Don't Aim For Black Snakes

Recently I mentioned to my boo and mom that I'm shocked that the plants normally decimated by rabbits are going to town.  Signs of those fat wee beasties have been few and far between lately.  I've been scratching my head and thanking god for small favors... Today, I learned the reason for my happiness... in doing so, I had to go through a mixture of terror, relief, and finally, sadness...

I pulled out of my garage at 4pm to get groceries, as I went to put the car in drive, I saw what looked like a piece of rubber in the street right in front of me.  I stopped the car and looked carefully... and it dawned on me I was looking at a 3-5' black snake.  I revved the engine... it didn't move... I stepped out of the car and walked a WIDE circle around it... it didn't move... snakes don't stay in place like that... I got closer and noticed a red welt around it's center... and took a picture to be able to identify it later... a little closer and still no movement... So, I'm positive it's dead.  Hallelujah.  I get back in the car, and go to drive off... I realize my sons bus will be here in a bit... and I don't know if there's some way a curious child can accidentally get venom from a dead snake... So I get out of the car again, go get a shovel, and use it as a golf club to bat it down the drain... I'm sure I didn't look elegant... holding that shovel by my finger tips and leaning just as far as I could to actually achieve my goal... Mission accomplished...  Heebie jeebies take over... Eewwwwwwwwww!  I HATE SNAKES.

After the groceries were put away I googled black snakes Georgia... and identified the creature who is laying in my sewer... It's a Black Racer Snake... Not poisonous, but they will bite you if you try to play with it...  They eat... SMALL ANIMALS...  OMG my garden HERO is dead.  Long live the Racer Snake.  He's been silently doing me a favor for a while now, and all the thanks he got was someones tire tracks across him... Sigh... I might have given him a warriors burial if I'd known... Hmmm... nope, I still wouldn't have touched him... But a prayer perhaps?  Yes, THAT I could have done...

So now my garden will probably go under attack again soon... With luck it'll be after I harvest my veggies.  Maybe he took out enough of the furry little bottomless pits that they won't return quickly... If not, is there a place where I can BUY friendly snakes for my garden?  LOL.


My peas are at the point that I think I need to thin them... I hate doing that as I feel guilty for the ones I remove...  The beans are moving along quite well too in their two straight rows...
 

 My Juliet tomatoes have their first tomato forming... it's the size of a dime... One of the banana peppers has a thumb size pepper growing on it... Lil over achiever... The plant isn't much bigger than my hand.  The blueberries easily have 3-4 dozen berries rapidly getting ready to harvest.... 3 lil strawberries are starting to grow...  Food glorious food... nothing like fresh fruit and veggies out of a garden.


I've been gone for four days, and flowers are blooming all over the place... My day lilies are going to town... The freebie plants from "if I dig it they will come" last year are looking AMAZING.



Tickweed and Shasta Daisies from my boo are going to town... In fact, this is the first spring his daisies have taken off... They are as happy as I am now, and showing it.  :)

I watered the garden, and spent a few hours weeding.  It's going to be beautiful in Atlanta all week and I am off for 8 days.  I plan on spending most of that time communing with nature, and giving my garden the attention I didn't give it last summer...  I have a bit of apologizing to do to it... and alot of TLC.

Roses my mother gave me a few years ago are blooming... I almost missed this one while I was away.  Almost looks like a Camellia!  Gorgeous!

I walked to the edge of my property... The magnolia mom and I planted two years ago is JUST about to go to town... I can't wait!  Magnolia blossoms are beautiful.... as I'm staring at this southern icon, a smell hits me... and I look down... The gardenias on my slope are in full bloom again... I always smell them before I see them.

It was the perfect spring day... waking next to the love of my life, spending time in my beloved garden, and then getting to spend time with the kids... I ended the day with a grilled ribeye steak that I splurged on... It was on sale, I HAD to right?  My son was in boy heaven devouring his steak and mine... Then both of the kids attacked the rice krispy treats I made for desert... I'm pretty positive they are both thrilled mommy is home... I know I am...

RIP my lil black snake... Thank you for the time you did in my garden... I hope you left a brother or sister nearby...

Aim For The Cold

Cold or Cold... Aim for either...

This past weekend I flew 7,224 miles... Done in 16 flights in 4 days...  By the middle of day two I had a dry cough... day 3 and 4, I had a slightly sore throat.  I'd gone running in two different states, so I figured maybe my allergies were going bananas...  Alas, the middle of last night, my first night home, my head lost control of my nose...

I rarely ever get colds.  I think thats because, as a flight attendant, I get exposed to so many things in small doses... Kinda like a vaccine.  When I do get a cold, it's an annoyance... as a single mom, who is only home a few days a week, I can't afford the down time.  So I trudge on sneezing and sniffling away.

This morning, I sneezed and sniffled through 5 bags of mulch for my front yard.  Lowes had a deal on them that ended yesterday... I stopped on the way home and purchased what I realistically knew I could put down in a day (today).  All this morning I dreamed of my pillow and/or a hot bath, but kept on trucking... making my garden look pretty while I'm looking like death warmed over...

Aim for Cold?

You can aim for the other definition of cold if you like... Mother Nature is pulling a fast one on us in Atlanta this week.  I was outside doing the mulch in sweatpants and a fleece jacket... In April... Where I'm supposed to be happily gardening in shorts and tank tops... Puhlease put another log on the fire Mother dear, and tell Mr Heat and Mr Snow to stop fighting... I want the healing sunshine on my face during my days off... Is that too much to ask?

Along asking for too much...  Last October I raised $2600 for the Breast Cancer Walk in Atlanta in honor of my favorite aunt who died in September at 60... May 11th I will be walking the Relay For Life in Forsyth County in honor of my neighbor Allan who died last summer at 37.  His wife has a team goal of $5000, and we're $50 away.  If anyone still has a spare $5 in their pockets after gas and everyone elses fundraisers, I'd appreciate it if you'd donate to our team. 

http://main.acsevents.org/site/TR?px=22831798&pg=personal&fr_id=39707

This day lily is almost done, but my boo should note the location of the blue tower in the right hand corner...  He'll understand what that means... :)

Gardening done, blog written, it's time to pass out for two hours before my kids come home...

Today is a gift!  Go unwrap it!

Peace Out.

Aim for Bad JuJu

The past few days I've been fighting a funk.  I'm not quite sure where it's coming from, but I'm going to sleep with it and waking up with it.  A sense of unease... foreboding?  It's not something I can pin point.  More like exhaustion with a clench in the pit of my stomach.  I don't think it's depression as I'm happy with where my life is at the moment, and have been for the past three months... everything is settling down into the path I had dreamed of...

I told my sweetheart two days ago that maybe part of my problem is I have nothing to plan in the future... I am a planner, always looking ahead... I planned for 3.5 years to get to 2011... and now it's 2012.  What's my plan?  I have no big vacations ahead.  No big events.  I told him that unless he wants me over analyzing us today, he needs to give me something to think about six months from now.  Give me something to look forward and reach for.  "Okay, what do you want to plan?"  Damn good question. 

What I want to plan for is retirement.  I want to start looking for places that I might want to live when I no longer need to live behind my ex husband.  I want to start going to beach towns and lake towns and see what types of homes are out there, what the cost of the homes are, and the pros and cons of the cities/communities they are in.

Do I want a house with a big wrap around porch that you can step out from with a dog onto a beach?  Or a condo, with less maintenance, and become a cat person for my senior years.  I love the idea of less maintenance but I think I might miss having a garden...

I want to discuss these options with the love of my life... Explore new areas with him.  See if there is any place that makes us both simultaneously exhale.... Granted we do that the moment we get next to each other, but if I'm not "home" or he's not "home" at whichever place we are co-sharing (he'll have his place too in a different town), I want it to feel like home for both of us.  I want both places we buy to be places we both love to go "home" to.

We have six years to explore together before my kids are both out of school... We need to do this exploration in small, fun, weekend getaways... Maybe go on 3-4 quick getaways a year... Just a day or two away from my kids... some adult time... I want to live in the 'now', making new memories together... while looking at potential places where a future could be.

Today's funk started to settle while sitting around with six friends having coffee in the city... It was nice to just shoot the bull, breathe fresh air, and laugh at things... past and present...


I got home and did my weekly garden check... It's rapidly filling in... The blueberries are starting to show... The next round of Iris are blooming... My magnolia is just about to bloom... My nectarines are going to have a banner year...  There's signs of beans and peas starting to sprout...  I watered and smiled and started to feel life and sanity slip back in...

I guess that's the answer... No condo... because I really would miss touching the earth... I need that almost as much as I need my man next to me.

Aim For Gold

I have perfect moments... perfect days... perfect weeks... even perfect months... Then, unexpectedly, they are rudely interrupted when something small slips into my rosy world and sears a hole as effectively as a drop of acid would landing on my soul.

Today the sky was blue and all was well, then in one imperfect blink of an eye, a drop dripped and hit me... I winced. Since then, I have found myself rubbing my heart and trying to ease the burn with positive thoughts.

The gold that soothes two souls wounds one. While you can argue that it shouldn't, that it means nothing to you... it means everything to everyone else who looks at it. It no longer belongs in or around MY world. It appears when I'm not expecting it, and slaps me in my face, effectively reminding me of my place and that not all of my reality is 'real', but smoke and mirrors...

It reminds my friends of my position and leads to uncomfortable questions that I can not answer. I am superwoman and this small bit IS my Kryptonite. I make valiant efforts to battle it's effects on me, but the point is, I AM affected.

I know working today will ease my pain... losing self in my job has always been my salvation. At this moment though, I long to run home to my garden and the sun that shines in it. Where I can hide and breathe fresh air... This part of my life holds no illusions - no surprises that can hurt. I know who I am and what my position is there. I know I belong.

Am I being unfair? I think not. I do know what I have here too. I just anxiously await the day when there will no longer be a pocket full of gold Kryptonite to affect me. I pray for patience and strength to get to that day, because days like today are getting increasingly harder to affect nonchalance.

I am very happy... my Kryptonite and all that it stands for is the only thing that bars my way to total nirvana. Knowing how I feel about need my world to be a happy place... knowing how negative juju affects my soul... please keep your Kryptonite hidden from me. Have a care for MY feelings as you are having a care for others... It works both ways my love.

Vent over... since I can't run to my garden from PA, I'll settle with pictures from yesterday.

Peace Out.

Aim for Alex

I hope you all had a wonderful Easter and spring break... Thanks to my mom for my new blog logo to the left... Too funny and perfect!

The bunnies got a break this Easter morn... Or some might say, my children did... It's a tradition in my household to do the bunny hop...


The bunny hop is a novelty dance that was created at Balboa High School of San Francisco in 1952. The dance has been generally done to Ray Anthony's big band recording of the song. It's a variation on a conga line. You dance in a line, holding the hips of the person in front of you. You tap the floor two times with your right foot, then with your left foot, then hop forwards, backwards, and finally three hops forward... The first person in the line leads the group around the floor.

In our case, the bunny hop is done all the way down the street from my children's Oma and Opa (when I grew up it was done down the street from my mother's parents)... This signals to the Easter bunny that we are not home and that he should hide the eggs. The men stay behind to wait for the bunny, while the women and children hop their way merrily down the street.

Alas, this Easter morn, I woke up with the worst hang over in decades... Courtesy of my bff's friend, who kept pouring margaritas at dinner and later providing beer as we three played darts... I didn't notice how much I drank... I never felt blitzed... But apparently my poor lil body was poisoned. So I'm aiming for my bff Alex this week... because I have no clue how to find Steve.

This was how I looked at my Easter celebration... Yes, that's a large bottle of Tums... That and a bit of applesauce was my Easter dinner lol...


Perhaps I should be aiming for my step mom for taking the picture... But I digress... when it was time to do the bunny hop my children both took a stand and said "We AREN'T doing the bunny hop this year"...

Weakly I responded... "You guys get a break... because I can't jar my poor body today... I'll be walking down the street looking older than Oma... Just keep up with us two lil old ladies will you...?"

Here's my step mom, Corrie, and Katie right before the egg hunt... (No it wasn't a requirement to wear this color scheme... somehow they came up with it on their own)...


My kids are getting sooo big...


Katie finding an egg... We don't hide real eggs, but plastic ones filled with cash or candy... :)


The kids checking out their Easter goods after the egg hunt... (and me trying to hold it together and watch them)...


All in all my kids had a good Easter... I was able to spend time in a very quiet, slow state with my family... which is better than being away from home, but not quite the Easter I planned...

The last two days I was gone... One for work and one for a union meeting in Newark... That was interesting and informative... I'll be going to more of those in the future... Especially when we get our own local lodge... I'm not holding my breath on that being soon... :(

This morning I got to spend a lovely morning lounging with the man I love madly... did a nice run and workout through Piedmont Park... and then brunch after... Truly a perfect start to the day... He centers me like no other. One of my life's greatest gifts.

As always, returning home I find a spring surprise... Today was from one of the Rhododendron's I planted in my front yard last year after I removed the 'builders bush'...


Spring is in the air... love surrounds me... the sun is out... and life is good...

If you run into Alex's friend Steve... kick him in the knee for me...

Spring Break... Aim for Water...

It's Spring Break... and this means travel for most... After somehow managing to get 16 days off... We decided to test our luck in getting out to San Francisco. Alas the DL gods didn't award us the winning ticket... I know better during Spring Break, but it would have been lovely to see family.


So by day 2 we gave up flying to San Francisco and spent the day in Atlanta... Atlantic Station and Imax 3D viewing of Wrath of the Titans...

I spend the evening searching for places our planes fly that stop at water... I'm aiming for a beach... A warm beach...

Finally day 3 we hop a plane to one of my favorite overnights, Wilmington, NC. Cape Fear area... beach, beach and MORE beach... We drive south, through Carolina Beach and find Fort Fisher...


This is my view for the rest of the day...



I decide to take a chance and take the kids to my favorite restaurant in Wilmington. Lil Dipper... It's a fondue place and they have never eaten fondue before... it's a total hit.




We wandered the wharf along the Cape Fear River. CJ decided to rest on a ship... while Katie thought it would be fun to lift it up.


The next morning, waffle fortified we went back to Fort Fisher... it's a beautiful day.




We end the day eating at another fondue place, The Melting Pot... not as good as Lil Dipper but the kids are happy with the chocolate fondue at the end of the meal.

We get up early the next morning and head back to Atlanta... Relaxed and happy... and slightly tanned. I get back home and my garden has lots of 'welcome home' surprises... Hostas are going wild.



Azalea's are in full bloom...



OMG this iris is amazing.


Today I spent the whole afternoon shopping with my boo to get plants for my garden. Went to Randy's Pond and Perennials... cool place...


We weeded, pruned, and brought the garden out of winter mode and into spring/summer. Planted half dozen new perennials to fill in the the blanks that didn't survive the winter..


We planted three different types of tomatoes... 3 different types of peppers... eggplant... basil...


I'm so stupidly happy. Great times with my kids... and a great 24 hours with my boo. My life is perfectly imperfect.

I love you CJ & Katie... with all my heart. I love you boo... with all that I am.