The Honey-Do List

Few things are sexier than my husband checking off items on the ol' honey-do list. It certainly doesn't hurt if he is doing it with his shirt off either. (My apologies to you guys, but you girls know what I'm talking about - it's like walking into the kitchen to see your man washing dishes . . . which I also observed on Saturday morning. Yes, Hubs racked up lots and lots of brownie points this weekend.)


The window boxes that line the exterior wall of our great room have been in great need of attention. Whatever had been previously planted in there was mostly viney, too big for the location, overgrown, and, ever since we moved in, crunchy from months and months of neglect and a lack of water. It was one of those things that had been bugging both of us, especially me, but we just hadn't gotten around to shopping for plants and doing any "yard work". (Hey, I know, but this is as close as it gets to a yard for us these days. It was also the first time in a long time we got our hands in the dirt. It was nice.)

Now, I am also obligated to include a more representative photo of my Darling Dearest working on my project. He is going to come home, take one look at the picture above, and be upset that I posted a picture of him in "sissy gardening gloves". The truth of the matter is that I insisted he wear my gloves while he was pulling out the prickly viney mess over there. I preferred his hands and arms not look like he got in a fight with a dozen cats this weekend. And then there are the pigeons that have been pooping in our window box; you know those nasty creatures carry all sorts of diseases, so open wounds plus weird bird illnesses . . . well, he wasn't going to get out of wearing the gloves completely. But anyway, plenty of his work was done sans gloves. So, for the record, a real man doesn't wear gardening gloves. Okay, whatever. Happy Dear? (Although he may use pliers to rip out roots. Lacking all the proper window-box gardening tools, we had to improvise a bit.)

I didn't go nearly as exotic as I had wanted to on the window box. The selection of small plants was rather limited, so I ended up using liriope and impatiens. Real original, huh? But, impatiens do really beautiful things here - you know, like grow and bloom all year long - so I think I'm going to get along okay with them.

I also got a new planter and some herbs this weekend that I am going to try to grow inside (away from the pigeons). I really miss having fresh homegrown herbs at my fingertips, so hopefully it will work out. We also added a couple new houseplants to the collection, including a really awesome jade plant that Eric came across. Our living room is slowly turning into a little tropical escape. :)

But more important than the exact details is that we pretty much finished all those little things that were still in need of attention to get everything guest-ready. Our good friend (and Eric's colleague) that is coming down this month had to put the trip off a week, so he won't be here until August 15. He plans to leave on August 29 and then my parents and grandparents arrive on August 30 to stay for two weeks. Only eleven more days and we start our guest marathon. I am excited to play hostess. Eric is excited that I'll be getting up early with him and making breakfast every morning.