Top View of Purple & Cream Iris From The Top
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From The Top

TJ Fox

Hubby ended up taking a vacation day yesterday. In part so he could get a lot of errands run that he needed to do, including going with me to get some flowers, and to get some much needed work done in the yard.

The trip out was interesting and frustrating to say the least. I only went to Home Depot with the plan to only stay in the outdoor section. Apparently, that isn’t allowed because you cannot enter that area. You have to go through the main door so that you can be counted. You can leave through the outdoor section, but you can’t come in that way. Instead, you are being forced to potentially come in contact with even more people by going through the main entrance before you can access the outdoor section.

If I were to estimate, maybe only 25% of the people there were wearing masks, including those working (this from a company that touts providing PPE for all employees, but they apparently don’t require they actually wear any). One of the non-mask wearing workers was coughing like crazy the whole time we were there. Another group was a woman and her 4 kids that looked like high school age all the way down to maybe 3rd grade, none wearing masks or understanding the concept of personal space, let alone stay 6 feet apart.

There are reasons I’ve opted to let Hubby do all the running. This trip didn’t convince me to change my mind. On the plus side, my masks are actually really comfortable and fit extremely well so there was no fidgeting needed which made me feel so much better.

I wasn’t able to get everything that I was hoping to find, sadly. I was able to get what I needed to fill my pots. I also picked up a small lavender plant to go in the ground and a pot of pretty dianthus that will also go in one of my beds somewhere.

When I was looking at the lavender, I spotted the strawberry plants. I have only ever tried growing them once years ago when I had the space, but decided to grab a few on a whim for BG as she absolutely LOVES strawberries. That and I thought it would be fun for her. Between those a few packets of seeds (lettuce, spinach and shasta daisies) that rounded out my trip.

BG was excited to get her strawberries and helped me get EVERYTHING planted. At least the potted ones as I didn’t get the in ground ones done yesterday. It was such a huge help and I loved the fact that she had so much fun. She is a little giddy at the idea that she is getting to grow and take care of her own strawberries, so that was an amazing impulse buy on my part.

I was glad to get my pots taken care of, but I was really disappointed that I couldn’t find everything I wanted. I could go to one of the nurseries if they are open (and around here I really don’t know if they are), but I’m really not sure it is worth it at this point. I did look into ordering some of those things, but didn’t find a site that had what I was looking for (in part because of things not quite being in season). I may dig a little deeper and see if I can locate at least a few things online.

In the mean time, I’ll be watching to see if my seeds come up. I’ve never grown lettuce or spinach myself, so that is going to be a lot of fun.

Published by TJ Fox

I am a slightly sane artist, amateur photographer, book addict, wife, mom and raging introvert. I have more hobbies than I can count, so it is beyond shocking that I manage to find time to do any of them, let alone most of them and still have time to do anything else. Of all the talents I claim, writing wasn’t one of them until my muse dropped the idea for a book on my head.

10 thoughts on “From The Top”

    1. Most of my irises are frilly, but my one that is rusty/mauve isn’t nearly as frilly. I’d have to do some research to see if the more colorful ones have less frills, but it is interesting to note.

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    1. I honestly don’t know how I’d feel about it all if I didn’t get a winter long cough every year. It terrifies me how my body would react if I were to get sick. Until yesterday, he was our family’s single point of contact with anyone and he has been extremely careful.

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      1. That’s how we are too – my hubby works outdoors, but does come in contact with folks – I mean, he wears a mask; but it scares me as our two-year old has been in/out of hospitals his whole short life with breathing issues!

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      2. We are exceptionally fortunate in that my Hubby can work from home, so our risks are relatively low. Even more so since our area has not had many cases. I have family in other parts of the country that aren’t as fortunate and have really risky health issues. MC’s girlfriend’s family has a member that is super high risk and side issues among others that could become devastating if any of them get sick, including his girl. It makes it incredibly difficult to not be worried or pissed off all the time because I don’t want to see any of them get sick. Yes, we are missing out on so much right now, huge things, but I’m okay with that. Keeping people safe and healthy and alive is so much more important. It is one of the reasons why I was so torn about going out at all yesterday.

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    1. I had some in one of my beds for a while. When they were blooming, it was absolutely beautiful. When they were done? I had a bed full of dead, brown sticks. They also tended to spread like weeds because they self seed so easily. It took us two years to get it to quick popping up in that bed. That and mint are huge never agains for me. The idea of having the fresh chamomile was great, but I ended up not ever using it because there were too many chemicals put in the ground around it and I didn’t want to take any changes. Being in a pot would be much better, but it would have to be indoors because of how it tends to spread.

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