The Ultimate Vampire Resource and Directory

We woke up with sore muscles this morning, whew! Spring is in full swing now so with every sunny day we're out in the yard making improvements and preparing for planting. It's a goal of mine to get the obnoxious weeds in the rock beds under control so that involves removing the rock, replacing the weed barrier, and then dumping the rock back after it's been screened.

Shoveling rocks SUCKS but the progress we've made so far looks really nice.

This year my husband is planting asparagus which will have its own bed. I'm also testing the waters to see if he wants to build planter boxes for me but that's not a huge priority as he has other projects lined up. We've planted hundreds of flower seeds and they're all popping up now. Since we garden we have to maintain that good relationship with our local pollinators. This year I have: Snapdragons (my favorite), Zinnias, Daisies, Milkweed, Marigolds, Alyssum, and a few others I can't think of before my first cup of coffee.

Ooh also, the lilac bush we bought and planted last year is blooming and I'm way too excited about smelling the perfume every time I'm out in the yard. I positioned it where it gets the sun it wants and the wind passes through it before reaching the rest of the yard. Our fruit trees are doing fantastic after a first year that seemed a bit stressful for them, so seeing the buds and new growth is a relief!

When we installed our newest beds we used organics (wood, leaves, dead brush, etc) as the bottom layer and piled all the compost we had delivered on top. We had a big beautiful hydrangea bush that was in the way of our layout. I initially tried to arrange for the bush to be left in but it wasn't going to work so with a sad heart we dug it up and threw it in to the bottom of a bed.

By the end of the season, that hydrangea bush not only survived being dug up, it had sent up shoots to poke through the surface of everything we had used to bury it and reached the sun again. I insisted we take the clippings and now we have FOUR little hydrangea clones that will be planted at the entrance of the garden. I want to honor that strong plant :P

When the weather is good I work like crazy in the morning to get orders ready to be shipped, then I go out and work on the garden and chip away at the list of tasks we have, then by the evening I'm back in my studio room working on orders until the evening. Turning 37 and managing all of this is a wonderful feeling and one that brings me introspection, especially when I'm tired or stressed, and my husband is there loving and supporting me. It's not enough to be loved; you have to be able to accept that love and feel it, otherwise you just feel harassed and stressed.

I struggle to switch between tasks and get hyper focused but that's never a reason to be an asshole or push away love. My husband doesn't cook dinner for us because he has nothing better to do with his time, he does it because it's an act of love... Plus we get hungry.

It's weird when not being an asshole is made out to be an impossible task, but when it's your turn in that position you understand that it's a choice. Huh... Weird how that works out, isn't it?