House Projects

Every time I come on here, I realize it's been a while since my last post... well I've been busy with house projects! I closed on May 31 and June 1 my tomatoes were planted in the ground and away I go!

So let's start with project #1: my jungle.  The previous owners were all into gardening, but they hadn't been here in over 6 months.  My goal was to have some sort of veggie garden for the summer and start planting pretty things in the spot right up against the house (there's about an acre of other garden space that needs to be tackled, but that's more long term). 

May 31: lots of snakes and other things. 

My awesome dad came up for closing and took me on a Home Depot shopping spree.  He bought me a sting trimmer which made short work of the jungle.  Dad also loves destruction, so he went to town on the jungle as shown in the next picture.  

June 1: after the carnage

I had a ton of tomato seedlings I started at my old apartment that I was determined to plant at my new place.  In the middle of the jungle, we found these 2 raised beds and I made the middle bed with wood, rocks, and bricks I found around the property.  The soil was already beautiful, but I added 2 large bricks of peat moss to fill out the beds. 

Tomatoes, basil, eggplant, and butternut squash. 

Something I've discovered about myself over the past few years is that I love gardening.  Growing up I always got dragged to various nurseries and garden centers and hated it.  Now I've learned that I share my mother's love of pretty flowers.  After whacking the jungle, I made a goal of clearing a little every day.  I cleared this nice little spot and found the granite and rock steps going up to the spigot.  So far I've planted foxglove, salvia, assylum, zenias, dahlias, black-eyed Susans, (not pictured) phlox, and red yarrow.  I also stole a pretty crimson flowering something or other from my friends' new house.

Mid June plantings!

One of the most challening things for me with the whole house thing is not tackling everything at once.  It's a process and everything will happen in time.  I've taken off the 2 days after July 4 to finish painting my living room and make window treatments.  Projects after that: paint bedroom and tile the shower (yikes!).

Holy shit, I bought a house!

Yes it's been a while....

If you would have asked me a year ago if I'd be finalizing the contract on a house today, I'd say you're crazy. I always said it was my goal to buy a house by the time I'm 30 and guess what, with some great financing and wonderful interest rates I'm halfway there! I found a lovely little house perched on a wooded hill in the Mad River Valley. 3 bedrooms, 1 bathroom, 4.5 acres! Enough for running space for Daisy, perhaps a few chickens, and a kick ass garden this summer.

Hmph.

Where have I been since June 9? Let's see... Georgia, Connecticut, Seattle, home to Vermont, then going back to Italy tomorrow.

Do you like travel? Want to trade lives? I'm seriously over living out of a suitcase, even if I do get to go to Italy like every other month.

I just want to live in my apartment and bring my dog back to Vermont.

Ok, pity party over. Meh.

What do you do while wearing your pearls?

I love my pearls. I have two necklaces - a string of black pearls and a string of cultured white pearls. Growing up in the South, all the "proper" ladies wore a string a pearls. (Ok you lude people out there, get that alternate pearl necklace image out of your head.) When I think of a lady wearing a pearl necklace, I instantly think of someone like June Cleaver, a total throwback to the '50s nuclear household with a mom in a apron in the kitchen making dinner while wearing her pearls.

I have no family to make dinner for and I work in food plants so I can't exactly wear my pearls to work. On the rare occasions I do, I end up doing things far from making dinner. Like today I wore my white pearls to work, then came home and disassembled the doorknob to my front door while wearing my pearls. Or yesterday I installed my new air conditioner while wearing the black pearl necklace. Sometimes the dog gets a bath while I'm wearing the pearls. Back in college my boat was racing in an important national regatta. One of my rowers raced in her pearl necklace.

So clearly I am not June Cleaver, but I love aprons and I love my pearls. Pearls are classic and will always be beautiful despite the changing roles of those wearing them.

What do you do while wearing your pearls?

Advice for travelling

1) When you go to a restaurant, do not ask for the English menu. Figure things out the best you can from the native language menu and be surprise. I had ox tail tonight where normally I probably wouldn't order ox tail. It was fabulous! Though I did feel bad because I didn't eat much of the risotto because I was saving room for dessert.

2) Know how to say please and thank you in the language of wherever you are.

3) What the local channels instead of BBC or CNN. You might learn something.

Where am I?

Wow, long time no post. I'm sitting here in JFK, waiting on my 7:15 flight to Milan. Yes, Milan, Italy. For work. No joke. Doesn't it drive you crazy when people write 2-3 word "sentences" for effect?

Anyway, April and May are a flurry of business travel. I spent all of April and the first week of May in Knoxville, TN for work, only returning home for one weekend. The other weekends were spent at my parents' house in Georgia, or working. I finally went home on Tuesday and here I am today, Friday, sitting in another airport.

I am spending the next two weeks on Lake Como for work. I will have some free time, but the main priority is to complete factory acceptance tests on some equipment. Sounds glamorous, but when you've been at home for a total of 5 nights since April 3, it's hard to be excited.

What a little bitch.

I've been in Tennessee for work for the past 4 weeks. My kind next door neighbor took care of Daisy for 3 of those 4 weeks. The last week she stayed at a local doggie daycare. I was able (despite flight diversions and cancellations) to come home every weekend to take care of Daisy and go skiing, so I thought she'd be fine when I was home for longer than 3 nights. Wrong. My little 15 lb dog opened the cabinet under the sink, pulled out the trashcan, pulled out the bag and its entire contents, just to get to a Styrofoam tray that once held some chicken. The trashcan is 5 times bigger than she is. I guess she's just one strong little bitch.