Daybook
Giving thanks - for grace and new mercies - Every. Single. Day.
Water and AC. Learning about what is happening in other places in the world, I am especially thankful for clean water that comes with the turn of a faucet. In fact, I’m thankful for water, period.
My husband and his patient, steadfast love for me in the midst of months of relentless mood swings.
My husband’s family who genuinely became my family.
Outside my window - the sun is shining today, but there has been sufficient rain to give the garden a good start!
I found a solution to the pesky carpenter bees that have spent the past decade slowly destroying our deck one hole at a time. WD-40 if you can believe it. I posted on our neighborhood Facebook group asking if anyone else had found a solution. There were a couple but the one that caught my attention was the gentleman that said he’d also been battling them for years and years. A “bug guy” had shared the idea of WD-40 and it worked for him. I always have it on hand and they were out in droves one day, so I tried it. Seriously? Honestly, I hate killing bees, I really do, and generally I protect them in every way I can. But these little critters were destroying part of our home. So I sprayed it into the holes like the guy suggested. What happened next stunned me - they literally came crawling out of the holes and fell to the ground and died almost immediately. They kept crawling out for the next couple of days. A week or ten days later - I was checking on the garden and spotted what I thought was new sawdust left from new bees making new holes. Guess that didn’t work as well as I hoped. But then I took a closer look - it was the larvae that had been in the holes and they had clearly wiggled their way right out of the holes too and died. Not a particularly happy sight, but I’m thankful to have a solution to stop the destruction to our property. I hope they simply find somewhere else to live, safely, in the woods or somewhere.
Clothing myself in - old faith stretch denim capris. I assure you these will literally fall apart before I stop wearing them. They are my go-to for comfort and practicality. My top is a black short-sleeve favorite with an Ohana emblem. I’m rocking a new haircut. Boy did I need that cut! It was getting long and it was great when I wanted to put it up in a ponytail or clip, but had zero style when I wanted to do something different. Now, because my stylist knows me so well, it’s the perfect length and style for both.
In the kitchen - Oh man, that chicken pot pie just keeps getting better and better. I posted the recipe earlier, so you can find it here. I used the photo from the original poster, but only temporarily until I can remember to take my own photo. I have modified the recipe enough to be a little original, but inspired by The Pioneer Woman. I have followed her for over a decade and watched as her platform grew and grew. Every recipe from her blog that I’ve tried has been a huge hit, and most become family favorites. Thank you Ree. :-)
I have basil in jars of water on my kitchen counter in hopes that they will take root again. My first experiment in this worked so well! I need more basil in my life!
Writing - I have resumed Morning Pages, and I’m really giving the blog my best shot. Getting up earlier than God himself - just kidding - I know He never sleeps… helps make sure that I have enough time to do some scripture study and daily readers without feeling guilty about starting my day by myself. I still have plans for a children’s book and some other fiction work that’s been percolating in my brain (and apparently my son’s too).
Reading - Still working on The Becoming. We have another trip coming up and that might give me another opportunity for some long swaths of reading time. The podcast took up all the reading time during the last trip though. Christina has urged me to start on another series that she says is worth setting aside the current book to dive into.
Watching - Just finished Vikings so we can move on to Vikings Valhala. Our son will be very happy to know this.
Listening - I tried using my earbuds this week so I could listen to music while I worked on the main floor where my husband has now taken up residency for his office. It didn’t work very well. The earbuds worked fine, but having people want to talk to you and the phone ringing and trying to juggle all the things to answer just isn’t worth it. I’ll just keep focusing on work in the basement I guess. My favorite is still Chris Renzema. One of my new favorite songs is from his album Get Out of the Way of Your Own Heart
New song - The Right Things
Making - We’re focusing on the garden right now.
The plants are growing tall! We learned that hard lesson about mixing compost, which being veteran gardeners you’d think we would have known. Mixing in some soil after-the-fact seems to be helping some of the plants at least. Some look really great, but others not so much. I’m doing a new thing though this year. I am journaling about as much as I can. I’m also using an app called Picture This I paid for the upgrade so I can get additional information about the health of the plant and how to address problems.
I also ordered a cultivator so I can work on a space in the yard that was basically a big compost pile for a few years. We moved all the wood that hadn’t decomposed, but the soil beneath it looked pretty healthy. John suggested that as the spot I use to move the remaining compost. I am hoping to create a burm or two to develop specialty plots of lavender or other high demand herbs. It’s a good opportunity to mix the compost with good soil and peat moss. We’ll have some for burms and extra when we need it for other areas.
I also suggested that next year we move the new bed so that we have two of them running parallel and we can place a trellis between them. It will frame the yard very nicely, double the growing space, and be very aesthetically pleasing as well. I think it will create a lovely garden effect that I’ve been trying to achieve. He agreed immediately.
I still need to get potatoes in the grow bag!
Also, I hope to explore options for where to sell our quilts after our return from camp.
Camp - We leave soon for a week at camp for a family reunion! We are so excited and hope that this will become an annual event for the entire crew. Looking forward to spending time together and getting to know more camp neighbors while we’re there.
The week ahead - We have babies this week! Their mom and dad are on a trip to Cancun so we have Ade and Sawyer. I have my right hand helper so I hope not to be exhausted by the time Monday rolls around LOL. We’ll have to get everything packed up and ready to leave the morning after they return. Gigi will be going back home with my brother to enjoy time with the folks who miss her so much. I’m thankful that this is still possible for her.
That’s it for now - gotta go make some meatballs. :-)
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