We've been gardening!

Oh the weather was so nice yesterday! So after some work, Mum, Gracie, Wiggy and I got in a little gardening.

Mum trimmed up the Peonies and staked them, so we wouldn't destroy them when we get the zoomies. Gracie had to get in there and help out!

Then Mum worked her way down the fence to trim up the Sage that she didn't trim last Fall. But Wiggy was taking over the Sage, lying in it, rolling in it, smelling it, you'd think it was Catnip or something! I don't know if you knew this, but Catnip is from the mint family and so is Sage - guess that's why he liked it so much. Mum has tried to grow Catnip in our yard, but the minute it gets about 1/2" tall, Wiggy eats it. Mum tried to put chicken wire around it until it grew, but Wiggy just tore up the chicken wire to get to the darn stuff. Goofy cat!

Here's some new stuff I learned about Catnip today from Wikipedia:

Catnip pleasantly stimulates cats' pheromonic receptors. The genus is native to Europe, Asia and Africa, with the highest species diversity in the Mediterranean region east to mainland China. It is now common in North America as a weed.

Oil isolated from catnip by steam distillation is a repellent against insects, in particular mosquitoes, cockroaches and termites. Research suggests that in a test tube, distilled nepetalactone, the active ingredient in catnip, repels mosquitoes ten times more effectively than DEET, the active ingredient in most insect repellents, but that it is not as effective as a repellent on skin.

That's interesting stuff, but I gotta tell ya, I wouldn't mind having some of my phermonic receptors stimulated sometime!

Later Mum started trimming up a few shrubs we have in the yard. We have a wide variety from Red Twig Dogwoods, Lilacs, to several kinds of Spireas (white and pink), Forsythia and more. Of course I had to grab myself a nice little stick that Mum cut for me.

We'll get some nice pics soon of the Forsythia (it's about to bloom), and of one of my absolute favorite shrubs in the yard, the White Bridal Wreath Spirea - it's gorgeous!

So the yard is in pretty good shape for Spring and Summer. Mum still has to fertilize the lawn, with that blood meal, bone meal and other good stuff. Our lawn really took a beating last Summer with the lack of rain and hot, hot weather. She'll probably have to throw down some seed too. We'll probably get all that done this weekend, and then we won't have to worry about our yard conflicting with peak agility season!

While Mum finished up some trimming, Gracie and I got in some nice wrestle time. She pummels me, I pummel her, then we zoom through the flower beds (which Mum hates, by the way, she's lost a lot of flowers because of us). But she'd rather we get some good exercise and are happy, than worry about doggone flowers. She can put them in the front yard!

We have such a nice fenced in yard, not really large enough for a lot of agility, but it works for us for now. We sure don't have to look into life insurance quotes, since we have the fence. It's so much safer for all of us!

Hope many of you are getting nice weather now! It sure is good to have Spring back!