Take It Easy

I'd said I was going to take it easy yesterday, and I did.  In fact, I took it so easy I completely forgot to blog.  I thought about it once, but checked the clock and said, "I still have time."  The next time I even thought about blogging was after I'd gone to bed.  

Nothing so exciting happened that made it worth getting out of bed just to write a post, so you got a break from my drivel.  Indeed, the most exciting thing that happened was that I made nine more half pint jars of pickled peppers.  

I figured pickled peppers would be more useful than pepper jelly, though I do have enough jars to make one more batch of the jelly.  I'll probably do that before this weekend is over, as well. 

It's a good thing I made that last harvest, because I lost one more pepper plant to that fungus or whatever it is.  

I pulled it up and added it to my new hot compost bin.  Eh, it's probably time to pull them all up anyway, since I've decided not to try to overwinter these.  I think I'm going to do that this evening after the sun sets and it cools off a bit. 

This morning I cut down those three oldest tomato plants and only have this one little one left in that bed --and the basil, of course. 

I chopped them up and put them into the hot compost as well because they were in that same bed with that glob of ....whatever it is.  I think it's some kind of mold or fungus, but I'm not really sure.  It doesn't matter.  The heat in that bin ought to kill whatever it is. 

Speaking of heat, I am just about finished cleaning out that shed.  I've got a few more things to get down out of the rafters, then I can call the clean up man.  Meanwhile, I pulled this bin of stuffed animals and Beanie Babies out to sort through them.   

I'm going to donate most of them, but first, I set them out into the sunlight to air out, because they were quite musty after being in that storage building for over a decade. 

But this guy right here, his name is Bennie and he's not going anywhere.  

Bennie is the first teddy bear I ever had, and believe it or not, I didn't get him until the Christmas I was 16.  Bennie has been everywhere with me, even to Italy when I was stationed there.  He's been my friend, my confidant, my supporter throughout it all.  Bennie was there for me when no one else was.  Nope, he's not going anywhere. 

Anyway, I've got one more bin out in that shed that I need to bring inside and sort out.  If it's anything like the others, most of that stuff I will get rid of.  There is a shop here in town called Another Man's Treasure that I'm probably going to take all my trash to.  

Trash...Get it?  One man's trash...OK, whatever.  If it's something I think someone can use, I'll take it up there.  If it's garbage, then it will go into the garbage. 

That brings us to today.  I was already getting a bit stir crazy, so I decided to go do my weekly shopping just to get out of the house a minute.  I know I was making fun of it last week, but I gave in and got me some.  

I was almost out of Dawn anyway, so might as well get the fun stuff.  That's my story and I'm sticking to it.   

While I was there, I bought a new mum for my front porch.  I transplanted it into a regular pot as soon as I got it home, taking a clue from Ben at GrowVeg.  He said to use a coffee filter in the bottom of your pot. which will keep the potting soil contained, but will still allow for drainage. 

It'll stay here on the back porch tonight, so it can get over transplant shock.  

Then I'll move it to the front porch and put it into direct sunlight. 

Kindly disregard the state of my porch.  Getting it swept and power washed is on the list, but it's going to have to wait until it's not so hot.  

And finally, the hummingbirds are in full migration mode.  I'm having to re-fill my feeder every single day.  In fact, when they first started migrating, I thought my feeder had cracked and all the nectar was leaking out.  I threw it away and now I'm thinking I shouldn't have done that.  Oh well, it's too late now. 

Thank goodness I had a spare feeder I could put out.