Sunday - Already having to water every day now. Lugging a hundred feet of hose around to water every day is a major drag. (ha ha). I enjoy watering, but dragging the water hose is no fun. The biggest tasks I did today (Sunday) were these: I pulled and dug grass and weeds and old plant debris out of one of the iris beds in the circular garden on the north side. Haven't been able to do that in several years, so it was in bad need of cleaning out. I let the water run and that made the weeds come out much easier and settled the dirt back down while watering them at the same time. There is still a third yet to do to finish that bed, but I had to stop for awhile. I got really hot and tired. When I am done, shredded wood chips mulch will go in there. It looks so much better already. BTW, my bearded irises have buds, so they will be blooming any time now. The minis irises are finished and the dwarfs have been blooming for a week. They a repeat bloomers. Later, I used my old-fashioned cultivator and prepared a twenty-foot bed in the vegetable garden. Then I set out ten of the broccoli plants there. There are probably 30 or more little plants yet to set out (somewhere). I only planted 20 seeds! How did 20 seeds grow 40+ plants? The rest went back into the greenhouse until I can till up a place for them. The soil is great in the vegetable garden this year because of all the manure-hay I put in there last year. I made one-inch collars by cutting paper towel tubes into 1-1/2 inch sections and placed them around each broccoli plant to deter cutworms from chewing through the tiny stems. I do that with tomatoes, cabbage, and peppers too. It works! I cultivated the potato beds - two 20 ft rows, to loosen the soil and then cultivated the path between one row of potatoes and the newly planted broccoli bed. The fern-leaf dill is up behind the broccoli where I sowed it earlier this month. Broccoli benefits from dill. I cleaned out the path along the asparagus bed where I planted the strawberries earlier this month too.(or did I do that in March??). Gotta keep the weeds down before they get away from me and drop seeds. Then I watered everything in there. I cut the lower limbs off the cedars on the east side next to the vegetable garden to allow more air and light into the yard and garden. I can't start the chainsaw (can't yank hard enough), so I had to use my bow saw. Ugh. The cedar branches like to et me up! I am allergic to them. Breaks out with an itchy rash and bumps like poison ivy, only the cedar's oil burns my skin too. Then DH came home and he came out and we hauled all the clippings up to the burn pile. He got out his chainsaw and cut down the big hackberry tree that was leaning over the garden. He cut all the smaller limbs off so I could throw them over the fence where he could drag them up to the burn pile too. Boy, do I hurt all over, but it looks great. Lots of sunshine now for growing tomatoes, okra, corn, beans, cukes and what-have-you. BTW, DH is going to buy me that little tiller so I can cultivate the rest of the garden. (he will probably use it too. He likes playing with gadgets and gizmos) :) Tomorrow, if I can walk, I am planting two rows of bush beans in between the two rows of potatoes. This is to confuse potato bugs when they fly over. It works. Marigolds will be transplanted on each end of the potato rows to help with repelling beetles. Garlic is growing along the other side of the potato rows. The radishes and beets are growing very well as are the onions. More onion sets will go into the garden in May to extend the green onions through summer. The strawberries are blooming and the asparagus are coming up. We will have to finish eating the rest of the strawberries I put up in the freezer last year to make room for this year's crop. Found more Morels today too. Yippee! Discovered that the Liatris bulbs I planted last week are up already. I never grew them before, so am thrilled. It was just such a beautiful day - I did not want to spend it in the house. I'd rather be in my garden. ~Annie

I had that happen on another site. DH determined that it was a spam program that wanted to download their software. Luckily I realized that it wasn't what we had on our computer and didn't. Could be that if you had it would have given you a virus.

'hard wired for fear' The phrase brings back a sad memory. I once worked with a Rottweiler-loving gal (does it seem like the big girls like the little dogs & the little girls like the big ones? Jane was a willowy blonde & all her dogs outweighed her.) Her dogs truly were gentle giants; they were house dogs who washed their feet in the kiddie pool after they'd been outside & slept on the couch & rode in the car; they lived with several cats- & were terrified of one of them, a bossy tortoiseshell... Jane lost her beloved Rosie when Rose was about 7 years old. From what I understood, Rotts are susceptible to or have a genetic predisposition to develop a kind of blood cancer. It was a long hard journey, & Jane was heartbroken at the end. About 2 months afterward, she went, on a whim, to look at a litter of Rotts. She said she'd had no intention of getting a puppy, but she wanted to see them. The 'breeder' had the mother & father dogs chained to doghouses, there was no grass in the yard, the water was dirty, it was awful... & Jane felt sorry for the pups & bought one. *She raised that dog in exactly the same way she'd raised the other*. He too, should have been a 'gentle giant', but he became more & more aggressive, snapping at the cats, growlilng at the other 2 dogs, etc. The cats were afraid of him, the dogs were afraid of him, & eventually Jane was afraid of him. One day when Jane tried to get past him to go into her kitchen, he growled & raised his hackles & bared his teeth. She said she'd never been afraid in her own house before. Yet, like so many of you, she kept trying. She tried everything under the sun. She finally had him euthanized, & the vet tried to comfort her, tellng her that it was a genetic or inborn irregularity, using the phrase "bad wiring". You cannot overcome bad wiring.

I love animals so much. I don't think I've ever been without a pet. I've lost so many over the years and trust me I know how painful it is. In 2012 I lost my ferret and a chain reaction seemed to happen after that. I ended up losing 6 pets in about 3 years. 2 of them being cats who passed within a few months of each other that were 15 that my husband and I got within the first year of dating. We think one had cancer and the other passed from kidney disease. Unfortunately they didn't show any symptoms until it was too late to do anything. Our other 2 ferrets passed after that. Ferrets are pretty delicate and can have lots of medical problems. After that we lost our cat that was only a few years old. About 2 weeks after losing the 2nd 15 year old cat we were at Petsmart. It was winter and a really bad cold front was coming in. We were about to leave and saw this gray and white cat rubbing up on the building. He saw me coming a mile away. My husband didn't want to take him because he was still to crushed from losing Neptune and Klondike and didn't want to feel like we were replacing them. I cried until we took him home lol That was 3 years ago and we still have Rupert. He's such a sweetheart and we don't regret taking him home. After losing our pets I thought about not getting anymore because it hurt so much. But who am I kidding I can't be without them. Not having pets would be just as painful as losing them. I now have 6 cats and a wienie dog who is in hog heaven having all these kitties to play with. Take your time and do what feels right for you. Animals are such a blessing and you maybe saving and giving them a better life than what they had. I'm so sorry for your loss. Your Buddy was such a cute little guy and I'm sure all my babies met him in heaven with open paws. I will keep you in my thoughts and prayers.