Garden Archeology

Hello Spring! Welcome! ...please... please stay. We're begging you!

Especially since the gardening has begun!

Since we have a lot on our plate this year, we won't be tilling and putting in a vegetable garden until next year. This year we'll be more focused on learning what's already coming up here, what is dead and needs to be removed and replaced, and weeding and remulching the landscaping we have. It's very exciting but I do admit, I'll miss my garden this year. Yeah, I'll probably be too busy to give it the attention it would need to survive even if I DID have the garden, but still. I'm plant greedy. DO WANT ALL THE GREEN AND GROWING THINGS.

Moving on!

I do have some planters so there's that. I've already gone ahead and planted 2 with mixed color bell pepper seeds! Fingers crossed on those. Having fresh bell peppers for Tony that we can pick ourselves would be so amazing. Small container gardening will also be the smaller amount of work we're looking for this year.

I must also pause here to tell you the pure joy reawoken in me while planting them. The weather has been just absolutely fantastic and my leafy little heart has been all aflutter. I chose to plant on one of these beautiful days because I had a glorious open window of time. Tony and I had been out and about adventuring (windows down, baby! woooo!) and Tony needed to stop back in to the house for something.. (wallet? sweatshirt? Hell, I don't remember, it fell out of my head as soon as I thought of planting.) When he walked out the patio door to have me turn to him with dirt up to my elbows and most likely some up to my eyebrows, and both hands full of dirt, I got hit with that look he gives me that makes me stop and go "uh... what?". It's made up of 75% amusement.

The missing 25% is a matter for a different kind of blog.

Anyway, the "uh... what?" moment was just right, because it made me realize how blissfully and stupidly happy I was in that moment of dirt covered activity. It made me hungry for more planting, for more things to grow green and beautiful for me that I can share with other people.

.......

Alright that was a long pause. But I enjoyed it so it couldn't have been too bad. But here we are and we've found our way to the meat and potatoes of this post.
I had the spring (pun intended) in my step to get some yardwork done. There is a back strip in the yard that isn't accounted for in the landscaping layout we received with the house. A rogue garden! Dun dun dun! Rogue enough that I asked the previous owner what in the heck she even planted back there. Her response? No idea, it was there and it had been allowed to do its own thing.
A mystery! DUN DUN DUN!

And a buried one at that. This very small section of the yard isn't ideal, as it's in the shadow of a very large pine. Well, a bit smaller since it snapped its top off in the recent windstorm. So I became a garden archaeologist for the day.
It didn't look so bad to start, but oh. my. glob. there was a lot more leaves and needles than I thought.

Luckily for my procrastinating butt, the shoots of the plants coming up were still low and sturdy enough that raking won't damage them too bad and in most cases, not at all. Here's a tip: I used a wide plastic rake for this job. I have an adjustable metal tined rake that's very good for multiple jobs but I chose the plastic one for a few reasons. 1: The metal tined rake has very thin tines, as I'm moving pine needles, a wider tine is more desirable. 2: The plastic tines have a more forgiving flex to them which means less damage to plants.

I can't believe how big this pile is from this area.

Now I got to study the things I uncovered. I'm 90% certain that we have a large section of irises and a CRAP TON of PEONIES! *SQUEE!* My heart! Oh madre mia! Such joy! I counted no less than the sprouting of 5 peony groups. There are some plants as of yet unidentified, but once they get bigger, identification should be a snap.

Friends, I can't tell you the love I have for peonies. Had we not had them, I would have added them myself. The existing flowers are so exciting! We'll have irises, lilacs, and peonies. If they come back (they look dead) we'll have roses too. In the fall I'll be adding the tulip bulbs from the potted orange tulips we're currently enjoying. Yay Easter flowers!
Speaking of readily available Easter flowers, Tony asked about adding Asiatic lilies, and sadly I had to decline the addition suggestion. He loves them, I love them. Why not? The same reason I will never grow lavender. There are some smells I love that stab me right behind the eyes immediately. Asiatic lilies have that lingering and long wafting smell that would fill the yard and set my migraine demons on a frenzy. So only when we find one that has a smell my head can stand, will we have them.
But Amanda, lilacs and peonies are lingering and long wafting in scent, why the distinction?
I don't make the distinction. I have no idea how it works. I just know that it hurts my brain or it doesn't hurt my brain.

I'm excited to find out if the few plants I couldn't identify will be brain-busters or some joyfully colored but non-offensive garden lovelies! Make sure to check back with us for future garden updates!

Meat & Potatoes

Now that we've got that moving surprise out of the way, let's talk some more internet friends.

Alright, we're still a little on the moving thing.

Let's be fair though, moving 30 minutes away into our first home that we own is not like a small single blog post kind of event.

I'mma be selfish. Let's talk about ME! Because it's my blog about our life, and it turns out I'm a large (haha! fat!) portion of that.

Enough fluff, lady! Meat and potatoes, please!

Well, since you said please.

And meat and potatoes it has been.

Meal planning has been, to say the least, not a priority. Budgeting is always a priority especially after scraping the bottom for a home. (A damn nice one if I do say so myself) What's a stressed out, bottom scraping, house...fiance? to do?

Pork chops. Instant mashed potatoes.

I have gotten shockingly adept at cooking a flavorful and juicy pork chop. Good enough in fact, that my "flavorful" ranch mashed potatoes were exceedingly bland in comparison. In this house, adding flavor usually means adding calories. SO I FREAKING DID. Tony has a physically demanding job, so why not? I make sure he gets the larger portion of the meal because of it. Leftover mozzerella cheese, parmesan, more ranch, and seasoning salt.

Seasoning salt is magic. MAGIC. It's like the bacon of seasonings. Throw it on anything. TADA! BETTER FOOD. More salt... but BETTER FOOD! Yay! *confetti toss*

Really though, pork chops and mashed potatoes have been a life and wallet saver on a good number of meals already. Pork chops I can get 4 for under $5 and I always have a box of cheap, instant mashed potatoes.

Don't cringe at my cheap potatoes, they're better than the individual packets. The ingredient list usually only includes one thing. Potatoes.

Tony gets his veggies in, but I (not so) sadly don't. I don't include that in my description of meals because I quite honestly don't care. Vegetables and I have not become friends, I imagine we will not be friends for a while yet.

A hearty and cheap meal on backup has been really great for me. I can't tell you how much crap I have to sort through and organize in the house taking up my time. On top of that, I've picked up an addiction. A certain citrus soda of some dewy range that's highly caffeinated. I decided to kick it because A: It's an expensive (legal) addiction. (I mean it's not like it's crack. Then again I'm not sure how much crack rocks go for either so...?) B: It's terrible for me and mostly importantly C: I actually don't even really LIKE that soda. I needed a carbonated and cold drink and it was there. Now it's STUCK to me, dammit.

For 2 days, I've been trying to kick it. I. Want. To. Die. Figuratively of course. I already suffer from chronic migraines, so this has been hell. The reason I can even look at the screen to type now? I broke down and took some Excedrin Migraine. That's right. I've even held off on Excedrin for 2 days of migraines. Normally taking some for a migraine is fine, but as it has a caffeine aid in it, it would NOT be a good idea when you're trying to kick the level of jacked up I've been. Vomiting my guts out wasn't really a good idea either so I took it.

Alright I took it with a chocolate eclair, so sue me.

It was such a shame to be dying on the couch today though, as the temp sat over 60 F and was a great opportunity to clean up all the twigs in the yard and yank some weeds out of our landscaping. Our neighbor puts my landscaping enthusiasm to shame. The man already has all of his landscaping raked out, weeded, and re-mulched. AND he did it already last week. I on the other hand have been considering if I would like to put on pants and go outside.

Side note: I am a cave troll. This is just something I need to deal with. In our home, I am a sloppy nightshirt wearing, hair a rat nest in a poor excuse for a pony tail, cave troll. Do not knock on the door if you are expecting some nicely made up, polished house-wifey type. Or don't knock at all really. If we don't expect you, we don't answer. End note.

I did accomplish one tiny thing today. I pulled the bag of potting soil out of the trunk of the car. MHHMMMM. That's right. We're getting ready to plant. Since there won't be a full-fledged garden this year, I'm container gardening and we're starting with bell peppers. So stay tuned for our dirt adventures.

I'm excited. Are you excited? If you aren't, that's a shame. And also, dirt adventures are like... 50% of this blog, what are you doing here?

We love you anyway. :)

picture provided by PEXELS