Week 13: Spring Planting

I’m not really sure what we did last week. I think it was a lot of chores, building and planting. It’s all kind of a blur now. We got a lot of things done, but so many little things that there’s nothing very significant to show for it. Mrs. Fong and I potted up some hanging baskets and then she turned into a planting genie and helped me plant a bunch of perennials. It’s great. I bring home flowers and then she goes and plants them. This arrangement works out great! 

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  I’m pretty sure these are Supertunia Royal Magenta and Supertunia White. (I didn’t save the packaging.)

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  Night Sky Petunia

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  We also put in some Blue Myrtle to hang over the edge. I later read that it is an extremely hardy ground cover so we definitely don’t want it in the ground.

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  Aurora Deep Purple Delphinium

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  Sensation White Salvia

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  Dalmatian Rose Foxglov

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  My favorite part of the yard is the butterfly garden that the sellers started.

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  Orange and yellow begonias

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  Hydrangeas

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I don’t know why I didn’t think of it before, but I thought that all flowers are annuals even though I know from experience that roses are perennials. For some reason, I didn’t think that other flower varieties come back year after year, but now that I know, it’s a complete game changer. Some succulents live here, but since it doesn’t get scorching for long periods of time like it does in the Bay Area, I think that flowers grow better. I still love all my little succulents though and got an echeveria to keep inside the house.

It all started because I felt peer pressured into making the yards look nicer. Keeping up with the Jone’s as they say. I saw this meme the other day that said “Adult peer pressure: Seeing your neighbor mow the lawn.” It’s so true. It’s so, so true. Everyone here has such beautiful front yards that I want ours to look nice too and if we’re doing the front yard, we may as well do the backyard too!

On Sunday, Mr. WTF and I took the rest of our boxes to the recycle center down the road and on the way back were hit with a hail storm. It’s June! It really did some damage on the succulents that I brought from home, so I moved them into our shed that night. The temps have dropped enough that I actually put flannel sheets back on our bed yesterday. It’s been getting into the low 40’s and a couple of nights into the 30s. For a family of Californians, it’s cold. 

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Tomorrow (Wednesday), we’re expecting our long awaited sofa to arrive and then the rugs I ordered should come in the following day. To go with the new sofa, I gave our existing furniture a facelift, but the paint isn’t sticking the way that I was hoping it would (it’s cheapy MDF) so it’s on to plan B. It took me four days to get these all painted and polyurethaned, then I was very unhappy with how the polyurethane turned my white paint into a streaky, yellow mess. What I was expecting to look clean, actually looks dirty. 

It was finally dry enough to put back together yesterday morning. By the afternoon, it was scratched. Reid went to move a plant pot that was too heavy for him and it scratched the paint right off. It didn’t even last five hours in our family room so it’s time to rethink my plan. Mr. WTF suggested putting contact paper on the surface when I was frustrated about the streaks, so I think I will be moving in that direction whenever I have the energy to do it again. I’ve been so tired from all the different projects we’ve been doing. 

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  This is what it originally looked like from Overstock.

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  The streaks make it look dirty.

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  I painted this small table top to go in between the two leather accent chairs we got.

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I got these chairs months ago and had them delivered to the old house. Mrs. Fong and I assembled them yesterday in preparation for the sofa arrival. I’ve been working hard to offset the brown tones of the house, but also am trying to have a good balance so that it doesn’t look like we’re fighting the color palette of the house. I hate painting walls so they are unlikely to change. I’m hoping that the chairs will tie in the brown room to the cool-toned sofa we ordered.

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We also surprised the kids with their own digger after watching Reid make believe.

The big reveal

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We’ve been doing learning time as usual, but admittedly, they’re getting less and less creative.

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Mr. WTF also put up our Arc de Triomphe photo that he took back in 2006 before we met. It went up in our apartment and we’ve had it somewhere in our residences ever since.

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  Lucas in Reid’s room

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  Lucas in Reid’s bed

Footage from the video monitor.

In a cute display of affection, Reid is comforting Lucas after I told a story about how my cousins and I tricked my brother into blowing bubbles with his straw using his nose when we were young. Lucas asked why we did that and I told him that younger brothers get picked on. Lucas is younger and got really upset about it. Reid immediately ran over to find out what was wrong. I told Lucas that it’s a good thing he has a nice big brother because big sisters are mean. Mr. WTF agreed. No wonder my sister-in-law and I get along so well.

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Doing some lounging in the warm days.

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  Mr. WTF really wanted this picture of Lucas in our downstairs bathroom.

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  I finished the wall decor in the guest room.