On Sunday August 14 we lost our beautiful Pumpkin at the age of 20.

Pumpkin arrived in our house three years ago after she had been left at a local shelter because her person had been admitted to a nursing home.  I saw her picture in the shelter's newsletter and showed up there the next day with adoption on my mind.  We ended up adopting both Pumpkin and Jeffrey on the spot.

Pumpkin was skittish and it took months to be able to pick her up without her snapping at me but perseverance and love won the day.  After a time she became comfortable enough to rest on my lap - but never for too long!  Pumpkin had her preferences - and her preferences were either to be on the move or snuggled up in her bed.  For the short six months before Jeffrey passed away he was Pumpkin's constant companion.  He'd been a lonely boy before he was rescued so never wanted to be far from company.

Pumpkin, though 17 when she came to live with us, was an active dog.  She loved being outside. Though walks were typically 'sniff arounds', Pumpkin would suddenly take off at a run and I would have to go trotting after her - she winded me more than once!  And how that little Miss Pumpkin loved to sniff at the local 'watering holes' - the fire hydrant, the mailboxes, any place another dog had been instantly became a source of utter fascination for Pumpkin!

As the years passed Pumpkin slowed down and so she became content to hang out in the backyard and spend more time cuddling.  I loved to cuddle her - her small sweet body nestled into mine.  And I loved to just look at her - Pumpkin had the most beautiful eyes and a little mop of fur at the top of her head that dangled into her eyes, requiring constant trimming.

I miss my Pumpkin.  I miss the sound of her breath, the tip tap of her paws as she walked around the house, her eager crunching of the dog cookies I baked for her, and those beautiful beautiful eyes.

Thank you Pumpkin for being with us.  You are forever in our hearts my little love.

Despite a shaky start at Reverence the Wave 2 planting is nearly complete (sunflowers and some experiments with grains yet to be done this weekend).  The Wave 1 harvest is still underway - lettuces and kale and collards though strawberries are almost done and peas and spinach were a major bust.  Lucky for me that I am friends with a local farmer who is willing to trade spinach for asparagus!

Of course, in the rush to get all the planting done the weeds have been overlooked.  The potato hills are thistle infested and it will be a major undertaking to get those all cleared.  On the up side - the cole beds and onion bed are weed free (for now) and the tomato rows look OK.  They will be hoed and mulched this weekend and the corn field will be dethistled and tilled.  I'll also be planting clovers and annual rye in between rows - this creates lovely pathways during the season.  The rye will winter kill and leave a nice mat of biomass to walk on during the spring - and the clovers will come back - hopefully densely enough to crowd out weeds.

Buckwheat will go into a section I am working on rehabilitating (Wave 1 cover) and will later get tilled under and succeeded by winter wheat or oats (haven't decided yet!).  And sometime very soon the potatoes will get dethistled and otherwise weeded and then hilled and mulched (she said optimistically) with annual rye and clovers in between.

A little rain is needed now though - those carrot, beet, bean, and cucumber seeds are unlikely to sprout without it!  The Chicago area got some heavy rain (and damaging hail) while we stayed dry here.  I really wanted that rain but am glad not to had golf ball size hail slamming into my tomatoes.

All in all, though, I am once again wildly impressed with the way the farm is shaping up.  I'm also thrilled by the legions of red wing blackbirds and swallows who have made their homes at Reverence and by the development of a substantial stand of milkweed.  It's great to have the company of the birds and bees and butterflies while I work (the swallows where busily gulping down winged insects while I was mowing down the asparagus the other day - an amazing aerial ballet).

No matter how the season finally turns out I know I will be deeply grateful - not just for whatever I harvest but for the opportunity to work with Nature to create food and habitat.  I feel the deepest sense of awe and reverence on the farm and in the backgarden - a connection to all that is and the humble realization that I am not apart from nature but deeply rooted within it.

Yes!  Seeds are sprouting and seedlings are rooting and almost ALL of the transplants have been transplanted!  Yippee!

This week the tomato seedlings FINALLY made it into the ground and today eggplants, sweet peppers, and hot peppers made it in.  (Not counting the ones that are going to be tended in the back garden at home - always something).  That leaves only the sweet potato slips and the late coles to get in (and of course all the back garden transplanting left to do but hey - progress is progress!)

I have also been busily 'manicuring' the farm - mowing and dethistling and mowing and dethistling.  I am finding that the work is getting easier as the season progresses - I just love the natural fitness that farming provides (not to mention the naturally good food!).

The current harvest includes strawberries, lettuces, spinach, snap peas, rhubarb, and sorrel from the back garden and asparagus and garlic scapes (the flowering part of the garlic plant) from Reverence.

At Reverence the corn seedlings are up, the squash transplants are holding their own, the potatoes are coming up (please please please let more come up!), and the coles are doing beautifully.  The garlic is also looking beautiful as are the onions.  The only disappointment has been the peas and the spinach (but hey - there's always next season  - plus maybe a shot at fall peas and spinach this year...).

So, once again, after the early season megrims, we are off and farming!

And so it goes - the weather has been more intractable than it usually is - and I will spare you the rant about global warming (this time).

A very long very wet very cold spring kept me out of the fields for a very long time.  I had a brief respite and managed to get in the coles, potatoes, and corn. 

(Though earlier I had gotten in plantings of peas and spinach - but those were Hail Mary passes and Mary wasn't listening.  So much for peas and spinach from the farm this season.  Good thing I had small plantings of each in the back garden to snack on.)

Then the heat and dry came on - mid 90's in early June - so, because I have no irrigation I was unable to plant any more seedlings for fear they would die of dehydration.  Well, there is always work to be done on a farm so I mowed and scythed and scythed and mowed (and fed untold  mosquitoes and at least three ticks...ick...).  I am still not done with that but... the rain and the cold came back so still no planting - the soil at the farm is too clayey to allow for tilling or planting when it's wet.

In the meantime, however, I am rather sure the weeds are still growing.  Oh, well - at least the coles and potatoes and corn got a good drink.

Meanwhile - back at the ranch (or suburban two story) I have made some progress.  All but one fruit tree got planted and all seem to have survived though I still have my doubts about the pie cherry tree.

I transplanted all my lettuce seedlings and they are now happy that they've gotten the cooler wetter weather so all is good there.  Soon I'll be able to add  my own lettuces to the romaine I've been buying from my real farmer friends Sue and Gary.  I've also been eating spinach from the backyard (and bought 5 pounds from Sue and Gary to freeze for this winter's spinach pizza, spinach quiche, spinach pie, and spinach crepes).  The lemon sorrel totally got away from me so I guess I'll be waiting till the fall now to eat more (the leaves are huge and are best eaten when tiny).

Today, I transplanted my celery into the back garden, interplanted with lettuces, and some up front in between some strawberry plants in the front garden orchard.  I also interplanted a few eggplants and transplanted  several others into harvest lugs.  I also managed to interplant some onion seedlings in between lettuce plants that are also in harvest lugs.

And - ta da! - I up potted my mini orange, lime, and pomegranite trees as well as some parsley that overwintered beautifully indoors, and my rosemary and bay laurel plants.  I also potted some bunching onions.  Oops!  Just remembered!  I forgot to up pot my cranberry - must do that soon!

A real bright spot in all the cloudiness are the gorgeous ripe strawberries I 've been eating right out of the berry patch.  They are outstanding.  Plus, I've been eyeing my rhubarb thinking that soon I will cut it and make a pie (assuming my husband repairs my oven...).  The apple trees are bearing some fruits (and the sweet cherry may too though I found a cherry already on the ground - yikes - hey birds - at least wait until they're ripe will ya!), the raspberries and blueberries are beginning to flower, and I made some very good brownies last night and I've got 15 quarts of asparagus soup in the freezer for winter - so - all in all - things are very very good.

Yep - the growing life is the good life!

As usual, time has gotten away from me.  The intent, of course, was to post weekly.  Ha.  Back to reality.  In between a full time job, three adopted dogs, and the farm there just isn’t much time for blog updating .  Though in truth, needing to switch computers to update the blog doesn’t help much.

Anyway – over the past few months I’ve learned a few new farming lessons and made a few compromises.

First, the lessons. 

Lesson One:  Take a look at the picture above.  You will note that the eggplant seedling to the left is quite a bit larger than the others.  Why?  The one on the left is in a plastic cell pot.  The others are in cardboard tubes.  I thought I’d go green and use the cardboard tubes from toilet tissue as ‘pots’.  It doesn’t work well – I think there might be some chemical leaching out of the cardboard tubes.

Lesson Two:  I have mentioned before that using soil in your potting mix will make your seedlings more vigorous.  Still true (assuming you don’t use the cardboard tubes as pots).  But – the more fertile the soil the more vigorous the seedlings.  I dug up some soil from my comfrey patch and the plants that got the enriched soil were SO much happier – they grew fast!

Lesson Three:  Tomato seedlings that spend too much time outdoors in damp cool weather come down with Septoria Spot.  If it’s too damp don’t leave them  out full time.  I am now waging a war against Septoria Spot and that means we are now on to Compromises.

Compromise One:  I have yanked as many of the damaged leaves off the seedlings as possible.  Now I have to use chemical warfare.  I had been hoping to get by with just sulfur dust but all they carry at my feed and seed store is Garden Dust – a sulfur, copper, and pyrethrin mix.  I don’t need or want to use pyrethrin (an insecticide) and really didn’t want to use the copper (bad for earthworms).  So – the compromise.  I am going to use the Garden Dust (and bundle up in a hazmat suit before I do).  My intent is to put the seedlings on a mat, dust, and leave them in the side yard (they are still in their seedling trays).  I am hoping that by having the seedlings still in their trays and on a mat that I won’t have too much of the dust getting on the ground.  And since I don’t have any bugs flitting about my seedlings just yet I’m also hoping to avoid poisoning any insects.  Like I said – a compromise.  

UPDATE:  I realized I could not make this compromise so searched harder for just plain sulfur dust and found it - off to buy it and a duster and the appropriate dust masks.  Some compromises are just not worth it.

Compromise Two:  More chemicals.  Before I realized that I had likely poisoned my eggplant and pepper seedlings by using the cardboard tubes (and these were not the seedlings that got the richer soil either), I decided they needed more nutrients than they were getting from the molasses and alfalfa tea.  So I used some chemical fertilizer.  I now think that may have been unnecessary given the other issues but I did it. 

What it amounts to is a battle of principles.  My first and guiding principle is do no harm.  My second one is to use organic growing methods.  In terms of compromise one  - the garden dust actually falls into ‘organic’ but the pyrethrin is decidedly not  life friendly.  And the more  I think about it the more I dislike it – so maybe it’s just time to keep looking for that sulfur dust.  Plus then maybe I won’t need to wear a hazmat suit.

Compromise two came more out of panic.  I refuse to use fertilizers made out of animals and seemingly my first choice – plant based fertilizer wasn’t working – so my compromise was to use the chemical fertilizer for the seedlings.  Once they hit the field though there is no more use of chemical fertilizer.

Which as I think of it brings up another compromise – the use of peat in my seedling mix.  Peat is not really sustainable.  The reason I use it instead of compost in my seedling mixes is that I just never have enough plant based compost.  All of last year’s batch went to create a new garden bed.

So – like it or not – and I don’t like it – I’ve made compromises.  Perhaps others don’t – or perhaps they have in the past and through the mistakes and compromises have arrived at a place where they no longer make either.  I can’t say.  All I know is that I learn something from each mistake and that each compromise sends me on a search for ways to avoid having to do it again.

Welcome to the Great American Meatout!  Glad you’ve stopped by for a visit – and I hope you’ll stay!

You’ve seen the films, you’ve heard the news headlines, you’ve read about factory farming - so you know WHY vegan.  But, maybe you’re wondering HOW vegan?  Maybe you’re wondering what you’ll grab for dinner when you don’t have time to cook.  Maybe you’re wondering what you’ll eat at a party.  Maybe you’re wondering how on earth you’ll make those killer brownies without eggs.  Well, don’t worry.  We’ve got ya covered!

Dinner on the run is something we all do, and sometimes we do it a lot.  I’m a farmer and I like to cook and I’ve threatened to write recipes that start with:  Start your spinach seedlings indoors at the end of February.   Joke!  (Sort of…)

But, I do get really busy and often in the summer I just don’t have the time or energy to cook.  That’s when heat and serve items come in really handy.  Of course, items you can eat straight out of the fridge are even handier.  Fortunately, there are lots of ready to serve or heat and eat vegan products on the shelves these days.  Check out the links but use your browser back button to come back here! 

Gardein brand ‘meats’(http://www.gardein.com/index.php),

Tofurkey deli slices (http://www.tofurky.com/tofurkyproducts/deli_slices.html),

Daiya (http://www.daiyafoods.com/) and Follow Your Heart cheeses and Vegenaise (http://www.followyourheart.com/), and

veggie burgers among the many many available options. (http://www.amys.com/products/product-detail/veggie-burgers/000281).

Plus there are oodles of naturally vegan products out there.  Canned beans, lentils, pasta, rice, quinoa, prewashed salad greens and precut veggies, fruit (fresh, frozen, or canned), and even Oreos.  A walk through your local grocery will reveal carts full of quick cooking or ready to eat items.

A quick any night dinner might include a few Tofurkey peppered deli slices on a bun spread with Vegenaise and stuffed with a handful of prewashed salad mix and a few slices of onion and tomato.  Have a piece of your favorite fruit, a glass of your favorite plant based milk (soy, rice, and almond are readily available in most grocery stores), and some Oreos for dessert!

One of my very favorite meals is a simple salad.  Load up a plate with some prewashed salad greens, sprinkle on walnuts, pecans, and/or almonds and the fresh or dried fruit of your choice (right now I am hooked on dried Mission figs though orange slices, raisins, apples, strawberries, raspberries, or blueberries are excellent choices as well).  Dress with just a drizzle of your favorite salad oil and a bit of balsamic vinegar.  A salad like this is just bursting with great taste and great nutrition!  Add a hearty deli style roll and dinner is ready in a flash!

If you don’t mind spending a few minutes cooking you can whip up a batch of lentils.  They are quick cooking and chock full of flavor and nutrition.  A really fun way to eat lentils is to mix them with your  favorite BBQ sauce and serve on a bun!  Sloppy Joes in minutes!

But what about those parties?  A variety of strategies exist.  Eating beforehand and nibbling on the veggies, nuts and chips is a time honored way of enjoying the company and being sociable without being hungry the whole time.  No need to stop there though.  Whip up something fun and take it with!  In fact, how about taking along your killer brownies!  Yes, vegan brownies to exist, you can make them, and everyone (including you) will love them.

Try out the recipe below and let me know how you like it!  Thanks again for checking out the Great American Meatout!  Don’t be a stranger!

Don't forget to checkout the new Reverence Gardens feature – Vegan In 1-2-3! – because vegan doesn’t have to be hard! http://www.reverencegardens.com/content/10659

And if you're on Facebook - join the group Going Veg for great recipes and helpful tips on Going Veg!https://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=243082119274&ref=ts

Killer Chocolate Brownies

(adapted from a recipe by Lois Dieterly in Sinfully Vegan)

Preheat oven to 350

INGREDIENTS:

1 ½ cups granulated sugar

2 tsp flax ground flaxseed (see Note below)

1 1/3 cups flour

¾ cup unsweetened cocoa

¼ tsp salt

½ tsp baking powder

¾ cup plant milk of your choice

1/3 cup cooking oil (I like to use walnut oil for this – a nice source of omega-3’s)

2 tsp vanilla

½ cup chopped walnuts (optional) 

Variation – substitute ¼ cup of Irish whiskey or other spirit for ¼ cup of the plant milk.  This will result in a decidedly fudgey brownie with a grown up flavor!

METHOD:

Mix dry ingredients (and nuts if using) then add wet ingredients and mix well.  Batter will be stiff.  Spoon batter into a parchment paper lined (or lightly oiled) 9 x 9 inch square baking pan.  Bake 40 minutes for chewy brownies  and 45-47 minutes for cakey brownies.

Note:  Ground flaxseed may sound a tad exotic but do buy some.  It’s a fantastic source of fiber, a premier source of inflammation fighting and brain boosting omega-3’s, and the best source of cancer fighting lignins.  You should be eating some ground flaxseed every day.  You can add it to baked goods, sprinkle on hot cereals, or add it salads.  You can buy it ground or grind your own in a coffee grinder.  Just make sure to store it in the fridge.

Glad you asked!  Yes, indeed.  Veggies CAN get a sunburn and sunburn can be fatal to young seedlings.  The transition from indoor growing to outdoor growing needs to be a slow one.  By indoor growing I mean veggies you've started on your kitchen table or other in home sunny spot.  Greenhouse growing is another issue altogether and since I don't do it I can't be of much help on that subject.

As usual - I digress - so back to the topic.  Seedlings should be moved out for just a few minutes the first day.  By just a few minutes I mean no more than 5 minutes and that may be pushing it depending on how late in spring it is.  It's best to get the seedlings out around before 10 am and/or after 3 pm on those first days.  I do generally take the seedlings out twice a day while I am getting them used to the sun.

I have found is that I can safely double the sun exposure each day.  So, 5 minutes twice a day the first day, 10 minutes twice a day the next, and so on.  Once I've reached one hour twice a day the seedlings are fine to be outdoors all day.  I may be erring on the side of caution with this easy does it approach but I have lost seedlings to sunburn so slow is how I go.

Though it's still quite early in the season it's not too early to be getting your cold weather seedlings out for their sunbaths.  My onions are out all day (weather permitting), basking in the warmth of the makeshift 'greenhouse' shown in the picture.

The newly sprouted lettuce seedlings are in transition to the outdoors while the as yet to sprout second batch of spinach seedlings (I managed to kill the first batch by letting them dry out...) is spending all day outdoors too - I hope they sprout out of doors so that I don't need to worry about hardening them off.

My little 'greenhouse' is nothing more than a large sheet of heavy guage plastic (available in any hardware store).  I laid the sheet on my greenhouse table (though a picnic table, patio table, or portable work table will work just as well), placed the onion flats on the sheet, propped up some empty flats at the end of the table and in the middle to support the plastic, and then wrapped the plastic up and over.  A few clothes pins keep eveything closed - or open - as needed.  Simple, inexpensive, and effective.

February 28, 2011

I recently got an e-mail asking me what I used as potting soil.  Hmmm.  Surely seems like a good reason to get back to farm blogging.

A little background, I rent three acres about 20 miles from my suburban house.  The backyard of my home hosts our strawberry patch, raspberry patch, a few rhubarb plants, a grape arbor, a few apple trees, a cherry tree, and a few blueberry bushes.  It's also where I plant things that need more care than I can provide up at the farm or things that I want to be able to pick for dinner.  This year's kitchen garden will include lettuces, spinach, zucchini, and eggplants.  Everything else will have to tough it out up at the farm.

So, on to the actual topic.  Living in the 'burbs means covenants and covenants mean no greenhouse (at least no greenhouse when you get narced out by your neighbor...but I digress.)  Since I have no greenhouse but still start all my own seedlings, I must make do.  Fortunately I have a south facing glass paned double door in the kitchen.

In the photo you can see my seedling set up.  The black trays were scavenged from a local commercial greenhouse (the owners were glad to get rid of them - I must have about 200 or so) - the bottoms are perforated which allows for drainage.  Three of them fit nicely on my shelving.  I got the shelving from a farm supply catalog but I've seen these in hardware stores too. 

The lights are simply shop lights which I've suspended from the shelving with light weight chain.  The bulbs are 'plant lights' - nothing fancy - just whatever you can pick up at the local hardware store.  The real plant lights in the catalogs were just a bit too overpriced for my budget.  Anyway - since the shelving is in a south facing door I'm really just looking for supplemental light.

I did splurge sometime back on thermostat controlled heat mats - but you can also make do with heating pads set on low (which I use as well).  You can also see that I have some plant trays sitting on top of the light fixtures - a nice source of gentle bottom heat as well.

For potting soil I use a 1:2:2 mix of soil (dug up from the farm), peat moss, and perlite.  Last year was my first year using actual dirt in my potting mix and - wonder of wonders - I got the best seedlings ever.  Turns out that seeds like dirt!  As you can see in the picture, this years seedlings are loving it!  Those are onions.  They've already started moving outside on warmer sunny days (temps around 40 F).  Pretty soon I hope to move them outside on a permanent basis to make room for the less cold tolerant seedlings.

I've also started spinach but I lost those seedlings because I forgot to water them so I'll start again in a day or two but just leave the trays outdoors so that they can germinate at their leisure.  Same with the lettuces I'll be starting this week.  I have some very nice sturdy greenhouse tables that pull duty all season long as either seedling tables (which can also be makeshift greenhouses with the addition of some plastic) and produce washing and sorting tables and onion/garlic drying tables (when moved into the shade and covered with tarps).

I am meandering so let me just wrap up by mentioning this years fertilizer recipe - soak 1/4 cup alfalfa meal in some water overnight (let the water sit overnight before adding the alfalfa if it's chlorinated water).  Carefully decant the "alfalfa water" into a one gallon container and fill the container up with dechlorinated water.  Add 3 to 4 Tablespoons of blackstrap molasses.  You can find alfalfa meal or pellets at feed stores or pet supply stores.

A great source for more information on seed starting can be found on the Vegan Organic Network:

http://www.veganorganic.net/information-sheets/1-propagation-and-fertilizers

February 27, 2011

Sadly, this post is the 'bookend' to the previous.  Our precious Meli lost her battle to mast cell cancer two weeks ago.  The little ball of blonde fur who came home with Sara has joined her again.

Meli was a sweet little puff ball who came into our lives as a tagalong to Sara, an aged stray poodle who had ended up in a kill pound.  My first sight of Meli was a little blur of reddish blonde fur dodging behind a desk.  That was really all it took - before I knew it I'd tumbled hard for her.  Sara and Meli spent about a month in shelter while being treated for kennel cough.  In the meantime a large tumor was discovered on Meli and it eventually claimed her life. 

Both dogs came home on my birthday.  Sara of the big smile and waggly tail left us about six weeks later - felled by a heart attack.  In the meantime, Meli, who had had the tumor removed, started chemo.  But this isn't a story about her death - it's about her life.

While Sara was with us, Meli was her guardian - standing at the back door and waiting until Sara came in before finding a cozy spot to settle - often the top of a recliner!  We never knew how she got up there but it was a favorite perch.  She also loved perching on a large upright cusion.  Maybe being up so high made her feel like Queen of the World!

For such a little bit, Meli had a lot of spunk.  I affectionately called her Cujo - she would give me teeth if she didn't want to be picked up and I learned quickly that when she rolled over for a belly rub that she did NOT want to be picked up.  Meli was also a tad jealous of her food - growling at poor Winnie who wanted just a wee bite!  Meli loved wrestling with Winnie - and it was hysterical to watch.  Meli won as often as not.  She did not win an encounter with Gabby though - one day I was startled to hear a dogfight going on - by the time I got to the kitchen Gabby had Meli on her back - Gabby snarling and Meli whimpering - a good lound thunk of a kitchen chair sent both of them scattering.  After that Meli didn't take Gabby on again.

Meli loved her Dad.  Until the very last days she perked up whenever she heard him and would wait at the bottom of the stairs for him in the morning.  Her favorite place was sitting next to him on the couch.  She snagged his heart too.

Meli spent the summer and fall romping in the backyard and chasing after squirrels (who were probably laughing the whole time).  When the snows came it turned out that Meli was also part snowplow - we'd watch her doggedly push through the new fallen snow - leaving a path the other dogs would follow!

We miss our little angel - her little black nose, her floppy ears, her endearing waddle and her wagging tail.  It was so hard to say good bye - but we were blessed with her presence and her spirit will always remain in our hearts.

Today I woke up to rain pouring down, a perfect match to the tears on my face.  Yesterday, after only six short weeks with us, we lost our little dog Sara to a heart attack. 

Sara was picked up as a stray and taken to a 'shelter' where she had only three days to live unless someone spoke up for her.  A friend asked me if I knew anyone who was interested and instantly I knew the little stray would be coming to live with us.

Sara was moved from the original facility to a nearby shelter for a medical evaluation.  While there, she and her roommate, a little dog who would come to be known as Meli, were diagnosed with kennel cough which substantially delayed their homecoming - yes, Meli came home with us too.

Sara and Meli came home on my birthday and quickly adjusted to being home.  Pumpkin, our nearly 19 year old rescued miniature poodle, ignored the newcomers.  Gabby, our rescued puppy mill Mom, a toy poodle, was typically reserved though curious, and Winnie, Gabby's puppy was bursting at the seams with the prospect of new playmates.

Sara, a poodle/bichon mix who was presumed to be 15, quickly made herself at home - testing out every doggie bed and locating both the fridge and the backdoor in short order.  She endeared herself to everyone within moments with her perky smile, her upright tail that wagged constantly, and her love of food (which in a household of finicky eaters is a very endearing trait).  She loved flipping pillows out of doggie beds and got a kick out of playing turtle, burrowing under the doggie bed in the picture and wandering around with it draped over her - it was a charming sight though a tad alarming the first time when the bed seemed to be moving by itself!!

Sara greeted us at the bottom of the stairs in the mornings, often with little "where have you been" complaints.  After a quick trip outdoors it would be straight back inside for breakfast.  We had to guard her bowl from Winnie and Meli who always were more interested in her food than theirs.  Sara generally wasted no time in finishing breakfast or dinner so we didn't have to guard long (but watching Winnie and Meli trying to sneak past was also part of the mealtime routine).

Sadly, Sara, her sweet smile, and waggy tail slipped away from us last night just before her dinnertime.  We are joyful that we were able to offer Sara a home and love and a cozy place to rest but are so sad that she was with us for such a short time.

Sara, our little love, we are honored that you shared even part of your life with us and we will always hold you close in our hearts.