Gone Fishin'

There are 12.5 hours of work between me and vacation.

Normally this would be a really good time, and I would be cheerily counting down yadda yadda, but this time my vacation is long overdue and I have no cheer left. My brain shut off a month ago. I am killing those hours between me and my vacation dead.

I will be away two weeks. Part of me feels that it's too early in the summer to take my vacation, that I shouldn't be blowing my proverbial wad when July and August still stretch before me, but the secret is this: I have more time to take, and I'm gonna take it. I'm going to take a week in July. Maybe a week in August. I'm going to distrubute it so that it counts. I'm going to take lots of long weekends.

And of course, because I am who I am and who I am is a serious list-maker, I have drawn up a list of things to do during my vacation:

1. Remove the siding from 2 sides of my house, and start putting up styrofoam.
2. Go to the spa with my sister-in-sort-of-law for a massage and pedicure.
3. Plant more perennials in my two-year-old terraced beds, which are not looking so hot.
4. Clean up the pile of dirt and tarps in the laneway.
5. Sell the old chimney behind the house.
6. Get pregnant.
7. Go camping for Canada Day weekend.
8. Visit a friend who has a new baby.
9. Take lots of photos of bugs doing it. Have them printed and blown up because I'm a pervert.
10. Finish up pottery class - make something for the potluck dinner, and bring home my stuff.
11. Go shopping with my mom, get her to buy herself a new dress (I am her own personal Stacey London).
12. Learn to make vietnamese salad rolls properly.
13. Finish the sweater I am knitting. Think seriously about the next one.
14. Read a book. Perhaps A Confederacy of Dunces ?
15. Hope my friend gets her driver's license so she can come to my house and shoot my bb gun.
16. Finish weeding and rehabilitating my 'boomerang' garden. Add dirt and plants.
17. Get a tan.
18. Download and make a CD of all the old-school rap music I loved in high school.
19. Install the new light fixture in the basement.
20. Go fishing.
21. Think about mulch for the terraced garden.
22. Possibly scam some free flagstone with my truck, so I can build that patio that I want around my firepit. Then I want those side-by-side muskoka chairs from Costco with the little drink table in the middle. I am woman of simple needs.
23. Move the furniture in the bedroom around.
24. Catch up on laundry and ironing.
25. Stain my staircase.

So not too lofty, right? I think that's a reasonable list. If I break it into time fragments, some of those are pretty tiny fragments. Some are evening activities, some are not. The trick will be to wake up at the same time as hubby and stay up, and not let myself get droopy during the day. I will of course keep you apprised of my progress when I return.

If I keep writing I will kill more of that pesky time. Tick. Tock. Tick. Tock.

Tonight I'm going to the Reno Depot to look at two things: Styrofoam and plants. I realize that I have one big galvanized tub on my deck that I filled with soil and then forgot about, so it needs something. Also I need to get some sunflower seeds because mine didn't come up, and if they still have some scraggly cucumber seedlings I may as well pick those up too because mine haven't shown their faces yet. I also want to look at shorty perennials for the terraced bed.

And here is a pic of my veggie garden taken this very morning. My garden is 30% weeds, 30% stuff I planted on purpose, and 30% cilantro, which re-seeds itself each year.

So it's very green, mostly because the entry is infested with a mix of clover (not the nice stuff, the tall gangly stuff), quack grass, and cilantro. Literally there is cilantro everywhere. I need to control that a bit better this year, nip those seeds and scatter them myself. Flagstones would look super nice there.

This is my favourite time of the year in the garden. Well, I guess this and early September, when everything's being harvested. But check out the colours going on right now: the bright fuschia of the spiderwort, the gray-green of the iris leaves, the dark blue-purple of the irises, I have the emerging electric-red of a poppy coming up, the bright orange nasturtiums and marigolds, and soon some yellow lilies, pink anemones, hot pink geraniums, red bergamot, purple bergamot, and yellow something-or-other-that-I-don't know. I am trying to work on leaf texture too - I am going to plant some colocasia that I grew in a pot into the ground, which makes huge leaves. I think I'll put them in that gap in front of the veggie garden on the right, between the marigolds and the irises. There were strawberries there, but they preferred the veggie garden so they migrated to the far right, about 10 feet away, and now stay there full-time. I let them choose - I am very relaxed about such things (see: cilantro).

Ack! There's a man in my garden! In this photo, L to R: rhubarb, pumpkins, catnip, turnips that need to be thinned, emerging basil, marigolds, beans, and a whole lotta quackgrass.

My baby boy. Man do I ever need kids. Oops I mean - more kids! Sorry Loki! This cat is the best cat ever. He's smarter than any animal I've known, and he's enormous - he weighs about 18 lbs, but I believe he's slimming down during summer - so he's substantial to cuddle when he lets me. He's just dense - he has big bones. When he smacks you, you feel it. But he also has a good sense of humour and a pretty face. And he's got great manners and knows the rules and comes when he's called, right at dinner time. Our other cat, Sasha, is adorable and cute and everything Loki isn't. They fill in each others' gaps. Sasha is affectionate and cuddly and a little bit dumb but sweet as heck. Loki is a party cat, he loves strangers and especially those wearing men's cologne, but Sasha hides under the bed. Loki doesn't fear from water - Sasha fears from lots of stuff. But Sasha's a lap cat, and chatty, and pure sweet sugar.

Phew! Sorry, got off track there. Hooray I'm at 12 hours now! See? Hang in there people! Nobody can ramble like I can!

Nice weather, if you're a duck

Today is a sad day.

The weather's been uncooperative the past few days, as the other night we actually had a risk of frost. It was 3.5 degrees C when we woke up. That's not enough degrees. I had to cover selected plants with sheets, mostly those on the deck, and just hope for the best, because I have planted so many frost-sensitive things that I'd need a one-acre sheet to cover it all. And it's been raining raining raining for the past week or so. Sunday was a nice day, but I managed to get a nasty sunburn, and then it rained again in the evening.

Thanks to a really dumb financial screw-up, we've been a bit broke for the past few days. It's been kind of interesting to watch our pennies in this way, but luckily hubby's paid tomorrow so we can start living the high life again. I'm kidding, of course; we never stopped living the high life.

And to top it all off, my team lost the Stanley Cup last night. Booo Hisss. I'm not even a hockey fan. I take bandwagon-jumping to new lengths, and during Stanley Cup playoffs (somewhere around the first series), I become a hockey fan. We watched all of the games, picked some favourite players (I unimaginatively chose Alfredsson and Fisher), and were seriously rooting for the Senators, but alas, it was not meant to be. Instead, Disneylan-er-I mean Anaheim, won Canada's biggest prize. Now I like Teemu Selanne as much as the next woman, but it would have been nice had my underdogs been the ones to raise the cup. Ah well. I look forward to next year, when perhaps I'll start watching in the regular season.

This morning we drove by a dead mallard duck on the highway. How sadly un-ironic. What a missed opportunity.

We now interrupt our regular subject matter...

I am not a big fan of the Police, and so I think that guy in the middle has to calm that shit down. He's dressed like Lance Armstrong from the waist up, and a 15 year old girl from the waist down, with the face of a middle-aged physics teacher. Even Sting disapproves, and he's worn some questionable things in the past. He's all like "does this drummer make me look gay?" The accountant on the right can barely contain his laughter.

Only a very select few can pull off white pants.

I am awesome.

This is the post in which I toot my own horn.

I was thinking this morning, as I lay on the bed waiting for the self-tanner to dry on my legs (seriously, I have zombie legs. Thanks Dad.), that I've done a number of things in the past year about which I am really proud. And at the risk of sounding like a braggert, because nobody likes a braggert, I thought I'd put them down for posterity since this blog is more like a journal that I use to amuse myself.

I drove in Paris
I was scared shitless, and some jerk backed into my car within 5 minutes of being out on the streets, but I did it, and found my way around, and figured out the whole people-coming-from-the-right-have-priority thing well enough. And on our way back into Paris, I, along with my trusty co-pilot-slash-husband, managed to not only navigate a rather expensive car through the most incredible gridlock patch of traffic I've ever seen in my life (it must have looked like a tight patchwork quilt from above. Cobblestones, no lanes, 8 directions merging into one - imagine it), but I found the rental car station no problem and managed to do it all in good time.

Then I drove the Autobahn
I know for millions of Europeans and other inhabitants of the world, that's no big thing and they use it as a morning commute. But for me, getting the car to 180 kmh in the slow lane and not pooping myself was a terrific accomplishment. I came back with a particularly leaden foot.

I organized a concert
... in cooperation with colleagues of course, but I played a major role in organizing a 50th anniversary classical music concert at the NAC a month ago, and it went off very smoothly. Afterwards, my brain officially hung up the "Gone Fishin'" sign and shut down for the summer.

I renovated a room, and built shelves
I've documented that process in these pages before, but every time I walk into that back room I love it, and it's been just over a year. Everything worked, miraculously. The shelves are still holding up (though a few have sagged ever so slightly - the combination of heavy books and MDF isn't necessarily a good one), the orange wall is still awesome, and now that we have new windows in there, the entire thing looks like a brand new house.

I built a garden
I terraced the front garden in no time flat this year. It went creepily smoothly.

I learned some German

I ate stuff for the first time
In the last three years, I ate the following foods for the very first time:
- lobster (hard to believe, but I am landlocked and hated seafood for years)
- foie gras (I can translate, and it doesn't appeal. I didn't love it)
- beef tartare (I loved it too much. Perhaps I'm a vampire?)
- truffles. (the fungus kind) Mmmm truffles.
- King crab legs (thanks Rob - my friend in Kelowna hates seafood, or 'fish product' as she calls it, but her hubby loves it, so he's happy to cook for the two of us when I visit and Nat has to do her own thing. tee hee.)

I grouted.
'Nuff said.

I knit an awesome sweater
I knit this sweater ...













...for myself last fall, and it was so incredibly enjoyable that I almost went right back to the beginning and knit it again in another colour. Mine is a dark mossy green tweed. Kate Gilbert is an amazing knitting designer, and I love everything she does. She hails from Montreal, I believe, and is now living in Paris, so obviously she's a woman of impeccable taste. I have ordered 2 more back-issues of Interweave Knits so that I can make a couple more of her designs.

I put down my cat
This took a lot of nerve, and was among the hardest things I've ever had to do. I love my cats like they're my children, and watching Peter decline was truly horrible. I made the decision to put her down after watching her fail for four days. She tried desperately to get outside, go down the front stairs, and get under the deck, even though she couldn't walk and ended up flopping down in the dirt, eyes all big and scared. That was my sign that she was ready to go, because Peter never ever hung out under the deck. I took her to the vet, and they gave her a needle to calm her before giving her the final injection, but that first needle was all she needed - she died really peacefully while I held her, with her chin resting on my arm as I stroked her boney back. When the vet came in to ask if she'd relaxed, I told her I didn't think she was with me anymore, and she wasn't. It was so difficult that I have a big lump in my throat right now just writing about it so I'm going to stop. R.I.P. Peter. I was going to post a picture in her honour but it's just too sad.

I subjected myself to crazy medical tests
We are currently in treatment at a Fertility Clinic (mostly because I'm impatient; there's nothing super wrong with us except I may have PCOS so I'm a bad ovulater), and I have had more blood tests this year than in my entire life added up. Then I had a sugar test, where I had to chugalug this weird Orange Crush x 1,000 that nearly killed me, and two crazy weird ultrasounds, one of which enabled me to see my eggs and fallopian tubes. That may be TMI, but I don't care - I am a science nerd and there were 3 complete strangers in the room and so you may as well know too. For all of you out there who are interested, I am in possession of a rather beautiful uterus, and my plumbing is fine.

I smuggled wisteria seeds back from Austria, which grew
Don't tell the cops. Thank god this blog is anonymous ha ha ha. My brother-in-law has a beautiful and huge wisteria vine growing up his super-cool house in Graz, and I couldn't resist picking off one of the 3-inch-long moss-green velvety pods. They're so beautiful and fuzzy. He told me "that will never work" but stillI brought it home in my suitcase, stuck it in the freezer for the rest of the winter, then planted the seeds in my greenhouse this spring. I am now the proud mama of a 7-inch-tall wisteria vine, and I couldn't be more smug.

I made this thing in pottery class















It's kind of a birdbath-slash-garden ornament. It's about a foot in diametre, and it stands on a copper pipe pole. I seem to have a wee knack for pottery, though my teacher might disagree (I am a bit impulsive on the wheel) and one of my classmates has borrowed my design to make a platter for cheese and crackers. Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery. I love pottery class so much and fantasize about it all day long, and am really really sad that it ends in three weeks. My instructor has been added to my (quite short) list of really-remarkably-fabulous-people-I-have-known.

I lost 15 lbs.

After the doctors told me I might have PCOS and recommended that I lose a bit of weight, I embarked on a serious but healthy diet of my own construction just after the dawn of the new year. I'm not obese and I'm tallish, but I was a bit overweight, so I cut out the junk, the processed stuff, upped the vegetable content, lowered the carbs and red meat, ate smaller portions, recorded everything I ate, watched the calories and fat content of everything, skied every week, did yoga for an hour and a half on about 5 saturday mornings (I'm not as dedicated an exerciser), drank gallons of water, ate fruit as snacks, and lost 15 lbs in about 2.5 months. So far I've kept it off, even though I have started eating junk again (reluctantly - I'm going to be more disciplined soon - it's easy to slide), and I always lose in the summer anyway, from all of the manual labour and the swimming. I had to have all my pants taken in, and that felt great. I want to go another 10 0r 15 lbs, and then try to maintain that. It may sound like I'm weight-obsessed, but I see it more as a medical experiment than anything.

That's all I can think of right now. It's been a busy year. Time passes quickly with age, so it feels like it's been no time since I renovated the bathroom a year ago, but in other ways the cycle keeps rolling and everything is just right. If I didn't mention something here, it's because it was good as usual or because it wasn't so great. And I guess I am a braggert, but I always say: if you don't toot your own horn, who will?

My bi-annual Blog Posting (a very big deal)

Phew I'm back. Sorry, I've been all taken up with Facebook there, I lost track of time and now it's almost June. One has only so many hours of wastable time at work, you know.

The garden is in. Not bad, it's May 30 and the veggies have all been planted. Frost is done for the spring, and everything's going hog wild already. In honour of this momentous occasion, and because I need some consistent place to write these things (rather than scraps of paper lying around the house), here is my annual list of the herbs and vegetables I am growing. And a new feature for 2007 - alphabetization!

- Artichokes
- Basil, Thai
- Basil, Italian
- Beans, Green
- Cayenne Peppers
- Cherry tomatoes
- Corn
- Chives
- Cilantro (perennial - it's everywhere)
- Cucumbers
- Dill
- Eggplant
- Garlic
- Leeks
- Leaf lettuce
- Lemon thyme
- Mint (always - invasive)
- Potatoes
- Pumpkins
- Red onions
- Red sweet peppers
- Romaine lettuce
- Rosemary
- Spinach
- Thyme (perennial)
- Tomatoes (red, forget the name)
- Turnips
- Vietnamese coriander

Fruit (aside from tomatoes):

- Black raspberries or blackberries, depending on whose team you're on.
- Cherries (I got a tree!)
- MacIntosh apples
- hopefully, Plums, but methinks my tree is on its way out.
- Rhubarb, also perennial. In fact, all of these fruits are.
- Strawberries, which have naturalized in the veggie garden.
The yard is always overrun by raspberries as well, at least until the vermin get them.

Here's a photo of the veggie garden, taken May 28, 2007:

I need a new garden gate. And superpowers.


I also planted sunflowers, canna lilies, and marigolds in the veggie garden, just for kicks. I figure, go big or go home.

That's my beautiful hand-made potato bin lurking in the background.

Keep checking back for my always-thrilling garden progress reports.

In other news, I'm still not pregnant. So no news there really. Also, my cat Peter died. We had to put her down just before Easter, they think she had cancer but she declined really really quickly. She was 18, had a good life, blah blah - I cried for 4 day straight and now she lives in this adorable wooden box in the wall unit. (ok her ashes do). The other two have adjusted to being spoiled rotten and are still fat, though they're on a hardcore diet now that Peter and her canned food are gone.

Oh I did build a new garden this year: the continuation of the terracing project from a couple of years ago. Finally I've finished it.

Turn your head sideways (to the right) to appreciate it.

I'm desperately trying to figure out what else is new and exciting but so far nothing is. We went to the Great Glebe Garage Sale on Saturday and made off like bandits with other peoples' junk. We bought an old video camera for $5 and hubby thinks perhaps it's time for a fishing show. Guess who gets to be the camera (wo)man? That's super fun.

I am knitting feverishly, even though it's essentially summer (for those who are interested, I am working on this sweater first - minus the linebacker shoulders - then I'm going to start in on this one for hubby), and I'm really enjoying the pottery class I'm taking. I've produced a few things, so far nothing's cracked badly and it's all good. We're getting three new windows as I write this, which is thrilling to me - no longer will I have to sit and watch t.v. in the winter while being blasted with arctic air through the windowsills. The frames are red, which excites me. We're looking to replace the siding of the house with board and batten (sp? Who cares) and insulate it with styrofoam underneath the siding, and then I want to paint it THIS COLOUR (sort of, more gray. Damn you Blogger!) with THIS COLOUR trim. So I started with three windows, trimmed in that colour, and we'll go from there. Fun and games! As my hubby loves to say, let's load up the money cannon!

Work is blah. I feel blah. I am burnt out and ready for a good relaxing vacation. I feel like I've been sapped, like a tree. See my fancy analogy? I guess I'm not too sapped to be an awesome poet. Again with the brilliance.

Summer's shaping up nicely. We have a bunch of concerts (Ottawa's Bluesfest and Toronto's Virgin Festival being the standouts) to attend, a few get-away camping and cottaging weekends, a wedding/beach getaway in September, a bunch of BBQ's - standard issue stuff. I have to work in between but I'm off the last two weeks in June, and still have 4 or 5 weeks of vacation that I need to take. I rack up crazy overtime, you see - hence the sapping. I don't think the Austrians are coming this year, but the Germans are later on - likely in late September. I'm sad re: the Austrians but I'm saving up my Aeroplan points to be able to fly to Vienna and visit sometime in the near future.

So yeah, those who know me can find me on facebook most days, those who don't can't unless they're like private detectives. Like Harriet the Spy. Or Ace Ventura. Good luck.

My mood.

Today I am feeling a little bit:

Acid Mattress *

Last Saturday I bit the bullet and went to Canadian Tire and bought this mattress, the Obus forme 8" memory foam Queen size mattress. Our previous mattress, if you could call it that, was a piece of foam so old that my parents got it when they were first married. I am 31. They got married two years before I came along, so do the math. I'd like to think of it as an antique, only foam rubber doesn't really age well, so we have basically been sleeping on the slats of our humble Ikea bed for the past 8 years.

My mom talked the poor sales guy into giving it to us for $100 off, which was the flyer price of the previous week, and so I carted the box home and hubby and I gleefully unwrapped the thing. Memory foam is interesting. It was vaccuum-packed into the box and when we cut the plastic open, it seemed to inflate itself. We lay down on the newly-unpacked mattress and it felt like lying on an inflating marshmallow.

I've now been sleeping on the mattress for 6 nights, and each night is a new acid-trip adventure.

One night I was wearing a flamenco-style skirt and peeing in a pail - the 'washroom' - behind some bookshelves at an artist-run centre. The next night, Serena Williams was being bitten by sea turtles in the ocean. I visited Tina Fey at her house, which was decorated almost entirely in toys. I had a look at the insides of my own body. I went hiking in a wintery wilderness and found elk antlers, and carted them with me, which was awkward because I had to be fearful of stalking bears (yes I know that bears hibernate). I was in an jumbo airliner flying between the buildings of Vancouver, right over the streets and almost scraping the buildings with the wingtips, but to be fair that is a dream that I've had before.

Every night, I kind of dread what's coming up, because I wake up not knowing which end is up and I'm exhausted from all of the action.

This mattress makes a lot of claims. It claims to repel allergens with some technology that involves silver somehow. It claims to boost metabolism, but I'm still waiting to see the results of that. All I can say is that it's a shocker to lay down on, because it feels like my bed is made of plywood, but it softens under me and is so super comfy that I think about it all day. My old-lady hip still hurts but I care less, and I think it's just a matter of finding the right position. The only problem is my shoulders - what do most humans do with their shoulders when they sleep? My arms are always in the way, or they're falling asleep, which is super scary - ever wake up feeling like a dead guy is groping your leg? I have. But it was my own dead arm, which took about 10 minutes to revive, even after mouth-to-mouth. Nice. My husband and I were wondering the other day what it would be like if we had detachable arms like Barbie dolls, which we could take off before sleeping and pop back on the next morning. Our only problem was how to get them back on with no arms? Teeth? Special arm racks? We spend too much time alone together, he and I.

Anyway, I guess it's no wonder my dreams are what they are.

Long story short - I love the mattress. I love it. My hip, shoulders and brain still have to get used to it, but it's nice and high, and it has the added benefit of not being older than I am.

* Also the name of my future band, which will sound a lot like a cross between Stereolab and Indian music.

Snow days

Just when I thought winter was over, today we get a snow storm. Snow and ice and all other matter is falling from the sky, and I feel like it should be a snow day, only here I am at work. Bah.

I am spending much of my 'free' day searching the internet for ways that I can green up my life. I don't mean with plants and stuff, but I mean to reduce my impact on the globe by living responsibly. There are a lot of bad things that we do:

- live 45 minutes away from work, requiring a vehicle and a commute
- fly around Canada a lot for work
- buy stuff, not always with the environment in mind
- eat food that comes from far far away
- use some cleaning products that aren't wonderful
- use halogen and incandescent bulbs at home
- heat with hydro and firewood
- power the house with hydro
- have three older cars, two of which don't work (don't ask)
- have renovated the house with no regard to sustainable materials
- love car races
- buy things like books and stuff online, when I could easily walk down to the bookstore at lunch.

However, there are a lot of good things that I/we do:

- recycle everything. I mean everything
- compost almost everything else
- grow our own veggies in the summer
- replacing the incandescent with CFL lighbulbs whenever they wear out
- economize on my laundry wherever possible
- dry on the line in the summer
- turn off the lights around the house when they're left on
- commute together, and don't use the two oldest vehicles
- plant trees and more plants
- garden completely organically
- catch our own fish to eat
- use non-toxic cleaning products, vinegar, baking soda, method brand stuff, when possible
- don't take a bag all of the time
- re-use plastic bags as much as possible
- clean out all milk bags, zip-locks, etc - recycle the really old ones
- take very few airplane vacations - or double-up, making work trips vacations too
- don't print emails or anything ridiculous like that
- print/write on both sides of paper
- use old envelopes as notepads
- all our water comes from a well - is unchlorinated etc and delicious
- economize water - water plants with leftover standing water glasses, etc.
- don't water my grass or garden (much) in summer
- donate old magazines to doctors' offices once in a while
- buy a lot of used things - furniture, housewares, etc. at garage sales and thrift stores.

Just writing this is giving me ideas for all of the things that I could be doing better. I could be bringing cloth tote bags to the grocery store (but then what would I use for garbage bags?). I could be riding my bicycle to my parents' in the summer instead of driving. I could be buying all cleaning products from method. I can replace the windows in my house to make it more energy efficient. I can eat more local produce and meat. I need to get rid of one of my cars, but first, I am going to teach myself simple auto repair with it. The car we use for commuting is eventually going to be switched for a hybrid - mama wants a Prius baby. That is a hot ride.

I need to influence my workplace to be more efficient - it drives me bananas to see people printing out every last email and keeping paper copies in folders, it's so weird. Those things can easily be saved to the hard drive. I take home recycled paper from the office to my house for printing, but nobody else does this, and the 'recycled paper' pile is like a foot high. Nobody uses the stuff. Also, our computers are 'sleeping' all night all over the office, and sucking power as they do. I for one am going to unplug everything every night, or put it on a smart power bar.

There's so much waste around us every day, so many things that people do thoughtlessly that can be remedied really easily. People have bad habits which can easily be broken. I am not perfect - lord knows I still shop online and eat whatever's put in front of me - but I am trying to at least be aware of my slip-ups so that one day I can pass good habits on to another generation. My little brother got down in the dumps one day about everything, the state of the world, and told my mom that it made him not want to have kids. I think the right thing to do is to go ahead and have a kid, but raise them responsibly and with awareness, so they can enact change when their time comes. Things ought get better through the generations as people become more aware. It's a responsibility to make good people to balance out the ones who will be end up being agents of waste and destruction.

A good day.

Today is going to be a good day. I can feel it in my bones.

How do I know this?

My hair looks hot.

My cold/bronchitis/tuberculosis thingy is going away.

My weight loss is showing.

My co-worker is gone.

And this morning's tear-away Far Side Calendar cartoon is my all-time favourite: the goldfish bowl's on fire, the fish are all standing on the table, and one says "Well thank God we all made it out on time.... 'Course now we're equally screwed." Good times.

I am still alive

... I think.

So I've been off the radar for a while. Not that I have a huge readership out there worrying about me, but I have not felt the need to blog since - whoa - last July. Dang . Sadly, not much has happened in my world since then, hence the lack of blog postings. If I use my wee brain to think back to last July, I can list all of the new things and issues in my life forthwith:

September: Half-sister-in-law and husband visited from Germany. I went to Vancouver and Kelowna, came back to visit with them some more in October

October: Not much else happened in October.

November: I was unexpectedly given a large-profile project at work, added onto my regular responsibilities, and was working like a mad drooling fiend for the entire month. November 30 we left for...

December: ... our trip to Europe. We flew to Paris, stayed a couple of days with a friend there, and then rented a car (surprise! A 2007 Volkswagon Cabriolet, with glass slide-down roof, and 6 gears) to drive through Germany to Austria. We saw Neuschwanstein Castle, drove the Autobahn real fast, and delighted in the Austrian Alps in a snow-less December. We went to Graz and to Vienna. I heart Austria, and it was super to stay with the in-laws, especially over the Saint-Nicholas holiday (and Krampusnacht! wheee!).

We came home and had a Christmas party. Then more crazy work events, all in one week (Dec. 11 back from europe. Dec. 12 back to work. Dec. 13 event. Dec. 14 event. Dec. 16 party). Phew December was busy.

January: Blech. We had a new year's party at my brother's place, where I partied like I was 19. Phew I drank a lot of whisky and tried to sleep under his christmas tree. Thanks to an ice storm, none of us could drive home (he lives at the top of a hill) and so we walked to my parents' house at 5 a.m. to crash. I fell on the icy hill, and my hip has been killing me ever since. So much for feeling 19.

The snow was late, so we didn't get in any skiing until late in the month, but we've been skiing regularly since.

Also, on my doctor's recommendation, I began a diet (or regimen, as I like to call it) on Jan. 2. I am not overweight - well, I was on the border of being overweight BMI-wise - but she suspected I have a condition which could improve with a bit of weight-loss. So I have lost 15 lbs since Jan. 2, and am enjoying it quite a bit. I had all of my pants taken in, and that felt pretty darn good. I figure I'll try for another 10 lbs just to get me into bikini form, for shits and giggles, and then try to stay there (ha!). The only down-side - my wedding rings are loose now.

February: Skiing a lot. I went to Saskatchewan and then to Dawson Creek BC, which was a fabulous trip.
One of my cats (the eldest, Peter) is sick and we don't know with what, but she's 18 and has lost a lot of weight. So I spent all of my paycheques in jan. and feb. on the vet for tests that were ultimately inconclusive (sigh).

That about brings us up to speed. I have loads of photos but it all feels like too much effort to post them, or even to look at them. I am literally exhausted. I am sick today, February has gotten me down, and I'm tired of work. All I want to do is sleep for a month, or just stay home and make stuff and listen to music. Though my CD player is unreliable these days, it's on its way out, which is an endless source of anger and frustration.

Also, and I guess this is the really big nasty adventure, I seem to be infertile. We are now with the fertility clinic, so we'll see what comes out of it, or who comes out of it, but for now it's a major source of frustration and unhappiness, at least for me. We're at a year and a half of trying now, which I realize isn't a lot for some people, but I was graced with extreme beauty and not patience when I was born (ha ha ha). Hubby is enjoying the trying part, but I feel like a big flop. Everyone around me is reproducing, and I'm finding it hard to drum up the requisite enthusiasm for them - I'm kind of going through the motions, in general. Anyway, that's a topic covered on lots of other blogs, so I'll leave it to them.

Needless to say, the garden had better be fertile this year to make up for it. I have a lot of work to do come spring. I recently looked at my last spring's to-do list, and realized that I did only about 2 things on it.

He! kann ich Deutsch sprechen!

It may be no secret to those of you who read this blog (all two of you) that my mother is dutch, and I speak a bit of the language. This came in very handy, as it turns out, when the Austrians visited last week and all of a sudden I was the minority in my own home. My husband speaks german, not fluently but he at least understands everything, my brother-in-law was raised in Toronto so speaks english as well as my husband, my sister-in-law is from Austria and her english is pretty good but broken, and my nephew just completed his first year of english study at school. His english is coming along, but it's still difficult for them to speak english to each other, so for 9.5 days the background language at home was German.

Now dutch and german are not the same language, contrary to what most people believe. In some respects they are very close; some of the words are the same with a slightly different pronunciation, and I believe much of the grammatical structure is the same. But dutch borrows heavily from french and english, and the sound of it is so different that my ears needed to readjust completely. That being said, I did remarkably well picking up what my new relatives were talking about, to the point where they couldn't say anything negative around me (not that they would, but that was always my test with dutch. My mom used to switch to dutch when speaking with my grandmother about touchy things, but that stopped when they realized I knew what they were saying).

We had a terrific time, the Austrians and I (and my hubby). They landed in Toronto on Friday and we weren't expecting them to come that night, but they called around 10:30 pm and said they may just drive straight through. So we rushed and got the spare room ready, but they ended up sleeping in the car at the side of the road. (They ARE _______s, like my hubby, that family is like that). They arrived Saturday morning at 8:30 am. After the greetings and hugs were had, we went out for breakfast, and then spent a glorious day on the beach. My sister-in-law and I chatted all day while the boys went out and had a fabulous day of fishing, then we went for ice cream, and on home for a big fish dinner. A perfect day was had.

Sunday she and I went shopping in town while the guys went fishing again (my 11 year old nephew is a fishing nut like my hubby), which was lovely. Then on Monday it rained, so our plans of going camping were put off by a day. We ended up packing up both cars with boats etc. and shipping out on Tuesday to 31-mile lake, an hour and a half north of us, and set up camp on an idyllic island in the middle of that heavenly clear huge lake. Almost perfection. Almost, because the island had no toilet, and was covered by ants during the daylight hours (we got to know intimately the ants' schedule, however, which was interesting). The fishing wasn't great but for three days we swam, rode around the lake in boats, snorkelled, ate food cooked on the campfire, swam more, ate, drank, swam, played a LOT of gin rummy, and swam. I got a lot of sun.

We returned home late Thursday night. Friday was spent hanging around and tidying up, we went to the little local lake for fishing and swimming in the afternoon, then that evening we went to the Edelweiss Valley Speedway for the SuperSprint car races. Man alive, I don't think they'd ever seen anything like that - I hadn't. So loud, dirty, stinky, and fun. My nephew had a terrific time. We all needed showers when we got home - after sitting in the front row, my hairline was actually caked in mud.

Saturday my brother (R) and sister-in-law (A) went to town and we hung out with our nephew, which was fun. We played games all day, went to the lake for a swim, then when R and A got home they brought all the fixings for a terrific steak dinner and cooked it, which was a real treat. We went for a good walk afterwards, then got home and built a fire and played cards by candlelight until almost midnight.

Sunday was again so hot it was uncomfortable, the boys went fishing and A and I read and snoozed all day. La-zy. It was kind of a sad day too, like the last day of summer holidays. I didn't want them to go, but they were planning their next part of the trip - a road trip to Montreal, Quebec city, Charlevoix and the Gaspé.

On Monday we went back to work. So sad. I didn't cry but was close to it all morning, they left sometime during the day while we were at work. I don't know if they'll be back on their way back to Toronto, but they might be - I hope so. I miss them. It feels like it was a dream week. It wasn't always smooth as butter having 3 extra people in the house, but it was fun, and I especially miss my nephew. Adults are fine with a one-year interval between visits, but kids change, and at 11, by the next time we see him he may be hit by puberty and gone sullen - who knows. It's hard to believe, he's such a little sweetie. (sigh).

Now I'm back at work. phooey. The house has been brought ALMOST back to order (I left the spare room set up, just in case) and I've been relaxing, but I would give anything to have that easy chaos back!

The garden is overgrown a bit, and we had a violent hailstorm the other night that knocked some things over, but it'll only take a weekend to get it back on track. This is the phase of the summer where the garden doesn't really look it's best. The raspberries smack in the middle of my perennial beds are finished and looking bedraggled, which ruins the entire look, and most things are past their peak blooming time for the moment. I have two big plants in pots that I need to plant: a dutchman's pipe, and something else that grows into a shrub-like thing with fuzzy pink flowers. I can't figure out where to put these two things, but for now they're doing fine in their pots in a semi-shady area. My hanging baskets are almost completely dead - that was a failure - and I'm still having a hell of a time with those cucumber beetles, though I'm getting a harvest of squashes anyway. The cucumbers suffered though, the plants look terrible. Even the fruits are looking sub-par. I am looking forward to loads and loads of tomatoes in August, the plants need to be staked up again! They're huge! And I am over-run by borage and cilantro, which popped up wild all over the garden. Fine when they're small and tasty and cute, but when that cilantro gets to be four feet tall and gone to seed it makes the entire place look a mess. I want it to re-seed though, so I will keep some of it around.

Oh! Another success! I have jalapenos this year! They'll be ready to pick in another week!

That's all for now!

Carry on then

Summer is clicking right along here in the hills. The brother-in-law and family arrive tomorrow from Austria to stay for I don't know how long, Amy's getting married tomorrow, and all of a sudden we're halfway into July.

The weather's been a bit odd lately. For about two weeks, it was really humid and stormy; we would have a thunderstorm every day, and crazy torrential rains. I called it Monsoon Season. But that pattern seems to have settled into a climate of moderate daytime temperatures, sun, and coolish nights. I'm sure that will change - this weekend's supposed to be hot as hades - but for now the sleeping is good so I'm not complaining.

I have several minor dramas on the go, as per usual:

My cat was getting into a lot of fights with something (?a stray male cat was hanging around - could be him?) about two weeks ago, and required a trip to the vet and antibiotics for his rather dramatic injuries (his legs were all slashed up). He's bounced back and healed up, but he seems lethargic and reluctant to stay outside. Although last night he wouldn't come in, but whatever. He sleeps all day and this morning didn't want to eat. I'm keeping a close eye on him but I'm very worried; I'm hoping it's a hairball or something innocent. He was eating up to this morning, but today he seems under the weather.

I have a nasty case of cucumber beetles, which is terrible because I'm growing cucumbers, butternut squash, zucchinis, and patty pan squash this summer. When the garden was planted up, i thought "wow that's too much squash, hope it's all ok" but now I'm starting to see damage, and I've lost a zucchini plant. If anyone has any great natural remedies for cucumber beetles I'd really appreciate it, I'm tired of going out there and manually squashing them all. They're sneaky little buggers and they run away from me.

We got a new refrigerator and now I'm obsessed with making it look bountiful rather than full of crap. When we cleared out the old one, here's a basic list of what we discovered:

- 3 jars of cocktail sauce
- 4 or 5 old homemade vinaigrettes
- 2 jars of pickles
- 3 jars of hot pickled peppers
- 3 jars of cocktail onions (who even eats those? I guess I do)
- 2 identical squeeze bottles of mustard
- 2 bottles of ketchup
- 3 kinds of fish sauce
- 4 jars of jam containing less than a tablespoon each
- fudge sauce that is exactly 4 years old
- jerk sauce from I don't know when

So you see, the fridge is pretty darn empty now. I am working slowly at filling it up with good things, gourmet ingredients and lovely treats for when my guests arrive. I want to open the fridge and be blown away by the cornucopia of fresh vegetables and chichipoopoo delicacies, while at the same time being reassured by the good old dairy standbys - fresh milk, cream and eggs, plain yoghurt, and a big hunk of butter.

See? It's not easy to live with me.

Aside from the cucumber beetles the veggie garden is doing well. In fact, all of the gardens are doing wonderfully - I should be posting pictures but I'm too damn busy doing yard maintenance. The only veggie garden failures, besides what I lost to the cucumber beetles (damn them!) are the eggplants (tiny, won't produce this year I don't think) and the basil that I started from seed. Oh, also I have one cherry tomato plant in a galvanized tub that has practically no leaves, only fruit. Why is that? Anyway, I have also had a few garden surprises. Coriander has sprung up everywhere, which is terrific because we eat a lot of it. I'm letting some plants go to seed, so it'll be back next year. I have one cucumber/squash mystery plant growing in a container of flowers by my shed, i have no idea what it is or how it got there, but I can't wait to find out.

Other dramas: I have discovered what's wrong with my plum tree. I'd previously thought that it was just too damn old, but now I see that I have a case of Plum Curculio, and this year is a wipeout. Which is too bad, because when we picked up all of the bad plums to throw them away, I realized that we would have had approximately 200 plums if it had all worked out. That was motivation to take drastic measures next year to try to ensure some kind of successful harvest.

Also, I have some kind of animal living in the woods beyond my veggie garden. I don't know what it is, but whatever it is I hope it's something that doesn't: A) fight with cats or B)eat my garden. I also saw a groundhog on the lawn the other day, but I'm hoping the cats will chase it away peacefully and without gore or tragedy.

Phew. I should write more often to keep the size of my posts down to a reasonable level.

Wish me luck this week with the in-laws....

Saved by the rain

So remember back when I said my little tomato seedlings would be a failure this year? They were flagging behind so badly that I had to buy transplants from the local greenhouse?

Well turns out I spoke too soon. My little tomato seedlings are bushy and green and happy. They're shorter than the transplants, and not blooming yet, but they're healthy and happy to be there.

I've mulched them with straw again this year, and I've started watering them with coffee to perk them up a bit, and I think they're going to pull through for me after all.

Now I can spend all of my time worrying about the eggplants. I'd forgotten that I planted eggplants, and discovered the seedlings in the seed starter under the deck, drowning and runty. But I put them in the garden anyway, and I think they're starting to stage a comeback after burning and wilting for a week or so.

So far, I am experiencing great garden success in 2006. Now if I could only do something about the cat fights...

New Skill Set

Last night I added another skill to my growing resumé: Tile Grouter.

Let me tell you, that is one messy job. Especially when your tiles are white and your grout is charcoal. Apologies go to the water table, and to all of the sponges in my house, and to my fingernails, which are now very black.

But my bathroom is looking fabulous, I must say. It took me approximately 4 hours, but it's worth it.

Where'd the spring go?

Well it's been a long time since I last posted, and I've finally gotten around to it only after a bustling weekend of activity.

More renovations! Yes, we're insanely doing it all at once, and we're on the bathroom now. Last weekend my dad helped us put in (OK, my dad put in) a new counter, sink and faucet, which completely changed the look of the place. This past weekend, we helped my dad install a tile floor. It's starting to look spa-fabulous in there, so much so that all I want to do is hang out in the bathroom and look at it all the time. I will post photos when it's all done and the mess has cleared.

As for the garden, well, it needs some TLC. I was completely discouraged when my little tomato seedlings didn't transplant very well (they burned to a crisp), and I kindasorta threw in the towel for a week or two. Now I need to get in there and weed, and get some straw to mulch everything because I think it's all big enough. Yesterday I went to the garden centre and bought a flat of tomato seedlings. It was a major pride issue for me not to grow all of my tomatoes from seed, but sometimes you have to go to drastic measures. Whatever makes it from my transplants is a bonus, but in the meantime, I got six plants of 'Lemon Boy' tomatoes from our local nursery, where they DO grow them from seed on-site. They don't have the dark-green hard-leaf crunchy look that the one I bought at the grocery store does, which has probably been Miracle-Gro'ed into oblivion. I also bought a tray of broccoli and a tray of brussels sprouts, but we'll see what happens there - I've never successfully grown anything in that family.

Other failures in that garden include a couple of zucchinis that I crushed while transplanting, and a bit of a weed infestation. Aside from that, everything seems to be OK. I've kind of lost track of what I've got, but I think this year's list goes something like this:

- yellow zucchini
- patty pan squash
- cucumbers
- butternut squash
- one plant of a tomato-shaped hot pepper
- red peppers
- cayenne peppers
- eggplants (don't remember how many or which kind)
- golden pear tomatoes
- lemon boy tomatoes (not in the ground yet)
- (regular red tomatoes, don't remember the name! Ack!)
- thai basil
- parsley
- coriander
- regular basil
- borage (ugh)
- thyme
- 'royal burgundy' beans
- yellow beans (not up yet, just planted them)
- broccoli (not in the ground yet)
- brussels sprouts (not in the ground yet)
- sunflowers
- potatoes
- the rhubarb and mint and onions that keep coming back
- the coriander that keeps coming back all over the veggie garden! yay! This is good - we eat a LOT of it.
- on the deck: yellow cherry tomatoes, red cherry tomatoes, leaf lettuce(forget the variety), romaine lettuce, and a basil. Most of these are in the same galvanized tub.
- in the perennial garden, in a tin pot - rosemary and garlic chives.

I also bought some marigolds to put here and there, but I need a few more things to fill it out. I will wait to see what it's like after I put in the broccoli and brussels sprouts, but I may go to get more flowers - maybe nasturtium or other edible ones to sprinkle into salads.

My hanging baskets are a bit sick too. The scaevola (sp?) died in two of them, so I bought some gorgeous purple sweet potato vines to replace them. I need some kind of watering system for the baskets, so any suggestions are appreciated. When I water, the soil runs out of them - they're these coir basket-liners that I don't think I'll be using again. The rest of the plants seem to be acclimatizing, but those darn scaevola make me so sad. They're so pretty, and look so crappy when they're not happy. Damnit, the most successful hanging-basket plants for my full-sun spot are petunias and geraniums, just the ones I like the least!

The perennial gardens are looking fabulous, however. I've had to do quite a bit of weeding and culling, but everything's coming up properly now, and all of the new plants that I put into the terraced garden last year are working together beautifully. The theme right now is pinks and purples, but soon I'll start getting some oranges and hot pinks and reds and yellows. I added annuals to it this year, which I've never done before, and I must say I will do that again. Also soon, my dahlias on the deck will get big enough to start blooming.

New favourite flower: Gazanias. I have put them everywhere, in all different colours.

The irises are exploding right now, as are the poppies, lupines, centaurea, tradescantia, veronica, columbines, and the malva that I bought earlier this year. The peonies are ready to go, and I'm excited. I love my peonies like crazy, they make the best arrangements for the dinner table, and they smell so beautiful. I get all girly silly around my big pink peonies.

My cleome seeds sprouted, much to my surprise. I took them from last year's flowers, and dumped them all into a barrel to see what would happen (I've not had success before), and they all sprouted. So I moved a bunch of them to various spots in the yard, and will give some to my mom as well. She gave me morning glory seedlings; we've got a little exchange program going on.

I put in an order for a whack ($76 worth) of bulbs to plant in the fall, and included some garlic. I can't wait for that - I wish I had garlic in the garden right now. There's nothing worse, in my opinion, than running out of garlic in the kitchen. Garlic powder just doesn't cut it. With these new bulbs and a lot of luck, my gardens will be riotous next spring.

Phew, so I hope that post was long enough to make up for my absence. The weather's been weird, but as soon as it warms up a bit I'll be back out there and get everything fixed up for photos. I've been busy, too busy for blogging.

Thank You, Gods of Rain

The last few days it has been sunny and hot all day, then raining at night. Consequently, all of my recent transplants are doing just fine thank you very much (except for the zucchinis I broke - 2 out of 3 are gone).

A girl couldn't ask for better gardening weather.

And today is supposed to be 32 degrees celcius. Bye bye blackflies!

Weekend Warriors

I never got around to writing about the evening I weeded my brother's garden. I showed up and got eaten by blackflies. After spraying myself with so much DEET I worried that my skin might melt off, my mother joined me in fixing up a bed running the length of his house. Turns out, he's got some lovely gardens in place, once all of the weeds wer removed.

Then his girlfriend came over, and that's when the plan went awry. She brought with her a bunch of annuals and some pots and soil, and since planting up colourful pots of flowers is much more fun than yanking out dandelions and mint (oh, the mint - he's got a serious infestation. I hope he likes mojitos), that's what we ended up doing. We did weed some areas, but at the end of the evening, his pots and the raised strip by his door looked fabulous. He was very appreciative. I also managed to scam a small piece of his very-eager clematis, and will go back for some hosta; he has this variety that seems to spread quite a bit.

This past weekend was stellar - amazing weather, a huge garage sale, plants, sun, beer, barbecue - everything a girl could ask for. On Saturday morning, we went to the Great Glebe Garage Sale. This chaotic annual event is about 10 x 10 city blocks of garage sales, and the entire city seems to go nuts. One of the best aspects of it is that there are so many nice gardens in that neighborhood, which I get to examine at close range, and many people are selling off parts of their plants. I picked up the following:

- 2 japanese painted ferns
- 3 pots of variegated perennial grass
- a geum (don't know what colour - oops)
- something else that has little white flowers on tall stalks, don't know the name of it.

I also got a great old galvanized tin pail, which now has 6 holes drilled into the bottom of it and holds a bunch of pretty annuals.

On Sunday my mom and I made a pilgrimmage to the local garden centre and bought a whack of annuals. I got $45 worth of annual flats. That's a lot of flowers. I spent the rest of the day potting up colourful containers, weeding, flipping the rest of my veggie garden, planting out all of my vegetable seedlings, trimming the edges of the yard, planting the new perennials that I bought Saturday, installing my soaker hose in the veggie garden, transplanting another fern for my shade garden from the woods, cleaning up the deck and doing minor outdoor-decorating tasks. The place looks terrific now, and in a few weeks when the flowers start to go nuts, it will be beautiful.

I am worried about my hanging baskets. I bought 4 of those black iron and coir things, and then four big hanging baskets of: profuse hot pink mini-geraniums, trailing purple petunias, bright yellow drooping strawflowers, and blueish-purple scaivola, as well as a flat of bright orange and pink gazanias. I split each of the hanging baskets into four and made four mixed baskets, with the gazanias added into the dirt in the top to keep the baskets looking full, not flat-topped. Well, now they're all a bit droopy, either from the trauma, the sun, watering badly or all of the above. I hope they pull through - I may put them in a shadier spot for a week or so just to let them establish themselves, and then put them back into the full sun. The one that gets the most shade at the moment seems the happiest.

I ended up hardening off my tomatoes and peppers and squash for a couple of days under the deck. I put the tray out into the sun for a few hours on Sunday and when they didn't turn white and crispy, I figured they'd be ok to put into the veggie garden. I planted them, put the sprinkler on them, and then what do you know but it rained overnight. So with all that water I think they'll be ok in the sunny 29-degree weather today. Keeping my fingers madly crossed. I was also an idiot and tried to carry everything to the garden in one load, and in so doing, I managed to break the stems of three of my zucchini plants. I just planted them very deeply, we'll see what happens. I have 8 or so of them so it should be ok.

I had to buy a flat of cucumber seedlings. I know, I am ashamed to admit it, but the ones I direct-seeded were eaten by something. Only one survived and it doesn't look too hot. From six, I ended up with one, and I am mourning my losses. But the new seedlings have a bit of a head start and were at least started by the nice ladies at my local garden centre, where you can see all of the little shoots growing away in the greenhouses. I love that place, I've often thought of getting a part-time job there just for fun. Hoping perhaps that it would satisfy my garden urges and save me some cash, or at least support my plant habit. But when? I am too busy on the weekends maintaining my own yard!

At any rate, the initial work for the 2006 version of my garden is pretty much done. After this, I will need to plant beans, mulch with straw, build up the soil and mulch my shade garden, and then just mow and weed and deadhead as required.

Phew!

My Brother's Pushy Big Sister

Woo hoo the sun is out!

For those of you in this area, in case you haven't been counting, it rained for 12 days straight. And it was cold, but you knew that already. What that means for us gardeners is that May two four weekend, (Victoria Day weekend) was a total wash-out, as that is traditionally peak gardening time.

Yesterday I came home from work a bit early, and we managed to pack a ton of yard work in before dinner. DH mowed the lawn, and removed all of the coverings that I'd put on my little annuals and veggie seedlings two nights before. I made up my hanging baskets. This year, I bought 4 of those black-metal-with-coir-insert hangers for $4.15 each (a steal!) and then bought 5 hanging baskets of flowers. I split the baskets up and re-assembled them into my metal ones, so that I now have 4 mixed baskets. I will take pictures so you can see what I mean. However I think I did some major damage to the plants chopping them into pieces and reconstituting them. We'll see. But they look fabulous!

Tonight I'm going over to my brother's house to perform a wee favour. My baby brother is a new homeowner, and as a 24-year-old bachelor, he'd much rather be fishing and tooting around on his ATV than gardening. But he's started a bunch of vegetables and fully intends to have a veggie garden, the foundation of which is already in place from the previous owners. He just hasn't gotten around to cleaning it out and flipping the dirt, etc. and doesn't even really know what he's already got in there. So I have volunteered to put in a couple of hours of weeding because I love it so. Yes I said it - I love weeding. I will don my best bug hat and yank all of those little suckers out, and perhaps label the plants that he should keep so he knows what he's got.

Then i will put my seedlings outside for their first night out. I'll put them under an overhang of my house, so they are in the shade. I haven't hardened them off properly, and I want to plant them all this coming weekend, so I had better do something. Last night I compulsively stuck my cathedral bell vines into the garden, and this morning they looked a teensy bit shocked. I think they'll be ok though.

Tomorrow I'm going to wander down to the Byward Market at lunchtime and buy a whack of herbs. 3 for $5 - I'll get basil, a few thai basils, rosemary, more chives, and maybe just maybe I'll get some for my brother as well, just to kick-start him. I am a pushy big sister.

Ironically, his girlfriend works at a major garden centre here in town (thank YOU brother!). She loves to garden. But because he stubbornly won't give her a key to his house, I think she wisely refrains from putting too much investment into his yard. Plus she works crazy hours and goes to school on the side, so she's probably too pooped to manage two gardens (she has one at her place too). I feel it's OK to step in, to a point. He's taking DH fishing this evening, so I will fix up his garden. Mmm I can't wait - the first sunny day in two weeks and I will be out until dark!

Are you kidding me?

Where does the time go?

It's been a month since I lamented my raking injuries! I can't believe it. I'm the world's worst blogger. I am not cut out for regular updates.

In the past month, I've made some nice progress on my gardens but it's really been, overall, a bit of a disappointment. Due to some renovations and minor disasters, I never got around to terracing the other half of my hill as I'd promised myself I'd do this spring. Perhaps I will get started on it this weekend, but the weather's so crappy that I'm not inspired. It's a lot of physical labour, and colour me daunted.

But I have got the veggie gardens ready to go, been taking care of my seedlings, and purchased a few new perennials. I have big plans for next weekend as well - annuals, hanging baskets, vegetables, you name it and it's going into the ground. We've mowed our lawn once, and I've been dutifully weeding even though it makes the blackflies hot to take chunks out of my flesh. My new 'look' is smeared in mud with dead blackflies smooshed into my hair. It's very sexy.

So you've been waiting with baited breath to see what happened with my renovation project, haven't you. Well, it's mostly done. There's still some trim to install, etc., but we bought it, have cut it to size, and it can go in this weekend after we stain it the right shade of faux-maple. Here's a nice shot of the new spare room/t.v. room:




In the middle of the project, after we'd finished off the floors in what is now our office, we shifted our giant aquarium into its new office home. A day later, I heard burbling, and lo and behold, the aquarium had cracked. Both of my back rooms were flooded. All the laminate flooring that we'd already installed - a day's worth of work because it took us awhile to figure the stuff out - had to be torn out. I had to put fans and dehumidifiers in the back for 3 days. Oh, and it all went down, so flooded the basement too. So that was a setback. But a few days later a friend came over and we finished it. Needless to say that ate up my holiday, and the terracing of the garden was last on my priority list.

Next - On to the bathroom!

Ye olde raking injury

Ah, spring.

It's the time of year when my back muscles go "oh yeah, raking! I totally forgot about that!"

It's the time of year where the cats plot out new places to poop in my garden. Toxomoplasmosis, here we come. Guess I should be wearing gloves...

The season where I have no idea what to wear. I'm underdressed in the morning, and overdressed by lunchtime. (sigh). My life is so difficult.

I have raked and raked. Then I raked some more. And a friend raked too, the entire yard, but then I had to rake again. And I will be raking tonight, and probably raking tomorrow night as well. The problem? We haven't mowed the lawn since approximately July 22, 2005. We don't have grass, we have hay. I could bale it up and feed a horse for a week. In fact, we have horses around, perhaps I could rent one for a few days to avoid raking. If I could get a set of four horse-sized aerator sandals, we'd be all set.

But as it is, I have the sandals, and I have been raking like a mad fool to try and get grass to grow where once there was only hay. This weekend, I will be spreading seeds as well, in the rain because I don't want to tax our well too heavily, and because I am lazy that way and actually enjoy the smell of wet dirt and grass.

I haven't started photographing the garden yet, but I'm going to have to take some 'before' shots this week because I predictably have a lot of work to do. On the horizon this year? Behold the following list:

1. Terrace the other side of my front hill, adding to the work I did last year (MAY).
2. Build up and add to my shade foundation garden (MAY).
3. Fill a hole in our yard with dirt and plant grass seed on it, so that we can string up our badminton/volleyball net (APRIL/MAY).
4. Get some flagstones for in front of the shed and around the firepit (MAY/JUNE).
5. Build (or at least plan) a basic platform for a treehouse. If built this summer, we could get a mosquito net and sleep in it on hot nights. How romantic is that?
6. Plant and maintain a cohesive bunch of containers on the deck, possibly containing herbs and/or veggies, but definitely colourful annuals and vines (MAY).
7. Get the lawn into working order, try to eradicate the creeping jenny - organically of course (ONGOING).
8. Make some kind of progress on the border garden (ONGOING).
9. Re-do the compost bin. Possibly buy one of those black ones (JULY).
10. Maintain a healthy veggie garden all the way through the season.

I think this list is very doable. That's in addition to replacing the roof over our kitchen (over the shade garden, grrr) ourselves, finishing the back room, staining our staircase, and renovating the bathroom all before July. Hey, it's gotta rain sometime!

I've said this before in this space, but there's nothing better than coming home from work, grabbing a cold beer or a glass of wine, and wandering the garden, puttering here and there, coddling the plants. That season has already begun.