A Time For Everything

 

...into the future...

...or...

Life Returns to Normal

 

The road trip is in the rear view mirror.

My friend's visit came to an end.

Life returned to normal.

And now I have things I want to accomplish.

My desire to finish books has returned. It didn't come back in a rush because you long-time followers know that I wasn't sure it would come back at all or that I even cared if it did. But it has. The feeling have been simmering for a while and broke into a boil more recently, but being excited about my books and about writing and telling stories feels good.

My first project is a re-vamp of the first series, including new covers and some Amazon A+ Content graphics, for which I got an amazing deal from my cover artist.

The books were originally written in some weird second person, present tense which is prevalent in fan fiction but *not* in commercial fiction.

Why I did that, I have no idea, but I've been meaning to edit all those books into proper third person, past tense for years, but doing that until recently has been a tedious chore. The advent of AI platforms means I can make AI do the hard work. I still have to edit and tweak what it gets wrong (dialogue), but that's a much easier and less time-consuming endeavor.

I also want to finish book seven, which has been sitting un-done and un-touched for too many years, so I've been re-reading and percolating those heroes and that story, as well as brainstorm a plot and character ideas for books Eight and Nine. :0) I'm ambitious, aren't I?

* * * * *

Just a quick shout-out to my friend's visit because I haven't done that yet...

My friend Angela is a fellow writer and a fellow hockey fan, and we agreed that it would be fun to attend a hockey game together and, long story short, we made it happen.

She flew into Dallas to see her team play my team in my team's barn. Now, her team isn't so good right now and we both knew the chances of the Stars beating the Coyotes were high--which they did--but it was more about the experience. Surprisingly, she wasn't the only Coyotes fan in the crowd. We spotted a handful of them.

And we had fun, both visiting in general and watching hockey. Well, I enjoyed it. I shouldn't speak for her. ;0) She also got to meet a shared online friend that she'd never met before, so that was cool for her as well.

Here we are, post game:

* * * * *

So Q2 starts today, and I've been ruminating on what specific goals I want to work towards and accomplish over the course of the next three months. I also needed to update my Vision Board to keep those tasks / goals front and center.

So here are the things I'm working toward this quarter: a new cross stitch pattern for the online store; planting a Chinese wisteria in the bird feeder bed to a) provide shade for the birds / bird feeder and b) provide food for bees; read two non-fiction books (about money probably); get my eating habits back on track; and lose at least 5 pounds. I also want to finalize the converted text of the first two books I mentioned above.

* * * * *

I've also spent some time out in the yard -- HELLO SPRING -- cleaning out the squirrel buffet area of the yard. I churned up the old mulch and pulled the weeds. The weeds I tossed, but I relocated the funky mulch and dirt to a large low spot in my lawn (see that dark patch in the upper right edge of the image).

I also took down and tossed that white bench hanging off the tree at the top of the image. It was falling apart. I like it a lot, though, so I looked for another and happened to find them on sale at Hobby Lobby where I just so happened to have a gift card. I bought two since it was basically a two-for-one deal.

I'll buy some fresh mulch in a week or two, I'm thinking red this year for a pop of color, and fill in all the spaces around the rocks and fill up the bordered space to help my tree retain any moisture come the heat of summer.

* * * * *

And some good news--the Brown Eyed Girl and her soul mate *and* Sonshine are coming to visit. Sadly, not at the same time, but I'm not complaining. The Brown Eyed Girl will be in town over Mother's Day, and Sonshine will visit for my birthday. So YAY!

And that's about all I have to say for now.

Take care and see you in a couple of weeks.

 

What I Did On My Summer Vacation

Today is Labor Day and, growing up, that signaled the end of summer and the start of the school year. Isn't it tradition that, at least in elementary school, you write about what you did over the summer?

Well this is what I did...

Despite soooo many days of triple digit heat, and caring for mom, and keeping up with my day job, I spent quite a few hours cleaning up the yard. In part, to keep sane, to be honest. Especially as the days passed and mom required more care and attention which required me to be in her room...

I worked mostly while I was out with the little dogs anyway, which was 4-6 times a day in the beginning to ensure they didn't leave deposits on my flooring. Anywho...

First, I picked the pods off the sticker burrs to save all dog paws and my own feet from being wounded by these ugly suckers.

(Technically, they are sandbur seed pods, but we call them Sticker Burrs--and anyone who's experienced them will know exactly what you're talking about, lol.)

But as summer and the heat marched on, I started to just pull the whole plant from the ground. May as well, right? Considering how little grass is in the yard, they weren't hard to find or pull. I think I've mostly gotten them eradicated, although every now and again I find a small straggler or two. But they don't last longer than a blink.

Once the sticker burrs were done, I moved on to some sort of spider-like ground cover weed. Those, too, have been fairly easy to tug from the very dry earth that makes up most of my yard these days. There are also a lot of other random not-grass things growing (or already dead) that I've just plucked. Except the kudzu which grows as vines. Not sure how I'm going to get that out of the yard.

Then I got a wild hair to rake. Not only were there some leaves already, but our lawn guy is really just a lawn mower--so all the detritus from mowing gets left behind and what doesn't turn to natural mulch just sits, so when I've taken the dogs out I've also taken to wielding the rake.

As I'm out there letting the mind wander, it turns to "fixing up" the yard and what that might look like. I know it'll take money, which I don't have a lot of right now, but some ideas include:

• privacy fence
• a deck around the master bedroom (with a French door from said bedroom)
• non-grass landscaping, which could include:
• gravel (bye-bye kudzu)
  
• actual ground cover
• hedges / trees
• pond / water feature
• mulch
• any combo of the above

I do have a small section of grass I want to keep and nurture, but we live on a decent size piece of property and I don't want to have to water that much grass in future summers (or install a sprinkler system). Convincing DH to do any of these other than the privacy fence is going to be a challenge. We'll see how it goes.

How's your summer going?

Have a great week.

Yeah, me too. I kinda miss my yard. I haven't spent a lot of time outside recently, except to hang while the dog runs around. I usually sit and read while she sniffs and chases things and does her business.

I haven't worked on anything in the yard in years and you can definitely tell. It's not that I don't want a nice-looking yard, because I do, but I no longer have the inclination to do it myself. At least not right now. I'd rather pay someone to do the back-breaking labor and enjoy the fruits of their labor and my money. But that's a ways off...maybe months, depending on how the books sell come June, July, and August...or maybe longer.

The lawn gets mowed and weed-whacked but that's pretty much it. The trees need trimming, we have a huge brush pile behind the shed and any semblance of specialty areas are mostly over-grown with grass or covered in leaves.


What I'd really like to find is a "putzer"--someone who'll come putz in my yard once they're done in their own. Someone who likes to just putter and weed and water and trim and plant. Anyone know someone like that in my neck of the woods???


I also miss watching the squirrels and birds. Although that could be easily remedied  by filling the bird feeders and squirrel feeders again. Once I have some extra cash, I plan to. But you'd be surprised how not cheap bird food and squirrel mix is.

Hope you have a great weekend!!!

I haven't had any this year. Usually by now I'm chomping at the bit to do some small project in my yard, but funds have been a little tight, so I didn't even plan anything beyond scrounging up the money to pay the yard guy who was due to start upkeep again after a months' long hiatus. Of course the spring rains have kept everything soggy, which is made worse when the grass is overgrown and the sun can't reach the ground as easily. But we finally had a few days' grace and Lawn Guy came buy yesterday afternoon.

Before:








And after:





There's still some work to do to get it looking like I want it to, but some of that's on me. We've still got large branches down and leaves in the corners. So between now and his next visit, I'm going to get out and enjoy what's left of spring.

Anyone doing any fun yard projects?

I've been writing and it's been fabulous. The muse has got his hooks in me and all I want to do is spend time in these alternate universes of mine. Unfortunately, between that and most of my other endeavors, I spend a lot of time sitting. My body has made itself very clear of late that it's displeased with the amount of sitting I'm doing and so I've had to make a conscious effort get my large muscle groups moving and my blood flowing out of my butt rather than allowing it to pool there.

My bathroom calisthenics haven't been quite enough, so if I want to pleasure read, I have to do it on the treadmill. Right now, that's the only time I'll allow myself the reading luxury. So there's my incentive to get it done.

I've also decided that, for this weekend at least, I'm gonna spend some time outside. We've got some leftover leaves and a ton of acorns that need bagging. Plus, it'll just be nice to get some sun on my face.

What about you? Big plans for the Valentine's Day weekend?

I'm a bit late on the uptake again, but I was barely on the PC at all this weekend, so the blog was not on my mind at all.

We hired some lawn care folks to come take care of our jungle...as I mentioned, DH was gone and the lawnmower broke. With all the moisture, it grew out of control rather quickly, though I don't think the guys really realized what they were in for. It took them almost 3.5 hours to do front, sides, and back--most of that was spent on the back yard.


But it's done now and it looks 100% better. I spent some time Sunday morning trimming away growth from along the fences and other random areas, as well as clearing out my bird feeder bed which has been terribly neglected of late and was looking rather pathetic.

Aside from that, I watched a lot of TV with hubster, but spent some time enjoying the sunshine with the dog.


Hope you had a lovely weekend!

Hope you had a lovely weekend. I got a yard work sub-goal done finally. The two large branches have finally been cut up into firewood. Most of the rest of the back yard was mown. I did a lot of reading, a little crafting, and watched some TV too. I also spent a lovely few hours with two dear friends. This morning's blog post didn't get spared a thought, so as a result so you all you get is this.

Have a good Monday...
 

Well, it's two weeks since I said good bye to my boy. Early days were tough and I still get misty-eyed every now and again. Sonshine called this past Saturday and seems to be fine. I missed his call, but he talked to his dad...

DD has also been gone more often than not, so the house has been very, very quiet. It's not unpleasant.

I'm still working from home with a couple of trips to the office per week, so that's a good thing.

This past weekend, I spent time getting my back yard cleaned up. After the crazy storm we had a couple of weeks ago, the back yard was pretty rough around the edges. So I mowed and raked and cleaned up the patio and the whole thing looks rather tidy now.

All I have left is to get the chainsaw out and cut the fallen limbs into truck-bed lengths to haul to the dump. I have a lot of yard waste to haul to the dump. At least, two loads, if not three...

Oh, wait--I also need to trim the holly and the wild hedge out front. Which will no doubt add a trip to the dump.

But it's fall y'all and fall is my favorite season, so I'm enjoying all of this outdoor work. I love it when the trees look like this, although that means it's colder than I like.

Last Thursday afternoon, a wild thunderstorm pin-balled its way across the Metroplex. DD works in the northwest quadrant of Fort Worth and we live on the far east side. Her work got nothing. We lost two large branches out of the dead tree and the whole neighborhood was littered with tree debris from the wind and hail and sideways rain. Limbs and trees were downed as well. Now, just a few miles northish--in the business park where our office is--nothing. There was rain and some wind, but the streets were free of the tree debris...

We lost power for a few hours, but it was back on before bed time. The Internet, however, has been stroppy all weekend.

Sonshine and I spent some time this weekend cleaning up the front yard.

Hope you had a lovely weekend without too much clean-up to do.

Okay, okay, so this post isn't going to be as deep as the title suggests, but there is an analogy...

If you've read this here blog for any length of time, you'll know I talk a lot about my yard. It's been a while, so I thought I'd mention it. But in the interest of not boring you, I thought I'd make some sort of point. Yeah, you're bored already, aren't you?

I used to have a really nice back yard. There was a lot of real grass and it covered most of the area referred to as the lawn. But through too much neglect, it is now more weeds than grass. I'd really like to have grass again. So I've been working, albeit slowly, to fix it. You'd probably shake your head if you came and inspected it up close a personal, but surprisingly, while it's not actually looking well, I think the process is coming along nicely.


Spring 2013 I decided to work on just the dandelions. We had a lot of them. So each morning and evening and during the days on the weekends, I would pick the heads off. No, I didn't actually remove the plant itself. As you can imagine, that was tedious process. For the rest of spring, summer, and fall, I just kept up with the mowing and weed whacking.

So spring 2014, back to the dandelions. And while I hadn't removed any plants, re-infestation was kept to a minimum. Despite preferring to stay green, I thought that a bit of chemical help was in order, so in mid-May, I weed-and-feeded the yard. Got those dandelions where they lived! Of course it took some time for them to wither up and die, but wither-up-and-die they did. In the mean time, it was onto the next issue. Sticker burrs.

I hunted them, pulling the whole plant, roots and all, when I could, pulling off just the seed pods when I couldn't. Two months later and the number of sticker plants dwindled. Time for the next round of weed-and-feed and time to find a new enemy.

Now I'm pulling up these small plants--I don't even know what the are. They have a central root system and then grow a bunch of arm-like tendrils. It turns out there are several varieties of these. So I've criss-crossed my yard over and over, puling these out even when they look dead (just in case they're only hibernating), still finding pockets of sticker burrs here and there as I go. I see the progress even if the project as a whole looks like a war zone.


Of course, the yard was mowed this weekend, so not much weed-picking going on until they start to grow out a bit.


The point I started out wanting to make is just how amazing and interesting the cycle of growing things is. As the dandelions died off, a different weed took the spotlight. As summer progressed and things died off due to heat and lack of water (I only water my trees), more new things are coming into view. It's really been quite interesting and I'm looking forward to watching the rest of the cycle back into spring.

As the title of this blog says...a time for everything!

I have a few things to share today...

A) It was another good weekend for yard work. It was warm, but there was a lot of passing cloud cover on Saturday morning. So I raked up at least 12 cubic feet of crap out of a small section of the back yard. As I've mentioned previously, I'm trying to get my back yard grass area turned back into a healthy green lawn. So that means getting rid of all the crap matted down between whatever grass and weeds I have and of course removing the weeds.

Sunday dawned bright and sunny and I decided to skip the yard work.

Before...

After...



The first 12 cubic feet came from this section of the yard only--from the two trees in the foreground, to the shed with the stepping stones providing the stopping point on the left...



I've been mowing in sections since I don't have the stamina to mow the whole thing at once. When I mow, I cut the grass low low low. And I've been raking that section. Meanwhile, I've taken to digging up the dandelions when I can and just snapping the plant off at the root if I can't actually dig it out. I put down weed and feed around the first week of May, but they only recommend doing that every eight weeks, so it's manual weed removal in the meantime.

And I'm enjoying the great outdoors as long as I can. Once summer officially hits, my outdoor hours will be limited to early morning and late evening. Good thing I'm an early riser!

B) On Friday evening, Sonshine and I found a baby blue jay on our back porch. It was sheer dumb luck that the dog raced out the door and right over the little thing. Otherwise we could have had a tragedy on our hands.

At first we thought it was wounded, but finally determined that the little thing had either fallen from the nest or was learning to fly. The worried callings of the parent blue jays as well as their constant transfer from branch to branch rather than just flying off led me to figure the latter two situations were most likely. Sonshine picked up and carried the dog inside and we left the birds to their baby.


A short time later, Sonshine looked out the kitchen window to see baby blue jay doing a hopping roll in the direction of his parents' encouraging calls. Eventually he made it through the chain link fence and under the neighbor's privacy fence. I hope he made it made safely back to his nest.


C) And last but not least, I stumbled upon another great resource for free books: Books Should Be Free. E- or audio versions seem to be available for books in the public domain, including many of the classics for many different platforms (Apple vs Google vs others). Believe it or not, I've never read Jane Austen, so I'm going to try listening to one of her books. First on the list: Pride and Prejudice. Though I must confess to seeing the 2005 film version starring Kiera Knightly, and then on Saturday evening, DD and I watched Sense and Sensibility starring Emma Thompson and Kate Winslett.

Hope you had a fun and/or productive weekend as well...

...to rest and relax. The weather was perfect for yard work--warm but partly cloudy.

Before the weekend started, I made a list of all the things I wanted to get done yard work wise. Sadly I went great guns on Saturday and was left pretty wrung out on Sunday. So instead of carrying on my yard work, I took care of the normal inside chores such as laundry.

I've been wanting to get my backyard lawn back up to snuff--actual grass rather than 90% weeds. That requires me to rake up all the crap imbedded down in between the grass and weeds. A very tedious and labor intensive task.

But here are a few of the things I accomplished...


Remember this lovely and fun planter I bought last year around this time?


Well, the flowers died, of course, so I replaced the flowers and now I have this...

That's blue lobelia in the center with white vinca and red petunias alternating around it. What do you think?

I also had plant my lemon slice super bells...



I still have quite a few tasks to get done. Hopefully, my energy will back up to near normals and I'll get some more yard work done today. Best of all I got to sleep in today. I don't get to do that very often.

How has your weekend been so far?

So Wednesday, I was met a friend to chat, but I was early, so I wandered into a Container Store. Believe it or not, I've never been in one. If you have, you know they have all kinds of storage containers and organizational paraphernalia. I just needed to kill time.

As I wandered about, I came upon these cool measuring cups and just couldn't resist!



Yes, they are Russian nesting doll measuring cups! How fun are they??

Well, it's Friday again and I have big plans for working in my yard. Hopefully, the weather will cooperate. Although we do need the rain...

How about you?? Big weekend plans?

And I'll have my weekends back. It seems like there's always something going on either Saturdays or Sundays and I haven't had a good solid weekend to work around the yard.

Most of what I'm doing are bite size pieces of larges projects--filling a bag or two or three of yard waste rather than twenty, weed whacking but not mowing, killing weeds here and there. But there's so much more to be done and by the time I have a full weekend, it'll be real summer and real hot.

Of course, despite my watching what I eat, my morning stint on the treadmill, and daily calisthenics, I proved yesterday, I'm still woefully out of shape. Granted it was pretty warm Sunday morning as I was raking and I was up till almost 1am Saturday night, but I ended up taking an hour and half nap yesterday afternoon and I still felt rather draggy.

I pushed through the lethargy to get laundry done as well getting my dinners partially pre-cooked and some minor housework accomplished. I was ready to hit the sack by nine p.m. So I did...

How was your weekend??

Just gotta get through the day and then it'll be the WEEKEND again.

Sonshine will be having friends over Saturday for the next round of Dungeons & Dragons and I'm looking forward to putzing in the yard some more. My goal is to get the back lawn mown and weed whacked. I don't mind the mowing, but I have never been able to properly wield the weed whacker. I can whack if I really have too, although it's not pretty, and Sonshine's gotta earn his keep somehow, right?

I have the last of the brush pile on the side of the house to dispose of. Last night, I broke out the chain saw to cut the larger branches and limbs into truck-bed lengths. Tonight, I'm going to work on raking up all the leaves that have been smashed down and wedged into the grass and ground so that it can all go to the dump first thing in the morning.

Once all that's done, then I have to start digging up the bush and tree stumps along there. Not a fun or easy task. Thankfully they're not large, not are there very many of them. Not sure what my plan is but it'll probably involve a lot of water and the roto-tiller, though *not* at the same time--churn up the dirt and pull out what I can. Then soak the dirt until it's soup and pull out some more. What do you think?? Any other suggestions?

The goal of all that effort is so that I can put in the flower bed I've been dreaming of for years. I want to plant all bulb flowers, so I definitely have a few months to put in the work. Plus I'm borrowing a page from AWESOME REGINA's book and asking for labor for Mother's Day in lieu of gifts.

And while I'm catching my breath between bouts of manual labor, I'll be proof reading and fixing a friend's website.

What are your exciting plans for the weekend?

It's been quite some time since I've rambled on about my backyard.

Of course, it's been way too cold to even go out there, so it's really no surprise is it?

But since yesterday was the official first day of spring, I thought it might be, if not fun, then interesting to see the pitiful state of my yard at the end of winter...

Without further ado...

The grass itself is in need of a good mow as well as several weed treatments. I'm going to have to research green methods, and I have a writing group mate who is the queen of green around these parts. She organizes a whole three day green event every year!

 This is the Chinese wisteria-- It looks completely dead, I know, but I'm pretty sure the main stem is still alive. I hope it's still alive. I'll have to inspect the neighbor's bush and see if she has anything on hers yet. Though I'll probably have to prune some of the for-sure dead vines.

The one azalea seems to have survived the winter, which included two or three freezes. I'm amazed. I really am.

My random tree treatment is a bit weedy there on the left, but easily cleared out. I want to get some sort of edging to put around the mulch/rock placement to keep the mulch contained and hopefully the weeds out. The squirrels really loved the mulch pit. I caught them napping and digging and enjoying it on several occasions.



The flowerbed is over run with dead leaves and obviously needs a good cleaning out. I can only see the Sweet William. I'm not sure the status of everything else.

Remember my large frozen bush?


This is all that remains...

The brush pile there on the right is a lot bigger now, though. And there's a dump run in my very near future.

And last but not least and the most exciting--my trees are leaving!

I can't remember the name of the above tree...

 Above and below is my oak...

And the one that dropped the pokey balls is dead. No more pokey balls.



So there you have it...and I have my work cut out for me. But I'm looking forward to spending time outside, enjoying the warmer weather and my backyard despite it's sorry condition.

Did I get everything done that I wanted to? No, but the birdies, squirrels and yard cat got fed and watered. I got eight bags of leaves raked and half the back yard mowed--which added two additional bags of grass and leaves.



 Remember my Chinese wisteria? This is what it looked like earlier in the season:

This is what it looks like now:


The house is relatively tidy and laundry and grocery shopping are done. Saturday, I worked on revisions to the young adult novel I entered in a contest. And on top of all of that I watched A LOT of television. I even got some reading in--'cause you have to do the quiet stuff when you wake up at 6am on a Sunday.

Remember my bush weighted down by ice?




It's standing tall again, but will be getting cut down soon in preparation for a flower bed. I want to plant red, white, and blue (purple) bulb flowers. I'm gonna take a page from a friend's book and request labor from my kids for Mother's Day. Several hours worth to pull the trees out and the root balls, churn up the soil, and lay the border stones. Yep!

And wouldn't you know, after ALL that raking and ALL those bags of leaves, a stiff wind blew through and left another layer of leaves for me to work on next weekend!

In addition to watching a movie I hadn't seen before (I'll catch you up next Monday), DD and I enjoyed a partial Harry Potter fest. We watched the first two movies on Saturday evening and then the third, fourth and fifth movies on Sunday evening. (Okay, I confess--I slept through most of the second one...) I even got to watch a few episodes of China Beach as well. All in all, it was a great weekend.

How about you? How did you spend your last weekend of the year??