Garden Update

It's time for a little garden update. I do not have any pictures, sorry.

Hot Pepper Wax, I think this stuff works. Other than the pea plants and one sunflower that were eaten by those bunnies prior to the spray, I have not loss any plants. The strange thing is the lettuce mix was totally undisturbed(even before the spray). I have always thought that bunnies like lettuce, guess I was wrong. I am actually tempted to get 2 carrots, spray one with the pepper wax and leave the other one as is then put it in the garden and see if the bunnies would eat the one without spray.

We've got lettuce, bok choy(a type of Chinese green), mibuna(a type of Japanese green) and radishes. I started harvesting them 2 weeks ago. Tomato plants are growing but it will be a while before we get any tomatoes. I just planted jalapeno and bell peppers yesterday. I replanted some more peas and they are just starting to sprout.

That's all for now from my little garden in upstate New York.

Pay It Forward

Last Saturday we drove pass Wal-Mart and hubby pointed at the parking lot and said "those people have been there since Tuesday". I looked over and there were 2 trucks parked and it was a family of 4 with 2 big dogs. I could clearly see that they were "staying" at Wal-Mart parking lot because the trucks were packed with their belongings.

Without sounding too corny, I would like to tell you how much I love my husband and one of the reasons why is that he has a very kind heart. He is a very tough guy and he acts that way too. He swears like a sailor or a trucker(no offence to all the sailors & truckers, he used to be a trucker himself). Sometimes people think he is a hard-ass. But he is a very kind man and he would do anything he could to help other people(his friends or even strangers).

Yesterday he called me at work and said that he just had to stop to find out why those people were "staying or camping out" at Wal-Mart parking lot. He found out that they came from South Carolina. Ray and his sons were offered a job to work with a local custom home builder. So they packed up their belongings and moved from SC to NY to persue this new job. Little did they know that the company went bottoms out recently and the owner is actually facing some criminal charges. So with no jobs and not a lot of money, they were not able to find an apartment to live in(having the 2 big dogs don't really help with apartment searching. I know how hard it is because I have gone through it myself, trying to find a place to live that would allow not one but 2 big dogs). They tried to stay in a local motel that would allow dogs but it's getting expensive staying there daily. So they went to Wal-Mart and asked if they could just kinda camp out there for now.

So hubby called me later yesterday and said that we may not have much but we could offer them a hot meal and maybe a shower and asked if I would be ok with it. Of course I would be ok with it! Other people had helped us out before when we needed it and we should always pay it forward. So he invited them over for dinner and he also offered them a job for now(helping him with his landscaping projects) until they find a full time job. Later yesterday we discussed over dinner and told the family that they are welcome to stay for a little while at our home until they can get back up on their feet. We only have 2 bedrooms but we have a huge yard. So, we asked our neighbors from 2 doors down if we could borrow their pop-up camper and let the boys stay in the camper in our yard and the dogs can stay there too. Our neighbors were very glad to help.

Ray and his family were very grateful and kept thanking us. They kept asking if there is anything they could do for us. We told them to just pay it forward.

I know some poeple will think we are nuts for inviting some strangers to our home. Even Mike's best friend made a comment yesterday to me: "Is he nuts? He doesn't know these people, he could get robbed". Well, if everyone thinks this way then this would be a really terrible world! We already have plenty of problems like school shootings, sexual predetors, killings....someone somewhere has to do something kind to keep the world going. If we got robbed then so be it, at least in our hearts we know we are trying to do a good deed.

So my dear readers, do something nice and kind to someone you know or don't know and ask them to pay it forward.

Heat, Heat, Go Away!

Heat, heat, go away, come again some other day. No scratch that, don't come again some other day.

I hate the heat. I can't stand it being so hot. Kristin at Going Country had a similar post about the heat last week. The heat makes me so grouchy. It makes my husbby moody(he is the same way, hate the heat). Even my dogs don't like anything about it!!! They would go out and do what they needed to do outside and hurry back in the house. I don't blame them, who wants to be outside in this kind of humid & hot weather? My poor girls, with the hair that they have, it's like wearing a winter jacket at this time of the year.

Yesterday we decided to clean the car in the garage, so the girls(my dogs, I always refer them as the girls) decided to get out of the house and hang with us outside. June, as always, found a spot underneath the truck and dug herself a hole in the dirt to stay cool. Samantha stayed close to us so that she could get hosed with cold water.

1 more day of 90 degrees weather and we will get a "break" of cooler temp. Arrrggghhh, I need a pool!!!

Friday 5

Just for fun this Friday, I thought I would try out these questions. They came from Friday 5. Please feel free to play this at your blog. Please leave a comment here or at Friday 5 after you have posted your answers.



Friday 5 for June 6: Sediment

When was the last time you had your hands in dirt?
Just yesterday, in my garden.
When was the last time you had your hands in clay?
Don't recall doing that, ever. But I would like to try making claypot someday.
When was the last time you had your feet in mud?
I can't remember.
When was the last time you had your feet in sand?
If we are talking about beach sand, then it was 3 years ago in Aruba. We have regular-not-so-fun type of sand here.
What part of your life could use a serious cleansing?
Hmmm, good question. I would say my will to folow through with things. For example, I would start exercising for a few months and then I would kinda slack off and eventually stop doing it until months later.


Have fun and enjoy your weekend!

Sam

Samantha, mommy's girl.

One day in early December of 2004, hubby was on the phone downstairs, all of a sudden I hear "Hey hon, what's your email address?" So, I gave him my email address and heard him telling the person on the phone my email. After the phonecall he said to check my email the next day and pick out the one I want but wouldn't really tell me what I was suppose to pick out. I "forced" him to tell me and when he finally gave in and told me, I cried and kept saying "I don't want a dog"(but the truth is I really wanted one and I was very happy that I'm getting one). The next day when I checked my email, I saw her and I melted:

I love the name Sam for a girl and since we have decided that we don't want to have any kids, I will name my little baby Samantha.

Samantha is a very friendly dog. When she sees neighbors walking by with their dogs, she is actually more interested in going over to say hi to the human than to the dog. But try knocking on my door, she'll bark at you like she's going to rip your head off. That is until she sees you then she'll be all over you to pat her(usually with something in her mouth - her toy or a shoe or a towel...whatever she could get at the time).

Fetching is Samantha's favorite game. She would fetch anything and everything that you throw for her, for example, a small rock, a ball, a stick, a plastic bottle...Playing in the water is another one of her favorites. I mean any place with standing water, doesn't matter if it's clean or muddy, if you don't keep an eye on her, she will be in there! Sometimes it's not such a good thing. She once went to a friend's house with us and we kept her outside the fenced in area away from the pool but somehow she found a way in(i think someone left the door open) and "splash", she jumped in the pool!!! Here's her getting sprayed with a hose by her daddy:

A year after we got Samantha we decided to get her a companion and then we found June. They are best buds. Here's them playing in the yard:

June

Meet June, our little Golden wannabe. June came to live with us on Thanksgiving day about 3 years ago. She was a rescued dog from Tennessee. She was found around midnight one night by the side of the street and had a horrible case of mange with a secondary skin infection. Some very mean people abused her and just left her. How could someone be so cruel? Her foster mom took her in and took very good care of her. Marian, if you can see this post, we just wanted to thank you so much for taking care of June.

It was early November of 2005. As always, I was surfing the net, checking out dog rescue groups websites and there she was - little Junebug. I fell in love with her immediately! I emailed Marian about her and informed her that we would like to adopt her. Well, a few emails and phonecalls later, we finally get to adopt her! The problem - transporting June from Tennessee to New York state. It was a few weeks later before they could find someone to drive her up(along with 2 other dogs who went to their new homes in PA). We were so happy that we didn't even care it was Thanksgiving day when the transpoters could meet us in PA. We drove 6 hours each way to outside of Harrisburg, PA to pick her up.

June was very afraid of my husband when she first came. It took her 3 months before she got used to him and knew that he wouldn't hurt her. Now, she is daddy's girl. She loves chillin' on the couch with her daddy. She loves playing with her sister Samantha. She loves sleeping on the bed. She loves howling like a wolf, so we call her wolfy sometimes. And she LOVES spaghetti and meatballs(I call it "June's meal to happiness")!!! She was given spaghetti and meatballs while being transported from Tennessee. There was a storm and the lady had to stop for a night at a motel and all she could find was spaghetti and meatballs from the diner next to the motel.

So, there's the story about one of my girls. Next up, Samantha - our moose.

Lucky Number 9

My co-worker emailed me this morning about an acticle in the Prevention magazine. I never knew about this until today. Do you know that when shopping for organic produce at your grocery stores, you should look for the lucky number 9?

The picture is just a snap-shot of the article. You could read the article here

Just thought I would share with you. Hopefully it's useful for you in case your local grocery store doesn't have an Organic section.