Tuesday, May 15, 2007

Getting busy with life

It's been a busy week for me. The girl thing happened (which laid me low for a few days), Gidget got a haircut, I planted a vegetable garden, planted flowers and a tree, cleaned the house, gave 2 flute lessons, got glutened...and had 4 migraines in the midst of all that.

While all of that was going on, I managed to crank out some pretty good stuff in the kitchen as well. Unfortunately, I didn't always remember to take pictures, but the thought was there. Over the next day and a few posts, I will post what I can remember. Here's what came out of the kitchen (that I can recall, anyway):

Berry salad
Honey lime salmon
Potato fans
Banana ice cream with chocolate chunks
Cucumber salad
Spaghetti with creamy tomato & sausage sauce

But let's go back to the vegetable garden. I am SO excited about this - we always had a big garden growing up and I have wanted one for years. I had been waiting and waiting for The Man to get off his duff and till me some soil, but alas - no such luck. Happily, his cousin stopped by a couple of weeks ago and happened to mention that he was tilling his garden. Well! After I marked my spot, he dragged the tiller across the street and chewed up my lawn.

There ain't nothin' like forcing the issue, is there?

So The Man got some 2x6s, chicken wire, and dowel rods and we built a half-assed 6 foot by 9 food garden. We only did a quick job because next year, we will tear out the wood and replace it with pavers to match the rest of the gardens around the house.

So over the last week, I dumped organic compost and organic soil into my new garden bed and then loaded it up with 2 cherry tomato plants, 2 heirloom tomato plants, 2 beef tomato plants, 12 green bean plants, a row of onions, a row of broccoli, a row of cauliflower, 3 basil, 2 oregano, 1 thyme, 2 parsley, and 1 rosemary. Whew!

I tell you what - there's nothing like making pasta for dinner and grabbing some basil right out of your back yard. Because I have done just that - twice. Well, once for pasta and once for pizza.

And of course, we planted a cherry tree for The Man's mother.

I got all the rest of my flowers planted in the very few (read - I am a lazy flower gardener) places in our flowerbeds that don't have perennials already planted. The yard is starting to shape up! All we need is to decide what we are going to do about the 2 current fountains we have (pull 'em or keep 'em) and we can buy the 20 bags of mulch it's going to take to get everything covered. Which, if everything goes as it usually does, will happen some time next year if left up to The Man.

Poor Gidget. The indignities never stop. We had our second vet appointment last Thursday evening - she had to stay in her doggie purse for an hour because the vet was running way behind. Then the shots didn't go as easily as the first set (I wanted to cry when she squealed). Then I make her get a haircut.


She gave ME a heart attack yesterday. We have her lovely play pen, of course, which is where she parks when we are at work or need to do something around the house that she needs to not be there for. I had (note the past tense here) a big pillow in the pen for her because when she sleeps, she likes to crawl under it.

When I get home at lunch, my habit has been to close the door and start softly calling, "Where's Momma's baby girl?" (Oh, shut up LOL) Then I call her name as I walk toward the living room. Usually, by the time I get to the play pen, she is doing her "prisoner spread 'em" pose inside the pen. So imagine my surprise when I walk into the living room - and no Gidget visible in the pen. I figure she hadn't heard me, so when I got up to the pen, I lifted the big pillow (noting that it is sitting weird). NO DOG. What the %$%^&? So I immediately go into panic mode, running down the hall yelling for the damn dog.

And here she comes, trotting out of our bedroom.

The pillow is now on the couch. Remember that I said that it was sitting weird in the pen? She used it as a ramp and jumped out of the play pen. Lesson learned well, Momma.

She suffered through an hour of grooming last night. And a bandanna and a pink bow. Damn you, Momma!


And NOW - the audacity to EXPECT HER TO GO OUTSIDE TO PEE WHEN IT IS RAINING! Geez.

1 comment:

Lynn Barry said...

You crack me up...thanks!