skip to main |
skip to sidebar
What, you may ask, could I possibly have done to get a bruise like this on my knee?
Oh, it was awful-terrible-bad, I tell ya, and it hurts like heck. Please send boatloads of sympathy and get-well wishes. Flowers would be nice, too.
Tee-hee, ha-ha-ha, hohohoho! I'm just foolin' with ya. This is what my knees have looked like for the past couple of weeks every time I use my blue foam kneeling pad that is in the final stages of self-destruction.
I must admit I've gotten several double takes and jaws dropping open when people get a look at my knees after I've been using the pad. I have to quickly tell them, "No, no! I didn't fall off an eight-food ladder and land on my knees!" They aren't bruised at all, I've had to explain . . . just colored up from a combination of disintegrating blue foam and dirt.
Did I fool any of you? (My slightly whacky daughter with the warped sense of humor made me do this post.)
Turned out to be a really good catch-up day for me. Didn't do a thing with my remodeling hat on and that was fine. (Ooops, I lied a little there. When Chicken Mama stopped by tonight we did some searching online for small bar sinks. I want to put one in the end of the kitchen island [the end farthest away from my main work area] for Papa Pea to use for his coffee fixings. I don't know if it's just the two of us in particular or if other couples in the kitchen have the same problem. We inevitably want to be at the sink at the same time.)
This is the largest picking of raspberries so far. And I only picked down one side of one of the three rows at that. We had a brief thunderstorm which left the bushes quite wet before I got my rusty-duster out to pick. The blueberries seem to be getting ripe early this year so I had a few of them to put in my harvest bucket also.
The strawberries are done. All done. Got right around one hundred pounds total from them this year which is only a little over half as many as last year. I'm pretty sure the hot weather did 'em in as it hit just as the berries were starting to mature. Still and all, I got plenty for our needs, but I feel bad that our daughter would have liked another large batch to make into jam. They were producing one day and the next, it seems they just stopped.
It's nigh onto 8 o'clock and I'm thinking of getting ready for bed so I can be rarin' to go in the morning when I will get back on the move-ahead construction bandwagon.
A schedule? Ha! What am I saying? As long as this remodeling/construction is going on there will be no schedule. And for a person who thrives on routine and having everything in place . . . well, you won't be surprised when you hear I've checked myself into the Funny Farm some time soon.
We spent last Thursday in the big city (left at 6:15 a.m. and arrived home at 9:30 p.m.) going from store to store trying to make intelligent, sane decisions on countertops and floor tile. Well, okay, we looked at and got info on a lot of other stuff, too, but needed to get the countertops and kitchen tile nailed down.
Papa Pea holds out extremely well on a day like that if he gets frequent infusions of industrial-strength coffee and has an occasional brief puff on his pipe. Me? I seem to hit one brick wall after another (caused by sensory overload and way too much thinking) and barely made it home alive. Unfortunately, circumstances necessitated me being gone from home nearly all day yesterday, too, so there was no time for catching up or recovery. I did manage to get into bed early last night and tried to relax by watching a bit of the British TV series "Upstairs, Downstairs" before hubby made it to bed. I kept dozing off so finally gave it up and turned off the light, but then couldn't fall asleep because of being physically uncomfortable . . . just plain over-tired.
This morning I woke at 5:15 . . . and was done sleeping. So far today I feel pretty good so am concentrating on making it a good catch-up day while still managing to possibly do a little in the move ahead department.
Living in this (small) torn apart warehouse is starting to get through to me. The last several days have produced no visible progress which is what keeps me going during all of this. (Remember, I'm concrete.) I know there have to be such times, but it still bothers me. Nothing seems to go quickly or smoothly. In my makeshift kitchen, I'm constantly reaching in the wrong place for something needed, only finding it after turning around in place three times and opening and shutting four drawers and/or cabinets. It's a strange feeling when I automatically reach overhead to the hanging pot rack (which is no longer there or ever was above my present work area) for a pan only to find my hand groping in thin air. Also makes me feel (and look) a little whacked out and stoopid.
But, hey, it's all part of the game and this, too, will pass. Either that or I will go completely crackers. Indication that I may be well on my way? I am buying paint today to repaint the pantry. It's one thing when I keep trying to talk myself into living with and/or forgetting about that atrocious color on the walls, but when Papa Pea who usually doesn't even notice something like that says, "We have GOT to repaint these walls," I just knew it had to be done.
But don't worry about me. Give me today to pull together as much organization as I can muckle right now and by tomorrow I'll be tack on bop of things. I mean back on top of things. Possibly. With luck. And lots of cool, liquid libations throughout the day today. As Erin recently said when they started imbibing at 11:30 a.m., "It's five o'clock somewhere!"
You might think I spent the day in the garden by the following pictures but I did not. I spent the bulk of the day polying and am hoping to get one more coat on three pieces yet tonight.
B was here today doing a little fancy work. I had something specific in mind for end finishing pieces for the shelves in the pantry so last week I told B what I was thinking about. She said if I would make the pattern for the scalloped edge, she'd construct them. I've seen one piece in place in the pantry when she was checking it for fit and I couldn't be more pleased. I'll have pictures of the installation tomorrow, I hope. If I can get the rest of the finish on the boards yet tonight.
While I was waiting for applications of poly to dry today, I kept running out into the garden getting bits and pieces of this and that done. I did manage to get the whole blueberry patch weeded. Yahoo and hooray! The raspberry patch? Not yet, but I think I've got the weeds in that area shakin' in their boots.
This is my totally volunteer cherry tomato bed. I've thinned it twice already but as you can see, it needs to be done again, then the plants staked up and pruned. But . . . it may not happen this year. I might have to let them go au naturel and be grateful for any tomatoes I happen to get.
I had promised Chicken Mama a couple of the tomatoes potted up to take to her house and I finally got that done today. No tomatoes on them yet but there are little yellow blossoms. She'll take them home with her tonight. If she can fit them in her little teeny-tiny red car. She usually has quite a load.
I had Morning Glories planted around this trellis in the field garden last year. I was surprised to see lots of volunteers coming up this spring, so I dragged the trellis back out there and said, "Go for it, guys!" No flowers showing 'cause I snapped this picture in late afternoon after they had closed up for the day. It's amazing the way all the vines have gravitated toward the trellis with no help from me. How do they know it's there for them to climb on?
Last but not least, I had to take a picture of my Sweet Peas. I always plant them on the trellis in a raised bed closest to the house that has a clump of chives on either end. They've reached the top of the trellis and are currently blooming their little hearts out. Do they smell good? Oh my, yes!!
No matter how many times I repeat this to myself, I can't seem to keep the frustration from setting in. Not to have the time to spend on the gardens this year is making me crazy. I have this awful feeling that weeds are going to take over everything and I'll never be able to get control back again.
I hadn't been down to the blueberry and raspberry patches for probably over two weeks. The remodeling has been more than a full-time job seven days a week and trying to keep up with every day must-dos plus the strawberry harvest has nearly been too much.
Lately, as I've given the raspberries a fleeting glance from the distance, I wondered if I was imagining a red tinge to the berries. Last night after dinner I went to investigate.
Not only had I seen color in the raspberries but I found a good bunch of ripe, ripe berries. I had already stuffed some into my mouth (Papa Pea always gets the first strawberries, I get the first raspberries) before I thought to take a picture.
It's usual that our strawberry season is winding down just as the raspberries start to come in. So now I'll need to add harvesting and preserving raspberries along with the strawberries. (I know we're blessed with this bountiful harvest of our own berries and am very grateful for the "hassle" of dealing with them.)
What else I discovered in the berry patches last night were many large, healthy weeds that seem to have popped up from nowhere. (Nowhere, ha! A couple of weeks of ample rain and hot, hot weather . . . of course they were going to pop up.)
These are some of the weeds between the two rows of the blueberries which are going to nag at me until I find time to pull them out by their well-established roots. The perimeters of the blueberries and raspberries are also acting as week nurseries. I put extra heavy mulch in those areas this spring because I knew they would be neglected. I guess the weather has been so favorable for weeds this year that they think they've found a hospitable environment to procreate. They just better be on guard though. Even if I have to go after them by flashlight in the middle of the night, their days are numbered. I will prevail.
Oh, it was awful-terrible-bad, I tell ya, and it hurts like heck. Please send boatloads of sympathy and get-well wishes. Flowers would be nice, too.
