September 11, 2020

Landscaping Pains

I'm already anticipating how sore I'm going to be tomorrow. My whole body aches!

I woke up super early this morning (5:00), and I laid in bed with Duck for a little bit (he still likes to drape himself across my neck). I read a little of my book, trying to kill some time before the kids had to get up for "virtual" school. Finally, I decided that I was going to head out for my walk at around 6:00. It was still dark outside, though, and I hate walking/running in the dark!

It's one of the items on the Cookies Summer Challenge list, so I thought it would at least be a good opportunity to check that off the list. I dressed in my reflective vest and my headlamp, and headed out for a dark walk with Joey.


It felt SO nice outside--the temp was in the 50's! I still wasn't thrilled about walking in the dark (a lot of people let their dogs wander, and I'm always afraid of coming upon one of them). Joey and I walked my favorite route, and it was nice to be done just as the kids were getting up for school. 


Once the kids were started with school, I started writing up plans to build a desk for Noah. He wants a corner desk for his bedroom, and I told him we'd make one together once the garage was finished. I went in his room to take measurements, and then I realized that his current desk would be good inspiration for the nightstands I wanted to make for Jerry and me. 


I can tell that his desk is handmade (my mom bought it at a garage sale) and I really like the way the drawers were done. I figured I could make just the side with drawers, modifying the size and drawer sizes, and turn it into a nightstand. Then I spent way too much time measuring and planning out the nightstands as well as Noah's corner desk.

I'd like to make it shorter (and not as deep) and have all three drawers be the same size. 


I'd planned to go to Lowe's to pick up supplies for the porch and Noah's desk, but before I did that, I wanted to start tearing out the landscaping so that I can be sure about the porch plans.

This is why tomorrow I'm going to feel like I got hit by a bus. I spent the next few hours removing all of the landscaping... I took out a bush and a few hostas. Then I searched for and removed all of the roots from the three huge bushes/tree things that we'd removed. This is what it looked like a couple of months ago when Jerry removed the enormous bush thing...


He removed the stump, but none of the roots! There were two other bushes just like that one (only one of them was round and only about three feet tall), but I don't have a photo with it in the picture). That's the one I removed today.

Right now, it looks terrible because I'm not done yet. I wanted to start completely fresh with the landscaping--so I tore out everything. We are going to kill the grass as well, and then have the landscaping go right to the sidewalk. 


I also removed the railings from the porch. It already looks better without the railings, which were totally falling apart! But we need to replace all of the deck boards because they are curled and warped. The porch is 17 years old and was built very cheaply, so it definitely needs to be redone.

The problem is that the lumber for decking is extremely hard to find right now! I'm going to keep looking, and I desperately hope we can find what we need before it gets too cold.

Removing the roots from the bushes was the hardest work for sure. The bushes had been there since we moved in here in 2003, so they were REALLY long. I was very proud when I pulled them all out, though. It's so satisfying to pull a root and have it go 10 feet across the landscaping, haha.

And Jerry was thrilled, because he hurt his back at work and he was dreading having to remove the bush and hostas today. Next, we have to kill all the grass, weeds, and literally everything where the landscaping goes. And then start fresh!

In addition to my two 45-minute walks today, I actually went for a third walk (only about 15 minutes)... I was feeling irritated this evening, and rather than go looking for something to eat to take my mind off of it, I went out for a short walk. It wasn't intense or anything, but it was nice to get out of the house for 15 minutes. I'd like to keep that in mind for the future! It sounds so easy, but when I'm in "a mood", it's hard to remember ;)

Jerry is off work tonight, so we're going to play Codeword Duet! Have a good night :)

(By the way, if you haven't seen The Social Dilemma on Netflix, go watch it right now! I'll try to write about it soon. Just trust me, it's worth watching.)

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