Woo HOOOO! Mother Nature finally got the memo and gave us a deliciously cool morning here in Arkansas! It’s 62 degrees F. right now, so I opened the doors to air the house out. It’s supposed to get to 92 this afternoon, though, so it’ll probably be tomorrow before I do any more work outside. Hooray for Fall!!!!
I’m HOPING my good friend, Linda, will feel well enough to come to Lunch Bunch today. I haven’t heard from my friend, Kay, but I have all appendages crossed that we’ll enjoy a wonderful surprise today.
I had a truly wonderful massage yesterday by my therapist and friend, Lynn. She zeroed in on my back where it is sore and made it feel better. It’s like I ‘bruised’ it, though, rather than hurting with movement. I’ll modify my yoga practice (DAY 70 today) so that I don’t irritate that area any more than necessary.
Make this a wonderful day.
Filed under Thoughts on a ________
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I’m feeling pampered and spoiled right now. I’m just home from a particularly wonderful massage. I told Lynn about the area of my back that was hurting since I added some new poses to my yoga practice. She really zeroed in on a big area, it turned out, and it feels much better now. I’ll drink lots of water this afternoon and then do my yoga practice for the day.
It’s almost time for lunch. We’ve been enjoying a wonderful bunch of grapes lately, plus we share an apple, called Cosmic Bulk, as a part of our healthy lunch.
My husband was doing some weed whacking in the front when I drove up. It’s too hot, so I got him to stop as soon as he had finished the section that was offending him the most. I reminded him that I’m planning to do the rest of the weed whacking on Saturday morning.
I wish today looked at least a bit like this here.
Filed under Seasons, Thoughts on a ________
Happy Fall! Mother Nature hasn’t gotten the memo yet, as far as weather in Arkansas is concerned, but we’re hopeful she’ll comply once she does. It’s only supposed to get to 92 today.
We’ve been trying to encourage it, putting our scarecrow on the mailbox, but the pleas have been falling on deaf ears so far.
I’ll leave in a minute to get my monthly massage. My body is already saying, “ahhhhhh!” :0)
Today is DAY 69 of my daily yoga practice. I have a sore spot in my back that MAY be due to the new poses I’m doing lately. I’m hopeful that Lynn, my miracle-worker/massage-therapist, will be able to ease the discomfort.
Have a wonderful first day of Fall!
Filed under Seasons, Thoughts on a ________
I’ve just come in from weed whacking. I got almost the whole back yard finished, but the weather was really getting to me. I came in, drank a whole bottle of water and tried to rest and cool off in preparation for going back out, but pooped out.
My husband mowed while I was weed whacking. The back yard now looks like someone cares. The front looks like someone cares a little bit. :0)
I told my husband I probably wouldn’t be able to get back outside to work until Saturday if I didn’t finish today (massage tomorrow morning and Lunch Bunch Friday) but he insisted I stop, going out with me to wind up the 100 foot heavy duty cord we use while I got the weed whacker. I have to admit he didn’t have to twist my arm much to get me to stop.
We talked about it and agreed that we would rather have each other in as good health as possible than a great looking lawn and flower beds. We’ll do things a bit at a time as the weather gets more encouraging of our efforts.
Filed under Gardening, Mother Nature
My SIL told me about “Remember When” – a book written half by “Nora Roberts” and the other half by “J.D. Robb.” I was unaware of this book and so searched, found, and ordered it. I’m reading the first part now.
The synopsis is – Remember When (2003) is a novel by Nora Roberts and J. D. Robb (the author, writing under two of her pseudonyms). The second half of the book is part of the In Death series, taking place between Imitation in Death and Divided in Death. The plot follows a diamond robbery, over a span of 56 years.
I’m not sure whether Nora was trying to introduce more of her readers to her pseudonym J.D. Robb with her In Death series, or was just intrigued by unsolved crimes. I’m finding it fascinating.
Filed under Favorite Authors & Books, Hobbies, Reading is FUNdamental
Hi.
I’m drinking some coffee before heading out to weed whack the front and the back yard. My husband is going to mow. So the yard will look like someone cares before it gets too hot to. The temperature for this last day of summer is forecast to be 101 with a heat index this afternoon. Oh, GOOD. I’m SO ready for some cool. My list of things to do outside is longer than my leg now…
Today is DAY 68 in my efforts to make daily yoga a habit. I’m starting to think that yoga is essential to my ability to move without pain, stay reasonably flexible, and avoid falling on my head as I age. I still have to consciously make myself do it, but I feel much looser after my practice.
I’m going to get outside now and work before it gets lethal out there.
Have a nice day.
Filed under Thoughts on a ________
This isn’t the one we saw yesterday, but we watched a beautiful deer on our way to town. Happily, this one didn’t get too close, or jump out at a time when it would have been difficult to avoid hurting him.
Yesterday I got the garden boxes sprayed nicely with EIGHT – the nice bug killer that only kills bugs – particularly the vicious fire ants that keep ruining my day. I’m almost completely healed from the bites/stings I got recently, plus the mosquito bites I got yesterday while spraying.
We’re leaving for my husband’s haircut in about half an hour. It’ll be too hot when we get back for me to spray today. Then “I” have MY haircut at 2:00 this afternoon. Poor Michael will be overdosed with Lewises today. :0) I’ll plan to do the spraying with the weed killer tomorrow morning.
I got the trash down the morning. It would be nice if that became a routine thing, not fraught with worry about our trash being strewn by animals because the trash people didn’t pick it up on the scheduled day. It gets old having to try not to fall on our heads as we have to get down into the ditch to gather our trash again. One can hope…
Hoping for a quiet day otherwise. I wish YOU one, too. :0)
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SOME PROGRESS!
I’ve just come in from mixing up and spraying almost two gallons worth of ant killer on our garden boxes.
I misspoke – saying I was spraying with SEVEN. That’s a weed killer. What I mixed up and sprayed is EIGHT – a killer of ants and other bugs.
The sprayer attachment worked perfectly! My husband is taking a nap right now, so I’ll wait to tell him until he is awake, but I’m delighted with his efforts yesterday. I must have a mean streak in me because I really enjoyed it when I found a pocket of fire ants and mercilessly hosed them down. :0)
I got two mosquito bites while I was out there, even though I sprayed myself with Deep Woods Off. :0( My ant sting/bites are almost gone, though.
It’s too hot and humid to do much more out there today, but I’m planning to mix up and spray two gallons of KILLZALL – the weed killer – tomorrow. I carefully labeled the container for the EIGHT remaining. It’ll be great to have the two containers working again.
Progress!
Filed under Gardening, Square Foot Gardening - Raised Beds
As soon as I finish a cup of coffee and talk to you a bit, I’m going to try out the sprayer attachments my husband worked on yesterday. He said he just ran a bunch of water through one of them, but took the other one out to the shop to blow pressured air through it. He thinks they’ll work now, and I really hope he’s right.
The ‘garden project’ includes
Our temperatures this week are supposed to be 100+ AND a heat index, so I’ll do what I can each morning before it gets lethally hot. We’re supposed to have a cool-down NEXT week, and I’m really looking forward to that!
Amber has been driving us nuts lately. Besides shedding a ton (more or less) of her hair on the floor and carpet each week, she managed to get onto the back porch without supervision and ate an entire bucketful of sunflower seeds meant for the bird feeders. She ‘gave it back’ to us on the foyer carpet at some point before I had decided I was really sleepy and would go to bed. I spent a half hour cleaning that up – gating her in the utility room – before heading up for bed. When my husband came up awhile later, he said HE had cleaned up where she had given MORE back in the kitchen. I don’t know how she got into the kitchen, but I expect my husband had something to do with that. Who knows what she’ll come up with next – if you’ll pardon the expression…
No big plans for today, other than gathering trash and working in the garden. (Be still, my heart).
Out to the garden now. I hope your Monday is a good one.
Filed under Thoughts on a ________
I’m starting to get vague rumblings about spending some time in my art room. It may be because the coming week is supposed to bring a heat wave right before the official change to fall and I’m not able to stay outside long enough to get anything appreciable done in our yard or garden, but the rumblings are getting stronger.
I’m being drawn to paintings with lots of TEXTURE and color lately. I really enjoy pieces that make me want to TOUCH them, or that are DROWNED in luscious color. Ideas are starting to swirl around. It’s a nice feeling. :0)
If the world gets to be too much, I can simply close my eyes and start imagining possibilities, or I can go upstairs and play. Aren’t I a lucky, lucky woman?
Filed under Dreams
May you feel cuddled today.
The “spraying-the-garden-boxes” project is moving very slowly. I found TWO more sprayers in boxes in the garage yesterday, but discovered they ONLY had the container, NOT the sprayer attachment that is supposed to come with them. It’s far too late to take them back. I fiddled around with the two sprayer attachments we do have for the current containers, but couldn’t get them to work. I’ll ask my husband to take a look at them today to see if he can make one of them work.
It’s hard to believe that we’re going to have a heat wave this coming week. It’s supposed to be the beginning of FALL, and we’ll have temperatures of around 100 with heat indices. Oh, GOOD!
Today is DAY 65 on my daily yoga practice. I’m doing a bit better on the new poses I’ve added. I can tell because I’ve got some NEW sore muscles to add to my old ones. :0) Yesterday both my dog, Amber, and my cat, Abby, wanted to participate. I finally got the message across that I preferred to do the yoga poses by myself.
While my husband is hopefully figuring out how to make a sprayer attachment work, I will be vacuuming another dog’s worth of hair from our tiled areas plus the carpet on the first floor. You would think our dog would be totally bald by now, but apparently growing more hair and shedding the old is her life’s work. We really missed the boat on figuring out something we could DO with all this hair….
I hope your Sunday is a quiet, calm, lovely one.
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Well, this morning’s work in the garden was less than stellar.
I mixed up a two-gallon sprayer of SEVEN to spray the garden boxes for fire ants. I pumped up the sprayer and it wouldn’t spray more than a second or two. It was already fully pumped up, and it just wouldn’t spray. I finally went back to the house and found a smaller quart-sized container and used that to at least spray AT each of the boxes. I came in when the sweat was getting into my eyes, feeling defeated.
My husband says he thinks we have another sprayer that we haven’t used. After awhile I will go see if I can find it and take it out to the garden. Hopefully, I can transfer the SEVEN to the new sprayer container and finish hosing down the garden boxes for the ants.
I WILL get this done – one way or another.
Filed under Gardening, Square Foot Gardening - Raised Beds
I’m having a bit of success with drinking more water and trying not to eat anything in-between meals – except for cottage cheese after my yoga practice daily. A couple of pounds have bitten the dust, hopefully to never return. I’m hoping that their ‘friends’ will follow soon. :0)
This looks very much like my cat, Abby, when I do my yoga practice. (Today is DAY 64) She either tries to curl up at my head, upset with me when I put my arms over my head, or sleeps on my feet, making it almost impossible to move them. Yesterday, she curled up beside me and kept batting at me with her paw.
My husband is sleeping in this morning. I’m waiting for the coffee to be ready. The morning chores have been done.
This weekend I want to spray my garden boxes with SEVEN to kill the fire ants and then KILLZALL to kill remaining weed roots. Then we’ll cover the boxes with weed barrier cloth, holding it down with bricks, and see how it does over the winter.
I hope you have a great weekend.
Filed under Thoughts on a ________
Today is a pretty day here. It’s cool right now, but I just read that we’re supposed to have a ‘record heat wave’ with temperatures at 100+ with added heat index between now and the start of ‘autumn’ on the 22nd. Arkansas has a wicked sense of humor.
I’ve decided that I’m going to hose down the now-empty garden boxes with SEVEN, first, to hopefully kill any leftover ants (I’m still healing from the stings/bites I got recently from the weeding and the harvesting of our sweet red onions) and then KILLZALL, second, to try to kill any leftover roots from the weeding I did. I’m hoping to cut and put the weed barrier cloth in the boxes, held down with bricks or rocks, to keep the boxes in as good a shape as possible over the fall and winter.
My to-do list on what I need to do outside is daunting, so I’m just concentrating on one area at a time so I don’t feel swamped. GARDEN— I’ll get the garden boxes under control, and then spray weed killer on the ground UNDER the boxes and around the perimeter of the garden fenced area, and then weed-whack the area AROUND the garden and behind the shop.
We have Lunch Bunch this morning. My friend Linda did well for a day, but now is having a rough time again. Her daughter is taking her back to the doctor today, so it will just be Kay and me, with assorted husbands, today. We’ll make a run for supplies afterwards.
Happy Friday, and even happier weekend!
Filed under Thoughts on a ________
I’m disgusted, but determined.
My scales are still impossibly snide, sneering at my efforts to lose the lard.
Most of the time I’m ‘good,’ only eating what I should. Other times – like in the middle of the night – I could eat the wall and not be satisfied. I’m frustrated and stressed, as we ALL are from time to time for various reasons. I’m trying to deal with that WITHOUT resorting to stuffing my face.
I’m using MyFitnessPal.com to record what I’m eating – except when I binge and all common sense and responsibility goes out the window. I’m 98% ‘there’ on trying to develop good habits of eating, drinking lots of water (my eyeballs are floating), and today is DAY 62 of my daily yoga practice.
98% is pretty good, but it’s the 2% that is killing my efforts. My husband said last night that the pain in my legs and hips at night might be due to my carrying a bit of extra weight. The result of THAT comment is that I can now add a bit of depression to the mix. He followed that up today, on the way back from the phone place, in stopping at Sonic and wanting to get us shakes! I told him to go ahead and managed to NOT get a chocolate shake. I did NOT bite him in the leg. (It’s a good thing because I haven’t had my rabies shot.)
So I’m going to fix our lunch now, drinking a full glass of water with it. I’ll drink a bottle of water mid afternoon, hoping that will curb my voracious appetite, and I’ve planned our good dinner, with lots of veggies, a bit of meat, and some fruit.
One day at a time…
We just returned from going to the phone place.
I brought the old phone, just in case. It turned out to be a good thing, because the kind lady transferred the SIM card from the old phone to the new one. I wanted a screen protector and carrier this time, since my previous phone had a hard life and had actually fallen out of the carrier I had been using for years. The nice lady put on the screen protector and then the carrier for us.
I’m still feeling very good that we managed to do the updates here at home, as well as transfer my information to the new phone.
I feel empowered now, with a phone that is not overheating, as my old one did, and doesn’t cut my fingers on the chips on the screen.
Little could happen the rest of the day that would dampen my spirits. :0)
Filed under Cause for Celebration, empowerment
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