A Letter to My Four Legged Friends

I give up.  Certain members of the fur bearing sect of this family refuse to leave my iris alone.  In a moment of desperation, I got out my trusty shovel and did this on Friday:

Go ahead.  Be impressed.  It looks quite sparse, but I dug it out and used only plants that needed rescued from the jaws of death, or that were already in the small one foot wide existing bed, which you can see I expanded to fit new plants.   And the bird bath is one that was left here broken when we moved in.  Brent repaired it with his mad concrete skills then painted it with some left over spray paint from one of his many projects.  So Beloved Furry Ones, while I do enjoy digging out  new beds, and I do love seeing the freshly turned earth, I would really appreciate you leaving all digging to me.

Oh, stop looking so sweet and obedient.  I know what you are up to.  As soon as my back is turned you will be doing such shenanigans as this:

I try to look at the bright side and delude myself into believing that you were digging for a gopher.  Or a rat.  Or China.  But truly, truly I feel no threat from any random Chinese coming up through our earth, so you can just leave them there, alright?  And I am having a hard time believing that Mexican dingos are truly bred to hunt down the Chinese.  Rats, birds, snakes, even lizards?  I can totally see that.

While I totally appreciate that this little critter didn't make it into my house, I would be totally okay if you did NOT leave them in my vegetable garden.  Although it is hardly recognizable as a vegetable garden as some furry critter with busy jaws  did THIS last week...

Forgive the sideways photo, Dear Furry Friends.  But just in case you need a cue:  It is a jalapeno pepper plant chewed down to a single stem...Now this COULD be due to army worms.  They are overwhelming this season.  But the ginormous paw prints tend to point a finger at a certain chestnut colored puppy.

Oh, you are sweet and obedient, and heaven knows you are endlessly retrieving, retrieving, retrieving.  I'm just not entirely convinced that retrieving all of these from the fire pit are necessary.

My charge nurse said Friday that my yard must look really beautiful since I'm always working in it.  I know all five of you, my Beloved Furry Albatrosses were home doing your part to ensure the fallacy of such a rash statement.  Because after all, if Chesney is not chewing every piece of wood into one inch squares, or Kelsey is not creating lunar landscapes then the blasted felines in the household are committing  murder and mayhem....And I have to say every blasted time I find these, I say "damn cats."

Oh, yes I do.  Profanity.  That's what you have brought me too with your blue bird murdering ways.  Why blue birds?  I never even SEE blue birds!  Yet, you find them and see fit to kill them!  Perhaps you could be coaxed to move on to cow birds?  Or grackles?  Sparrows?  Please?  I promise to not voice one word of profanity complaint if you will just stick with the less visually appealing birds.

Oh!  And just in case you haven't noticed we will soon have some new four legged friends here. Kelsey I realize you will be utterly unable to resist tormenting them, even though they will make you foam at the mouth.  Please realize I'm referring to the rabid dog manner of foaming, not the Pavlov's dog sort of way...Just so we're clear.  The foaming is NOT a good thing, Kelsey.  So could you please just refrain from tormenting these little amphibians?  Thanks for your consideration in this manner.

 

Oh!  And I just realized as I took this photo today, that in this stage these little guys actually resemble little mice!  So perhaps it's a very good thing they are in the front yard and not in the back yard!