Tales from our own personal nature preserve, which I mildly tolerate on a daily basis.

You know how I like to brag about the fact that I cannot keep plants alive? That might not be *completely* truthful. Here is where I tell you about the knockout rosebush debacle.

It is pictured above. In case you are a gardening dumbass, like moi, the knockout rosebush is the one with the pink flowers (duh) that looks like it is threatening to eat our entire yard. Ghetto play toys, dog poop, yellow-slide-of-death and all.

The rosebush started small! And cute! It was planted at the request of my oldest daughter, who wanted some roses. That request alone should make you chuckle, knowing my severe learning disabilities when it comes to PLANTS.

Honesty, I invested about $15 in a stem with some leaves. I asked around for how to plant it (seriously), where to plant it, what kind of sun it likes (as if I would even know the difference), how to maintain it. I listened to the answers and followed through on NONE of the advice. I thought it would die within a month.

Quick side note: One year before we planted the roses, we had our ENTIRE back yard re-landscaped. Tore out the big, ugly deck that bounced when you walked on it and added a concrete patio. Knowing our inability to keep things alive, the landscapers selected a variety of bushes and tall grasses. NO FLOWERS, minus a couple of azaleas. That should have been my first clue.

So I found a nice little spot between two azalea bushes that looked like a *perfect* place for the roses that would be dead in 60 days. The innocent planting of this bush, however, became a scenario similar to the garden toad we captured. And are still feeding crickets to 3 YEARS LATER.

Note to other garden dumbasses--knockout roses grow like weeds!!!!! It seemed to multiply before our eyes. Fall came, and it seemed like we were in a good place...and then. Spring.

Holy hell, this thing exploded. So pretty (kind of, it's like an untamable weed), but it is seriously bullying every other plant in its area, which FYI, was WAY too small for this giant. Mike and I have begun having conversations about "taking it out" (used in mafia slang, not the terminology of gardeners who know how to dig/divide roots, blah, blah, blah).

Until I was taking pictures of it today and noticed a cardinal? fly out of it. Of course, it has built itself a nice little nest in that rosey forest. Now it seems the bush has to stay because it is some kind of nature preserve and destroying it would equal annihilating an eco-system or something.

Just kidding. I have no idea what any of that means, but I am kind of interested in seeing cardinal babies. Also, I'm not even sure it was a cardinal, but it wasn't a robbin, so if we are being honest, that is the criteria I am using when identifying common, Midwestern birds.

Speaking of dead things.

G and I found this under the yellow-slide-of-death this evening. It was belly-up with cute little leggies poking out, and as I don't know of any animal that safely nests that way, I called Mike for confirmation of its passing. If you are wondering WHY I need confirmation on whether something is dead...a couple of years ago, Mike said there was a dead bird under one of our trees and that he'd deal with it when he got home. I took a peek, cuz I am morbidly curious, and was startled to learn the dead bird was a duck! Sad! When Mike got home, he said it most certainly wasn't a duck, and we headed out back so that I could gloat about my bird knowledge...only to discover the dead bird was some piece of crap and the duck I spoke of? Actually alive and nesting under our tree. So. I guess I don't do so good identifying dead/alive.

What do you do with dead animals when you find them in your yard? Do you have your husband scoop it up and pose it on the stairs to the slide so that you can photograph it?

Just curious.