Projects

I've been trying to throw myself into projects around the home since I'm no longer employed. It's still frustrating and sad at times, but I'm trying to be joyful, positive, and grateful. Not that this situation is ideal, but there are many people who would love to be able to stay home.
So after a brief moping around period, I decided to get busy. I've been working around the house quite a bit, but HALLELUJAH, spring is here. I absolutely love being in my garden, so spring is kind of my jam.

Here's what I've been up to:

I've been reading a lot lately, which is something I love to do, but haven't felt like I've had the time. I think I've gone through 3 or 4 books in the last 2 months and I'm working on 2 more. It has been so nice, but sometimes I get so wrapped up in books I sit and read all day. Oops :)

I have decided to make myself a project these days. I'm committed to improving my physical, mental, and spiritual health. I've been working on forming a sleep schedule for once in my life, which had been going really well until I caught this awful cold a little over a week ago. It's one of the worst colds I've ever had and I'm not fully over it even after being on antibiotics for 10 days. That set back some of my projects, so I'm eager to be well again. I've also made a commitment to improving my battle with PCOS. After a few months of not feeling well at all and knowing PCOS was behind part of it, I realized I have to commit myself to doing more than taking medication. That's part of the reason I began working on my sleep schedule. I have to take my Metformin 3 times a day with food, and I wanted to begin taking it on a normal eating schedule, not just every 4 hours. Not only is that better, but it's getting really hard to coordinate when I have to eat a snack because I wanted to eat dinner 2 hours before I was supposed to take my pills. My doctor also told me I need to eat well (a low carb diet) and exercise a little each day, which has NEVER been my thing...so I'm adjusting :) Many women with PCOS claim they never experienced true relief until they also made the changes to their routines, so I need to at least try. The Metformin has kind of helped with the eating well thing simply because many foods make me very sick now, much to my sadness. Fried food, sick. Sodas, sick. Any type of sausage whatsoever (weird, right?), sick! I'm continually finding things that make my stomach FLIP OUT (I'll spare you the gory details...) but it's not too bad. Fortunately, most of the foods I can't tolerate are bad for me anyway...but it's always the most delicious of things! Right now my guilty pleasure food is toaster strudels. Those are what I run to if I'm craving something sweet and I don't have fresh fruit on hand. Randy and I also got a recumbent bike to help us both work out. It get very humid here and summer is unbearable, so we wanted something we'd feel more inclined to do. You kind of need to amp yourself up to go outside when it gets hot, and more often than not, we don't end up doing it. Before we caught our colds we were doing really well :)

My health has been good for the most part. I saw the cardiologist I mentioned a few posts ago and it was basically no help at all. The test the epilepsy doctor wants me to do is going to cost $675 after insurance and the cardiologist thinks it will be a total waste of time. He even called my other doctor while I was in the room to see if the test was absolutely necessary to his diagnosis. The cardiologist said it will most likely cause a false positive rather than being helpful. Ugh. Doctors....
I've been feeling good, so I haven't worried about it, but I had another episode 2 days ago, so that's frustrating.

But now the sun is out and I have been taking advantage of it! Working in the garden has always made me feel better, and this year is no exception.

I began painting this coffee mug hutch I bought for $8 at a garage sale on a whim to house my Starbucks mug collection a year and a half ago. I had always intended on painting it, but haven't felt like it, so it has been serving its purpose in its natural form. I can't wait until it's finished. I'm going to paint the hinges black or dark brown because I didn't feel like taking it apart before painting it. I was kind of concerned it would fall apart if I did. I have these lovely glass knobs from Hobby Lobby set to go on it as soon as I'm done. It's going to be lovely!

Once we got over our colds we got to work in the garden! We decided not to grow any veggies last year because I was having daily migraines and didn't feel like I had enough time to take care of them. Also, 2 summers ago I had a tragic experience with bugs infesting my garden. Every time I'd kill them the eggs I hadn't been able to find would hatch and I'd have a new batch to attack. I didn't feel like dealing with it again. This year I desperately wanted some fresh tomatoes, so we built up one of my raised beds so it would be better for veggies. It's also nice because I don't have to strain my back quite as much. Next year we're planning on raising it another level. I'm very excited about it :) We left the other veggie bed with one level and we weren't planning on planting anything, but I've added a couple pepper plants and iceberg lettuce, just to try. We're gonna add an ochre plant and we'll officially be done planting this year! I usually plant zucchini, but I really didn't feel like dealing with squash bugs this year. They are little demons, I swear. Maybe next year.

here's our little tomato plants with some marigolds for color and help with bugs :)

 I've also added several new trees to the garden this year and I am LOVING it! I finally got my fig and cherry trees I mentioned last year, I got a gorgeous rose standard, and a variety of cold hardy avocado. I'm so excited about all of them!

I included this picture because my new north star cherry tree is in the front. It's so skinny it's hard to photograph

I was raking old leaves and branches and hadn't collected them yet...oops! 

pomegranates on each trellis, and jasmine in the beds
Avocado tree on the right in front of a huge gardenia

dill, parsley, rosemary, lemon verbena

Succulents back from last year

I finally got all the herbs I was hunting for!
Cilantro, sweet basil, lemon basil, sage, lemon balm, hot and spicy oregano,
gold ruffles marjoram, lemon thyme, & german thyme 

Apple tree, blueberry, apple, blueberry, negronne fig :)

Spanish lavender, French lavender, Goodwin Creek lavender, Blueberry ruffles lavender (in the pot) all of the ones in the box are from last year except the French lavender in the bottom right. The English lavender that was there died after 2 years

herb beds, lavender, mint, boxwood basil, arbequina olive, laurel bay leaf, and a Texas sage on the right. 

This is my favorite mint - apple mint. It's SO hard to find!

The fig after only 10 days. They grow SO fast!

Lila Avocado

Rose Standard

All of my other trees are doing really well and I'm thinking I may get fruit this year. Hoping for blueberries, pomegranates, and apples! Next year I'm hoping to add a variety of columnar peach I found and maybe another olive tree.

I really love the look, smell, and feel of fresh herbs. Growing herbs is one of my very favorite things about gardening. Some day I plan to have a massive garden with beds and beds of flowers and herbs all mixed together for a glorious smelling place

Sorry for the picture overload, but I'm really loving my garden and finally feeling well enough to take care of it. I'm sure there will be more pictures in the future :)

Here's one more to make you smile. This is Annie totally passed out on Penny. The kittens are getting HUGE and are such a joy. We thought it would be absolutely insane to have 3 cats at once, but they are so good and haven't been much trouble at all. We mostly get sweet moments like these

I hope everyone had a blessed Easter! He is risen!!!