Creative Kimpire: Oh My Garden!

This week we finally got an item checked off our wishlist for our house. We have been wanting to get a fence installed in our yard since we moved into our house and had our first set of pups. It was finished on Tuesday and we love it! More importantly, Sansa and Sophie love it, too! I had no idea what an outdoor dog Sophie is. I have a feeling she didn’t either. We had tie outs hooked to our patio before and we would tie them out when we were outside working. Sophie would always immediately run back up the steps and sit in front of the screen door, wanting to be let back in 🙄. Before we had Soph, Sansa was the same way, but since we’ve had Soph, Sansa has started enjoying her alone time outside 😂. I can’t imagine why 🤷🏻‍♀️. My friend, Kim, got me a gift this week that perfectly sums up my life:

Now the girls run and play inside the safety of the fence and it makes my heart happy. What doesn’t make me happy is when Sophie decides to run underneath the deck and come out covered in mud. Also filed under the category of Things Sophie Does That Don’t Make Mommy Happy, is what happened this past Thursday morning. I got to sleep in for once, waking around 9 am, feeling pretty refreshed. Sophie was still sleeping, which is unusual for her. My typical wake up involves a puppy kiss, nose nibble, being sat on, or all three. I woke her up and said good morning to Sansa, who was laying on her bed beside me. This was only our second morning having the fence so I was pretty excited that I could just open the door and let them out, rather than having to take them each out on their leash. Sansa is the biggest procrastinator when it comes to finding a place to poop. She’s ridiculous and stubborn in the mornings so this makes my routine much easier and less stressful. Anyway, I opened the door for them to go out and potty and then went to the bathroom myself. After I brushed my teeth, I came out to find them both excited and standing at attention at one of the windows in the living room, in front of my big stand that holds several potted plants. It only took a second for me to realize what was going on because the curtain started moving like crazy because there was a FREAKING BIRD IN MY HOUSE!! 😱 They were both fixated on it and kept jumping up each time it fluttered inside the curtain. I was like, “OMG, how am I gonna get this stupid thing outside?!” So I went and got some gloves because I didn’t want to touch it. When I came back from the other room, they were both still standing there but I didn’t see the bird anymore. I assumed they’d kept watch on it so I decided I was going to have to move the plant shelves and as I started by picking up a heavy pot with a huge peace lily in it, they both ran to the other window. I saw then that it had relocated and I tried to put the plant down quickly, however, it wasn’t quickly enough and in a nanosecond, Soph had the bird in her mouth! I was screaming at her to “spit it out!” and “come here,” which she did…with it’s head hanging out of the side of her mouth 😫. So I grabbed her collar and dragged her outside because I didn’t want her dropping it in the living room. Once we got in the yard I told her to “drop,” and she did but as I went to pick it up, she snatched it up again 🤬. If the poor thing wasn’t dead before, she finished the job then. I told her to “drop” again and this time I was able to pick up it’s limp little body. I took it outside the fence and laid it down to make sure it was dead, and it was. Poor baby. I was so conflicted with emotion because three minutes before, I woke up feeling pretty good and now I’d discovered that my child is a cold-blooded killer. And what’s worse, with way more access to unsupervised outside time, she’s likely to do it again 😭. UGH. I just kept thinking about my grandma always talking about her superstitions and I’m pretty sure having a bird come inside your home is a bad omen, meaning someone is going to die. Good thing I’m not a superstitious person or the fact that it was the day before Friday the 13th would’ve probably really freaked me out 🤭😧.

They have a big yard and can go anywhere they want and where does Sophie sit? Right beside Sansa, of course!

Now that they can go out whenever they want into the backyard, Sansa gets pretty miffed when I won’t take her out to the garden. Just this morning she gave me the most sass she has ever given me and kept pointing with her nose to the door 🙄. I told her no but then took her after I made some coffee. At least she had to wait 🤷🏻‍♀️. That dog had better learn who the boss is around here and that it’s not her 👸🏻#momstheboss. Anyway, speaking of the garden, we have had about 30 cucumbers in the past week, which resulted in 20 jars of pickles, so far. The tomato plants are doing well, in their own, recommended spacing apart, spots. No tomato jungle this year! However, we do have a surprise tomato visitor growing in this year’s watermelon bed, which was home to last year’s tomato jungle disaster zone major. It is literally right beside the watermelon plants and they might even have roots entangled. Kim and I wondered if it will breed with the watermelon and she coined the term, “watermato,” as a new species of fruit if it happens. I’ve eaten all the lettuce and onions and will have to replant. My carrots looked better this year than last’s but that’s because last year’s were terrible lol. I had to google why our carrots had grown weird little legs on the sides and found out that carrots don’t like fertilizer, which was applied to the bed right before planting. It would be super helpful if I read this stuff BEFORE we planted but you know, that’s not really my style. I’m a live and learn kinda girl. Oh well. 🤷🏻‍♀️

Cucumbers

Pickles

Tomatoes

3 watermelons 🙌🏻.

The girls have been providing me with some really great photo ops lately so here are some of my favs from the past couple of weeks 💕: