February Review

Time moves so quickly… we are back to goals again and the end of month two.  We have had interesting weather lately with thoughts of spring bookended by snowstorms.  We are back to below freezing temperatures and winter weather advisories to start out our month of March.   Here is a pictorial history of our pendulum weather swings in February.

February 15th we have a foot of snow accumulated on the ground.

Two days later we have sunshine and melting snow.

A week later our snow piles are almost gone but winter returns.  2/24  1 pm

I took pictures of our yard during the snowstorm that came February 24 through the 25th.  It was beautiful to watch, but I was glad that I had gotten all the errands completed and gone grocery shopping the day before.

2/24 2:14 pm

2/24 3:54 pm

2/24 5:46 pm

The wind was driving the heavy wet snow from the North so the south side of trees were bare but the north side were white.

2/24 7:43 pm   The snow that was blown onto this north facing window melted and made it difficult to take a picture through the water beaded window.
The temperature was at or just above freezing the entire storm.

The next day we had beautiful sunshine and 6+ inches of heavy wet snow.  2/25

White!  Snow makes everything look clean.  2/25

The snow was so heavy and dense that it stuck to everything.   2/25

Aannd back to snow melting away.  This was taken 2/28.  

Looking out the window today (March 1), the snow is falling again, temperatures are dropping, and schools are closed.  The 50 degree weather of last week is a memory…

Well, onto our goals, which may not be as interesting as snow falling, but as the topic of this week’s blog post, I should now address.  Last month’s goals were to make a seed order and to paint the newly appointed War Room and library.  One I finished, the other is still in a pile.

Cheerful bright yellow walls instead of dingy white.

The walls’ many holes were spackled, taped and painted a bright cheerful yellow.  The library was culled, moved and reorganized onto the shelves.  My butterfly stamp collection now hangs in this room.  We hope to hang encouraging victorious battle oriented pictures in here too.  Putting on the Armor of God, verses on prayer and some cool military vehicles per T’s request will be added.  It is definitely not finished yet but it is useable while we accessorize it.

My piano lives here now and just outside of the picture to the right,
we have a corkboard with prayer requests that we lift up when we pray.

Our other goal, the one where I get presents during the month of February, wasn’t fully completed.  T and I sat down with lots of catalogues and our list of what seed we currently own and over a couple of sessions of a few hours each, we whittled it down to three catalogues and three pages of seeds.  I have to go through the herbs and flowers yet before we make our final tally and put in our orders.  I hope to get presents for my birthday month!

So next month’s goals?  Presents.  Turn 40 gracefully.  Gulp.  Be thankful that I am privileged to have lived for 40 years so far… that is amazing isn’t it?  So much time and yet it doesn’t feel like I have really done 40 years’ worth of stuff.  Perhaps that should be an ongoing goal…. Make every moment count.

Oh, and keep painting.  We are now onto the guest room which is cleared out and ready for its makeover.

Guest room ready for prep work. There are a LOT of holes in these walls.
The people before us stapled everything to the walls.

I think I am going to do a light blue above the wood.  No I will not paint the wood…
my father the wood craftsman would be sad if I did.

Other goals for this month?  Well, I need to get my flower and herb seeds organized and ready to start.  While we aren’t planting in our “food beds”, I will be adding flowers to the other beds and potting up containers.  I also want to add beneficial perennials to the beds around the raised beds and the terraces.  I am going to experiment with glass cutting too.  Hopefully that will show up in the how to blog later this month.  Also I am going to be a cacao tree at the Grand Rapids Home and Garden show for 600 + elementary school kids who are learning about different trees.  They will have a scavenger hunt of which I am one of the stations they will find to learn about a cacao tree.  My final goal is to go to Fredrick Meijer Gardens for the annual Butterflies Are Blooming event for my birthday.  Someone always ends up going with me; we’ll see who it is this year.  

Lots to look forward to and lots to be thankful for…  it is good to be alive.