In Which a Post is Not About Nursing School

I took a mental health day this past Saturday and gave myself permission to do some much-needed yardwork.

Two weeks ago, we bought quite a few plants at a garden expo, but most of them have been sitting around, dying bit by bit because I've been too busy to plant them.

We also finally got the first half of the weed pit cleared! Evan made a fire that burned for about 7 hours, and with his trusty machete cleared all the jungle weeds away. It looks so crazy-different that we can't stop gawking at it.

Now the picture show begins. I didn't take explicit "before" photos, stupidly, but I have a couple that will get pretty close.

Exhibit 1: The Weed Pit (or as I like to think of it, the Sarlacc Pit.)

If you look past the end of the deck, all that mess is the "before." 

And now, the after! A clear view into the neighbor's yard. 

Exhibit 2: The Water-Logged Spot

What I thought was a before picture turned out to be a video clip. Oh well! it was weedy and dank before, how about that? 

Exhibit 3: The Deck

We're planning to build a corner trellis/pagoda on this end of the deck. The confederate jasmine will eventually cover it, we hope, and provide some nice shade. Soon there will be lattice covering the junk, too. 

Exhibit 4: The Front Flower Bed

The first of several incarnations. 

Current. Notice how the lantana has eaten most of the bed. That will be moved in the spring. 

Lining the walkway we have nandina, 24 dianthus/violas, and underneath waiting for spring about 3 dozen bulbs. 

And for the remaining photos:

I love violas almost to a fault.

Black tupelo tree, turning a beautiful purplish-red. 

Beginnings of our vegetable garden, currently hosting chocolate mint, creeping rosemary, and Provence lavender. Oh, and Monty. 

Finally, the view-from-the-road before and after pictures. 

Before.

Four months in. 

How Writing is Gardening: a post in pictures

Inception

Outline

Skeleton draft

First draft

Revisions

Final draft. 

Okay...so maybe this was just an excuse to post pictures of my garden's transformation over the course of 1 year. 

All These Things

This post is going to be a bit fragmented; a perfect counterpart to my mind as of late. I've been having great difficulty concentrating on any one thing the past month. I've tried to focus on what revisions need to be done for my sci-fi novel before NaNo, I wrote 15k of a new idea and dropped it, I've been cleaning and organizing our house like a madwoman, and I've recently picked up an old hobby again: crocheting.

It's interesting, crochet. There's no real documentation of anyone doing it until the 1800's. Can you believe that? As I'm sitting here, winding loop after loop of yarn around my hook, it really makes me wonder who came up with it? Evidently, no one really knows.

I'm not a great crocheter by any means, but I enjoy having something to do with my hands while we watch a movie or an entire disc of whatever TV show we're currently binging...

My one-day-will-be-sister-in-law's birthday is this Friday. She's Japanese, lives in Maryland with my brother-in-law, and I've only met her a few times. Kind of at a loss what to give her, so I decided, "hey, maybe I'll make something."

So I made these fingerless gloves. It was my first non-scarf project, and I'm pretty happy with the result. They took me about 8 hours total, I guess, plus a little extra time sewing them together & adding the buttons. Here's hoping she likes them.

This is the scarf I'm currently making for myself. 

Between all the cleaning and the crocheting and the cooking I've been doing, I'm kinda joking with myself that I'm "nesting" for NaNoWriMo. I can't concentrate on writing unless the house is clean and all the little chores are done, so I guess I'm getting a headstart on that.


I've been meaning to upload these pictures for a while. For those of you who've been following me from the beginning, you'll remember my on-going gardening saga. For those of you who are recently joined, just know that when we moved into this apartment, the garden space looked like this:

But after 6 months of hard labor and a lot of money, this is the garden's look as it's entering the decline:

It's been a lot of hard work, but worth every sweat drop (and trust me, there were enough to fill a lake).


So, am I the only one with Restless Brain Syndrome? And is everyone as excited as I am about finally pulling out my sweaters and boots??