I finally got it right - after 10 years

Mother's Day has always been a challenge for me.  Not more than anyone else, I know, but still: I've always tried to be very good at anything I did, and I wasn't getting Mother's Day right.

I think it revolved around my selfishness.  I've learned a lot about that side of myself over the last year, and worked to overcome it.  So this year, I feel like I finally gave Katrina the tribute she deserved as my companion in life and raising our children.  It turned out that the dollar amount wasn't important at all.  It really was the thought and the effort that counted.  

This year, I thought and planned for a few weeks, and it worked out really well.  I got the motorhome ready to go (de-winterized, checked out, packed) and got sitters for the kids, and took her away on Friday for a night at Cannon Beach.  We did fun, no-stress stuff, got home Saturday and she wasn't ready for the piece I prepared for the recital.  Another good surprise.  

It was all about her - I got flowers on Tuesday, and didn't even get her a card.  But I think this weekend will be one she'll always remember fondly.  

10 years, 10 Mother's Days.  And I finally got one right.  

On Lanscaping (the verb)

Last night I got home from work and was feeling edgy.  Usually that makes me either bury my face in a book or bury my brain in a game of Red Alert 2.  

I chose to put on some shorts and work in the yard instead.   It was such a good choice.  We were trying to get a major remodel done, and this week the loan was denied.  Not enough equity.  So we decided to put our energy into the back yard.  We have a very very very long list of things on the yard to do list, and it's high time the to-do list shortens up.  

I went to the shed, where I had stowed the stump-digging tools: an old shovel, a flat crow bar, a hand saw, and a sledge hammer.  Toting them off to the back fence line, I looked at the sky above and the mud below.  It was breezy, and the rain had been off and on all day.  I dug.  And when I hit a root, I'd clear the area with the crow bar (to dig with), and then saw through the root.  Then I'd whack the trunk with the sledgehammer and see what root needed attention next.  It's therapeutic.  And I'm starting to understand people who say that.  I still don't understand why, but it is.

In a little over an hour I had another stump out.  I carried it over to the hard debris bin, and now I don't have to think about that particular lump of twisted wood ever again.  Nice.  I've been thinking about those lumps of twisted wood for 2 years now.  

So now I've got the bug - 46 stumps to go, lots of roto-tilling, a fence to repair/replace.  Katrina bought a Costco play structure this morning.  We'll remove the old barkdust under our current play structure, redo the ground, build a play house, maybe put in a sport court.  Evening are sounding really pleasant.