TREASURES IN THE GARDEN AND RE~VAMPING A VANITY BENCH

Happy Thursday!  I hope everyone has something to look forward to this weekend.  I thought I'd get a post in today because tomorrow will be busy.  This week has been a little crazy, too, but isn't it always around here?  I know that all of you furniture painters out there know of The Painting Everything Syndrome.  Yes, you paint one thing and then you just have to keep finding more inanimate (hopefully) objects to paint.  And there is something about going to Home Depot and gravitating right to the paint sample aisle, just knowing there is something at home you can transform.  So, the syndrome started with that mirror I painted and shared in my last post.  I think my non~painting syndrome actually goes on longer because that mirror had been sitting in my garage for at least 3 years, and worse, right next to the door where I couldn't miss it!

Okay, I had these three plate rack thingies that I ordered from One Kings Lane months ago.  My daughter asked me why on earth I would order something that went with nothing in my home.  I was asking that question myself when they arrived in brilliant yellow, red and blue.  That's the yellow one above.  Just about the only time I use primary colors in my home is at Christmas, those glorious reds and greens.  I know I simply fell in love with the design and shape and I never...NEVER thought to spray paint them, my mind just never went in that direction until recently.  And I know this is hard to believe, but I hadn't even taken them out of the box because I was so dejected that I had ordered them in the first place.  So, out to the patio we went yesterday. 

Gray, white and blue, the blue is the original color, it stays.  Can you see why I fell in love?

I tried out some plates...clearly I will have to use the salad/dessert plates as the dinner plate is way too large.  And where am I hanging them (cue Blondie laughing hysterically)?  Let sit on that for awhile!

I have another project in the works.  I have had this vanity seat sitting in my bedroom for about 19 years looking just like this.  Oh, I can just see the horror on your faces!  Abby was a toddler and wrote something undecipherable on it with lipstick, and then one, out of the menagerie of dogs we had, had a go at it.  Poor bench.  I never even sat at my vanity on it as I'm so near sighted I have to have my nose pressed up to a mirror to put my make up on.  I have kept various pieces of fabric neatly folded over it all these years and I finally sat down with it the other day.

It took me about 3 minutes to take apart what has sat in my room like this for 19 years!  It didn't take long to figure it out nor how to redo it.  I hope to get to Joann's for padding and fabric either tomorrow or early next week.  I really think she needs something classic and pretty.  I haven't mentioned it but we are having the master bedroom painted on Saturday.  This room has not been painted for a good 10-15 years, I'm guessing.  The last time we did, we broke part of the four poster bed trying to move it.  So it's not a room you want to fiddle with unless you have to.

I chose the middle color here, Silver Screen.  I'm a little nervous, I consider gray a "cool" color and the furniture is definitely warm.  The color we have now is like a beige/tan.  But I want to stop worrying about things like this, and other insane hang ups... like not wearing white after labor day, redheads not wearing red, and only blue eyed Swedish women being true blondes.  I am on the hunt for a new comforter or duvet cover and an area rug.  I found a duvet at Land Of Nod that I really like (did you know it's not just for kids anymore?).  I will post an image of it next week.  The hard part is the area rug...it stays forever, like carpeting, it has to coordinate with whatever kind of bedding I switch to over the years. A nice neutral sisal rug would make me more than satisfied, but The Husband likes to feel something soft under his feet.  I guess I can't fault him there.  

So, I spent Tuesday taking everything but the large pieces of furniture out of the room.  The biggest job was emptying the bookshelves.  I never thought I would or could eliminate a book shelf, in fact, I always looked for the right place to add one.  But I've reached that time in my life that once I read a book, I can pass it on.  As much as I love it, there will never be time to reread it when there are millions and billions of books out there that haven't even been written that I want to read!  So I've been passing them on to my family and I also drop them off at a used bookstore nearby.  We have several shelves in our den and that's where I keep all my garden and decorating books, as well as classics and limited edition books I've found over the years.  I think I'm good with this, and these in the bedroom were finished and I decided I didn't even want shelves anymore.  I'll find a pretty piece of artwork or something.

I was up bright and early with Emily this morning and off to one of the last few farmer's markets we'll have this year.  This is about 10 blocks from my house.  It was jammed packed.  I walked right by the mums, my summer flowers are still looking nice and I want my mums to make it into November.  I did get 3 really cute pumpkins (you might remember that last fall I went pumpkinless because the squirrels kept destroying them).  A few bloggers recommended wiping them down with Pledge furniture polish, so I thought I'd try that.  Maybe it's the smell, maybe it's the slickness from the wax, but if I see one little tooth mark, they are coming inside!!  I also found a beautiful 4 year old hydrangea plant for $18.00.  I was elated!  It's huge!  I have to get it into the ground fast before we get a frost.

Off to the lake tomorrow night.  I am definitely going to chill!  The Husband and I both need it.  Emily accused me of taking the last great white pumpkin so I have to scour Michigan to find one to give her and make her stop pouting!!  See Ya! :)

I am linking with Jody over at Rooted In Thyme for her Simple & Sweet Fridays party.  You have to check out the Woodland Garden birthday party her friends threw for her!  Rustic and so, so sweet! :)

XO,

Jane

HAIR TODAY, GONE TOMORROW & REFLECTIONS

Well, since I was such a drama queen before I got my hair cut last week, I had Katie take before and afters.  It looks pretty ratty, doesn't it?  That's just washed and dried the night before.  Have I ever told you it takes a village to get my hair to look good?

And here we are minus 7 inches.  Katie also styled it nice and smooth and straight.  I like it a lot and I have barely noticed that so much is gone.  The Husband didn't notice at all, he's just aloof like that.  The same old frizziness came back after I washed it so I just added some curls with the wand and I was fine.  And of course I can let it dry naturally curly or straighten it.  My hair, like Sybil, has 27 personalities.  I think I am going to get 2 more inches off the next time I go...just not sure if it has reached that "chic" level yet.  I want to be chic in my old age.

I mentioned in my last post that I had an old mirror in the garage.  It's been sitting there for a few years.  Emily had a friend throwing it out and said we'd take it.  I had always planned on painting it, but I procrastinated because I just couldn't think of a place to put it.  As you can see, it's a monster.  As tall as my counter (which it is leaning against) and as wide. 

Look at the detail.  And the ugly gold tone.

Here's how it turned out.  I used Pewter Mug by Behr, and I had a can of Annie Sloan clear wax that I rubbed on over two coats of paint.  Sorry for that reflection, I have no idea how to photograph a mirror!  

I started to distress it a bit but the gold gilt underneath started crumbling off so I left it as is.  Now...where to put it.  Well, I have been having second thoughts about a set of art prints I hung in the living room this past spring.  I really and truly love them, but the more I look at them, the more I think they just don't look "right" in this room.  So, the room is very neutral with just a splash of pastels in the sofa, so that's why I painted the mirror gray, I thought it would blend with some of the blues. I'd like to hang it where the prints are. We'll see.  I paid a lot for the prints so I can't just store them away until "whenever".  Hopefully I'll have it hanging somewhere for you to see soon.  Oh, and if you ever have to stand or sit in front of a mirror doing something like this, remember, mirrors don't lie.  I was sitting cross legged in front of it, talking with The Husband and it was like talking to myself.  I was really traumatized!    

I'm going to fly you right through this next topic, but there is a lesson to be learned as well as a great recipe.  Remember when I made those little drumsticks last week?  Well, this recipe was on the same page, I used chicken breasts instead of drumsticks though.  This is another quickie where you mix up a marinade of sorts, and this is the beauty of it all, you can do this as far back as the night before.  When you are ready to make dinner, just pop it in the oven.

This is a combination of 2 T. lime zest, 1/2 c. lime juice,  1/4 c. honey, 1/2 c. chopped cilantro, 1/2 chopped white onion, 1 large seeded, chopped jalapeno, salt and pepper.  Very simple.  Drop your chicken in a zip lock bag, pour the marinade in and work it into the meat  Then let it sit for as little as 20 minutes if you'd like.  In a second I'm going to tell you why this tasted out of this world.  But first...

We have to interrupt this post to pass on some safety measures when following along with Blondie's Cooking Sessions.  Did I mention I bought a fantastic knife sharpener at Target last weekend?  Hmmmm...usually a trip to Target becomes blog fodder.  Well, I was happily preparing this marinade and began to work on the fresh cilantro.  Rather than chop it, you just want to run your knife through it in forward motions.  And I always warn my girls, keep your fingertips tucked under, that way the knife will glide against your knuckles if it gets too close to your hand.  Well, the  index finger wasn't tucked very well, and the knife sheared off half my finger nail and a bit underneath (I'm trying to word this mildly), which was good, it was at an angle.  My finger wasn't bent under enough and I was using a bit more pressure than I needed since I wasn't used to the knife being sharpened.  I have thanked God a thousand times that my finger was bent because it would have taken off whatever it came in contact with.  I am super big on knife safety,  lots of experience and  a class at Sur la Table on it, and I have cautioned my kids so much that up until recently, Emily wouldn't use a chef's knife.  ANYWAY...gosh, I do ramble, This is just a paper towel and some surgical tape on it, I ran to Walgreen's this morning and bought fingertip bandaids.  It hurts, but more than anything I am mad at myself. But this will teach me to slow down and never feel too confident in a situation where you can hurt yourself.

Moving on, bake the chicken breasts at 350 degrees for 1 hour.  If doing the drumsticks, it would be 450 for 35 to 40 minutes.  And remember me saying that there was a reason for the outstanding flavor in this recipe, before I got to the gory part?  It's the honey!!  Lime and honey, imagine that?  The honey gives it a little texture and grabs on to the meat.  It's tart and sweet at the same time.  I think this plate would have been a bit more attractive with the fresh vegetables we usually have, but to be honest, I wasn't interested in much more chopping after my little incident.  So...add these ingredients to your shopping list and toss together a great dinner this week! :)

I have a huge bowl filled with Honeycrisp apples, and a spice candle burning.  The Husband is watching back to back football games all day.  It's 62 degrees out and I'm wearing my first sweatshirt of the season (on which I have already spilled Ben & Jerry's chocolate ice cream, my treat from Walgreen's when I picked up the bandaids...I deserve it, don't I?).  The apples are begging me to make a pie and the tarts I talked about last week.  I have puff pastry and a fresh bag of King Arthur flour.  But my boo boo hurts and you really ought to see the unique typing method I'm using!  I picked up this magazine last week thinking it would be nice to look through in a few weeks, ear mark a few ideas or what have you.  I ended up curling up with it last night and read it cover to cover.  Fall flows into Thanksgiving into Christmas at such a fast pace that I never accomplish what I want to.  I say, "Next year", and sometimes just, "Forget it"!  So I marked a few pages of simple projects and ideas that I can do any time.  Now, you know me, I'm not a craft person, but sometimes I like to think that I'll get the hang of it (or the patience!) someday.  So, my first holiday decoration project is easy.  You will need:

3 clear Mason jars

1 bag of short peppermint sticks

Red ribbon

Place peppermint sticks in jar.  Tie ribbon on.  Arrange attractively somewhere.

I can't wait to get started!  Don't you wish my recipes were this short?!

Joining in with Brenda at Cozy Little House for Tweak It Tuesday.

XO,

Jane

THE COOK, THE GARDENER & THE FUSSY READER

Hello everyone!  It's good to be back.  As much as I aim to post more often, my schedule gets wonky and I don't complete the things I want to show you fast enough to whip out a post.  For example, I was grocery shopping Friday and I saw so many beautiful apples,  into the cart they went with plans to make some apple pie and turnovers.  You won't see them yet.  And I uncovered a gorgeous mirror in our garage with a garish gold frame that I intend to paint...not on this post!  So I'll give you what I have since last week.  Oh, I wanted to mention, this is my 500th post!  I'm really amazed at myself.  It means a lot to me to write, to get my thoughts on paper, get things in order...and this has been a wonderful way to do it.  And I guess I'm amazed because it all comes without a lot of effort... I can visualize all of you, my friends, and the words just flow.  So thank you, if it weren't for you I would still be sitting at my kitchen table in my robe with my coffee, scribbling away in my journal.

I picked up a little bouquet of flowers at the grocery store, the colors are just perfect for getting in the mood for fall.  I haven't started doing any sort of decorating though...okay, I picked up two very cute pumpkin candles.  They are darling.  It's those one of a kind things that get to me when I try to curb frivolous spending.  Anyway, about my bouquet...

...this is the flower frog jars in a basket thingy I found at Tattered Tiques last month when I met up with Kris from Junk Chic Cottage.  I really love it, the old wire, the zinc lids and the wooden handles.  It makes flower arranging a breeze!

Okay, while I should have been making apple turnovers, I came across a recipe that really got my attention.  One of the many reasons I love to cook is that I just love experimenting.  It's beyond trying new recipes or new foods, I like putting  a twist on things and getting out of the sandbox.  Middle Eastern cooking has been so interesting to me lately, how using spices that I've barely tried in so many different and intriguing ways adds a whole new level of flavor to our everyday fare.  Look at that ginger (above).  I wish you could smell it!  Now follow along with me.  Grate up 1 tablespoon of this heavenly stuff, and don't worry about wasting it, toss it in a plastic bag and you can freeze it for whenever.  Mix it up with a cup of plain yogurt, 3 minced garlic cloves, 1 T. curry powder, 4 t. paprika, 1 1/2 t. turmeric, a little cayenne and salt and pepper.  Isn't that easy?  You don't have these spices?  Get them in small jars so there's little waste, but after you've tried this marinade, you'll want to try it on everything!

See how that mixes up so creamy?  Oh, the fragrance!

Now add 8-12 chicken drumsticks that you have pierced a few times with a fork, to a zip lock bag and spoon that marinade over.  Zip it up and work it all into the chicken.  Now you can leave it overnight or use it as soon as 20 minutes.

Now you know the patrons to Blondie's Kitchen have a thing about seasonings.  Of course I'm not going to force spices on them that they can't even pronounce, so those bare naked drumsticks are for them.  Feel sorta bad for them?

Bake these babies on a pan that's been sprayed with cooking oil at 425 for 35 to 40 minutes, turning once.  I saved the marinade to brush more on when I turned them.  Once you take them out of the oven, sprinkle some chopped green onion on them.  Don't skip this because it added a lot of flavor. I made cole slaw to go with it.  Yum!

The first question from The Husband was, "Why are yours so much better looking than mine?"  Well, because they are.  And sometimes you have to try new things...get out of the sandbox.  And he did.  And he was happy.

You can find this recipe in the October issue of Redbook magazine. 

I was back in the garden toward the end of last week.  It was still hot but I was determined to keep at it.  I returned the garden hose I didn't need back to Home Depot and used my refund to pick up a few more plants.

Russian sage.  I see this in commercial landscaping all the time so I think it can be neglected a bit.  Funny that I think that way,  can you see me in a garden nursery asking an employee, "Can you point the way to the plants that can be neglected please?" ;-)

I want to also show you my "new" old trellis, or rather wrought iron twin headboard.   A neighbor was throwing it out a few years ago and we grabbed it.  It's just been sitting on the side of the house, camouflaged by ivy.  So I lugged it over here and I think I'm going to grow some clematis on it next spring.  And do you see that little square covered opening in the wall on the bottom right corner of the picture?  That's the entry to the crawl space.  It's a little unsightly so I have a small trellis at the lake that I'm going to bring home and try some sort of vine on that, too.  

Across the yard in front of the fence, Black Eyed Susan's.  I love anything in the daisy family. 

This is how that space is looking now.  I order tulip, crocus and hyacinth bulbs every year from Breck's and they should be here soon.  That will be the end of my work.  And for the spring, I ordered seeds from Renee's; Alyssum, Cosmos, Four o' clocks, Morning Glories and miniature Sunflowers.

As I continue putting off making those tarts and painting the mirror frame, I've been doing a bit more reading.  I started a book last week and I was so disappointed.  It was about a 30ish young woman who decides to rent a house in the Hampton's with a group of young single people, all strangers to one another.  It was supposed to be a laugh a minute, sort of Sex And The City humor.  As always, my brain wavers back and forth...should I keep going, I paid $$ for this book.  Or...this is a total waste of my time, my time is important.  Well, I just stopped.  You know what you do with books like that?  You keep them in your purse and pull them out in waiting rooms, long lines and at the bus stop.  You're so grateful you have something to read that you don't mind that it's the worst book ever written.  Anyway, this is the new book I started last night (also on my sidebar), The Provence Cure for the Brokenhearted by Bridget Asher.  "...an unflinching portrait of a grieving young widow, tempered by a powerful dose of humor and an unforgettable cast of characters."  "...will have you canceling dinner plans, staying up all hours and flat~out ignoring your family so you can keep reading."  Ooh, love it!  I'll let you know how I like it.  

Not much planned for the rest of the week, dental check up tomorrow, major haircut Thursday.  Yes, I am getting it cut back up to my shoulders, I think that will be about a good 6 inches off.  My breath catches a little at the thought of it, it's sort of like a curtain I can hide behind.  But I want something more chic, something I can style easily.  As long as I can fit it up into a ponytail, I'm happy.  That's me, everyday.  And then I really, really hope we make it to the lake this weekend.  In another month we will be putting everything away until the spring.  I haven't been there since mid July.  How can that be?  Last weekend we had a fund raiser to go to which was very important to us and we had a great time.  The Husband won an autographed football by Jay Cutler of the Chicago Bears.  He was one happy guy.  And after we went to one of our favorite restaurants.  So while it was a good weekend, I just want to spend a few days outdoors doing nothing, maybe even hop into the old fishing boat with the captain and take a slow trip around the lake!  Have a great week everyone!

Joining in with Tracie at Fishtail Cottage for her Thursday Garden Party.

SOME HO~HUM & SOME DRAMA

It was too hot to go out and play today, so I stayed inside and played house.  The Midwest is having a heatwave which is supposed to end tomorrow.  We just had a wonderful downpour which we needed and even with the a/c on, I have the windows cracked just a little so I can smell that fresh rain scent.

I brought this basket home from the lake last time I was there.  I had moved it around and couldn't find the right place for it so here it is.  I think it is the coolest thing!  I laid some different placemats in blue and brown (no fall colors yet)...

And added some white flowers with a few little red ones to keep it from looking like spring.  I love a good slow day of tweaking.

You know, the rosemary and I are getting a bad rap around here.  In order to keep this topiary looking good, I'm trimming it quite often and I've made the rosemary salt and olive oil too many times to count.  So I started adding it more and more to our food and I think it's been overkill.  The other night I made Greek Hamburgers.  I thought this was genius.  I made my burger mixture (ground beef, egg, bread crumbs, S & P), and then crumbled in some feta cheese, rosemary and green onion.  Ooh la la!  Well, my little family of 3 didn't "ooh" or "la la" too much.  The Husband has been on a "no spice" kick for several months, I don't get it.  After 28 years of my cooking, he suddenly declares he doesn't want me to season his food.  Okay.  One night I was making spaghetti sauce and he happened to walk by just as I had added my palmfuls of oregano, basil and thyme, yet unstirred.  "Oh My Gawd!!  What Is That???"  I really thought he had finally come unhinged.  So, as he works his way to the Funny Farm, I just keep doing my thing.  And then we had the Greek Hamburgers!!  Abby sat picking out the rosemary, muttering, "It tastes like a Christmas tree." and The Husband speared his salad pointedly while looking over at me from under his brows, saying, "I'm not eating the burger."  So now the motley crew comes to the table every night, looking around cautiously and sniffing the air for that piney scent, ready to protest, I'm sure.  By the way, you have to try these hamburgers, they were delicious!!

Well, the drama escalates as the week goes on.  I had the big backyard reveal scheduled for Tuesday evening (last night).  I had just donned the safari gear and was going to trim the hedges, spread a little more mulch, put some grass seed on some spots and plant one last rosebush, when I heard the sound of trucks...big trucks.  Here's one in my next door neighbors driveway.  Now, The Husband and I had been talking about having our trees trimmed but I had no idea he had scheduled it, much less for this day.  

As I watched this little guy, who reminded me of Indiana Jones, strap on his equipment and slither up one of my huge trees, my mind raced.  Okay, I'm definitely not going out in the backyard and nonchalantly go about my business with a crew of ten roping and tying limbs and dragging them out to the old chipper.  Okay, and what about my reveal?  All my work over the previous week?  The five bags of weeds and bark and dead squi...okay, I'll leave that out.  The 27 bags of shredded bark, peat moss and cow manure I hauled in?  No, The Husband would walk back there and see our beautiful walnut trees trimmed up so they will never drop 1500 pound branches on our neighbor's roof. My beautiful landscaping job would pale in comparison to what man can do with a chainsaw.  And every guy wants to survey where his hard earned money has gone, and let me tell you, we could put another child through college for what this cost.  

So The Husband came home and the first thing I asked was, "Are you going to go out and look at those trees when they're finished??"  He gave me a sideways glance.  I sulked for awhile and became even more quiet as Indiana started packing up the trucks with his guys.  Finally I broke down, even with a few  crocodile tears as I confessed all that I had been doing and how I wasn't finished and how I wanted it to be the perfect time to show him.  He just chuckled and hugged me and I knew I was making huge deal out of this.  So we walked out to the backyard together and stopped in our tracks when we saw this...

Yes, my beautiful wooded forest of a backyard now has walnut trees disguised as telephone poles.  They go around the whole yard like this, I'll spare you.  Not much was said between me and The Husband.  We walked over to one of my new garden beds.  With the temps in the mid 90's and the wind blowing the heat around like a hot furnace, he surveyed my work.  It wasn't the casual little morning stroll I had planned with our coffee.  Or a pre~sunset evening, nope, just here and now, the hot sun beating down on us.  

Along the back fence:  sedum, hydrangeas, phlox and blanket flower (and 15 bags of cypress mulch).

My herb garden, out with the old, ready for the new.  Ivy trimmed, 1 bag of cow manure and 2 bags of hardwood mulch.

The bed along the house: day lilies (finished blooming), allysum, ajuga, rosebush (ready to be planted), 6 bags of cow manure, 6 bags of peat moss and 5 bags of cypress mulch.

And The Husband saying, "C'mon in, Blondie, you did good!"  Priceless!

A HOE LOT OF GARDENING!

Ahhhhh...I've finally come up for air and can sit and put together a post.  I hope I've gotten around to visiting your blogs, I really put in some time doing that Wednesday and Thursday night.  My life has been consumed with  cleaning up my backyard here in the city and getting it back into the little woodland forest it once was.  I have a confession...I was emailing back and forth with a good friend of mine that now lives in New Mexico (Hey, You!!!).  We get into these marathon email sessions which can be very therapeutic.  I told her that I had thought my gardening days were over.  For the past few years I have really started to detest the heat and humidity, my back has gotten bad and I just didn't think I had it in me to be bending and crouching and lifting.  The cost of plants was also  driving me crazy...blah, blah, blah.  And then my brilliant son said something to me and he is wise beyond his years, "Mom, you can make up an excuse for anything."  I was not offended in the least.  I told my good friend in my email that I was ashamed of myself.  That I had to get back to doing the things I love and stop making imaginary roadblocks. 

I made a plan and I stuck to it.  When everyone was back to work on Tuesday after the holiday, I put on my safari gear and headed out to the shed.  Rake?  Check.  Shovel?  Check.  Dead squirrel?  Check...WHAT???  Great.  What a way to start my big project.  And I found two more.  I truly think someone is poisoning them.  Some of the neighbors keep the big plastic bins we use for trash in the alleys behind their homes.  The squirrels will bore right through these, scatter trash and then you have not only a mess, but possibly mice, raccoons, etc.  I am so tired of finding their little carcasses and whoever is doing it is cruel and insane.

I worked mostly on the perimeter of my yard, raking and cleaning out old leaves, weeds, bark, sticks, walnuts and so on.  Milo and Layla were ecstatic, they acted like they were on an outing!  They love being outdoors but only if they have company, otherwise they just sit on the porch and wait to be let in.  Layla laid, basking in the warm sun, and Milo grabbed sticks from my piles and took off to gnaw on them in the shade. 

This is the main area I'm working on.  You might remember seeing pictures of my tulips and daffodils along this fence in the spring.  Well, that's all I've had here other than the Sedum that you can see...this sprouts up at the end of August.  I worked my tail off here...dug up the bulbs and moved them to the end and turned the soil over.  I was quite pleased to see that the soil was dark and rich, all of those decaying walnuts have been the perfect compost over the years.  I cleaned out what I call my little Woodland Garden in the corner, just to the right of this fence.  I have a forsythia there that takes a lot of space, some day lilies and columbine.  I'm thinking a cute bench or chair might look good there next spring.

And I raked out my herb garden and added fresh topsoil.  My unrelenting ivy has made it's way over here as well.

All in all, I had five 39 gallon bags filled with debris and a few small carcasses (ugh).  It took me about 3 hours to do this and I will admit, I had to take a few Tylenol before bed!

One of the biggest battles I had was dealing with this weed.  It comes back every summer on a stalk over five feet high.  It has huge leaves that decay right around now and these awful burrs.  They stick to your gardening gloves like velcro and it took me forever to cut all the stalks down.  I posted a picture on Facebook and someone identified it as a Burdock weed.  I Googled it and she was spot on.  I was able to dig the root of one up, it was at least 2 feet long under the ground.  The rest were just impossible to dig up so I resorted to a little poison.  I will NOT go through this again next year.

Well, I hope I haven't bored you silly.  Wednesday I treated myself with a trip to Home Depot.  Perennials are all marked down, some 4 for $10.00.  I will share those with you later.  And...my son is going to give me a huge rosebush that he has blooming in the yard of a property he recently bought to rent out.  I haven't seen it yet, but if it's free, I'll take it! lol!  And yesterday I bought a ton of shredded bark to neaten everything up and protect the new plants over the winter.  All I have to do now is add some tulip bulbs as I do every fall.  Now...this is a total surprise for The Husband.  So far he has not ventured out into the backyard to see anything I'm doing, and in his own daffy way, he never questioned why I wanted him to bring home a few gardening tools from the lakehouse last weekend.  This is his second weekend in a row up there without me.  He and his brothers have a big reunion there and take in a Notre Dame game (our home is just 30 minutes from Notre Dame).  So...I am going to get that mulch in this weekend and I have to return a hose to Home Depot and I think I will use  my refund on a few more plants! ;-D

I fiddled with making a late summer mantel the other day.  I put my new window up there (on the left), not sure how it looks.

And I went for a clean look on my coffee table after son Jeff repeatedly complained about my "clutter".  Boy, he has been pretty verbal lately about my tendencies!  So I thought, okay, I'll try it his way, and yes, I like it.  And those decorating books are close at hand to peruse through instead of hiding on a bookshelf.  

Okay, I'm off to find my gardening gloves. I was in heaven all week long with temps in the low 70's.  Today is 88, I don't know how that happened.  And we have rain in the forecast tomorrow, So I want to get my work done.  I will try to have my camera ready when I surprise The Husband on Monday!! :)

XO,

Jane