Summer Time Crazy

Hey Mom! Look at this!

Hey people! Things are just busy and crazy and I'm running here and there. I am so behind on blogging, I just haven't been in the mood. I haven't even created anything for weeks. I have been reading some instructional books and am plenty inspired but not taking time to do anything. I don't know where the time is going.

Summer gets here and I'm outside so much and swimming lessons for Asher 3 days a week, the Farmers Market the other 2 days plus Saturday! I really can't use that as an excuse though... I've only been going to the one on Thursdays. I took my little man with me each time. He has mixed emotions about it... haha. He was actually trying to sell my magnets this last time, so cute. He tells me that it was sorta fun, but if his daddy asks him then he says it wasn't very fun. No choice though due to schedules. It won't kill him and hopefully he'll inherit my entrepreneurial spirit.

I am so unorganized that getting everything together has been a chore and my husband doesn't want me to leave my things out, where getting it all back in the van would be so much easier! Instead I have to trudge it all back upstairs, boxes and bags this and that. I really ought to streamline my booth. I'm about done selling the tomato plants, they take up so much room and are a hassle to take back and forth to the markets because they've gotten so big but I can't hardly give them up, they're like my babies... haha

1st Day of Farmers Market in Wadesville and my little salesmen

I had a scare this weekend with Asher. We all went out to eat Saturday night and my husband was rubbing on ASher's neck and discovered a lump. I freaked out. This kinda shit always happens on a weekend doesn't it? I had to wait to this morning to call the doctor. She got us in this morning and eased my mind right away. She asked if he recently had a tick and he had. In fact it worried me because it swelled up the next morning quite a bit and stayed swollen for a about a week. I never linked the two. His lymph nodes were swollen and they are just basically doing their job. What a relief.

We have lots of ticks around here and it's rare that he comes in at night when he's outside all day to not have one crawling around on him. I've picked plenty off myself including a few in areas I'll not mention! I'm a bug smorgasbord. I've currently got chigger bites, mosquito bites and tick bites. Oh well, I'm just happy it's summer!

who's this cute little guy?

So what's going on with you all? Are you staying as busy as I am??

cute little guy

Koi Pond - A new beginning Part One

I want to share with you the making of our new koi pond. It is a work in progress right now and it consumed several days out of our "stay-cation" last week, haha! Up until my hubby hurt his neck and sadly, it sits... patiently waiting. So here it goes!

so here's our old pond, kinda looking tired and sad after years of neglect.

view from other side - still same old pond only being emptied

 So, we discovered a month or so ago that our pond was losing water. After figuring out the tears in the liner were pretty down low, I had the fantastic idea to move the pond out from under our deck (where it shouldn't have been in the first place!) so we could see it from our deck and I could finally grow some glorious lotus (hopefully) and other pond plants.

just a short jaunt to the left - our new location for the pond

rough layout for the new pond - I was going for an organic shape

I laid it out with a trusty garden hose and went up on the deck to check it out. Looks good to me!

Breaking ground

Having a backhoe it a definite plus on the digging part.

almost done digging mechanically

 It didn't take long to get all we could get with the backhoe. Next was the hand digging and leveling. Yes, I jumped in there and slung dirt too. I've probably got liver damage from all the Ibprofren I've taken... haha

So I don't have many pictures of it in between here as we cut, glued and laid down our liner then schlepped it to the hole, because hubby was not too keen on me stopping to grab my camera every 30 minutes, plus it was 96 degrees (F) and I had sweat rolling down the crack and everywhere else you don't want it... ew. You wouldn't believe how heavy that stinkin' thing is. I think I ruptured my spleen heaving it up on the wagon.

Asher wore out

We even had broken child labor laws I'm sure by having Asher help shovel loads of sand. He is a little sand shovelin' machine! But he loved to feel important by helping and he really did do us a favor by staying in the back of the truck and shovel sand into buckets for us to level the liner. We worked until about 10:30 that night.

not too wore out to do tricks for the camera

happy fish

While we emptied the old pond, we had to keep the fish in a holding tank - an old pre-formed pond I had from a long time ago so they were really happy to discover this ocean of a new pond. The reason we had to remove them was because we put the dirt in the old hole.

curiosity killed the...

Here's Lightning checking out the fish wondering if they are supper. haha

All one day's hard work

Hubby and Asher admiring the work we had done, and watching Lightning

view from deck

The next morning I got this picture and was happy to see the fish happily swimming along. We have 5 fish, 2 are blackish bronze and may never be seen again!

go the pole in for the electric box

This was part of the boring part, but needed. Installing the electric. Luckily hubby is multi-talented. See the little orange koi showing off for the camera?

adding electric box for pump

Another scorcher and to add insult to injury there are these nasty little knats that fly up your nose in your ears and buzz all around you that literally drive you mad. Skin So Soft to the rescue. Too bad it breaks me out, but sacrifces... ya know? Plus it made hubby smell better ;)  remember... still 96 degrees F.

playing in the bubbles as we add more water

The white and black koi fish is our largest. I think it's a she, we've had babies but not in the previous pond. Hopefully we'll get more babies as I get plants and the pond matures. Not sure where the time went and what we did in between these pics but before I knew it, we were building the first waterfall and it was dark. Yes, those rocks are heavy!

waterfall #1 made of Kentucky flagstone (limestone? sandstone?

close up - ahhh if you could only hear it.

Really, if you could hear it... heaven. Trickle, trickle and the bull frogs singing to each other. So relaxing. We are going to add more of the same rock all around the perimeter of the pond. I hope I have enough. Rock is really expensive! We don't have this kind around us or on our property to dig up, too bad.

We actually have another waterfall built but I haven't taken pictures of it yet. I'll post them soon. Hubby's vacation is over now (good thing, he was working me like a dog), so back to our normal schedule but stay tuned for more as the koi pond slowly progresses!

Paint Party Friday Week 12

So, summer has hit here in full swing and I have been slacking big time on the blog. If I didn't get a chance to visit you this last time from PPF (Paint Party Friday), I'm so sorry and I'll be by this week for sure to see both installments.

This PPF, I'm showing my finished painting from last week which was from my May installment of Sisterhood of the Traveling Sketchbooks.

Next week the Farmer's Markets start and I'm seriously considering doing it again to sell some artwork. There are actually 3 in my vicinity of 15 minutes away each way. I'd better get my paintbrush fired up! If you're thinking what does artwork have to do with Farmer's Markets? then you are not aware of it apparently being a trend. To be fair, I am selling plants, too. I'm also trying to stick to artwork that is related to this type of theme this year. Hey, that may be a perfect place for my pastel peppers from a few weeks ago! They invite crafts people and artisans to help generate interest since most of the produce isn't available yet (in our area). Are there any of you that have good luck selling your artwork at a Farmer's Market? I've done it before with limited success. Click here on this Farmer's Market to see my set up for last year and the year before.  I plan to make my booth more attractive for sure cause it looks pretty lame. I'd love to here any of your tips, tricks or stories about Farmer's Markets and sprucing up my booth :) 

Happy Friday Gang!

Paint Party Friday Week 11!

Who was this girl? I have forgotten.

Yahoo! It's Paint Party Friday! I've got a WIP (work in progress) today. This is me as a young bride (back in 1994!). It is a small portion of a Sisterhood of the Traveling Sketchbooks journal page. This is my entry for the month of May in Lori's book. I got her book in the mail earlier this week and it is so colorful and pretty and revealing! hee hee...

Join in the fun, all you need to do is create something, post about it and link up on the PPF blog. Then you go and visit the other artists posts. It's very inspiring and will get your creative juices flowing!

Thanks to everyone visiting from PPF! :)
Have a great weekend my friends!

I'm a busy bee!

I have been MIA for a while now. I'm sorry I haven't really given any kind of explanation. I show up for Paint Party Friday and that's nearly it.

Life has been a whirlwind. A gardening whirlwind! I've been trying to sell my heirloom tomato plants and get my veggie garden planted along with picking out gorgeous new plants for my flower gardens. I always go overboard on the flowers. It's my weakness and I can hardly say no. So I thought I'd share some of my garden with you.

part of my veggie garden - just starting out

other part of veggie garden - corn and beans just peeking their heads out of the soil to the left

Now these pics aren't from the new flowers I've bought, I'll post pictures for those as soon as I finish planting. I take my time, carefully deciding where each little beauty will take its place in my beloved gardens. I set the plant in pot in gardens and step back to see if I like the color and texture combinations. It takes me forever, but I so enjoy it.

The Swing Garden

The above picture is my Swing Garden. I love the roses on here. My favorite being the climber on the left. It was a start from my mother. The only one I've been able to keep alive of all the rose starts she gave me. She could put a stick in the ground and I swear it would grow. She always called this Seven Sisters.

Siberian Iris

just a pretty red rose - I don't recall the name

a vigorous phox - I keep spreading it around cause it just keeps spreading!

peony

I have big plans for the Farmer's Markets around here but I am dreadfully behind on everything. I want to get back to painting my painted pots that I like to do and wanted to sell them with herbs and plants in them this year.

Oh, I wanted to show you also my finished graduation card that I made. Some may know it didn't quite get the warm reception from the recipient that I hoped for, but hey she's 18 and it didn't have any cash in it... haha   But it does make me feel good that as soon as I listed it on my Etsy shop, it sold! woohoo!

I have a mystery plant that I would love for anyone to help me identify. I went to pick them out and thought better of it. It just looks like it should be a flower. But I have no idea what it would be. I don't have anything that looks like this that I have found. It may be a bunch of weeds, who knows.

? Do you know what this is?

 Thanks for taking the garden walk with me :)  Oh, also my son had his last day of Pre-School! More pics are on my Facebook.

Asher and his little crush ~ her name is Piper... how cute are they?!

Speaking of Facebook, I finally made myself a page for my heirloom tomato plants. If you want, look me up... it's called Jaime's Heirloom Tomato Plants. Till next time...