A week off

This is my week off.

Technically, I have the entire summer off. But that's from my job at the church as Jr. High Youth Director and Assistant for Adult Education. I'm still Wedding Coordinator which never has a day off. And I have my summer job with Heather doing landscaping.

I'm not working for Heather this week, I don't have any weddings, and I haven't volunteered to make anyone else's garden pretty.

Woo hoo!

Oh wait, I can't get too excited. I created a summer to-do list. I have to get working on that.

We're fixing up the guest bedroom (which I mentioned here), I have a couple of exterior windows to paint and scrape, I have that table for the guest room that needs work done to it, and there's just normal house cleaning that I didn't get done over the weekend. Not to mention there's a neighborhood ice cream social tomorrow night, a card-making (stamping) party Wednesday night, a teen's musical Friday night, and a wedding that we're attending Saturday night.

So much for the week off.

I also have a summer bucket list of sorts. Most of those things listed above are on it. I also have:
     finish reading Anna Karenina

Guess what?

I'm almost finished with it.

I may try to finish it tonight.

I also have:
     strawberry picking
     play with Lego's
     go to the beach (and not get burnt)
     frame artwork

It's not exactly a thrilling summer to-do list, but it will keep me on track.

Did you make a summer list?

The rest of the landscaping

I told you that I finished Lynne's yard on Friday. This is the section that I worked on Thursday and Friday, and at the very bottom of the post is the finished front bed with the cocoa mulch.

This smaller flower bed is to the left of her front door, under the living room window. I wanted to fill it with brighter flowers that she can enjoy from inside.

It had been tilled by her son, but you can see the grass was still invading the space. 

Katrina, her daughter, came out and dug it out for me.

I didn't do a great job with photos during the process. This flower bed required a paver wall be put back in place (Max had removed it when he tilled). 

 Here it is, ready for the pavers to be put back in place. Bill came and helped that day. He added in garden soil and peat. 

 And this is the finished product. This photo has an aster, a coral bell, a sun drop, zinnias and forget-me-nots.

Here is another coral bell, russian sage, and sedum.

All the little black spots are peat surrounding the zinnias and forget-me-nots that Katrina grew from seed. There is also another aster, sun drop, coral bell, russian sage and sedum.

Here's the front bed with the mulch.

The mulch really highlights those stones I dug out and placed into the semi-random patterns.

 Bonus, the cocoa mulch will help keep the slugs away!

Leaves of three

This morning, I decided to do some weeding in the backyard. Mostly it was in effort to rid myself of my ridiculous tan. There was also a small amount of weeds/tiny trees growing that needed to be uprooted.

Everything was going just fine. I had thrown my work gloves into the wash pile, so as I was weeding it, I was bare-handed.

Needless to say I learned a lesson. Don't garden without gloves. Ever.

Why? Poison Ivy. That's why.

I have never seen it in our yard before. Yet, there it was. As I was pulling weeds and tiny trees, it was hiding among them. It fooled me into pulling it. That's when I looked at it, saw the three leaves, the red centers and the vine and said, "Oh, poison ivy!"

I dropped it, went inside and rinsed my hands. Then I rinsed them some more. And then I washed them. I put on gloves, went outside and picked up the wicked foliage and threw it away. Then I went and washed my hands again.

This is only the second time I have ever gotten it. I had never seen it before the first time I accidentally touched it. That was at work camp in Bay City in 2009. I was pulling weeds then too. I seem to recall that I was wearing gloves. The other leader pointed at it and told me what it was. It had brushed my arm. We rinsed it off immediately. I had a small tingling on my arm for about a week. I resisted the urge to scratch it.The allergy pill that I take daily seemed to help then.

I was sort of surprised that I had never seen it before. All those years of going to church camp. If I had seen it, I didn't know it. I'm sure I never got into it.

I remember asking my dad what it looked like (since he's an Eagle Scout), but since he didn't have any to show me, he could only describe it. That was before the internet. He did a really good job. Maybe that's why I never got into any at camp. I avoided anything with three leaves.

I really need to remember to watch out for it. Especially since we have it in our yard now.

My finger is a little tingly and slightly swollen. I'm using an anti-itch cream for it. I hope it goes away fast since I rinsed it right away.

I guess I'm thankful I realized what it was and that I've learned my lesson to ALWAYS wear gloves.

strawberry time

The garden is all finished. I even mulched and got the rock wall weeded. Photos are on my camera, but I'm not moving to go get it tonight. You'll have to wait for pictures.

In the meantime, strawberries are ready for the picking. As part of my payment, Lynne gave me two pints (or are they quarts?) of fresh picked Michigan strawberries.

I have heard that a vinegar/water wash keeps them fresh longer. I googled it and found several blogs claiming this is true. I am trying it. The strawberries are currently drying. You air dry them so the vinegar dissipates.

I had some California strawberries that started to go bad so I did the vinegar wash this morning. I have since cut them up and put them in my water glass and I don't taste any vinegar, so that part worked.

Now I have to see if this actually keeps them fresher longer.

Either way, I'm excited and thankful for strawberries.

My gardening skills

I finished the front flower bed today. So I'll post pictures of it from the beginning.

First, you'll recall I had to remove the grass that had overgrown it. You'll see the bed itself is outlined with a stone edge (on all sides).

 Yup, I removed all that grass. To give you an idea of how long it is, two SUV's park in front of the rock wall. Based on the length of the Flex, it's at least thirty feet.

 In the midst of digging on Monday.

 Most of the bed is four to five feet wide. Here, along the driveway, it curves around another five feet or so.

 The cars were to help with the length...

 I bought flowers and set them all out. They sure do look purdy!

 I did it, I dug it all out.

 See, all of it!

 Then there were these smallish rocks. So I got creative and made a few designs.

 Heather taught me how to make a little moat around each plant. This helps keep the dirt from washing away when they get watered.

 You can see some of the rocks along the edge of the wall. 

 Here you can see the rocks, "puddling" over an old tree stump.

 I'm trying to show the little rocks and the pattern I made.

 Oops, I didn't rotate the photo. 

And this is the far end, happy little plants!

What did I plant? Verbena, geraniums, petunias, bee balm, hosts, pincushions, daisies of some type, penstemen, and poppies. I'll have to go back next month and take another picture. Hopefully everything will be filled out by then.

Tomorrow (and maybe next week) I'll be back to work on the flower bed up by the house. I'm taking pictures of that too. 

Oh, and we'll also try to mulch this bed tomorrow.

I am thankful that I got it done! 

chapstick, energy drink, and a woodchuck

I went back and kept on digging out the grass at Lynne's. While I was digging, I found a "natural" (empty) tube of lip balm. I guess I can't say it was Chapstick because the label was missing. I threw it away.

I also found a crushed energy drink can. I recycled it.

Oh! I forgot to mention that yesterday I found a quarter. I have definitely earned it.

When I got home, because I'm slightly insane, I ran. While running I saw a woodchuck. He ran the opposite direction, into the woods.

There you have it. My day in three things.

I thought about writing a haiku. I'm too tired to think that much. You got this instead. We all win.

I'm thankful that I got the one garden dug out. It's ready for pretty flowers.

My Gardener's tan

I am ready to go to bed. I worked hard today.

I am not working for Heather this week. I am working for a church friend.

She has two flower beds that had become overgrown with grass. Her teenage son tilled up one of the gardens. However, when I arrived this morning, the prepared bed was sleeping under a blanket of blue tarp and roof shingles.

She's having another church member re-roof her house.

These are all great things, and I want to make sure this doesn't sound like I'm complaining.

The other garden needed to be prepared so to do that I used a shovel and started cutting lines and removing sections the reverse of how sod it laid. I got about half of it done. Then I went and bought plants, garden soil, and a few other items.

I'll be going back to continue working on the flower beds tomorrow.

I'm taking pictures. I want to wait to share them when it's all finished.

Needless to say all this work outside is giving me quite the unusual gardner's tan. I wear a hat, so my face isn't getting burnt. But the back of my neck has missed some sunscreen applications. My arms are gloriously tan between my t-shirt sleeve line mid-way down my upper arm and my gardening glove line at m wrists. My legs are almost completely white because I wear long pants. And then, because I've worn a few v-neck t-shirts, I have a crazy v-shaped tan that fades into white. I'm definitely not taking a picture of my tan. The sun has been lovely and I'm thankful for it.

Free no more

As I have gone up north to work for Heather W. doing summer landscaping I have been able to check my email and blog. I have not used her internet, but a neighbor's wireless. Hey, if it's not password protected, it's open.

And now it's no longer an option because they either password protected it or moved. This means I don't have internet. Unless I want to get on Heather's computer, but I really don't. It's okay if I don't check my email every night. It's okay if I don't blog every day. Sure, there are things that come up, but they can wait a day.

So if you're trying to get a hold of me, the best way would be to try my cell phone. If I don't answer, then I can't talk and just like back in the day when people left messages on answering machines, I'll get back to you as soon as I can. Or, if you can, text me. It's definitely easier to send a quick text.

a good cup of coffee

Every once in awhile, I pour the perfect cup of coffee. It has just the right amount of cream not too much, not too little. It is exactly how I like it.

This morning I got up early and drove to Farwell to meet Heather so we could go work (landscaping). I took two travel mugs with me. The first one had too little cream and the second one had too much. If I would have poured them together, it would have been exactly the right amount and I would have had the perfect cup of coffee.

Alas, that is not what happened. But it did make me appreciate that good cup of coffee when it happens. I like to be able to taste the coffee; coffee not being overwhelmed by cream. I am pretty sure that for those of us who drink coffee, we each have our own "perfect" cup. Next time it happens to you, give thanks because it doesn't happen every day, to every coffee drinker.

the grass is greener...

We love our house. We bought it for many reasons. One of the perks was (and still is) the landscaping.

There's a lovely flower bed that lines the front of the house. It starts at the driveway and wraps around to the other side of the house and stops at the corner. That side of the house (the non-driveway side) used to be covered in ivy. Bill pulled that out when we discovered it had grown through the foundation and was in the basement.

There was also a peach tree on that side of the house. But we pulled that out too. We really are tree hugging type people (okay, me more so than Bill, I recycle everything), but the peach tree had to go because it was diseased.

Where the ivy had grown, I transplanted grass. Then, with Heather W's help, I made a flower bed. I lined it with rocks. The rest of the landscaping, that existed when we bought the house, is lined with bricks. It's very pretty. 

I should stop writing these on my laptop because all of my photos are on my desktop.

Back to the bricks. 

The grass I transplanted came from between these bricks. Boy does that grass grow. Currently the flower beds are being taken over by rogue grass. The grass just grows right over the bricks like they're not even there. Every year it's a summer-long battle to keep it looking nice.

Bill takes great pride in our lawn and it's somewhat of a neighborhood "fight" over who has the best lawn. We have Jerry, the retired military man who spends hours (I'm not exaggerating) upon hours blowing every single leaf off his lawn. He also takes great care in creating the "great divide". You know the large gap between where the lawn ends and the sidewalk begins. Children have fallen in there never to be seen again.

We have Scott, who just decided to start something.

Poor Justin bought the house next door not realizing what was going on, and has joined in.

Glenn across the street has tried valiantly, but they're moving and they have a dog, so he's given up the fight.


So it's my gardening duty (hehe, duty) to keep the grass where it belongs. 


I should buy a hoe. That would probably help. Instead I kneel down and pull out the grass with my hand spade. I do have to get all the roots. So maybe it's better I do it this way. 


There's just a lot of brick left to clean up. I'll just do it one day at a time. In a month, I'll start all over again.