Learning to pace myself & enjoying the two days we had of spring

I was so excited to get pictures of all of my lilacs and apple trees blooming but then I blinked and BOOM, spring was over. It was like we went from -20 degrees to 90 in less then a month… Oh wait – I think we actually did that! Our trees and bushes literally bloomed, pollinated over night and dropped it all the next day. Everyone I know who has ever had an allergy said this was the WORST spring they’ve ever experienced!

Had to share this bird’s nest off my back porch. Yep, that is tinsel! lol

I love the heat but after spending two days straight hauling, moving, planting and working in it I can honestly say that I definitely over did it.

I remind myself, yet again, “None of this stuff needs to be done ASAP.”

So, Saturday was a productive day when it came to my yard. I tackled my “Tack shack” by emptying all of my horses’ tack etc out of there and moved it to my other shed.

(Why is everything always so HEAVY!?)

With my “tack shack” empty I’m using it now as wood storage for my fire pit because its close to it. Funny how I spent three weeks thinking about building something for wood storage for my fire pit before I finally realized that I already had something that would work great at least for the time being lol.

This meant I also moved the pile of wood I had left in my old wood shed, all of the wood I still had in the house and a big pile of wood from my mom’s house. And, yes, it hit 92 degrees that day!

Whose tired of hauling wood? THIS GIRL!!!!

(Yeah, I know my old tack shack looks like crap and, yes, fixing it is on my to-do list lol not to mention, yes I really need to mow my lawn oh and get that big window somehow to the dump!)

I had a bunch of other randomness that I wanted to get done as well. I had things from my OLD stable still just hanging out back behind the garage from four years ago.

I also still had some things in the old wood shed to move to the garage and barn. So, basically, I did a lot of organizing and cleaning up and a TON of moving heavy stuff around finally to the spot it belongs for good. Who feels like a pack mule? THIS GIRL!

Once I hauled everything to the barn it was time to clean out my whole big ol barn including sweeping it out AND I even got my water tank wrapped in a bunch of insulation I had left over! I SO hope it will help with the cost of keeping it from freezing next winter!

I also headed to my mom’s house to take care of a loose end that’s been bugging me. When the divorce happened I unplugged all of my freezers to save money so I had a bunch of frozen meat and vegetables I needed to go through that she was keeping in her freezer for me. Four garbage bags to the dump later and I had just enough room at home in my little refrigerator freezer for what I decided to keep.

Phew!

From there it was time to tackle the new flower bed at my mom’s house. Two 12 foot 4x4s screwed together made a great border and then it was time to haul the dirt, the plants and get everything planted.

Next we plan on putting down landscape fabric, mulch and some big rocks but, so far, I think it turned out really nice!

I also got some annuals planted in my flower box tables out on the deck and in my three pots out front of the house. This is the extent of my planting this year as I am definitely not going to be putting in a garden because my “honey-do-list” for myself just keeps getting bigger lol

I am FINALLY starting to narrow it down though.

There is still a bunch of trash and stuff in a pile behind my old “tack shack” (not to mention that giant window) but after the last couple of weekends of my working on it that is (miraculously) the last of the trash my ex left behind. Why does it seem so totally normal and cool to just leave crap lying around everywhere?

I have a few jobs that I’m going to get done before fall if it kills me. First I need to haul the bales of leftover hay from the barn and put them over my septic line under my deck. (Hopefully that means it will not freeze again!)

Besides that I have the two major messes to fix that my ex left behind for me.

The eves on the garage were not installed right so that’s probably what I’ll be doing next as it won’t take long to fix but, as you can see, looks HORRIBLE.

The worst of my chores though is that the stone my ex put on the side of my house is falling off and needs to be totally replaced. (I’ve got some posts coming up all about that and how I plan to fix it.)

And I still need to get my outhouse built hopefully before July but we’ll see lol. Fortunately I have enough leftover lumber etc that I don’t think I’ll have to buy anything to build it.

I was sitting at work after that long weekend and finally had to go home early. I laid flat out on my basement floor to try and get my body temperature down. My internal thermostat was totally out of wack, I was shivering, sweating and hurting like crazy with a fever on top of it.

A LOT of sleep and water later and I was just fine but with several lessons learned. I LOVE the heat but I have to learn to pace myself… Oh and beer doesn’t count as water when its 90 degrees outside.

Nowadays I plan on taking things a little slower by working on them a little at time as opposed to cramming my weekends full. After my day job I have HOURS before sunset right now (a perk of living this far north) so there’s no reason why I can’t work on things a couple of hours every day after I get home instead of trying to get everything done on the weekends.