I haven't posted since my Memorial Weekend find.  My girlfriend T came down from  the city.  We did a bit of antique shopping.  It was weird to be out and about after so long in self quarantine.  She likes to come down and visit the country, said the city had been really eery with the closed down everything and empty interstates.  I now especially worry for her and all my city family and friends with all the rioting.  What a strange time we are all living in.

Anyway, just keeping it light and happy - like I keep my social media...LOL.  I had found a really cool metal arbor on FB marketplace and was happy to drive 2 hours to get it.  I got the color I wanted and design was cool, very big and strong.  It is really nice.

I put it at the left side facing my house (north side).  It will provide entrance to my already existing
raised flowers planters and my new hosta garden (and hydrangea and ferns).  It is all on my north side and so they have some shade, but until few of my trees and bushes get bigger, will be pretty sunny.  I think some of the more hardy hostas will be ok.  They may not flourish as much as they could in more shade, but in time this will be a really pretty feature I hope.  I even ordered 6 sun tolerant ones to plant in the edge with the most sun.  Pictures later.

At the base of my arch I planted 2 small plugs of wisteria...one white and one purple.

Hope you are having some time to enjoy and not be too overwhelmed by the events in our country.  I too want to be informed and what not, but I just have to allow small pieces of news and just keep out much more than that for the safe of my well being.

Friday Again, i am sensing a pattern here

So as of last Friday I mentioned I have a new job.  I started the onboarding process (electronic paperwork) Monday and did several documents Monday and a couple of missing/mistakes on Tuesday).  Then we got an email Tuesday evening like around 9:30pm, work Friday that all the people being hired still had onboarding documents, etc).  So I figure I have 2 more days off - more work in the yard - mowing, puttering around.  Planting a few more flowers, some more veggie seeds, etc.  Then we shopped for inlaws.  I helped with a couple more things with sister in law's yard, etc.

I finished the border on my deck azalea area - the water rushes under my deck from neighborhood to our south and out the side where the azaleas are - that is why I spent the money and got rocks for this area - mulch would just be washed away.  Even the rocks washed over the flat brick pavers, so I got these longer thicker ones from my SIL and stood them vertical so I could fill in with more rocks and make it more substantial.  I love it.

Oh, and she has a business where they sell vintage/used/flea market/antiques stuff, mostly furniture but also décor, seasonal, nick nacks, some glassware, etc.  She is know in the community and a woman downsizing sold bunch of furniture to SIL and SIL texted me that the lady was selling a treadmill.  So I bought it for $40!  I really don't have the room, but I just stuck it in the middle of my small guest room for the time being.  I will be glad I have in on really hot and really cold days.  Just don't like where it is at the time.

I am eventually going to get rid of some bigger furniture, so my long term plan is to move to larger guest room.  I don't have company much, so I am not too worried about it being in either guest room.  But our furniture is big - was for bigger house and good functional well built furniture is hard to get rid of.  More on this later with photos!

My DH is one of 3 boys and 1 sister.  Their grandfather made this beautiful walnut cabinet with glass out of a walnut tree he planted as a young man.  Then went off to war and came home and cut the tree down and made this.  I have my blankets in it that I crocheted.  I just gave one blanket away for a wedding present - the white and black houndstooth with red trim - see below.  Well, my brother in law has 2 sons so they are eventually going to come and take the cabinet so the boys will eventually get it. One son just got married - I gifted the blanket to them (and some cash!).  DH has agreed that I can then get rid of the huge bedroom set (he has owned since the 80's, and it is very nice, but so big and bulky/dark).  He is ok with the idea.  He is seeing as we get older we don't need so much stuff to take care off/move/clean around.

I got an email this morning (after I went to bed early and got up early - preparing to work and GET PAID!).  No work yet this morning.  I sure hope the project otherwise goes smoothly - this is frustrating.  But since it is for an arm of the federal government - it moves like a glacier getting everyone on board.

Oh well, guess we can finish working on our deck.  We painted our picnic (I always say pick-a-nick like the cartoon) in my head!  We painted it turquoise for fun pop.  The sellers of this house left it back there when they moved.  DH has replaced several of the boards, so it was diff colors of wood.  So we thought a bright paint job would be fun.

It turned pretty cool this week Thurs after we had nearly 90 degrees Wed!  Weird.  I saw a post from a friend of mine that she was doing big Easter dinner and delivering to her loved ones, so I was inspired to do the same.  I am making baked ham, potato casserole, green beans, deviled eggs and a coconut cake.  We will deliver to Mom and Dad in law, sister in law and her husband and my husband's uncle who lives alone and has health problems.  I have been trying to do nice things for people (care packages, cards and just calling/texting) just to be supportive during this weird Covid 19 quarantine time.  I know if it is hard on me, in must be hard on others too, even though we are all still in the thick of it and don't really talk much about that - I think we are all mostly staying positive and all our feelings haven't processed yet - mine haven't!

Have a wonderful Easter weekend1

Hello it's friday!

I have been busy working like crazy in my yard - I LOVE it.  Love being outside.  During the last couple years I have frantically downsized, but during this quarantine I actually thought to myself yesterday how grateful I am to have a nice big (1 acre) yard.

My biggest task of the past week was moving 7 large bushes out of my sister in law's yard.  She is making her yard less maintenance and I seem to be doing the opposite.

Here are four.  The middle forsythia was already there.  Not a place I would have chosen.  But I keep it pretty trimmed.  So, I figure what is 4 more?  I like how it softens the yard and make a welcoming look.  I also planted 2 (1 each side) of driveway and couple flanking my barn in the back yard.  So I guess its closer to 10.  Only 7 large ones tho, 3 small ones.

My azalea.  I also have started my veggies.  The square ones mostly planted.  I have seeds and plants I can fill in, I am staging the planting so that they are ready at stages.  The round ones will be 5 nice tomato plants.  2 cherry tomatoes will be in pots on the deck.

Well today it is cold and rainy.  So I cleaned the house.  Made DH help me.  I hope you all are staying well and finding nurturing things to do for yourself.  I signed up for an online yoga class and have been doing a few times a week.  It is good.  

Oh, my most exciting news...I think I have a job!  Working from home.  Stay tuned for more on that later.  Ta ta.

Last week I painted my kitchen table and hutch.  Our new pup chewed the corner of the hutch.  DH patched it, but the color was off.  So I picked out some chalk paint on my way home from overnight hiking trip early March before all the coronavirus quarantine started.

Have been going back and forth between contentment and gratitude to stir crazy/how am I going to make it through this summer mentally with all this strangeness.  I have to find outlets during this solitude.  I am honing a structure to my day and I think it is helping me keep perspective and remember all the things I have to be grateful for.  A LOT!

But I did have a cry the other day when I looked at our retirement accounts and we received the news that any assistance from the Fed government is going by returns from 2018.  We will retired at the END of 2018 - so we will likely not get any of our hard earned money back.  PLUS I have already filed and PAID my 2019 taxes.  Sometimes it seems like doing all the right things puts one at a disadvantage.  But I have never been a procrastinator.

Then I got out of my pity party and put a note on my hiking group that if anyone needs help, PM me and I can help them with errands to the story.  Many of them are 10-15 years older than I.  We went to the store for my in laws this weekend was so happy to help them.  They seem to be doing fine - just working in their garden, etc.  Not worried about toilet paper, etc.  My Granny is not doing as well, her mind is just racing and worrying not having any company.  It is sad.  My area has indicated that businesses closed for next 30 days...people are taking that the CDC suggesting it might be through August that people are supposed to stay home...if so our fundraiser of Memorial Weekend will be cancelled.  That is also the month of our reunion.  I just hope that if this quarantine/social distance goes on all summer that we can see the benefits of the flattening of the curve of infected because I can't imaging the economic and mental health implications it will cause our nation.

I also bought through Amazon a wifi extender to see if I can get internet in our guest room so that I can do yoga online classes in the bedroom - we don't really have room enough anywhere else.  I did a nice session Sunday and Tuesday.  I will do another one Thurs and maybe Friday or Saturday.