Lionmom’s Musings

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Well, after a hiatus of almost all summer, I am getting back to my blog.  In that time, we have had the house painted, carpeted, weatherized; and I have been the general contractor.  I have had fun with my new garden, and that will continue through the fall, but my thoughts are finally turning toward my blog again.

Also, in the interim, I have learned the usefulness of Twitter — where else could I find real time information about the abuses and chaos relative to the Iran election…when the news channels had stopped reporting.  And where else could I talk to my sister about my new found addition to Lost in 140 characters or less.  Or talk to my son about his cycling.  Or talk to my sister’s very sick kitty.  Twitter has all of the attributes of e-mail and multiple-user instant messaging.  I’m hooked.  You are invited to Follow Me on Twitter @ lionesss2 as long as you aren’t spammy and have real content.  (I block gratuitous spammers.)

Once I get back in the swing of blogging again for real, I may gain as many followers as I have on Twitter.  I still need to follow Crowd Mountain in earnest and develop some more direction with my blog. Then, I hope to monitize it without becoming a spammer myself.

Well, it has been awhile, but I am finally getting dug out of most of the boxes and have a good portion of the improvements made.  We still need to paint, carpeting has been put on the back burner.

However, we Did install some of those solar tubes (a really cool kind of skylight that can be put almost anywhere in the house)  We installed two of them in the office and family room to increase the amount of light in the house. We want more, but that is what the budget will allow.  This helps cut lighting needs.  Our heating bill was Much higher than in our old home, so we had an energy evaluation done with some recommendations for improved insulation and weatherizing our windows better–we will probably do this this summer.  Yikes, I am starting to sound like an eco-geek…Well, this area is big on that kind of stuff!  Is solar in the future?….probably not with the cost of installation!

My newtest toy – a Kindle electronic reader (Amazon), is an eco-smart but not so budget smart  gadget…However, I am on a mission to get rid of the books that take up so much space.  This may or may not help, but it is fun to play with.

Most of the plants I brought with me are now in the ground, and the garden is looking good.  It is warmer here, and I actually have hope that my tomatoes will ripen before September.  We will see!

Settling in to my new place. I’m finally developing something of a routine. There are not nearly as many boxes. However, I haven’t touched my books, and the bookcases are still in the garage. I’m even having time to get to the gym. There is a steady progression of new things blooming in my new garden…daffodils, anemones, and some pink shrub that I have no idea what it is. We have decidd against recarpeting just now, because it actually seems to be OK and without further dog smell. The paint project is still on as is the project to install solar tubes.

Everything is a little less hectic. I have finally started looking at my much neglected web enterprise, which have suffered….and not just because the economy is tough right now! I have long been working on BANS sites, selling other people’s stuff. I just bought phpBay, which is similar to BANS, but is more integrated with Wordpress blogging. I have made some inroads in integrating blogs to my sites, but phpBay should make this even easier. Now I need to learn the software. I will keep you updated.

Well, we are now in our new home, which had also belonged to a gardener before us. The garden was one of the things that attracted me to this house in the first place. It is now near the beginning of March and already I have some spring flowers blooming…snowdrops, crocuses and some miniature irises. This is a Lot earlier than the first spring flowers in Washington…about three to four weeks earlier!

I find that they prune roses beginning now…again, about a month earlier than in Washington…and setting out peas…and a variety of other garden tasks!!

I am seeing that all kinds of things are coming up in the garden…lots of tulips and daffodils (none blooming yet). The clematises are already sending out shoots. And there are a whole bunch of things I am not sure what they are, but I have some ideas. The woman who owned the house before us gave us a partial plant list, which is nice. What will be just as nice will be the surprises. I am really looking forward to that!!!

I am still not sure just where to plant some of the things I brought with me, partly because I don’t yet know what ground is already in use and partly because I don’t know the summer sun patterns. I do want to get my strawberries in soon, so we can have some berries this summer. Some of the other things may just have to wait until after spring has progressed a little and after I get these roses pruned.

Ah, yes, it Will be a new gardening adventure!!

After a crazy two weeks of getting the movers to get our stuff, waiting for the sale to close on our new home, getting moved in and having to go back to work in another state to train my work replacement, I am Finally moved in and settling down a bit. We have workmen in fixing stuff. I am trying to get those really neat SolaTubes installed. We need to paint the interior. What we didn’t anticipate is having to change the carpet because of dog odor, so we are also shopping for that. It is still crazy, but we are REALLY on the downhill slope now!!! Then, maybe I can get down to a little gardening!!

We are on the home stretch with our move and I am still gardening away. This last weekend, I decided that the landscape job still needed some cleanup, so I went out hosed down the muddy pathways, and the rocks in the culvert and moved some of the rocks. There were also a couple of things that looked unfinished (because I had not asked for them to be done), so I went out and bought three heathers and planted them in front — It looks nice, if I do say so myself. The primroses are still unplanted and I May just take them with me when we move. I also cleaned up the beds in back a little more, even though they had already been worked on. And all of this in 35 degree weather–nasty. Then I took out half of the strawberries we want to take with us, and planted them in a pot. These are really fantastic strawberries!!! Most of my bulbs are already up except for my tulips and bluebells. My red flowering currant is showing promising buds…too bad I won’t have one where we are moving. And why am I doing all this for someone who gave me such aggravation?? I’m compulsive, and I want it to look nice! That’s why!! Next stop, my new home and planting stuff I dug up!!

Well, this is it! My house, we think, has sold. The buyer is sticking. We are a week away from closing. I have boxes stacked 3-4 high in all parts of the house (and the packers haven’t even gotten here yet.) The landscaper has completed his job, And cleaned up! Looks Really Nice!

Since I am paranoid, I will believe it next Monday, when the papers have all been signed and we are officially tenants in our own home for the next two days until the movers come. I have given notice at work and we have hired someone. I need to come back a week after the move to train the new person. Then, I will officially be retired!!! (Until I am either bored or poor or both.)

New on the homefront. The sale of my house seems to be sticking – the buyer signed off on the last contingency the other day. AND The landscaper finally finished putting in the new sod. The results are terrific. (Yes, they Can lay sod in my Zone 8 location in winter, although we did have some pretty nasty weather at the start of the project.)

The house we are moving to has a very nice garden as well, but, of course, I have some favorite plants that I have wanted to take with me. So I have been digging up plants I want to take, making divisions of others, repotting some things that could take a smaller pot, and unpotting some of the bulbs to make them easier to transport. We have dozens of things we are taking, yet still leaving behind lots and lots of plants. I have a friend who is fostering some of the plants until I can get moved into my new home in Oregon.

In repotting some of the plants into smaller pots, I was able to dump some of the soil into spots that needed it. Some of the bulbs I removed from pots had so much growth on them that I left them there. We have some very nice strawberries, that I want to take some of. I plan to dig up about half of the strawberries and leave the rest for the new owner. These were no-name strawberries that are some of the best I have ever had.

Now will come the challenge of what to do with the plants on the other end. The woman we bought the house from is a gardener too, and I will need to find places for my things. Such a problem! But this is the kind of problem I like!!! Maybe we are seeing some light at the end of the tunnel after all.

If you have been reading this blog, you know about my home sale saga and the fiasco with having a landscaper modify a few things in my yard. Nevertheless, there are some other things going on in my garden which at least bring some bright spots in the middle of such craziness.

I love my winter garden, and right now, in mid January, my beautiful witch hazel is in full bloom with glorious yellow fringe flowers, my hellebores are beginning to bloom and my sarcacoca is showing a promise of tiny white flowers ready to bloom and send an intoxicating perfume across the yard, and the garden centers are already selling brilliant primroses ready for the garden.

And I’ll bet you thought you couldn’t have beauty in the garden in winter!! Well, I will tell you that my winter garden is one of the things I really wanted to cultivate, because I Can have beauty just when all the other gardens on the block are dormant. Where is this, you ask?? In a Southern clime, you imagine. No, I am up here in the Pacific Northwest in Washington state – soon to move to Oregon. We have a Zone 7-8 climate (cold factor in the low teens to high single digits). I am having all of these beauties, and the crocuses won’t even bloom for another two and a half months. I certainly plan to replicate my winter bloomers in Oregon.

If you like the thought of having things blooming in mid winter, check with your garden center or Extension for the types of plants that will bloom in your area. I sure love the winter interest long before the first snowdrop or crocus.

I am still holding my breath, but so far, the buyer seems to be sticking. We have had the home inspection with what looks like fairly normal repairs needed. We Finally told the landscaper to finish his job, and that is coming along. We finally stopped making the house look like “Home Beautiful” and are starting to pack stuff!! We Might just make this stick, and get to move on time withoug having to rent out our house after all. It is Still not a done deal, because we have not yet signed the final papers, but it looks encouraging.