Like Tantrums, we also have a dog that wouldn't be suitable to be homed with small DC. We don't have any, so the charity was happy to be able to place him with us where he is a much loved and very special member of the family, who gets on very well with our small nephews and other family members. We are careful and take basic commonsense precautions with him around DC and it works. It's not rocket science - it's just commitment and common sense.
It's also been great for the boys to have got to know our three very different dogs and now they are confident dog handlers who love coming over and attending charity dog shows with us, and going to rescue events. I really wish you could see the happiness that is brought by dog adoption and the many benefits to children like our nephews. Seeing their faces beaming with pride as they came home with a rosette and a prize bag of poo bags 
or making strangely wonky Fancy Dress costumes for boys and dogs has been a delight, and given us some of the nicest times we've had.
This reality is repeated up and down the country every day with a huge variety of rescue dogs, big, small, old, young, pedigree, mongrel, cross breeds, four legs, three legs, tail on, tail off, ex racers, ex sofa surfers, ex poundies, ex breeders. When I did my Gold KC Good Citizen Award with one of our greys, (see, rescues can be trained beautifully too) out of the eight dogs in the class, four were rescues, and one (a Staffy - shattering yet another myth right there) was a brilliant agility dog, who competed regularly with his owner.