Another Cloudy Tuesday

[Colliemom]

Good Morning everyone. Another cloudy damp day in store for northern Michigan. Temp is 45°. Been keeping busy, running errands for gardening stuff, made couple wood flower planting boxes, transplanted Wild Geranium, bought a flat of Pansies as they love this kind of weather. Will plant in planter boxes that will sit inside of wood ones, had a fun outing with neighbor to our old church, turned performing arts center to see an art show fund raiser. Just a mixed bag of this and that type stuff.

Pepper plant is growing slow but sure. It might get outside for some sun and warmer temps this week, during the day at least.

Barbie, that women sounds like she is one of those people who tries to get refunds or free services by manipulating and intimidating people who offer services for what she wants. She probably liked her son’s haircut but she didn’t want to have to pay for it. So she raised cane and got some of her money back and just about walked out the door for free. Don’t be upset about it, you probably got duped by a con artist. I also answered your question about what’s in back of my house in my Fence project thread and added a couple pictures.

Laundry this morning, Sanding and staining of the wood flower boxes on agenda today and whatever else I decide to get into. Have a nice dsy all.

[Shirlv]

Morning Sue and All, cloudy, predicted 67°. Weather is making me crazy, high yesterday was 81°. Nothing exciting happening. Family wanted to go out to dinner for Mother’s Day but I passed. Traffic and restaurants will be very crowded. We decided a Happy Hour at the Fushermans Crab Deck sounded a better choice. Be safe

[Acadianmom]

Shirl, I'm with you on eating out on a holiday. My son wanted to know what I wanted for Mother's Day. I told him I just wanted my Uber driver to come get me when I have trouble and my dog sitter. lol

I'm dressed but haven't made it out to feed yet. The barn cats probably wonder what happened. My neighbor usually feeds about 6:00 in the morning. I haven't talked to his wife so hope his trip is going good.

The radar shows rain across the top of the state but not suppose to rain here. Parts of my yard is getting crunchy. I haven't tried walking bare foot but I think there are stickers because there are places Sugar doesn't want to walk. There is probably something I can put out to kill the stickers. One year I put out some weed killer in the yard and killed almost everything because most of it was weeds. My yard use to be a pasture.

Martha

[Shirlv]

Martha, #2 daughter always buys me a gift. Her husband would give me a handwritten IOU for every occasion. It would specify how many hours of labor. I loved it. He passed away at 37 so heaven has another angel.

[OregonLuvr]

Good morning, just been doing some housecleaning this morning, now getting ready to make some spaghetti sauce. I like to have some in the freezer so all I have to do is cook my pasta in the micro with my Fasta Pasta (a favorite kitchen item). It was a toss up between a meatloaf or sauce.....sauce won today.

Supposed to be a nice couple of days so might get outside to stir up my garden dirt as soon as it dries out a bit more. Next week I will pick up some more potting soil and some geraniums and pansies at Home Depot. Need to get my vegetables after I till the garden area tho.

[Irmi]

Hi ladies!

Shirl & Karen, your talk about gardening has convinced me to do something, too. I have the root ends of green onions sitting in water. I want to get some tomato plants and will go from there. I appreciate all your encouragement.

We are residents of Florida, as of today. We got the tags for the pickup truck and I got my license transferred from MD to FL. I only needed my birth certificate, marriage certificate, social security card, a bill with my name and FL address on it and my MD drivers license. I actually think I may have forgotten something, but believe it or not, I had everything with me that they required. When Steve got his FL license last summer, all he needed was his MD license. Oh well, it's done. It hasn't all been easy and I hope we never move again, but we survived this one.

The weather is still nice. If I can Steve off his laptop, I would like to start planning some day trips. Let me see if I can encourage him!

[Bethers]

Barbie, my mind has wandered to that terrible customer several times since reading about her. I agree that she deliberately caused trouble. Don't let it eat at you. You have do many customers following you from shop to shop and you get great tips. Those are the people to remember.

I'm freezing. I just walked Ty and it's in the low 50's and mostly sunny BUT winds are 20 mph... Don't want to know what the gusts are. Just cold! It looks like the winds will be with us for the next week plus. I don't remember when, all of a sudden, last year the winds calmed. But I know they did. And I'm still showing 5 nights definitely below freezing overnight in the next week.

Ok, done complaining. I still like the guests which make the hours easier. And there's lots of down time.

[BarbaraRose]

Hi gals!

Yesterday I decided I needed a little mini vacation and made reservations for a night up in Idyllwild in the local mountains. Only just over an hour drive from me.
Came up this morning and headed to town to do some retail therapy. Lots of cute shops here, many New Age/spiritual/rock shops here which I love so that was fun! Came back to the...

Oops! Gotta go pick up my giant "cookie"! Be right back!...

Anyways, got checked into my cottage this afternoon. It has an electric fireplace so it makes it cozy in there. Last night I cooked up some hamburger to make sloppy joes to bring with me, so I had that for lunch. Later, I went back to town to check out some more shops. Picked up a couple more things. Shops were closing around 5pm so I headed back to the cottage.
When I pulled in I had noticed a giant tree had been cut down and the trunk pieces were laying on the ground. There were three guys there so I stopped to ask about getting a thin slab of the tree trunk. It is a beautiful red color of wood! They told me it is a Sequoia tree that the utilily company had taken down due to being too close to power lines and the tree was dying so they decided to remove it. These guys were just gonna take the trunk pieces to make boards from. They said for $50 they would cut me a nice 2" thick "cookie" (it is over 2 feet in diameter). I agreed and they just called to tell me my "cookie" was ready, so I went to pick it up. I guess I have to let it dry out for awhile before I can do anything with it. That's fine. It is just beautiful! Sequoia's are protected so it is rare to be able to get a piece like this!

This area is also full of Manzanita trees which are blooming right now. I walked around the grounds here and found a small dead branch of one that I will take home and paint to look like the original reddish bark. I love how gnarly the branches are on them!

Another thing I am seeing up here are tons of Lilac trees, also in full bloom right now! I haven't seen one since I moved from Minnesota! I love the smell of them! All the one's I have seen here are purple, except one (the only Lilac on the property where I am staying), which is white. We had a couple white Lilacs in our yard when I was growing up and it was my mom's favorite color of them! I was thinking of her, when I saw these white ones, and they just happen to be right out in front of my cottage. I picked a couple small stems to put in my room (shh! Don't tell anyone! ).

Yesterday, I only did 5 haircuts all day and the last one was a lady who brought in her young son for a haircut. When I got done, she came over and said I did a great "fade" cut on him and she was so happy! That made my day! I really needed to hear that, especially after the fiasco the day before.

Now I am gonna make another sloppy joe and then read some of the books I have. I brought 3 with me and have 3 more (used ones) that I bought today.

Tomorrow, I plan to go to a little cafe down the street for breakfast and then go hiking at the nature preserve near town. Also will go check out the little lake about 5 miles north of town. It is really pretty and has a trail around it. Will leave for home in the afternoon. My mood and energy level is already better today.

The temps up here are in the mid 60's and it is perfect! Will be in the 40's tonight but another perfect day tomorrow. It is pushing 100* back home. It is so nice to have a place like this to get away from the heat that is so close but so different! Such a beautiful little mountain town! And the mayor is Max, the Golden Retriever! Their motto here is "We follow the Golden rule here!" They do seem to have an obsession with Big Foot here lately. Everything in many of the shops is Big Foot related. I guess some guy up here dressed up like Big Foot and walks around town, so they are all about that now! I prefer bear stuff, personally. I just don't want to run into either of them while hiking up here!

Time to eat! Have a good night!

[JudyJB]

I love lilacs, also, Barbie, and really miss them. Our yard in Michigan had a lot of old trees in it, so we did not have any lilacs because they need sun, but i remember sneaking around to steal a small branch or two when i was a kid. Still might be tempted to do that!! Smell is incredibly lovely. When we moved into our first house, the first thing I planted was a lilac bush!

[Pooker]

Lilacs! Oh, yes, there's nothing like them. California has a lilac, but it's not like the colder climate ones, so when we bought the house with a pretty good size lot, I lugged a rooted piece of my mother-in-law's huge bush from New England. Everyone said the back east lilac wouldn't survive in our hot, dry climate, but she didn't know she wasn't supposed to live! Miss that bush. From time to time, if the winter temps got too hot I'd dump a tray of ice cubes around the base. I remember my grandmother had a huge patch of lilacs like an island 7 or 8 feet across in the center of her yard.

My DIL is trying to keep my patio plants alive while I'm recuperating from the pacemaker procedure. I'll probably lose them come the dry, hot summer here in So. Cal, but I do have a few baby cherry tomatoes coming and the strawberries have runners with tiny buds. The flocks aren't doing well and the poor mini lemon looks pretty sad, but the rosemary thrives no matter what Mother Nature throws at it. Last summer I had a portable beach tent as well as my umbrella table trying to protect the plants on the patio, but the heat got them. Probably because the metal shed from next door is white and the patio cement is light, too, so I'm guessing the radiant heat does them in. Oh, well, I try.

Evie