August 2026 Fresh dinners out of my Garden and Pickling!

In early August 2026 with my divorce finally completely over and totally official forever I took four days off from my day job. With a consecutive six days off in a row it was my first real vacation since 2018, the year I met my ex husband. Yes, I did go on a couple of “vacations” while we were together but I did nothing I wanted to do and they were both truly terrible experiences for me. Never allow an abuser to take you away from your safety net: your car, your home, your family. I don’t know if I’ll ever trust going anywhere with anyone again or, at least not without my own mode of transportation: I.E. the ability to escape.

And that’s actually OK with me as its really not that much of a stretch. I’ve always been overly independent and ever since I got my car when I was a teenager I’ve rarely, if ever, road with anyone. In fact I’ve pretty much exclusively always been the driver lol.

I’ve mentioned it a couple of times that my lawyers felt that I should not only get everything (which I did) but Lodi also owed me $19,000 after he took $30,000 against the house. I agreed with them of course but I also knew I’d probably never see that money anyway so I settled.

Now I’m enjoying the purge, it won’t pay it all off but its going to be a very good start.

And getting rid of everything I never wanted, that he insisted on having, that I helped pay for, is incredibly satisfying. Oh he’d be SO mad and the petty in me feels like the cat that ate the canary.

The ridiculous ATV RZR side by side for over $20,000 that we couldn’t afford and the $2,000 plow attachment for it so Lodi could plow our driveway to save us $200 a year…

No wonder I was absolutely broke all of the time as that’s just an example and the tip of the iceberg. At least with all of it gone soon I’ll stop running into (literally) things on my farm that remind me of the utter stupidity of it all and make me mad all over again.

That $30k he took means I am literally starting at the same amount against my house when I bought it twelve years ago. Its like I never made a single payment.

I have a lot I can sell, it won’t cover all of that $30k but it will be close and without him draining my bank account anymore I can tackle it financially. It absolutely enrages me but, as my best friend is often to point out, it is a small price to pay for my life.

With all that said. I’m happy.

I’m relieved. I’m so glad to be here.

August 2026 My life is too good for me to be mad about much of anything right now and looking back at wasted time and money is, in itself, just a waste of time. (Of course that’s easier said then done…)

My first real vacation in 8 years was not exactly everyone’s cup of tea but it was exactly what I needed. I didn’t leave my house lol my third day in the same pair of pajamas I realized it was probably time for a new pair and a shower. It was bliss. I slept for a lot of it. Read for much of it and spent the rest of it with my family.

I did put on “real” clothes a couple of times and worked in my yard and garden because: of course I did! I made 5 more quarts of pickles and dilly beans putting me up to 11 quarts done by mid August.

My only complaint is that those six days went by so ridiculously fast. It felt like I turned around and was just right back to my day job. I felt better for it though. Clearer headed and just plain BETTER.

I’m looking into buying a “new” car here sometime before winter strikes. I own two 20 year old Hondas, my dad bought my blue four door Civic from me earlier this year (with about 200,000 miles on it) and I’m driving my red two door Accord that has about 170,000 miles on it.

I’ve always had small cars and I’ve always held on to my vehicles forever.

These two cars are only two of three vehicles I’ve ever owned. My first car (a Toyota Corolla that I adored) I sold with nearly 300,000 miles on it. The doors didn’t really work and there was a giant hole in the trunk but she still ran lol.

But as I’m getting older driving small cars in the winter here in northern Minnesota just sucks worse and worse every year. Not to mention, hauling lumber and dirt and mulch and god knows what else in my little cars has always been pretty silly. The fact is that with my lifestyle my having a small car doesn’t make much sense.

I’m told in absolutely NO uncertain terms by my cousin mechanic that he won’t be mad at me but he will be VERY disappointed if I don’t get one of three makes. Toyota, Honda or Subaru.

Yes, sir!

So right now its looking like I’ll probably be getting a used Subaru Forester and I’m not mad at all. It isn’t really my style but everyone I know with a Subarus absolutely love them, they’re spectacular on ice and snow, they’re still a small vehicle (I don’t like big vehicles) and they get decent gas mileage.

So that’s kind of exciting!

Its a couple months off but I think it will be a pretty great little gift to me from me. A kind of celebration of my getting my life back.

When we were together Lodi often drove the red Honda that I’m driving now and he hit three deer with it and didn’t get the body fixed. So, as you might imagine, I’m always a little annoyed when I look at it now and I drive it every day. I’ve been living and driving here my entire life and have never hit (or been hit by) a deer.

YES, we do have an absolute ton of deer and the likely hood is at some point its going to happen but hitting three deer in darned near the same spot in just a couple of months isn’t just bad luck anymore, that’s just stupidity and recklessness.

Regardless, I do really like my red Honda.

Its a two door with a V-6 engine. Its legitimately a little sports car and, though I’m about 20 years passed 20, it is still VERY fun to drive! I never thought I’d miss my back seat so much though and that’s what is finally giving me the motivation to get an SUV. Frankly I just hate using my trunk for everything.

August 2026 I got old and practical

I’ve been eating out of my garden for nearly a month now. Its giving me dinner at least a couple of nights a week (as long as I’m not too picky lol) I planted my beats and carrots too close together so I’m not getting near as much as I should be out of them.

My bad… and something I’ve been consistently bad at for all of my gardening years.

I saw a “hack” online that I’m going to try next year. Because beat and carrot seeds are so tiny they’re very hard to plant with plenty of space between them. The hack uses a damp paper towel where you put all your seeds on it exactly where you want them with a tweezers and then cover them with another damp paper towel and then bury it.

Definitely going to be doing that next year!

For the first time I’m attempting to grow Acorn squash and Butternut squash. I am super excited to say that I have both and they’re looking wonderful! In fact they’re kind of taking over my garden which I also kind of love.

I’ve got lots of cherry and Roma tomatoes on the way that I am super excited for. I use a lot of canned tomatoes in my cooking so I’m hoping I’ll get enough to cover me for at least six months if not the whole next year.

The cherries I’m just going to slice and freeze, the larger ones I’m going to freeze whole so I can peel them before I use them later. August 2026, many of my herbs didn’t come up this year but fortunately my basil, dill and sage all did pretty well for me!

You can see from the pictures that I finally got the mess cleaned up around my pond and garden and now am just looking at lots of plastic ground cover. So I am ready for mulch! Which I think will look nice and save a ton of time in mowing maintenance and weeding.

TREE UPDATE: Its not looking good guys. Early July storms gave me a bit of hope… but not anymore.

Of all the years I’ve been alive I could not have picked a worse year to plant anything. I’ve still got a few survivors that were in any kind of shade but, besides that…

I tried getting my trees watered initially but then my brother’s well dried up to the tune of thousands to dig a deeper one. Here I was trying to water an acre of over 360 trees, trying to keep my pond full and my garden watered as well.

I got worried about my own well too so I finally gave up.

My very last post I ended it still so motivated and excited to plant more trees next year but I’m not sure anymore guys. The effort to plant them was tremendous and I’m just heart broken. I can’t even bare to walk out into the field to visit them anymore.

Maybe next year instead of spending $300 for three hundred more tree seedlings maybe I should spend $300 on three mature trees instead? I know I could baby them then and get them watered…

August 2026, it just won’t rain.