Garden Update

I just finished this entire post and it didn't save anything-grrr. So, let's try this again.

We had the most fun this weekend building our new Square Foot Garden! We've been researching and reading up on it for the past several weeks and have continued to be inspired by Emily and GW's very successful gardening over the last couple of years, so we've been very eager to get started. Takes a little bit of prep to get your SFG going, but it's supposed to pay off big time in the long run:)

All our supplies ready to go!

Our "power" drill is a P.O.P (Piece of POOP!) so my big, strong man hand-drilled the whole thing! We constructed a 4 x 4 box out of untreated wood because treated wood will mess with your soil and crops. We also used 1x8" boards, but I think 1x6" would have been good too. Maybe next time.

We covered the bottom of our box with weed fabric to cut back on the upkeep.

Next is the lattice top to divide out each square foot section for the different crops.

Here we are combining our Mel's Mix soil composed of compost, peat moss, and vermiculite. Can you tell that we had to wait till after Trey went down for this part?:)

And Walah! Project Complete:)

I forgot to take a picture after we'd planted our veggies the next day, so I'll just tell you what's in each square. Can't wait to show you the results (and see them for myself!). We've got oregano, basil, sweet potatoes, cucumbers, red leaf lettuce, roma tomatoes, celebrity tomatoes, lavender, zucchini, squash, cantaloupe, green bell peppers, red bell peppers, and watermelon!

I go out to check out the progress multiple times a day, but I haven't seen anything yet;) A watched pot never boils, I suppose;)

Going Green

It's funny how our interests change season to season. Using the Barnes & Noble magazine stand as my indicator of change, I can remember each transition. In college, I dreamed of my perfect man and that perfect wedding day (no need waiting till the last minute to get the details in order, right?), so I poured myself over every wedding magazine. I still love a good wedding spread, but my thoughts moved to design and decor after Shaun and I had a house of our own. What's our style? How can we make it ours on a shoestring? The challenge is so fun:)

My latest focus has become our garden--or my visions of our garden, so far. This one hasn't been as natural of a transition for me. Mom has the green thumb in our family, and for some reason I have managed to kill every living plant I've every owned. But I'm determined that this will change. I'm excited about gorgeous blooming flowers, but I'm more excited about getting our vegetable garden up and running. Fueled by my desire to grow delicious food that we planted and harvested with our own two hands, but even more so by my increasing disgust at the fact that I feel like we have to choose between eating fresh and healthy or on target with our budget. ugh!

So...last year, I got a roma tomato plant and a basil plant. Loved having both, but the summer heat burned them up and I harvested one lone tomato and eventually lost my herbs:(

With even more enthusiasm this year to get multiple crops going, I had to pull back my zeal. As of now, I have gotten some red leaf lettuce, which experimentally I planted in a window box, and SUCCESS!!

The First Harvest!

Our lettuce has been the most productive so far, but we have a small basil plant with several more seedlings trying their hardest to grow, cherry tomatoes in the works, and a neighbor just brought up a green bean plant:) We're on our way!

We are in the process of researching the Square-Foot Gardening method, so we'll be sure to update you on that as it comes together.

Master Bath Mini-Makeover

A couple weeks ago, Shaun and I had the hankerin' to do a little home decorating. The challenge was to pick a space that we could see a noticeable update with a very small budget. Our goal was $50, we went over a bit, but with only $75 we gave our master bath a "Spa-inspired" mini-makeover:)

Our vision for our bathroom is the relaxed and luxurious feeling we get from "the Vitality Room" at the Ritz Carlton in Charlotte. I just love walking into a spa. I don't even need to be having any treatments, and I feel so relaxed. This is our hope at some point.

Thanks to good ol' Garden Ridge we stretched our $75 and were able to get a great hanging shower caddy that tidied up our shower space, a faux-wood shower rod and curtain hooks, a botanical print celadon curtain, a cozy bath rug (that kinda reminds me of a sea anemone), a beautiful impressionistic painting of a willow tree, and last but not least, my little potted moss creations:) Super simple, but I couldn't find anything like it for the price I wanted to pay in the "floral" section at the store, so I thought it would be easy enough to just add our own natural element to the countertop.

We've got some bigger, more dramatic ideas for this space, but this was a fun Saturday project.

One of my favorite people from my college days is Mrs. Sara-Beth Noll. It makes me smile just to think of her and all of her sweetness. I have truly loved getting "reacquainted" with the Noll family through their blog the last several months, and I just wanted to share one of her most recent posts and thoughts that I had while reading. Well, I can't take credit. I'm sure that the Spirit put them there, so, perhaps He'll use this to make you think about it too:)

Just in time you don't get a chance to read her post (which you should), then I'll tell you that they have been going thru the process of adoption, and Sara-Beth has been generous enough to share her thoughts and feelings throughout. It has certainly opened my eyes to the world of adoption, and I'm so thankful for her openness. This particular post is about their family Easter and the joys of the day, yet the ache in her heart knowing that she is missing her boys. The waiting is very hard. A dear friend (and veteran of adoption) of hers gives some amazing counsel. Part of which she directs SB's attention to the direct parallel to OUR adoption into Christ's family. Wow! So what follows are my thoughts and comments to Sara-Beth in response...

"Thank you, Sara-Beth, for always being so honest and open with your heart thru this whole process. Never knowing anyone personally who has gone thru the process, I have never really understood everything that surrounds it. Thank you.

I also wanted to thank you for making me think about OUR adoption into God's family. What a beautiful and heartbreaking picture of God's heart yearning for me to turn to Him completely. Though He knew that I'd come running back to Him (and the role you would play;) ), each day of waiting and watching His daughter make mistake after mistake without Him must have been so hard for Him. I am in such need of these reminders because as intimate of a relationship that I know God wants with us, I think that in my mind I have such a hard time believing that He would feel that way about me."

Now being a mom, God has been more than gracious, in the insight He's given me to the Father-daughter relationship I have with Him. I am tearing up thinking of the intense love I have for Trey and for baby #2, and am then in awe and disbelief that I can't even comprehend how much greater God's love is for me.

Nesting?

I remember reading all about nesting and all the preparations that you go through to get ready for the new arrival (conscious or unconscious, I suppose), but I seriously thought that wasn't supposed to happen until they were about to arrive. Perhaps it's not nesting if it's not really "baby" related, but I sure have gotten a domestic bug in me--and for once this long winter, it's a good bug that I've caught;). Any TV-aholic like me knows that there is nothing worthy of watching between the hours of 12 and 3 (unless you have gotten sucked into the world of "stories", then I suppose this is your happy hour(s) ). During my "downtime" after I put Trey down, I usually curl up on the couch with my lunch to watch a good PBS show. I love Cooke's Country and America's Test Kitchen! But they've also got some really creative craft and baking shows on. Between the PBS cake show and Cake Boss on Netflix, I apparently think that I can create any cake creation, just give me some fondant and some modeling chocolate and I'm set;) And thanks to all my very creative friends out there, I'm led to blog after blog of fun crafts! So my inspiration for the wreath below came from Mrs. Priss via the prompting of the very talented and creative Ashlee Proffitt--Thanks, Ashlee!

If it's not obvious, the circle is covered in yarn, and if you're a wanna-be knitter like me, then you have tons hanging around from past/unfinished/future projects:) It's a nice shoulder toning workout too to wrap all that yarn around.

The flowers are made from felt and Mrs. Priss gives super easy tutorials on her blog. Ashlee will lead you to it too on hers. They are sooo cute, and I think that I could make 1,000 of them and just toss them in every corner of the house!

When I was in Michael's getting the supplies I was looking for something that may help me to make the large yarn covered letters that she has on her etsy site, and I didn't see anything, but I did find this cute little star, and I thought it was cheap enough to experiment with. I think it turned out super cute! Can't wait to make a bundle of these. Perhaps they will be perfect for a new nursery;) Oh, that will have to be a post for another day! I can spend all day searching online for bedding and fabric. It's funny that all I keep looking at is girl stuff. haha. I guess we'll see, won't we.

Trey's Announcement!

The Big Man's BIG Announcement...

"I'M GONNA BE A..."

Congratulations, Trey! You're gonna be the best big brother ever! You already love your little brother/sister soooo much:) It's so sweet to hear you talk to the baby through my belly button:) (That's where you say the baby is "in my button". So cute!)

We can't wait to see what you teach this sweet baby!

Here's our first family viewing of the new baby.

It was so fun to have Trey there with us as we point out to him where the baby is, it's head, it's little bottom. Such a different experience the second time around, but just as exciting in it's own new way:) We're expecting the wee one in October, so it will be nice not to be too enormous during the dog days of this North Carolina summer.

Where to begin...

Phew! It's a good thing I denounced the ol' resolution to have a weekly post before I went AWOL for the last month and a half:) One would think that I've taken a posting hiatus due to us digging a ditch and taking up residence for a few weeks, hence having nothing to talk about--though I'm sure we'd have MANY "stories from the ditch". Anyway, I don't even know what I'm talking about anymore, but I feel like there has been so much to post on that I've gotten a little overwhelmed and haven't been able to find a good place to start. I think that sometimes I'm afraid to post without pictures because what if my ramblings on and on aren't thrilling enough to have my 13 precious followers come back to "see" us, or "read" us, as it may be (haha, that is making the bold assumption that our pictures are thrilling, haha, so perhaps I should just decide that you visit because you love us despite the "thrill" of the post;) ). So I'll partially blame it on the fear of word-only posts and link it to my growing technological disgust for the archaic rituals I must perform to get pictures from my camera to the blog. Seems like it would be a cinch "these days", well, in the Redgate house, think again! For starters, I've probably taken 50% less pictures since I can hardly open the velcro flap to the camera case without Trey racing over, saying "CHEEEESE!!" So cute, right?! Well, until he's then demanding to take the pictures himself and this just isn't a "toy" I'm willing to allow him to destroy. So we then have a meltdown, until the next distraction has been successful. Once I have actually been able to take a few shots, it's time to take out the memory card, grab the laptop, head upstairs into the abyss, I mean, the office, plug the card into the printer, plug the printer into the computer...we're almost there...oh woops, the computer is too old and we have WAY too much stored in iphoto for this process to take any less than an hour. Well, I think you're getting the picture. It's quite the process. We dream of the day that we'll have a new computer with many timesaving capabilities:)

So, since you've last gotten any updates, here's a quick review and HOPEFULLY we get a little bit more in depth over the next couple of days (no promises) with each. We've celebrated Shaun's 30th Birthday, Valentine's Day, of course, a weekend trip to the Ritz in Charlotte (Thanks BofA!), a bridal shower, a baby shower, small decor additions, a new living room purchase! (delayed delivery, so you won't see that until mid-April:) )...oh, and there's so much more, but I'll wait till I get a picture up for the best part!

See you soon:)