Pets are Good for Depression!

I did better today: I was busy but I was working in a tidy living room. The kids even vacuumed.

While I was not bouncy and happy today, I was not depressed either until this evening, and then it set in.

 So, I gave my litle dog a rawhide bone at the same time I gave him his dinner! Oh, the DECISIONS he had to make! Whether to leave his food unattended and chew his bone-and we have 3 cats for him to be suspicious of- or whether to put off the pleasure of chewing his rawhide bone in order to eat his dinner!

Silly dog!

First he picked up his new toy and walked into the living room with me. Then he went back to his dinner, set the bone down, ate the dinner and took his bone back to the living room and he took it under the furniture. Where he hid it.

He must be too full of dinner to want to chew it this moment, but he WILL get back to it, LOL!

An update on my weed-free vegetable bed.

There is rather more grass than I expected, as the wind brings in some seeds. Just because you use weed free medium does not make it weed-free for ever. Still, I am VERY pleased with it! A casual pull of just a little grass whenever I harvest greens is enough to keep the weeds under control. The vegetable leaves are now touching each other, and so the grass seedlngs are gettng very little light. The vegetables are simply out-competing the grass and weeds.

The carrots are just starting to get thicker roots, which is a little later than when they are planted in our good clay soil but the plants are healthy and they will get there. I only got a few beets  from all the seeds I scattered but those beets look VERY good! I would pull them to cook beets if  had more of them: as it is I am getting HUGE beet leaves to add to my salads! I would rather enjoy weeks of big leaves than one meal of beet roots! I have let the lettuce go to seed so that I will get volenteer lettuce this fall, and the green onions are the star attraction of the garden at this time. They really are good, and every onion set appears to have taken.

The days wll be getting longer soon, and so the onions will soon bulb up. I doubt they will get very big, as right now they are still just an excellent size for green onions. No matter. If they get big I will make onion rings to DIE for, and if they are small I will cut them up for stir-fries. Both are good.

My chicks are now little red hens, and they might start laying the first of July. And, right on cue, my kids have stopped eating eggs! That is the thing with kids: first they cannot get enough of a food and then they do not want any for MONTHS! I had thought that that would stop because both of them have stopped growing, but apparently not!

Chckens are very good for a handicaped homesteader. They produce every day, and everything is light and easy to carry. They only need 5 minutes of care a day.

I get the kids to carry in the big feed sacks. Older folk with no kids simply ask for it to be placed in the car for them. Then, when they get home, they open the bag while it is still in the car and they unload it one small bucket full at a time. Since 4 chickens only need one bag of feed a month, a small flock of layers are not much work, and 4 hens will give almost 4 dozen eggs a month, if they are well-bred birds.

I had started a few patches of alfalfa to give high-protien snacks for the hens, and now I am glad that they are spaced out! Something-possibly slugs- has eaten half of the alfalfa patches! There are some bare patches and there are a few skeletenized leaves, and I have lot half of the alfalfa.

The other half, however, is strong and so I might plant more before it gets hot. Maybe. We will see!

I feel stupid, lately, and lethargic. It is the MS doing it.

To rev me up a bit I went out to mow on the riding mower. I always feel good after I have enjoyed the sun and fresh air!

I got half of the front lawn mowed and the mower quit on me! I suspect the fuel filter and so does my husband. He says it cannot be cleaned, it will have to be replaced. So I guess it is out until Monday at the earliest.

Tomorrow is Sunday, and I think that I will stay home from church and have the kids pick up the clutter. It ALSO lifts my mood when the kids have taken care of all of their stuff and vacuumed as well! And, yes, some of it is my stuff as well, so we will all be working. I think an hour of work should do it.

The MS DOES cause depression at times, but a tidy place to sit helps me to beat the blues. And, I have a library book and the makings for popcorn and ice tea. All of these things are remedies for depression, and I have found that it works on MS depression as well.

Good night!

It took them 3 days to install the floor, and it was exhausting!!!

It was only suspposed to take one or two days, and I was on pins and needles the entire time! I don't know why.

The floor was installed, the furniture moved in (After pads were attached to the bottom of the table and  chair legs), and the clutter is 80% gone. WHEW!

A problem has already show itself. A small spill of flour occured, and I was left with a thin white line where the boards joined. I was able to vaccum it up, but it is a warning that we will have to be VERY carefull when we cook, or there will be thin white lines all over the floor!

It looks wonderfull however!

DD graduated on Friday, and DS graduated on Saturday.

I need to totally rethink my life!!!!!!!

Raising 2 kids with health problems has been totally absorbing! First they get sick, which makes for school trouble, then they get caught up, then they get sick AGAIN which makes for more school problems, then they get burned out from school, then.....

You get the picture! Between getting them well again and getting them caught up in school again, I haven't been able to focus on much of anything else. Last months trip to Bennet Springs was a much welcome break from being on a get-them-well-then-help-them-with-school-repeat-as-needed treadmill!

Well, as of now they have both graduated from high school. Check.

Both are healthy. In fact, DD was taken off of her meds last week on a trial basis. So, possibly no more health problems (maybe, anyways) Check.

Both are of legal age. Check.

That means that if I dream a dream, that there might be no emergency to take me away from it. If I want to do something more for myself, I can.

Decisions, decisions!

I might try writing articles again. I haven't sent in a magazine article in years, and while I have a Squidoo account I have never published anything on it. Yet. (Squidoo publishes articles for folks to find on-line  during google searches.)

The house is in poor shape and I REALLY want to fix that! It was a lovely house when we bought it, and now it looks SO shabby! The kitchen floor was the most obvious thing, and once that is done perhaps I will find the ambition to put in more sweat equity.

Lastly, the finances need attention. We were actually in the black until 2 years ago, when everything broke at the same time and my BIL died and DS had his second surgery, and then my MIL died last June. The finances most CERTAINLY need more attention!!!!!! I have been neglecting them, and the credit card statements are showing it! Well, I am good at paying them off, but it DOES take time and attention!

So, I cannot throw very much money at the house. I *CAN* afford to pay the kids $5 an hour to help, buy paint, and.... I wonder if I can buy carpeting next winter? This carpeting came with the house, and it was new 25 years ago. It was GOOD carpeting, but now it looks old and, well, SHABBY!

That is all I am going to post today, as we are going out to dinner tonight to celebrate my youngest son's graduation.  We MEANT to go out last night after grduation, but ice cream was desired and nobody was very hungry. Also, I wa REALLY tired!!!!!!!!!!!! We ate at a place of DD's choosing on Friday, and now it is DS's turn. He wants to eat at a buffet, so off we will go!

Terri

My No-Weed Strawberry Bed.

Hey, this thing just might work!

I made a long, narrow bed (1 foot wide) by the East side of the greenhouse. There is weed barrier below and perlite as a filler. I lay strawberry plants flat on the bottom before the filler went in, and then I poked onion sets into the top of the filler. The bed is only 3-4 inches deeps.

It appears to be working! The onion sets are now tall and strong, and the strawberry plants are just starting to break the surface! The idea was for the onions to get the light that they needed by growing above the strawberries, which would spread and cover the perlite in a solid mass.

It ALMOST did not come off, as strawberry plants were hard to find! Everybody had individually potted plants at a few dollars each, instead of the bundles!

I eventually bought bare root plants off of the shelf in the hardware store right next to the gladioulus bulbs. They failed. I THEN was able to get real, live plants from The Grass Pad.... the day before we left for our trip!!!!! 

I thought that they would be fine in the fridge in their paper bag but they were not: they dried up something terrible!

I planted them anyways, and 3 plants have just broken the surface. I expect more in the next few days. Even if no more plants grow I can propagate these!

This success helps to balance out my no-dig spuds, which appear to be failing. In previous years the potatos would grow long sprouts while waiting to be planted, and I figured that I would throw woven weed barrior on top of them with just the tips poking out. I figured that potatos would form all along the sprouts.

Alas, the potatos have short, stubby sprouts this year and it is not working at ALL! I am going to plant them today as they are trying to spoil. I have no idea who will end up digging the spuds: probably whoever needs pocket money. More on that in another post.......

I have been playing hooky from the blog!!!!!!!!

I also  had a good bit of fun!

We started out by renting a cabin at Bennet Springs. And, for a REAL treat, we left the kids at home to take care of the critters. A good time was had by all!

Bennet Springs is noted for its trout fishing, but the trout did not bite. I got one and some pan fish. Mind, there is a trout hatchery there and they release trout daily, but fish are sensitive to weather and there were tornado warnings out south of us....... There were only a few showers during he day but the night time storms were wild!

We usually camp when we decide to enjoy the great outdoors, but since DH had wanted a cabin we ate hoot fod at a table while it stormed outside. It had been a very long time since we took a weekend just for fun, and I feel SO much better! I hadn't realized how discouraged I was getting.

Both of my kids will have their graduation ceremonies in the next couple of weeks. DD actually finished school almost a year ago but because of healh issues she finished late (and at another school, one with on-line high school classes)and so she did not walk down with her class.

One will graduate on the 18th and one on the 19th. I am terrified that I will somehow blow it! Arrive late, or spill something all across my front, or miss something......

I am nervous as a cat. So is DH, and for the same reason. The kids are nervous also. Oh, joy!!!!!!!

On a more homesteady tack, my kitchen floor is still plywood and the kitchen furniture is still in the living rom. See, first they did not order enough flooring and it also took 2 weeks to arrive. Then when they realized that it was short they ordered more and that took 2 weeks to arrive. Then there was minor damage done to two boxes (and also minor damage on the flooring inside the boxes) and so they are ordering more flooring. Which will arrive in.....

I am not holding my breath, here. I try not to let it get me down but I was so looking forward to hving a really good floor............

Those are the highlights, I will write more soon. I promise!

They are coming today to give me an opinion of the floor.

Though it might take them a few days to let me know if I have done it well enough: the communication with the sales staff is good but the communication with the people who come out to give estimates is simply NOT! And, us hiring them is not guarenteed. We shall see!

As far as the garden goes, little and often! I watered what was up because we had 4-5 days of 90 degree or hotter weather, and I got some coleus seeds planted in a pot.

On the household front, I think it fairly obvious that my daughter will not be working for me much longer, as she is putting in fewer and fewer hours and calling in sick far too often. I have been encouraging her to put out her application for whatever job comes up. Because summer is almost here there really are several entry-level positions being advertized, and because she is a people person I think that she would be outstanding at them. She is falling into a rut, what with part time school and a job that she does not like, and life is too short for that.

She needs to get out there and do a job that challenges her: no woman who has barely turned 19 is excited by pushing a vacuum cleaner! Accept it, perhaps, but teenagers need more stimulation than that!!!!!!!!!!!