Randi, where are you?

I have been inside! And I have been LAZY, and haven't done much of anything. I have done some cross stitching and made a couple of book marks but other than that, I am been watching a lot of reality TV, reading, and listening to books.

What sucks is that we had a terrible heat wave recently and so many of my plants died. My cucumbers didn't ripen correctly and went bad on the vine, and I haven't gotten a good tomato or strawberry in almost two months. I am waiting until September when I am going to mulch together all my dead plants, replant new ones, re-seed the grass and cut back everything that needs to be trimmed.

On a side note, my sunflowers bloomed. They are amazing!!!!

I have been bugging Matt for weeks now about getting a hummingbird feeder. I wanted one so badly. He kept saying no. Well, I no longer want one. I walked outside this morning to take the picture of the canopy and there where TWO hummingbirds at my new Trumpet Vine. So two of my obsessions have been fulfilled in one purchase.

> I am happy to present to you, our new canvas cover
>

Excited

The canopy we ordered will be on my door step on Monday :P

We picked this bad boy up off craigslist.com for $60. It sells at Target brand new for $500. The replacement canopy is sold out everywhere except like one website, so we picked it up there for about $100. For approx $160 we have a canopy gazebo in our backyard. The replacement canopy should be here in about 3-5 days, hopefully we will be lucky and it will get here by Saturday, which means Father's Day will be spent back here. Which will hopefully also include our new mister system that I want to install :)

(Dad this is your unofficial invite over :P)

This weekend I am picking up some vines called Orange Trumpet Vines to plant next to one of the pilars and I am also putting one or two out in the front side yard. If all goes well I will also be planting four new rose bushes as well.

Oh and dad, if you come over, I might need your help setting up the new sprinkler station :)

It is going to be a busy weekend!

On my way home from work today I stopped by Joanne's where they were having a sale on all their outdoor decor for like 60% off. I found these hooks and lanterns and I also got flameless candles, plus a bunch of garden gnomes and some signs for my veggies for like $40. My favorite so far are these lanterns and the flameless candles. I simply cannot wait for a BBQ :P

Not to keep you in the dark....

But I need shade. Lots of it. I think I finally have Matt convinced that we need to buy a canvas top patio cover. They have them on sale at Big Lots for like $200 which is a HUGE break from the one we looked at at Target for $600. It will help do a number of things:

1. It will provide shade over our patio table since our umbrella broke in the horrid wind storms we had this year.

2. It will help provide more lighting, as I will be able to string lights around the edges of the cover

3. It will help keep the sun from beating down through my sliding glass door so that our living room doesn't turn into a sauna during the summer months

4. It will save us almost $700 because instead of Matt building one out of wood (that he will figure out how not to finish because he has a habit of not finishing projects).

And so there you go. I think we will be picking it up Father's Day weekend.

On to the garden....

I bought some burlap to use as a shade cover for my veggie garden because the sun is just wilting everything. I am trying to figure out how to attach the burlap to make a shade cover. And not that my garden will need shade in about a week or two because I think my sunflower is getting big enough to cover the whole garden in it's leaves!

I also picked up three of the most interesting and beautiful mini cacti ever in the world, but it was too dark when we got home to take a picture. But I will this weekend.

It's getting too hot (Part 1)

So since it is getting too hot out, as I stated before we are going to be working more on the inside of the house. This weekend it was Project Office. We inherited two bookshelves from my grandparents in March and they fit and completed our desk set we already had. They don't match 100% but you can't hardly tell they don't. Adding the shelves involved almost reconstructing the whole office. The pictures below are the aftermath of the additions.

And apparently this is how we have been filing our taxes for the past 6 years.....

It's getting too hot (Part 2)

After a few hours of organizing and actually filing our taxes, this is the end result. It is so nice to have a functional office again. And now I might actually get some of my scrapbooking done, seeing as I am over a year overdue on Lucy's books!

I am scared....very scared....

This is my sunflower plant that my dad gave me seeds for. This is after three weeks after I planted, maybe a month. And it is over a foot tall now.

I am scared.

On a side note, I found it almost swarming with ants. Thanks to Mandi over at It Grows in Vegas, I remembered that cinnamon keeps ants away. So I just sprinkled some in my garden, hopefully they will be gone soon.

Oh, and I need some advice. All my garden plants are in full sunlight all day long. I want to shade them but I am just not coming up with the right idea....So I need your help! Please leave your ideas in my comments box....Dad and Candy this means you :)

Garden updates

I planted a climbing rose bush about a month ago, and I thought I was losing it. This just goes to show you, that I am not in fact losing it. It is just a slow grower. Below are some of my other newer rose bushes. I am proud to say, they are all growing quiet well and all are getting ready to bloom!

These pink flower are called Mexican Evening Primerose. I love them. They spread pretty easily and fast from what I hear, so I cannot wait for them to cover over all this rock in my side yard. And the plus is they smell incredible.

This weekend, Project Front Yard

Our friends at friends Cactus Rescue told us about how the CSN Charleston campus is closing their Plant Nursery. Well we decided to take a quiet trip over on Saturday to see what they had to offer, and we picked up five plants and four cacti for $19. Their last day in business is May 31st. They are selling out quick but still have a bunch of stuff left. I recommend going over there and checking it out! It was well worth it for us.

One of the cacti we passed was planted into the landscaping. We talked to one of the guys that works there and told him how much we loved the cacti and how we wished they had some to sell. Well the great thing about cacti is, if you pull off a limb, you can use that limb to start a whole new cacti. Which I think is really really cool. So since they didn't have any cacti to sell, the guy just broke off a piece of what was there and gave it to us. I will be able to plant it in about a week.

Here are the small cacti we picked up. Two they gave to us for free, and the other two they charged us only $.50 a piece for. Below you can see how I planted them.

We didn't even notice until we got home that one of the cacti came with a stow-away. We didn't know if snails were good for the garden or not, but my friend Jarrett said that they will practically kill anything we have. We didn't know how to get rid of him, but this morning we went outside, and he was all dried up anyway so we didn't have to worry about anything.
And here is Lucy helping us decide where to place the plants.

The following are the cacti that we got from my friends over at Cactus Rescue. Even though I did exactly what they told me to do when planting, ie using gloves and tongs (I used my BBQ tongs) I still got bit twice. And this little guy in particular is very vicious. He doesn't look it, but he is. I haven't decided what I am going to name this one, but Little Shit comes to mind right off the bat ;). But anyway, my friend Jarrett said that with water, this guy will be more than likely three times this size by next year (at least that is what I remembered). So I put him on a dripper, but it is almost completely closed up.

This guy also hasn't been named. I also cannot remember what his real name is either. What I do know is that he will bloom. And it will be very pretty.

Matt and I have been in a debate on what Jarrett said about how old this one is. Matt says he heard he is approx. 100 years, I say I heard 30. Jarrett if you read this, will you clear this debate up? I am hoping that we don't lose him. When I took him out of the pot to plant him, I thought the root broke off, but maybe it was just really small. I do remember Jarrett saying that they don't have a very big root to them so maybe he will live afterall.
We did name this one, and his name is Sonic. As in the hedgehog. He is tough and rough and really really awesome!!!
Here is the finished product:

Matt helped with the yard this weekend too which was great! He also hung up all my wall decor. In these wall sconces that I got from my grandma, I bought some coconut cloth, or at least that is what I think it is called. I couldn't find any that fit perfectly, so I had to cut it and do my best! Let me tell you, this stuff is not easy to cut at all!!!!

The cacti that are from the plant nursery at CSN's Charleston campus. I don't remember the names of what we picked out, but I do think they are very very neat looking.

Here is everything from a distance glance. The little sign between the seats says "Welcome to my Garden." I got it for Christmas from my Uncle Jerry and Aunt Linda.

The weather has been insane. It is probably why everything has been blooming so well and growing like crazy. However, we finished all the projects today before the temp dropped down to the low 60's and got too cold to work outside. Yes you heard me, it was too cold in Vegas in May to work outside.

Last year when we got our table, my in-laws gave us their old umbrella for our table. It has survived a lot of things, but apparently, this wind we have been having finally killed it. So next weekend we are going to replace this broken one with this one with solar lighting in the ribbing.

When I walked out this morning, my red roses were in full bloom. They are so pretty.

The bogenvia, is going insane. I picked up some wire anchors and wiring to make a permanent lattice. After gluing it, you have to wait 24 hours before installing the wires. I am probably just going to wait until next weekend unless I get a bug up my butt to do it this week.

The honeysuckle is looking pretty good too.

These neat little purple plants are from my dad's garden. He gave me a bunch a few weeks when we were over there for a visit. I thought that I was losing them, but yesterday when I inspected them, they had bloomed. I am so excited. I love them and think they are so pretty.

This is the other half of what he gave me. I really thought this one was done for. There are three stalks here, and I honestly think that two of them are gone, but if you look closely....you can see a bloom on the third. Again, I am stoked.

Let's play name that plant.

So I planted some seeds, some by mistake (I dumped some little pots I had herb seeds in and forgot about them, and well they started to grow).

And then I planted some normal seeds....But now I can't remember what I planted where. So lets play Name that Plant. And go.

These are the herb seeds that started to grow.

I think this is the start of a sunflower plant. Either that or holly hocs
And this is the product I am sure of the mystery seeds my step mom gave me. Soon the mystery will be over!

And holy crap! I just looked back at my past posts and I just barely planted these seeds on or around May 8th! Look at them go!!!!

Saturday was a big day for us because we picked up a bunch of new plants for our back yard and thanks to my dear friends over at the Cactus Rescue, we picked up the cacti for the front yard too. I am very excited to get these guys in the ground. We weren't able to do it on Sunday like I originally planned, but this weekend will be the magical weekend.

I really can't wait to get them in. The best part is, they are all native species, and except for the big one, once they are settled, I will only have to water them once ever couple of weeks or so. It works perfect because I am really bad at remembering to water plants if they aren't on a drip system.

But you should check out the Cactus Rescue website. It is a great site, and run by some really great people :)

My basil and cucumbers are taking over my garden. I must have about 15 cucumbers. I also have like a million tomatoes. And my rosemary is out of control as well.....Anyone want some fresh basil and rosemary? I have plenty to share!