Front yard re-do, Part 1

Our house is in need of some serious TLC.  When I was home full-time I kept a pretty close eye on repairs and maintenance needs around here.  In the last year and a half our 30 year old house has started showing her age.

Next month we are having some foundation work done and I have been really wanting to get the yard back in shape.  Today we started cleaning up and renovating a big flowerbed in our front yard.

The front flower bed.  A mix of 1982 fabulous and a 2005 re-work that is looking a little tired and boring.

After Day 1.  

Lots of clean up and digging out of 30 year old ground cover.

There may not be a lot of obvious progress in these pics, but I have the blisters on my hands to prove that The Boss Lady and I did A LOT of work out there today.   I dug out about a mile of Asian Jasmine ground cover that was here when we bought the house.  This stuff is notoriously hard to kill and even though it is brown and dead-looking in the top picture, I am sure we have not seen the last of it.  In fact, I didn't trash the jasmine, I moved it to the backyard to fill holes left by the dog, kids and chickens.  We have a retaining wall that is a pain to mow or weed-eat, so ground cover will be perfect up there.  

To keep the cost of the renovation down, I am going to move several plants to new locations in the landscape.  When we are done with the cleanup and new pea gravel ground cover, we are adding some large planters.  You'll have to wait for those details though.

I highly recommend

Taking a cruise back though your own blog.

I was heading to bed two hours ago.  Then I decided to find something really quick that I knew was posted here, back in 2006.  Or was it 2005?

Anyways, I have just gotten lost in stories about my children as babies, long dead pets and many of our great times at home.  It made for a good night and I am sure it will all be worth it when I am waaaaaaaaaaaaaay too tired in the morning.

I need a minute

Or maybe a few days.

This working for a living thing is highly overrated.  Especially the parts that involve rolling out of bed before 7am and back into bed after midnight.  I think I'll be burning a day off this week.  I'm not really sick, but I guarantee I could hack up a lung on command just to make sure that my request is taken seriously. 

I was thinking about taking off Monday, but I have evening meetings that I can't miss.  Might as well go in for the whole day.  Exact same thing for Tuesday.  Wednesday would work except that the students get out early on Wednesday, so that is the first day I can actually head for home at a decent hour.  Don't want to miss that!  Of course we have a meeting with The Princess' kickball team that night, so I won't ACTUALLY be at home very early...

Thursday isn't as good as Friday, but this coming Friday is Friday Fun Day.  On these days I let the students work on hardcore math like strategy games (checkers and chess are big hits) and online math games.  That is a day without a lesson plan.  And that is a good day.  Can't miss that one.

So Thursday it is. That is the soon to be (and much needed) scheduled day for my mental health break.



Please don't call.  I'll be very contagious and weak.  I won't be able to answer the phone.  Or email.  Or faxes.  Or text messages.  Or smoke signals.

If it isn't raining I will probably be found out in the garden.  If it is raining, I may still be found out in the garden.  Stop by and plant something for me.  'Cause I am sick, remember?