Daisy's garden...

In April we said good bye to our beloved yellow lab "Daisy." She brought us so much love, joy and energy for over 13 1/2 years. It was a very, very sad time. We miss her more than words can describe. But, we are so thankful she was happy and healthy for so long. To honor her life, we decided to plant a memory garden.

Before I move on to the garden, a few words about Daisy. Besides being the best dog in the world, she had many talents, one of which was gardening. When she was a puppy, she liked to help me in the garden. She was an early adopter of drip irrigation. Who needs soaker hoses when you can bite hundreds of tiny holes into a regular garden hose? Those hoses could be used as sprinklers too. Or, she often up cycled them for chew toys. Daisy had a sixth sense when it came to special hard-to-find flowers and plants -- the ones I spent hours sourcing and traveling outside the city to get. She loved to frolic around ripping the plastic pots to shreds. As soon as I turned my back, she would have one of the plants in her mouth manically shaking it. I knew what she was thinking: "go ahead, try to catch me if you can" -- her favorite game. That of course was impossible because she was extremely agile and fast as lightening.

Daisy liked to help me do the dishes any chance she could. She took care of any remnants of food on plates in the dish washer. And she took counter surfing to a new level. In her youth, she could actually jump up on top of the counter. No exaggeration. Retrieving was another one of her talents. She would fetch things and bring them right back and then run away begging you to chase her. Tennis balls and dog toys were way too boring and inexpensive. When left to her own devices either at the park or on the beach, she would steal just about anything she knew was valuable. This included, but not be limited to: shoes, cell phones, keys, wallets, other people's picnic lunches and articles of clothing that she usually dragged through mud. Or, really disgusting things like trash, dead fish and other animal carcases. Although, she would swim from here to eternity to retrieve her cool kong and bring it right back for more. She made some frenemies at the dog park earning the nick name "Crazy Daisy." It was hard to hold a grudge for long. She was too cute and loving.

Moving on to the garden. When we renovated our house several years ago, our backyard was leveled leaving us with a clean slate for landscaping. I decided to go with a green and white color scheme -- something I've always wanted to try. Here are some of my favorites.

{coneflower 'meringue' my new all-time fave}

{coneflower 'white swan'}

{coneflower 'white double delight'}

Of course, there are lots and lots of daisies!

{shasta daisy}

{shasta 'crazy' daisy}

{shasta daisy 'aglaia'}

Here are a few in a frog cube…

{lab garden ornament from the etsy shop Garden Copper Art}

{heart-shaped memory stone from etsy shop Memories to Stone}

You can see more garden pics on my Pinterest board.

Daisy's garden reminds us every day of what a wonderful dog she was and how lucky we were to have had her. I have no doubt she is wagging her tail in doggy heaven wishing she could dig up each and every one of those plants.

Daisy a few weeks before she left us on our way home from Wag-A-Lot -- her home away from home.

So many happy memories.