A year later, and I'm back!

Wow, it's been a year since I've blogged about anything, and let me vague-post about why!!  Life is pretty much as fun or as dull as you make it out to be.  For the past year I've been floundering a bit in my own personal reflection.  I've come out of that funk, all shiny and happy again.  So voila, I'm back!

Yesterday:
I've been staring at my garden and lawn for the past little while, thinking... "Ewww, there's sooo much work to do out there!"  Weeding, maintenance... ugly lawn... that sort of thing.  So yesterday I went to Home Depot to buy a weed-claw thing-a-ma-jig for pulling out dandelions, because well... we have more dandelions than we have grass!  So with my new-fandangled garden tool, I go out into the backyard to try it out.  It's definitely not as effective as I thought it would be, so I give up on my masses of dandelions, and start shoving leaves, twigs, branches, etc into my giant compost bag.  It's almost completely full, and I've only tidied 1/30th of my backyard!  (Seriously, I've cleaned up a corner of the yard!!!)  Sigh!  This is going to be a veeery long task, and I'm already getting achey!

So my not-so-fit, achey-self decides to do a walk-about in the backyard to survey what else I can do that won't be so tiring.  I take note of the dug-up yard that our neighbourhood bear has made, take note of the taller weeds, and shorter weeds, dead grass, no grass, etc., and then spot a giant pile of bear-pooh!  Yuck!  Well, I got my wish... this is something to do, that doesn't require a lot of muscle!!  And it definitely needs cleaning up, because of the kids!  So here goes...

Gloves... CHECK!
Shovel... CHECK!
Compost bag... CHECK!
Holding my breath so as not to smell or gag... CHECK!

Well, the thing to picking up bear-pooh, is that I really should have used a good-sized shovel.  Instead, I had with me, a little trowel that I use for my garden.  I naively thought that this little trowel would be enough to shovel bear-pooh.  I misjudged.  I will only say that bear-pooh is heavier than you'd think it would be, and with a trowel you will not be able to shovel it with just one movement...  Just give that comment some thought...

Anyway, after accomplishing this lovely task, I was quite proud of myself for not running away to my husband to ask him to clean it up (which is my usual reaction when there is something horrifying for me to do... like catch spiders and bugs).  Now I am ready to head inside after cleaning up this terrible horror, when... I spot another pile of Bear-Yuck!  REALLY??  Ugh!  Ok, repeat the above.

After one final, slow walk through of the backyard, I declare that I now have a pooh-free yard.  Hooray!!  It's a good thing that the next day is garbage / recycling day!  The garbage guys can take my bear-pooh infested bio-degradables, where they can turn it into something better.  And now I can run inside the house to shower!

And that my friends, is my shitty story from yesterday!  Life can just keep going up from here!

Spring Gardening

I finally started to weed out the garden.  It will take days to do.

Our garden is plagued with English Ivy that likes to crawl, climb, and choke out our plants.  In the city of Coquitlam, English Ivy has been designated an "invasive species" and I have to agree.  It is very invasive.

This year, thanks to my sis P, I am growing a few corn stalks, some tomato plants, and a pumpkin.  The corn stalks and the pumpkin seem to be doing well enough.  The plants are quite sturdy, and that gives me hope.  The tomato plants however, were still quite small when transplanted into my garden, and they are looking a bit iffy.  I hope a few of them survive...

One other weed that I'd like to call invasive (which really isn't) are dandelions.  Our grass is plagued with dandelions.  So many dandelions that Hubby just mows over them with the lawn mower, instead of pulling them out.  If anybody wants dandelion tea, they are welcome to pick dandelions from our yard!  We have more than enough to spare!

To assist my husband's dandelion massacre, we are now on the lookout for a gas powered lawn mower.  Our hand-me-down electrical one just doesn't "cut it" anymore.  So if anybody hears of any lawnmower deals, let us know.