Turd Herding

Yep, that is right, I am going to talk about poo! The other morning I sat baby Gnat in her bouncy seat on top of a cloth diaper while I quickly showered with the thoughts of quickly grabbing the babe as soon as I was finished and bringing her into the shower for a quick cleaning. I can hear her above the shower babbling and cooing, as I finish up with my cleaning I notice that the bathroom is very quiet. Too quiet, in fact. I am thinking maybe she fell asleep again or something has her really interested so she is not making any noise. Well, that something was poo, she pooed upon the cloth diaper upon which I had sat her, and was now enjoying the feel of the poo on her hands. Needless to say this was not and will not be my first experience with babies and poo.
Today I went turd herding in my own yard. Yeah I know it is 12 degrees, but alas this is the very best time to turd herd. We have 2 dogs who poop 2 times a day, and this quickly adds up. Before baby Gnat, I harvested dog poo once a week, the day before garbage day, I prided myself on the fact that when one wanted to walk barefoot in the yard, there would not be any turds to step upon. I grew up on a farm of sorts where my parents had many dogs, they were all kenneled in a very nice kennel system with its own sewer, but they still pooped in the large yard and I would always be the one to step in the poo. So when I became an adult and a responsible pet owner I vowed my yard would never be full of poo. Sadly, when the baby came more important things became my priority so the yard was taken care of whenever I was not too tired or whenever I thought of it, which was not too much. However today when I woke up and saw the beautiful blue sky, albeit cold outside, I told myself that I would make time for some therapeutic turd herding today. I have an undiagnosed or self diagnosed case of OCD, I love to fixate on things or tasks. Picking up cold turds is like a phreaky treasure hunt, I walk CSI style back and forth across the yard turd herding. I place the turds in a biodegradable trash bag which I purchase from our food coop, because I think if I am going to throw this into our landfill, that at least the bag can bio-degrade back into the earth.
I pick up the poo all seasons of the year but frozen turds are absolutely the best kind of turds to herd. In the summer it is warm but the poo is all sticky and smelly, in the spring and the fall turd herding can sometimes be prohibited by the rainy weather, wet turds are absolutely no fun. But, picking up frozen turds is the one of the most pleasant jobs I can think of, I often think if this teaching thing does not pan out I can always start my own turd herding business, called Princess Poo. I would clean yards for a living, and leave the bag for the customer to dispose of, and charge a minimum of $15.00 per yard.
Keeping my yard clean is a reward unto itself, but sometimes I get to see the unimaginable things that these dogs eat, like that one time last year where Callie got a hold of some magical reindeer food, you know oats and glitter that you sprinkle on the yard for the reindeer. Well that was some magical poo, it had the most beautiful red sparkle to it, and did you know that it takes several days for glitter to pass through the internal plumbing of a dog?
Well, I hope you all are keeping warm inside while Earthy Birthy Mama will be going back outside later to seek out some more frozen poo.