Potential Yard Plan

Bad picture...still gets the point across

I've spent the last little while working on this: the plan for the front and back yards. I finally got it to a point where I'm pretty happy with it now.

There are different elements that will be part of the yard. Here are the different parts, along with the supplies that I expect we'll need:

-Bark. This will make up a fair amount of the yard. It will line the edges of the fence on the north and west sides. There will be patches of it in other places as well, potentially with shrubs and stuff planted. Needed supplies: weed barrier, bark.
-Rock. This will cover a lot of the front yard. Needed supplies: weed barrier, rocks.
-Grass. Trying to keep this to a minimum so we don't go crazy trying to maintain it, but we do want a little in some strategic spots. Needed supplies: topsoil, grass seed OR sod, sprinkler system.
-Dirt/soil beds. For areas with flowers/plants/garden/etc. Needed supplies: topsoil, organic matter, rocks for border, plants.
-Gravel. For areas where nothing needs to grow and should be kept very low-maintenance. Needed supplies: gravel, weed barrier (possibly).
-Dirt/gravel path. We'll probably just leave it as dirt for now, then add gravel to it later on. Needed supplies: gravel.

Next project is to estimate how much each project will cost...

Skinny Snickerdoodles

Oh my giddy goodness.
Amazing. So amazing.
Found a recipe for Skinny Snickerdoodles from Chocolate-Covered Katie, the Healthy Dessert Blog. Because I don't have a lot of patience, I didn't bother to refrigerate before cooking. I also just added some cinnamon to the dough instead of rolling the dough balls in cinnamon/sugar mix. Amazing.

State of the Garden Address

Ok, so as of today here's how things are progressing.

Seeds I've Started Indoors (and how they are doing):
Tomato, Gourmet Heirloom Blend: 3/4 sprouted. They seem to be doing quite well :)
Tomato, Bonny Best: 1/2 sprouted. Doing okay :/
Pepper, Golden Treasure: 0/2 sprouted :(
Pepper, Sweet Golden Cal Wonder: 0/2 sprouted :(
Eggplant, Black Beauty: 2/3 sprouted. Only 1 seems to be thriving, however. ;/
Lettuce, Salad Bowl Red: 7/12 sprouted/thriving...originally more sprouted, but they dried out. Still, the majority are doing well :)
Pumpkin, Orange Smoothie: 2/2 sprouted and thriving...I think starting this indoors was a mistake since they are already big-ass sons of guns. Doing great :)
Winter Squash, Delicata: 0/2 sprouted...they may need more time? :(
Melon, Casaba Golden Beauty: 4/4 sprouted, 2 of which are already thriving :)

Seeds I've Started Outdoors (and how they are doing):
Pea, Dark Seeded Perfection: Planted 16. These have finally, just BARELY, started showing their lovely little faces! About three little sprouts are now visible, so I'm quite joyful :) I'm going to try to keep them pretty wet and hope they keep on growing like a boss. :/
Carrot, Danvers Half Long: Can't remember how many I planted...but regardless, nothing yet :(

So far, not too bad, right? If nothing else, I've got tomatoes, eggplant, lettuce, pumpkins, melons, and peas to look forward to! Next step is, I think, to move the thriving/larger plants to bigger containers, and soon I'll start hardening them off.

And the results are in!

Here's how I did today diet-wise:

So now I have a basic idea of how I eat on any given day. To be fair, though, I think I ate a lot more sugar than normal. I know I eat a lot more sugar than I should...but today it seems like I went way overboard...like 5x more than I should have had (!). I am also concerned with the amount of fat I ate. I don't think I typically consume that much. Maybe I should try this again tomorrow, then kind of take the average of the two days? Or maybe I should do it a few more times...I'm not sure yet.

"Red Flag" foods that I ate today:

*Winco Cranberry Almond Mix (26.6g of sugar)

*Bridge Mix Candy (61g of sugar...oops)

*McDonald's Hot Fudge Sundae (48g of sugar)

Good Food Choices I ate today:

*1/2 Turkey Sandwich (lunch)

*Baby carrots

I dropped the ball today. I may have come in under 2000 calories, but I sucked at how I chose those calories. Clearly I need to set some boundaries for sugar and fat consumption. Maybe I'll start with that--reduce sugar and fat.

I'm making a tentative goal here: eat less than 50g of sugar and less than 65g of fat each day for the rest of the week. We'll see how I feel.

Once I get my diet "on track," I'd like to revisit this and see how I'm doing then compared to how I did today. I really hope that I'll be pleased with the results.

Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to try to ward of Wilford Brimly and insist that I'm not in the market for diabetes testing supplies yet.

Organizing Jewelry

Looking for a cheap but visually-appealing way to organize your jewelry? Years ago I discovered that a simple mug rack:

could be easily transformed into this:

with just a few nails or tacks in the wall.

I love it!

Dialogue

Brain: Hey stomach! We're going to lose weight.
Stomach: Whatever. I don't care as long as I don't have to do anything.
Brain: Well, actually, that's part of the plan...
Stomach: Screw that.
Brain: Look. If you'll just try to enjoy healthy foods instead of junk, I'll do my best to supply the willpower to make this possible long-term.
Stomach: But I like junk food! I LIVE for junk food! In fact, me getting junk food is one thing that makes YOU happy, remember?
Brain: Well, yeah...for a few minutes. Then I'M the one that's stuck living with the guilt later on! And what about YOU? You just keep stretching out and then you want MORE food and I just feel worse and worse!
Stomach: Well, you over-analyze everything.
Brain: YOU DON'T SAY! That's my !@#$*&% JOB YOU !@#$ GUT!
Stomach: .....
Brain: .....
Stomach: I'm not speaking to you anymore.
Brain: I didn't even think it was possible for us to speak.
Stomach: .....
Brain: .....


THE END.

. . . . .

Sometimes you just feel like a cow.

I kind of wish that the above WERE just some silly thing I came up with, but there is some real truth to it. I want to lose weight, but it's quite difficult in part because I've grown up using food as a band-aid. It's like, "I feel upset. I'll have some chocolate because I deserve it since I'm upset. Then I'll feel better." And I do. For a few minutes. How long does it take to A.) be excited with the anticipation of the chocolate; B.) actually enjoy eating the chocolate; C.) feel content because i just ate chocolate? Not very long. And after that comes the guilt where I wish there was more chocolate, then realize I should never have eaten it at all because of how caloric/fatty/sugary it was, and soon I wish I could un-eat what I'd eaten to make me feel "better" in the first place.

It's a bad system, worse paired with my recent sedentary lifestyle. I don't work cleaning or running around a warehouse or anything like that anymore--I am sitting or standing most of the time. I do try to get some exercise in daily, but that's not enough. And since I live in the middle of nowhere, getting to a gym or whatever is a pain because it takes time to get there and it costs extra gas money. Thankfully I've been getting into walking/jogging outside with D. since the weather got nice. BUT...I think there needs to be more, and losing as much weight as I want will start with figuring out what I'm doing wrong NOW and get rid of it, for starters.

Tomorrow, I'm planning to keep track of everything I eat. I am also going to check my gym/rec center options again and just make some comparisons. It seems like it will be super inconvenient to change anything, but most major things don't come about without a bit of change and sacrifice. Right?

Truth

This is pretty much how I feel about gardening. And sometimes about life in general.

Idea: Gravel Path and Garden Area

We have a big-ass yard. It's a huge task to even make a final decision about what to do with it. So imagine how fun it will be to actually start the process!

The north-east section of our yard is especially a puzzle for me. There's nothing out there besides a dinky little tree. What else should be do out there?

Well, at this moment I'm thinking of doing something that's a mix between an English garden and a desert landscape. Yeah, I know, those two things really go hand-in-hand, right? But I just mean I want a nice gravel path that winds through some lovely bunches of native plants. Kind of, although not exactly, like this:

Oh yeah. Maybe a little of this:

...and this:

aaaand this:

You get the idea.

Ideas: Patio

This project here pretty much exemplifies how I want to do our future backyard patio. This particular one is for a garden path, but I'm sure it would work as a patio with just a few changes.

Obviously we'd need to make it wider, which would be no problem. Also, I'm thinking that, although flagstone is lovely, we might use stepping-stone tile things, like this:

The process is pretty simple. Lay down weed-block fabric:

Then dump some sand on there, get it wet, and press it down:

Place the stepping downs down in the sand where you want them:

Then, fill in the gaps with some fine gravel:

Shouldn't be too complicated, right?

I'm really excited at the idea of finishing this over the summer...maybe even sooner. It's all of matter of how much funding we can dedicate to the yard, you know? Anyway, just some thoughts.

Pride and Joy

I have a confession to make: I collect books. I love owning books. I like getting new books almost more than I like to read them.

It's the English major in me that got me started, I suspect. Unlike many majors, English students tend to want to keep their books instead of selling them back at the end of each semester. Or, maybe it had more to do with the way I started to look at books. When you read a book for a college class, you can be sure that you will discuss the hell out of that book. And whether you loved the book or weren't so much a fan, you have still gone on a journey with that text and it will always be a part of you. It makes you come to treasure the books you've spent time with.

But since graduating, I've kept up a love for books and a desire to collect them with the hope of reading them. But, another confession: I am a slow reader. I know I don't read as often as I should, but this is partly because it takes me a fair amount of time to get through a book.

One of my favorite things in life is searching thrift store shelves for special books. There's a lot of what I would consider crap there (cheap romance novels, mass-produced best-seller thrillers, etc) but it can really be worth the time it takes to graze over all of those titles to get to the gems.

I guess there are worse things a person could spend time fretting over...but I tell you, browsing books is one of the best things in life.

Although I don't read as much as I really should, I'd like to share some of the best books I've encountered on this blog. Ones that have been important to me, or deeply influential in some way. This will require some consideration, though, so I can't commit to anything yet.

In the meantime...my library keeps growing and very soon I will need another shelf.

Simple Wishes

Simplicity is so easy for HER...a little ray of sunlight and she's happy as a clam.

 I want things to be simple. I don't know quite how to get there, though, because that in itself seems to be complicated.

I wish life were as simple as wanting something and getting it. I wish changing your feelings was as simple as just deciding not to feel that way anymore. I wish I could stick with an idea and not give up on it.

I want...
...to feel fine about how I look.
...to feel fine emotionally.
...our little dream cottage to be a reality.
...to get so invested in my work that it doesn't matter how much I make.
...eating the right foods to come naturally.
...a successful little garden.
...to write every. single. day. Even if it hurts.
 ...to really, genuinely like myself.

It's been a tough couple of weeks. I'd like to push the reset button now and start aiming for my simple goals. One thing at a time...I can get to where I really want to be.

When life hands you rocks...

...use them to landscape your yard!

 We lined the bottom of our rock wall with some weed blocking material with the idea of covering it with rocks we already had in the yard.

 

   To help prevent too much dirt from ending up on the weed block fabric, we used a few things from around the yard to allow us to filter the rocks from the dirt. This worked pretty well, although slow-going. We just shoveled areas that were especially rocky and dumped the load on top of the grate, letting the smaller rocks and dirt fall through into the black bin.

 

 We started creating a boarder of larger rocks along the edge of the area to help contain the smaller rocks and look spiffy.

After a few loads of rocks, here is the result! This is only a small section, but we'll definitely be spending more time getting this just right.

Idea: Patio Dreams

One of our next projects will inevitably be working on our yard's landscape.

Pretty much it's a wasteland at this point, nothing but dirt and rocks and weeds. And because we don't have a ton of money to spend and because we don't want to waste a lot of water, we are leaning toward a lot of rocks and xeriscaping concepts to decorate our bland yard. See, we live in a climate with fairly hot summers and snowy winters, so keeping certain kinds of landscaping alive can be a bit of a challenge (and not to mention a waste of water...I'm lookin' at YOU, lush, stretching, green lawn!).

There is a lot of potential in this here yard. It may seem desolate now, but hopefully we can work on it to the point that it looks decent AND doesn't cost much to maintain. Like, for example, the pictures below:

Flt rocks and gravel make a flat-ish area that's great for relaxing. This would be great for a backyard patio!

I love this look! It is a lot like the above picture, but more polished.

Decorating with lots of rocks, shrubs, and other plants. No grass in sight, and it still looks lush and beautiful.

They just used a nice gravel as a patio area for their table set-up. Seems simple and easy to execute.

Bark, rocks, and stepping stones make up this garden area. And I love the decorative grasses too--these plants do well in our area.

(all images found using google...I do not own them, etc)

What's up, Doc?

It's been one of those kinda crap-tastic days.
So...what better to do than plant carrots?

Sprouts are doing okay inside so far. Not much from the eggplants or peppers yet, but tomatoes and lettuce seem to be doing quite well!

Catch-up for this week...

Seeds are sprouting!
Tomatoes are doing the best so far. There are a few peppers and lettuce seeds just starting to show their little green selves, too.

This little guy? That's a freakin' Canby thornless raspberry. For sers. This is going in my yard! FTW! Did I ever mention how much I love raspberries? Well, it's a LOT.

Aaand...here is the totally finished raised garden bed, complete with the soil mix, square foot gardening sections laid out, and PEAS planted! Awesome.

I still don't really know what I'm doing, but I could probably fool a few people at this point. Let's see what actually happens...

We did it!

A few hours on a nice warm spring day, and the garden bed project is done!

 D. was oh so willing to help a TON with this project. Don't get the wrong idea, though, because I worked my ass off too! D. is just more photogenic than I am. Plus, he knows how to use a drill, so there you go.

Thanks, D., for the pose.

We drove out to Lowe's once we'd built and moved the wooden bed. We stuffed 12 bags of topsoil, 10 bags of manure, and some peat moss into two small-ish cars. Believe it or not, it smelled worse outside the cars than inside on the ride home (thanks to the mink farms we passed on the road).

Haul. Dump. Mix. And...we misjudged how much we would need, but we got the bed 3/4 full anyway.

We'll have to hurry and get the rest in there so I can plant the peas!

Little Project: Umbrella Stand

So what do you do when you need access to shade for garden work during the middle of the day? And you just happen to have a couple of PVC pipe pieces leftover from a previous project? And you have extra containers, and plenty of rocks?

It' not a pretty sight, but then again, neither is the rest of the yard. This will be great for shade while working in the garden!