Summertime

I'm so sorry for this 3 week blogging delay.  I just haven't felt like sitting down and typing lately.  Blame it on the heat.:)  Let's see...what have we been up to?

Yard work!  Jason has been diligently working in the flower beds in front of the house.  Thanks to a friend who is a landscape architect, we've had a plan to follow.  Years of neglect and overgrowth take quite a bit of time and money to correct.  We're starting slow, adding a few bushes at a time.  First Jason pulled up numerous holly bushes that were prickly and too large.  Then we replaced them with smaller non-prickly Japanese holly bushes interspersed with camellias.  The next step will be adding dwarf gardenias, peonies and a variety of other little plants.  We're probably crazy for planting in the heat of the summer but we were getting impatient and tired of looking at the bare flower bed.  Can't wait to see what our water bill is like this month as we've desperately been trying to keep everything alive in the 90 degree heat! 

Only other yard project in the next few weeks will be removing 2 more trees.  This is a precursor to phase 2 of the yard projects which begins in the fall.  Phase 2 = regrading the back yard and planting grass!  Good-bye dirt pit!  We cannot wait to have usable space behind our house. 

The Pit, ugh

Despite having access to such wonderful and bountiful produce from Jason's parents, we've planted a small garden ourselves.  We've yet to harvest anything from it but at least we're trying.  Supposedly there are a few tomatoes in the works.  I think we have some rabbits who have been delaying progress.

Cucumbers, tomatoes, squash, okra, herbs, etc.

Also in the past few weeks my mom has been coming to visit on Fridays.  It's been so much fun having her around to help with home projects; she is so talented in this area.  We've rearranged furniture, hung decor in the kitchen, looked at various fabrics and paint colors and most recently we've been working on selecting blinds for the den.  I hope these Friday visits continue!  Maybe I'll even convince her to move to Raleigh before too long, after all we do have a larger Whole Foods than Winston-Salem does!

Last weekend being Father's Day we celebrated with both dads individually.  We went to Sims on Saturday and had the privilege of pulling weeds in the pea patch.  This is definitely not my calling but at least it's a great way to help out my father-in-law.  We also threw together a last minute lunch with several members of Jason's dad's family.  I whipped together some mac and cheese and a banana pudding to go with the abundance of garden vegetables.  It was a treat we hadn't planned on!  Then on Sunday we met my dad for lunch in Chapel Hill.  It's nice being able to meet in the middle!  We're so thankful for both of our dads!

Yesterday was quite possibly the most fun day we've had thus far this summer!  Parents of some friends in our sunday school class have a lake house about an hour from Raleigh.  If you know Jason and I, there's no place we'd rather be than on a lake water skiing.  We dream of having a lake house or condo one day, or at least some jet skis:)!  Thanks to our college friends the Sanders and the Marxs, we learned to ski several years ago behind jet skis.  Skiing behind a boat yesterday was a different story.  Jason got up on one ski like a pro but I never managed to get up on one ski and had to settle for two.  At least I was able to get up though and enjoy the adrenaline rush of it all.  Jason's side to side moves were most impressive, myself on the other hand, I just like to go straight and stay right behind the boat.   

      
Running update...as you may remember I committed to running 100 miles this summer.  As of today I've run 55 miles, well ahead of schedule.  I'm up to running 5 miles at a time.  This week I ran 5 miles on two different days.  The week before I alternated between 4-5 mile treadmill runs and 2 mile outside runs.  I've mapped out a great path around my neighborhood which is relatively flat, exactly 2 miles and a perfect temperature if I start about 8:45pm.  I've loosely committed to running a half marathon in October on a very flat course in Greenville, NC.  If I increase my mileage by 1/2 mile each week then I will be up to 13 miles by race time.  We'll see how it goes...stay tuned!