Saturday, May 17, 2014

Sharing Spaces with Dogs – New Fence

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I will be the first to admit that I am not really a dog person.  I am a cat person.  That being said, when my daughter spent two years asking for a dog, and she happened to be the daughter that also takes care of our chickens and rabbit every single day without forgetting or without fail, well, I eventually said yes.  And I love this dog.  I adore her. 

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She is sweet, VERY smart, and the perfect size for a ‘not dog person’.  (Not yappy-sized, and not ‘bigenoughtoknockyouover’ sized.)  The only thing that was killing me was the poop.  I spent a lot of time wondering if all dog owners were crazy.  Do they all poop this much? 

So my daughter set off to train her dog to poop in one place.  There is a barked off area in the back of the yard between the garden and what we lovingly call ‘the sticky tree’ because this huge fir is always putting off pitch.  The puppy took to using that space beautifully, but after a while, we realized it was the medium, not the spot, that she enjoyed using as her bathroom.  That became a problem, because my entire garden is covered in the same bark.  So now the whole side of the yard was free potty space, and she used it liberally.

Then, as I started planting the garden this spring, other things came up.  She loves blood meal and egg shells.  Both of which I use liberally as I am planting.  She is also a whole foods lover, so she would eat my broccoli sprouts right to the ground, including the egg shells I had put around them to deter slugs.

All of a sudden, my dog was not nearly as charming as she was before planting started.  In fact, I had dog-homicide on my mind regularly as I would go out into the garden and find that my pea seedlings had been trampled again, or she had taken down my trellis netting and it was now stuck on her collar as she drug it past my newly sprouted dill seeds, ripping them all from the ground… there were many instances like this and it wasn’t getting any prettier.

 

I set about making my space ‘dog free’.  At first, it was a trial, because we were spending money, time and energy, but she could still get in there easily…

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Super effective, eh?

We got gates and started to put them together.  Considering the arbor and boxes are my own design and by no means ‘professional’ (or even square in some cases) this proved to be a bigger task than we thought but we figured it out.

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Last week we got the last gate finished and the latches put on. 

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And now I love the view from this side of the fence. 

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It’s like having my own room outside.  And the dog is back to being wonderful and delightful again.

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Isn’t the view from the garden gate lovely?

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Friday, May 16, 2014

{this moment}

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{this moment} - A Friday ritual. A single photo - no words - capturing a moment from the week. A simple, special, extraordinary moment. A moment I want to pause, savor and remember.

{Inspired by SouleMama}

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Friday, May 9, 2014

{this moment}

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{this moment} - A Friday ritual. A single photo - no words - capturing a moment from the week. A simple, special, extraordinary moment. A moment I want to pause, savor and remember.

{Inspired by SouleMama}

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Wednesday, May 7, 2014

More nature notebook

This nature notebook has become a sort of  therapy.  

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A way to remember the world is beautiful around me when it just seems like the dark and cloudy, inside my mind and outside of my house, just will not let up.  

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I like to log our nature adventures away from anywhere.  Some of these creatures we see in our own back yard, others we see driving through more rural areas, and even others we have found at wildlife parks or the parking lot of a local store.  I love packing them away in a neat little package to admire later when I have some distance and can remember when Logan was excited to see the bird in the parking lot or the moment when we saw three red winged black birds on the drive home from an especially fun Letterboxing hike (I’ll write more about Letterboxing soon).

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This one is from the last week in April.  I wait for this week every year.  For when Mother Nature loosens her grip on all of the nutrients that grow everywhere around us and things start to grow that will sustain our human bodies and feed our beautiful souls.  These are Mother Nature’s salad greens.  I spent some time showing the kids (and my friends kids too) where to find them and what they looked like and I just couldn’t help adding it into the nature notebook.  That passion has been ingrained deep in me to find the food for which to feed my babies if the world fails and the grocery isn’t the abundant world of calories.

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At this point, it is easy for me to see doing this for years.  Having a collection to come back to and flip through of all of the different animals we have seen and my imaginings of what their homes and spaces look like in each season.  I look forward to collecting many more of these moments!

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Tuesday, May 6, 2014

May The Fourth Be With You!

Star wars day was a celebration like always here in the Rose household.  It started with going to church all decked out in Star Wars shirts.  After we got home we made lunch and started our marathon with Episode 4. 

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I had the idea for a get together about a week before, but I wasn’t able to ask anyone until Wednesday or Thursday due to getting a nasty cold.  I am glad my friends are good sports and amazing guests!  They all showed up with themed treats even though they got almost no notice (and one set of friends literally got asked that morning!).  I have AMAZING friends!

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The menu consisted of Bantha Milk, Han-burgers, Princess Lays, Boba Fettuccini, and Arti-chewy Dip. 

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Even my teenager got into the mood and made ketchup template of the Rebel Symbol!

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I am so lucky to know such amazingly fun people.  It was such a fun May the Fourth be with You! 

Happy Star Wars day!!

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Friday, May 2, 2014

{this moment}

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{this moment} - A Friday ritual. A single photo - no words - capturing a moment from the week. A simple, special, extraordinary moment. A moment I want to pause, savor and remember.

{Inspired by SouleMama}

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