Please Don’t Piss on the Petunias by Sandra Knauf has 11 reviews on Amazon with an average rating of 4.7 stars.

Please Don’t Piss on the Petunias: Stories About Raising Kids, Crops & Critters in the City by Sandra Knauf

Please Don’t Piss on the Petunias is a collection of essays and stories by a Colorado gardener with a dream: to give her two daughters the nature-centered childhood she had always longed for. When her husband finds an old house in a quirky part of town, she begins to make her dream a reality.

Engaging, edgy, and often hilarious, Please Don’t Piss on the Petunias follows Sandra Knauf as she turns a weed-filled yard into an urban paradise.

Over the course of several chaotic years, she:

• Muddles through “mistress gardener” training, learning the ABCs of horticulture.
• Raises, with her young daughters, exotic breed bantam chickens named after Greek goddesses
• Goes on her first bee-swarm capture.
• Discovers that a hen in their small flock has undergone a sex change.
• Copes with a series of family dogs: a rambunctious rescue Dalmatian, a destructive black Lab puppy, and a counterfeit teacup Chihuahua with a bad attitude.
• Adds to the animal menagerie: Netherlands dwarf rabbits, fancy backyard goldfish, triops from the age of the dinosaurs, and more.

Through creating a life filled with plants and animals (and plenty of love) Sandra Knauf makes a discovery that will resonate with any rebel: Going off the beaten path may be the best way to find out who you really are.

About the author, Sandra Knauf:

Sandra Knauf was born in California and spent most of her childhood in Missouri. She moved to Colorado when she was a teenager and has lived there ever since. She is the publisher and editor of Greenwoman Magazine, a garden writing magazine, which she started in 2010. Her work has appeared in The Denver Post, GreenPrints, Colorado Gardener, and other publications, and she has been a guest commentator on KRCC’s “Western Skies” radio show. (KRCC is NPR’s southern Colorado affiliate station.) Zera and the Green Man is her first novel. Sandra Knauf lives in Colorado Springs with her family, pets, and a big garden.