So I have always wanted a really cool garden around my house. Like for ten years. Not the kind with potatoes and tomatoes and squash. We have a community garden at the church property for those sorts of things. And a little grocery store we walk to with a nice produce section. This garden would have vibrant plants of various sizes and colors with all sorts of flowers and the plants would be found all over the place. And no weeds.
We have always had plants around. Roses and daylilies and grasses are on two sides of the house. Some other plants too. I don’t know their names and couldn’t spell most of them if I did know their names. And weeds. Lots of different varieties and a fairly vast quantity of them.
My mom came up for Mother’s Day. I told her I was going to plant a few hostas. She has had hostas around for decades. So she brought me some. She told me who gave them to her, how long she has had them, where they were planted, and even gave me their social security numbers. And so it began.
A trip to Lowe’s and Lanoha’s and we were all ready to get to work. It seemed simple enough. Pull all the weeds in the existing gardens, put down Preen to prevent future weeds, work nutrients in the new gardens, cover the new gardens with a tarp so weeds can’t grow, plant the new plants, and put mulch down.
People who know me know that I am late a lot. I did research on this a few years ago. Actually I was researching somebody else’s research. The main reason people are chronically late is because they underestimate how much time a task will take. I was thinking after some hard work on Saturday night and much of Sunday — my dream would come true. And I was wrong. Another trip to Lowe’s and Lanoha’s meant more plants, some RoundUp, some of those solar lights, and a brass sea turtle shaped sprinkler. A trip to Yano’s secured the delivery of four yards of mulch. It was sunset on Tuesday when the task was finally completed. I was only two days off. And that is with mom helping Saturday and Amber pulling weeds much of Sunday (Happy Mother’s Day!) and Tuesday.
So I’m really out of shape. I have a respect for professional landscapers. If you drive by my house there is a pretty good chance you will see me outside walking around the house making sure all the plants are still alive and that no weeds are present. And a lesson learned from renewal leave: If I double the estimated time I give to tasks then I probably won’t be late as often.
