mandy Elder!) and adopted from the Charles County Animal Care Center in 2020. Angel is her Beagle-Pom-Chow-Chi (in perfect 25% ratios!) trapped by Drema in 2015 as a feral living on her own from the time she was a puppy, with a belly full of rocks from hunger. Sunset, surely the most spoiled feral cat of all, has the best beds, water fountain, automatic feeder, back scratcher, climbing shelves, and waterfront window views from his private luxury suite with attached catio.

Closing all her pet posts with “Life is short, love a dog.” She truly believes “Life is short, love ALL!” And she will 'Safe Keeps', personally provide all of the care,  and love your pets as if they are her own.