Life Updates in Pictures

So how are things in my life? I thought I'd give you a little tour in pictures:
We're still preparing to re-roof the house next month... one of our helpers has bailed, we have to make sure the other one can be there or we may have to try and find a way to budget a professional to come do it. For now it's patched up, and we're ripping out moldy ceilings and such (well, sort of... long story, which will require way more pics.) to try and keep any biohazards out. Anyway, note the light gray patching which I did, and later covered with black roofing patch... much less water is leaking into the bedrooms now!

Sarah-doggie, pictured here looking perplexed at a doggie treat, is loving being an indoor doggie but shedding like CRAZY!!! What hte heck?????

M, the unofficially-adopted daughter, had her 18th birthday in May! Here we are celebrating at Red Lobster. Behind us, you might notice, is the huge aquarium with the large crabs. We ate some of their cousins during our meal... I was not too impressed, but James and M liked them! I enjoyed the shrimp, and shockingly... I enjoyed the stuffed mushrooms, which DID contain both lobster and crab meats.

Here are greens and brocolli growin in my garden, along with weeds and the impossible-to-remove poppies.

My husband has decided to grow a goatee. HOT, is he not? it's getting longer and fuller these days too.

Yes, I did build a trellis completely out of bits of leftover yarn and discarded yarned creations. I planted two very-cool types of beans that climb this year... I forget what kind these are, but the others are called asparagus beans and the instructions tell you to pick the beans, for best flavor, when they are eighteen INCHES or smaller. I kid you not... the things should be huge! How fun is that?!

As always, poison ivy is attempting to steal my soul. Here it is growing in my garden/poppy patch.
Sarah-doggie, looking cute like always.

And last but not least... a pic and poem.

bowed

imperfect

Beautiful

Instead of Typing...

I'm going to blog. I need a break from paper-writing for a few.

So, what's new in all of your lives? For me...

IT'S GARDEN TIME! Inspired by a post at Robyn's blog, I will tell you a little about my garden adventures. Unfortunately, since it is dark, this post will not have visual aids. *sniffle* I'm sure my camera would take some interesting pics with the flash, but it would just not be the same.

So, what have i planted so far? Welll.... of the things that I've planted, the following have emerged from the ground:

Broccoli, Brussel sprouts, collard greens, mustard greens, lettuce, 3 types of onions, and chives.

The following are also planted:

Leeks, snap peas, spinach mustard geens, cauliflawr (you know, I just typed that word like 5 different ways and none look right... whatever. It can just stay wrong.), another type of lettuce, dill, cilantro, parsley, lemon basil, and savory.

OH! And for the first time EVER, I have sweet peas growing in the yard! I have successfully killed them the past 2 or three summers... but this year, they are STILL ALIVE! Wooooooo!!!!

Also, since it is garden time, do you all remember what this means?

POISON IVY.

We've brought the doggie inside, and of course any time I let her out to play, she gets into the ivy. We're working as fast as possible to get all of the ivy out of our yard, but it is not going so well. I HAVE cleared off a must bigger portion of the ground than last year, and at a much earlier part of the year. In fact, part of it is cleared enough that once hubby puts the debris in a bag (he's not allergic... douchebag.), I may even plant some carrots there. I've not only cleared the ground, I've even used the hoe to dig the ground up and get the roots out. In all honesty though, I started clearing this patch of ground last year, so it should definately be more clear lol.

In other news, my pastor has challenged us to not think or speak negative things... we are even supposed to keep a container in our house, to put a quarter in each time we say something negative.

I just put a quarter in for calling my husband a douchebag earlier in this post...

It was WELL worth it. :o)

Don't Panic!

Yes, I am still alive.

*I'm working hard on my classes, and I have A's in both of them.

*Working in the backyard, (aka the land of poison ivy), without thinking about covering up my skin... *sigh* I was planning to only work in the front, but I had to take the leaves and such to the compost area in the back yard... and found myself working on the weeds back there. This will probably be something I'm regretting in just a few days.

*Falling and making owwies... fell down a flight of stairs this week while doing the volunteer work required for my intro to social work class. Made a large bruise on my arm, skinned and bruised my elbow, bruised my tailbone, and jarred my back. All in front of one of the kids there... *still embarassed*

*Feeling annoyed that a former coworker is causing a lot of problems for my office, and I have to be involved in the drama. Save the drama for your mama!!!!!!! I don't want it.

*Planting lots and lots and lots of veggies in my gardens. So far I've planted lettuce, cabbage, brussel sprouts, broccoli, argula, and green onions. Tomorrow's list includes another type of lettuce, cauliflaur, and some other kinds of greens. I really want to grow some bok choi, gotta see if the seed store has that. Bok choi is cool.

*Staring at the wall above my computer, and realizing a Christmas decoration is hanging up there. How on earth have i not noticed this before? It's MARCH!!!!

*Worrying that I have lice. That is the very bad part about working with kids... kids = lice. *sigh* I need to find someone who knows how to look for lice. I wonder if my hubby knows?

*Working on our taxes. All done except I have to put our property taxes in. Then on to Mommy's taxes.

*Speaking of family, did you all know that Cousin Amy had a baby?? Somehow I missed the family memo, (probably by not checking my e-mail) but I hear that she is doing well (after a poop-in-utero scare) and everyone is happy and healthy I believe.

*Speaking of babies, my newest neice is absolutely ADORABLE!!!!! I just love her so much, with her cute wittle eyes and her cute wittle hands... and I think she loves her Aunt Jana too. :o)

*Also speaking of babies, we still haven't gotten one. I'm handling that okay right now.

*I'm still hungry, even though I've been snacking all night. Perhaps God decided instead of a baby, I should have a tapeworm? If so, I may not be speaking to him for a while. *frowny eyebrows* (Just kidding God... but please don't give me a tapeworm.)

*My pastor's wife is working with me as an intern in my office. I am finding this both extremely wierd and kinda fun. We seem to be... bonding.

*We have fallen in love with the new Jalapeno Popper Doritos. YUM.

*I miss art. My inner child has crayons but we can't find a coloring book that she likes. I think I'm going to have to check Walmart tomorrow, because she has been sniffling sadly far too much lately.

*I'm really angry at my social work professor. I worked very hard on a paper for that class, using the sentence structures we had been working on in English class... I made a phenominally awesome sentence, using a structure from my English book, and was all excited and proud... until I got my paper back. She had counted my sentence wrong! I am so upset. I plan to take my English book with me to meet with her, and ask if she'll give me my point back if I promise to never use creative sentences in my papers again. Or maybe I should just take the point deduction, and display it with pride as a sign of my non-conforming ways... *sigh*... but my sentence was right, and I WANT MY POINT BACK! Stupid program, preparing us to write dull journal articles with no personality... Grrrrrrrrrrr...

So, this is just a glimpse of what's going on in my life. Now tell me... what's new with you??

Guess What?????

I have a BEAN!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I don't suck as a gardener!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Wooo hoooo!!!!!!!!

And in honor of my new label as a "small-minded" woman, I have a new poll up on my sidebar! (And no, it's not for me. A friend is over at my house at the moment, asking for your advice.)

What's Up, Buttercup?

So you're probably wondering what I've been doing...

Well, aside from the basics.. (the car is FIXED!!!!!!!! Made my first crock pot meal, had my first real fight with James, had my first make-up sex with James - and YES, it IS all it's cracked up to be!!!! lol, visited my mommy, hung out with Kim and Jakey)... I have been:

Attempting to transplant a Hollyhock plant from my mom's house. So far, it is not going well lol


Admiring the growth of my green beans... and if you look close, do you know what you'll see?
A BLOOM!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! From each of these blooms will come a green bean!! *beyond excited*

Taking wierd pics of the awesomely cool flowers growing in my yard...
And making a stockpile of things to sell, either on my Etsy site once I get it up and running, or at local craft fairs... and my current obsession? BABY BIBS!!!!!

This is my work table, filled with bibs in process and 3 that are ready to sell already! :) I'm learning so much from making them, and having a TON of fun in the process. So far I've only done ones for girls, but once I use up these yarns I'll switch and do some for boys. FUN!!!!! :o)

So.... what have YOU all been doing???

How does the garden grow?

At the moment, the garden is growing GREAT!!!! Not only do I have morning glories:

And the newest bloom, my very first blooming cosmo of the year:

But I also have green beans:

Isn't it crazy how tall and bushy they're getting???

And MUCH to my surprise... when I went outside last night, I discovered that after two months of waiting for them to sprout... I have pepper plants!!!!!!

Two different sets of them, in fact!!!!!


I know I planted four types of peppers... cayenne, cerrano, jalapeno, and umm... maybe bell peppers? I dunno. I'd given up on them ever coming up, after waiting all of this time! I was so surprised!

I also have carrots coming up here and there in the back, and some cherry tomatoes... I'll make sure and take pics of those later. I'll also have to take new pics once I get the garden area weeded and the peppers and cherry tomato plants thinned out.

How about you? Do you have a garden? Anything cool growing in it?

Garden Progress

Happy Earth Day my fellow bloggers!!! Wow, I've had a crazy weekend/beginning of my week. I have enough to put like 20 blog posts on here LOL But I'll start with just the most recent garden updates, to celebrate our Earth Day green-ness!!! :)


Last year, my goals for the fence in my yard were: Weed the first half of it and plant flowers, kill all poison ivy on the second half. This year, I'm getting a head start, and have ALL the fence weeded, poison ivy free, and TWO types of flowers planted!!! See:


The morning glories are already coming up! Aren't they impressive?? I also planted some sweet peas today! I tried those last year, but kept forgetting to water them lol so they never came up.

Next in line for fixing up? The poppy bed. My old roomie LOVED poppies... in this case, bright orange poppies. The flower bed where they live is overgrown, over-poppied, and just generally in need of an overhaul. I plan to put some shorter flowers around the outside, and thin the poppies in the middle.

Vision Board

Suzie challenged us to make a dream/vision board, and since I had been meaning to do that FOR EVER, I decided to jump in!!!

Here is what I made:


I really want to start taking care of my body. I want to start using moisturizers and natural treatments to keep my skin from being damaged by dry air, wind, and sun. I want to care about myself.

Of the entire board, THIS is the area that defines me at the moment. The words on here say:
"It's Gro Time"
"It's time for your DIRT MANICURE" (I love this, as I rarely wear gloves to garden lol)
"Every blade of gras has it's angel that bends over and whispers, 'Grow, grow' - The Talmud"

I want to enjoy the mild weather of spring and get this yard in shape. I want to plant flowers and veggies, and a lilac bush would be lovely too. I want to make my yard a place to be proud of!!

I have got to get my house organized, it is driving me INSANE.

I want to enjoy my relationship with James and encourage that relationship to grow and deepen. Although we have not officially decided to have kids, I also want to prepare my life so that we'll be ready if we DO make that decision.

All month long, my pastor has been preaching about abundance and living life with passion... this basically sums up how I want to live my life... with gusto!!


I have GOT to have one of these bed sets. I will save up my money, and I will have this set IF IT KILLS ME. I'm leaning toward the one on the bottom left, with white walls, red carpet (eventually) and red & black decorations in the room.