Actually, the title of this post isn't accurate. Abi's had a great time. She's had loads of fun. It's Matt and I who have been having the not-so-good days.
Here's where we've been the last week. Abi has discovered things grow. She likes these things. She just doesn't like them growing in the yard. Where they can thrive. Or live.
A couple weeks ago, she ripped one of our little apple trees right out of the ground and ate it. Since apple trees need more than one to cross-pollinate, we had to purchase another one. So we bought another apple tree, brought it home, planted it and decided to water it. So I went to turn on the hose.
Water is squirting out at me, but none is coming out of the hose. Something is not right. There are two Abi-teeth puncture holes in the connection from our hose box to the spout. The new hose connection. Because she ate the other one.
So we unhook the hose from the hose box and hook it straight into the spout and turn it on. We walk the hose all the way back and realize that what was a 100 ft. hose is now about 50 ft. because of all the chewing and repairing that took place over the winter, and it doesn't stretch back to the trees anymore.
So we have to go to get a new hose. We get the hose, hook it up, water and decide to keep the hose outside of the fence where Abi can't reach it.
We go out for the night and come home to check on the trees.
What trees?
That's right. We got home and both of our apple trees have been ripped clean from the ground. We found the roots for one of them. Abi ran around us in circles with the roots of the other one in her mouth for about 10 minutes. Any attempt to get near her sent her running and we just stood there, at 11:30 p.m., in the dark, trying to figure out what in the world to do now. (She finally dropped the roots and we were able to pick them up and give her a little discipline).
So I put the apple tree roots in the garage. I want to try to get them healthy. Save them and our money.
Fast forward. Yesterday, our lemon bush was ripped up and left in the yard.
Today, four out of five of our other bushes were ripped out and chewed. Only one bush now remains. (Well, there is a rose bush, but she learned her lesson with that one...if only all plants had thorns.)
I now have a whole slew of roots in the garage that need to be planted and nursed back to health.
Abi and I had a talk today about how we don't have the money for this. About how trees are not toys. About how she needs to leave them alone. About how this is not a game and we are not having fun. I don't know if the message got through to her.
We've decided we need to take action and build a fence dividing the yard so our newly plowed garden will stand a chance.
In the meantime, I guess we're getting what we deserve for leaving a yellow lab puppy unattended in nature.
On another note, and this is a true confession, I cleaned the tile floor this week. Not that I haven't cleaned it before, but for some reason, my feet were always so dirty they were turning the shower floor black. Disgusting I know. So I decided to tackle it. I cleaned that sucker 6 times before it got decently clean. Sick. I stood back and admired the clean, shiny floor.
And then Abi came inside. And now there are muddy paw prints on the floor. I wonder how the floor gets so dirty.
Needless to say, Abi is treading on thin ice these days. She did learn the skill of dropping her Kong this week though (we decided we needed to work on "drop!" so any future root incidents will end in a quicker, happier surrender).
Until then, we may be setting up a "Save our Landscaping" fund.
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