Thank you LtEve.
Ants, no that is not what I was saying at all. I'm making no judgement on you one way or the other in this respect. I am saying that a breeder worth his salt won't sell over Christmas and neither will they sell to someone who is buying a dog as a present. Both of these are admirable morals in a dubious trade.
Your comment re a rescue dog being without history is a shockingly common misconception held by people who often frankly just haven't done their homework.
Many rescue dogs come from family homes. Sometimes this is as a result of marital breakdown or of losing a home/moving house. Other times it's due to idiots dispensing with their dog because the woman is pregnant or has a baby or toddler. Some may be rehomed as they don't get on with another dog in the house or owing to allergy in the family. Thus many rescue dogs do come with a history.
A reputable rescue will assess all their dogs before offering them to new homes too.
A dog from a responsible rescue will also be neutered, vaccinated, microchipped and matched to the new owner and vice versa, bringing with him lifetime support from the rescue and an agreement that the rescue will take the dog back should the owner not be ablt to keep him, even if that's in 10 years time.
Some rescues, especially the larger ones such as the RSPCA and Wood Green, often have a blanket ban on homing to families with young children. This is often not the case with smaller rescues who are frequently more willing to judge on a case by case basis and not reject those with children under a certain age out of hand. It's always worth asking - don't be deterred if the first rescue you approach says no to those with DC.
I must argue one thing that LtEve has said. Another common misconception is that rescue is full after Christmas.
The sad reality is that rescue is most full just before Christmas as owners dump their dogs to save money and spend it instead on the new Wii for the kids, or to replace the old dog with a Christmas puppy.
Each year thousands of dogs are killed in pounds on a weekly basis purely because they have no home to go to... but never more often than at Christmas. When the credit crunch first hit in 2 years ago I was working til 4 and 5 most mornings to find rescue places for dogs due to die at 9am that same day. Rescue was on it's knees and just couldn't cope with the sheer number of dogs not just coming from pounds as strays but being handed in by their owners too.
One of those was a long haired white German Shepherd, an old boy of about 10 or 11, who was 80% or so blind and as gentle as a lamb. I literally saved him from the vets needle - he was about to be put to sleep within a minute of my stepping in. When I spoke to the pound manager about him she said with the confidence of one who has seen it all before, "He was a stray, he'll have been thrown out to make way for this years puppy.".
I've no doubt she was right... I've seen it all before too.