Marsia's Diary

Emilyrose said:
It honestly sounds magical. 'Marsia's Magical Garden.' :)
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It sure does 💓
 
Slowing down your pace in the heat is definitely the healthy thing to do. Paradise can't be built in a day, even with such industrious contractors.
 
Thanks everyone! I love walking in the screen house. It does feel a bit magical! And I think you're right about slowing down, LaMa. Got a lot of seeds planted today - a ton of peanuts, many wild plum pits from our wild plum trees in CA and some from our apricot, winter squash, and thought I'd see if I could grow grapes from the seeds from our amazing huge Concord grape in the old place. It was very hot, so I cleared out a lot of stuff the last people left in the garage, got a bunch of packing boxes cleared of tape so I can use them for mulching the fruit trees, and watered the garden a couple times because it got wilty in the heat.

The floor tile is mostly in, the stairs to the basement are stained, my room got its second coat of stain, and the banister is getting sanded down so it can be stained the same color as the floor. The contractors who are working on the tile are still here and it's nearly 7 pm! I think I'll go get in their way and make a quick dinner. Probably some shrimp scampi with lots of broccoli mixed in.
 
Thanks Cate! I really love the house as is, but we've lived in all our houses for years with someone else's paint colors and tile, and when we finished fixing up the last house, immediately sold it, so we're splurging and living in a house with our taste this time. We didn't do anything crazy expensive like redoing bathrooms, so it's not too bad as far as expense. The tile I got is lovely, but very inexpensive, and the rest is paint and labor costs. The house looks really good, but definitely in the middle of construction with lots of dust from sanding floors and muck on the tile, and tools everywhere. I can tell it's going to be as nice as I pictured, though!

The contractors are amazing - never seen a whole team work so hard and fast, and they are happy and sing arias and joke, too. They all speak different languages, so it's an interesting challenge talking with them. Lots of pantomime...

I had my nice broccoli shrimp scampi and am going to go wash some clothes by hand before turning in. The washer/dryer are not hooked up and I am running out of warm weather clothes. I really need to find more, but may wait a bit as the pants I bought a month ago are now so loose I don't have to unbutton them to put them on. Soon my loud pants should fit well enough to wear in public if I get brave enough to wear them out!
 
I think you'll find that you have dropped at least 3 kg in the last month. The contractors do sound amazing & it will be wonderful living in a house that is to your taste. I'm looking forward to those photos xo
 
I work in a part of Vienna with people from all directions. German is the lingua franca and all the different accents are a lot of fun. Singing workmen are awesome!
 
Thanks Cate and LaMa! Today was so hot and muggy I planted a bunch of seeds in the shade while sweating profusely and when it got up to 94F (34.4C) I went inside and watched videos on fermenting veggies and canning. The tile guys left at 8pm and so I didn't get a lot done today. I'm going to go vacuum the dust out of the floor vents because tomorrow they stain all the floors, grout the tile flooring, and put in the kitchen backsplash. I also did laundry in small batches in the sink and got in everyone's way walking it out to the back deck to dry. They come Saturday and then again on Monday and then I have my house back. I can hardly wait!

Cate, you may be right about how much I lost. One of the thrift store pants was a little tight when I got it, and now will hardly stay on, so I do think I lost a good amount. LaMa, I really like the boss. He is a small man with a big, sunny personality and laughs a lot. I think his workers appreciate having a happy atmosphere to work in, and they contribute to the atmosphere, too.
 
Hi Em, I am feeling industrious lately, which is a really nice change from living in the tiny apartment and feeling bored. I also want us to feel financially stable after so much of just hanging on because of too many expenses. So I think canning and fermenting and using my food dehydrator are going to be helpful because we are going to have such a bad harvest year as a country and I don't want to stress about it.

I also feel lately that I don't want to get too passive watching too much of other people's creative projects. I want to start doing my own art and creating my own things. After I get the garden in, the next thing will be my art. I had to throw out my old printing inks because they were left in the garage too long and dried out, so I just got a new set of ink. I have to unpack my notes from printmaking class in college because it's been so long since I did printmaking, that I forget how to mix the ink and what I mix it with!

Ok, it's nice and cool-ish out, so time to fill the next huge raised bed!
 
Thanks so much LaMa! Had a really productive day yesterday gardening. Got blueberries, blackberries, rosemary, passionfruit all potted up and a few other herbs, too. The tea plants were lost in the mail for 25 days so I went to cancel the order and the seller asked if I'd rather try sending via another carrier. I said yes. Two days later the cancelled plants showed up, and most of them still have a few leaves on them. I potted them all up to see if they make it and will pay for them if they do, and then another batch is on the way. So we are going to have a mini-tea farm. It was cloudy and rained softly yesterday and it was nice gardening in the cooler temps with a little cooling rain.

Lots of progress on the house. I was supposed to have today off, but the tile guy will come finish up the grouting and kitchen wall tile today. My peanuts are sprouting already!
 
The printmaking project sounds great. I completely understand that you are enjoying doing all this gardening and house prep. You are building a lovely new life for yourself.
 
I understand that you want to try and save the poor mistreated tea plants but if you pay full price now you're overpaying by a LOT.
 
alligatorob said:
I know that feels good, but always too slow.

Blueberries, blackberries, rosemary, passionfruit, a mini-tea farm and peanuts! What else are you planting? How much yard do you have to work with?
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Hi Rob! There is about an acre of cleared land that we can put a garden and small orchard on, and the rest is pine forest and marsh. But being by the coast, the soil is unimproved sand, so I am doing raised beds so all my nutrients I add to the soil don't wash away as quickly. So far I potted up fruit trees that will go in the ground in the fall: persimmon, pear., citrus, and elderberry. I also have a bed of sweet potatoes with a little bit of basil and carrots mixed in, a bed of strawberries with garlic and onions, and lots of potatoes in buckets so they are easy to harvest. I also have asparagus and rhubarb in big pots until I make their beds up. And I have some cabbage, winter squash, chives, and Swiss chard seeds started for fall. Got a really late start, so I may just buy a few tomatoes and summer squash that are bigger.

Today should be the last day of the contractors coming, which will be wonderful to have my house back! Then I just need to paint a bunch of rooms, and clean up all the sawdust off the walls and everywhere from them sanding the floor. I got one room primed yesterday since it will be a light color, and was painted a fairly dark blue.

Llama said:
I understand that you want to try and save the poor mistreated tea plants but if you pay full price now you're overpaying by a LOT.
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I think so, too. Especially because the other postal carrier has this shipment delayed, so I may only end up with half the tea tree plants making it. I will wait to see what makes it before seeing if I want to pay extra for extra plants or not. it's a very small business, and I would like to be supportive, but not pay for dead plants either.

Hi Em! I do feel like I'm building a nice life for us. My family besides me has never lived anywhere but California, so I really want to make things nice for us after such a big move. It feels way more like home now that we put our own touches on the place. The final coat of finish went on the floors yesterday, and they look really beautiful. And all the tile is done in the kitchen and I am really happy having a beautiful kitchen now. Once I am done painting, it will be as nice as our fixed up house in CA. Plus we have a whole huge new part of the US to explore!
 
Fingers crossed the contractors will be able to finish up everything today so you get to have some peace in paradise!
 
Thanks everyone! The contractors have everything done except some of the baseboard that is on back order. So they may come again this weekend, but they won't be making monumental messes, so I can clean all the saw dust off of every surface of the house now. They were also very sloppy with the floor stain, and there are hand prints in the floor stain color everywhere and lots of splashes of it on all the big baseboards, so I think we'll hire the painters back to clean up all the baseboard. It's looking fabulous though!

So I have a few days to clean and unpack the kitchen, and set up beds for everyone, possibly finish painting the laundry room, as well as mop the walls and clean the bathrooms. I won't get all the walls done, so will be strategic. I also want to food shop and prepare stuff in advance so I can just enjoy having J's brothers over without having to fuss too much over feeding them. They are small guys, but eat a lot!

Last night there were 2 frogs sitting together on the threshold of the basement door, and I shoed them away and discovered a third frog almost at the door. I was hosting a small frog soiree without knowing it!
 
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Marsia said:
Last night there were 2 frogs sitting together on the threshold of the basement door, and I shoed them away and discovered a third frog almost at the door. I was hosting a small frog soiree without knowing it!
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🐸🐸🐸 That's adorable. When will J and K be joining you, by the way?
 
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