The White House

The White House

Sunday, June 17, 2012

Must.Sleep.More

I would have blogged last night, but after watching a movie it was obscenely late. We have to go to bed earlier. I’m so tired and Emily’s bird Trixie wouldn’t let me sleep. I’m really mad at her right now.

Emily and I have worked really hard the last couple of days cleaning our way across the yard. It seems that there are always piles of this and that or equipment (pressure washer) all around that detracts from the parts that are nice about the yard.

Trimmed, mowed and weeded the end of the pool. Need to plant the rest of the grass. Put a sprinkler on the seeds in the ditch. I hope they sprout soon.

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Not growing as quickly as I had hoped.

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The strawberries outside can barely be seen.

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These are the strawberries inside the greenhouse.

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                   I boiled the wild rose petals and made the juice. Now to make the jelly. We should pick more petals, too. They’re only here for a short time.

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My greenhouse has been sorely neglected. The cucumbers fell over on the jalapenos and garlic. It took 2.5 hours to straighten things up and water. It was 80-some degrees in there and I was more than irritated. This will not happen next year.

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Found 5 cucumbers hiding. We took the big one in the middle to Debbi last night along with some apples.

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     After the greenhouse I fertilized the front yard and ditch looking for a deeper green to the grass. Everything takes so much time.

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The girls helped me weed half the vegetable beds. Emily found this spider that was “huge”. Really it was only thumbnail size, but for us, that’s huge. I don’t know what it was, but I squished it.

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More weeds than garlic.

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We planted two pots of geraniums.

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Also a pot of Impatiens and Celosia…that would be the one in the back. Emily took a photo of the wrong pot. You know how well teenage girls follow directions. If I told her to stand by the truck she’d stand by a tree. She only half listens. :)

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Miss Daisy Duke is a frightful mess.

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Emily and I cut on her for 1.5 hours and got NO WHERE! I’m buying electric shears. Why have I been so cheap all these years?

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Ummm…Miss Tiny Head can I take your photo?

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Whomph muph sspts (mouth full)

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There you go. My head.                         

That’s not what I meant.

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How’s this? There’s a skinny sheep screaming to get out.

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Are you done, Mom?

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Don’t you wish you could “lose weight” just by getting a trim?

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Okay, it’s not like I don’t have enough to do already so I asked my husband to bring home some rock for the waterfall part of the pool. The sand has to be screened out, then washed, then packed to the pool. Sounds like a good job for Elijah. :) (And, yes, my truck still has a full load of garden dirt that Emily and I picked up on Friday).

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Here are the apples the neighbor gave me. See…we are eating them. Emily sorted out one box of good ones to bake with (like I have time). Really, we could have kept two boxes, but I don’t have time to process them all. One person’s animal food is human food to another.

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Homer cut down some trees last night. Emily pointed out that that tree should stay. It’s Nick’s Pee Tree. He’s been using that one so many years the bark is permanently stained yellow.

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10:00pm at night. Nuts!

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Photo by Emily.

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Our hard-working sweet man. We sure love him.

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Here two trees are down. He did the three in the middle as well. It really opens up the sky. Those six trees (the one in the back will go, too) really shade the yard and pool in the 5:00-ish to 8:00-ish hours. One day that big hole will be filled in and my man will have his shop.

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Five hours of sleep isn’t cutting it. Stupid bird. Guess I should get dressed and get to work. I fertilized half the flower beds last night before the mosquitoes drove me inside. Any idea how long that takes? Mixed the fish fertilizer a gallon at a time and watered 500 plants. Then I sprayed each bed a little to make sure it soaked in to the roots. I’ve gotten myself in over my head!

3 comments:

Lori Skoog said...

Daisy will really appreciate getting rid of that coat...don't give up. Around here you can pay someone to come and shear them and it only takes 15 minutes at the max. Look forward to seeing her in the nude real soon.

Nancy J said...

Is that water in the pool still quite cool??Homer, great work on the trees, after watching Hugh with his chainsaw I know the work that is done to fell a tree properly.will that be next winter's firewood?? Great pics too Emily. Cheers from Jean.

Kim@Snug Harbor said...

OMG - Gayle you exhaust me just reading what you accomplish in a day. I am in awe of you. And give that Homer a hug - what a sweet, sweet man you have there.