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<\/a>I took this with my camera phone after Ellyn and I got back from a deliriously ecstatic morning at a great daylily garden near her house. Row after row of gorgeous plants for fabulous prices. I had a hard time restraining myself to just 7 selections. Restraint and daylilies are not terms that easily co-exist for me.<\/p>\nBut that is not really what this post is about. It’s about the fact that the woman who owns this particular daylily garden is an absolute genius. Because when you have that many daylilies, you have a nasty little chore called deadheading. Each daylily flower last only one day. Then you are left with the spent flowers and it takes days for them to drop off on their own. Now of course in my own<\/em> garden, I get out there at the crack of dawn<\/em> every morning and snap every one of those nasty things off. Yep. Well, sometimes I might miss a few. That is where these guys come in: You will have to forgive me for 2 grandchild-centric posts in a row. Though today, we are also talking about daylilies, which is a Saturday thing and goats, which I believe are legal to talk about on any day of … Continue reading <\/a>But, I don’t have huge growing beds or lots of people traipsing around who I want to bedazzle with gorgeous flowers so that they will buy them. When you have that kind of business, it is essential that you keep up with your deadheading.<\/p>\n<\/a>Apparently goats love daylilies. But that is not the real genius, because the problem is not what to do with the blossoms after you get them off, but getting them off to begin with. And adorable though these little guys may be, I doubt they are very selective and unopened blossoms are probably just as tasty as the dead ones. No, just having the goats is not the genius part. Here<\/strong> is the genius part:<\/a>See? The little goats look all cute and engaging and the kids want to go see them and then the lady who owns the place, goes over and pulls a few deadheads off a couple plants and casually hands them to the parent, telling them “The goats LOVE to eat these.” So the parent takes their kid over to see the little goats and the kid is immediately captivated by shoving the deadheads through the fence and watching the cute little goats gobble them up. “Let’s give them some more Mommy!” But the daylily lady is now nowhere to be found, so the parent does this amazing thing! She goes over and starts deadheading daylily plants<\/em><\/strong> so her child can be further enchanted by feeding the little goats some more.<\/a>And when those are gone, the parent goes and gets some more!<\/a> [can you believe Ellyn gave birth only 2 days after this photo? I was bigger than this by the time I got out of bed the morning after conception with my second baby! she gets this from the women on her father’s side of the family. not from me. definitely not from me.]
<\/font><\/a> Who would not want to see their kid having this much fun? The day lily lady actually rents<\/em> these goats every summer. And every day she sits, sipping on drinks with umbrellas in them, while parents\/grandparents\/customers stand out in the hot sun doing her deadheading for her so their kids can feed the goats. Genius I tell you!<\/a> I think any amount of deadheading is worth seeing your grandson enjoy himself this much. On the other hand, I have a heck of a lot of deadheading to do around here and these peeps are going to be living a lot closer this summer which means I can expect to see them around a lot more. Hmmmmmmmm – I wonder how much is costs to rent a goat anyway?<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"