Sunday, February 23, 2014

Garden Dreaming

So I'm not sure if it's because we got two gardening catalogs in the mail yesterday, because the temperature finally spiked above 40 degrees, or because our garden bed looks like this:


. . . . but I'm definitely dreaming of the days when it looks like this:


This year's planting schedule is going to be a bit tricky, since our baby is due May 1. Plus, we're planning to spend almost a month on PEI during my maternity leave, so watering & harvesting are going to be problematic in July. We cobbled together a plan over breakfast though that we think will work.

The plan is to start with some early spring vegetables that I've always wanted to grow, but we've always put in the ground too late, like peas, carrots, and radishes.  Those should be able to go in late March to early April (4-5 weeks before the due date).  Then, we'll order cucumber seeds and tomato & pepper plants from Burpee to be delivered (versus picked up at the local nursery or at Home Depot) in early May.  If all we have to do is take delivery of the plants/seeds and plop them in the ground, that should be easy enough.

We're hoping to dig a shallow, snaking trench inside the bed and install a soaker hose (which we should have done before we ever filled the bed with soil, but whatever). Connecting the hose to a timer at the sillcock set to go on and off daily should take care of our watering needs when we're away in July.  Then, we'll plan to ask family members and friends to swing by once a week to make sure the garden is getting enough water and harvest whatever's ripe.

You'll notice a lot of shoiuld's in this post.  Who knows what will happen with a newborn in the house?  Here's hoping this will all work out, though!

Monday, February 17, 2014

Our Trip to Montreal

We went to Montreal this weekend!  It's starting to become a tradition that every couple of years, we make the drive 5 hours north for a weekend of Quebecois food and fun.  We went for our honeymoon in 2010, for our 2-year anniversary in 2012, and for a bachelor party, also in 2012.  This was the coldest, snowiest trip we've made up there, but still fun.  It was also our "babymoon," i.e. our last planned trip before baby Eleanor joins us.  Here are some of our photos:

Love this huge arched window in our regular suite.

As well as this lovely terrace, overlooking a much snowier Parc la Fontaine than we're used to.

20 degrees and snowy outside meant an afternoon at the Biodome was very welcome.

A marmoset!

A couple of caymans!

Hibernating beaver butts caught on camera!

A huge sturgeon!

Saturday's dinner - the famous poutine at La Banquise.

There were a couple of slightly better post-poutine couple selfies, but I like Justin's face in this one the best.

Parc la Fontaine is lovely, but chilly (about 9 degrees and windy in this photo).

Saturday, February 08, 2014

Baby Steps

Remember my little garden house?  Well, due to the baby's room being transformed right now, it's finally started on its path to being a little guest house/office.  I talked a little bit about that plan here, but in essence, it involves creating another space to sleep in the garden house to accommodate both guests and my husband & I when my parents are here providing childcare.

The plan is scheduled to move forward with furniture moving and styling in April after our bedroom and the dining room have been painted, but that photo above?  Of the spare bed looking awesome and peaceful in the space even without sheets?  That's step #1.  :)

Wednesday, February 05, 2014

Nursery Montage

I'll probably do a more complete summary of the nursery's transformation from our guest room (formerly my grandparents' room) at some point, but for now, here's a series of photos showing some of the stages (mostly taken from the same angle, except the ones showing the paint samples by the window).











Saturday, February 01, 2014

More Baby's Room Stuff

Look what I made today!  I had seen the quote in a couple of places around the internet, then decided I wanted a print with the saying for Eleanor's room.  Rather than try to find one to buy, I ran to Publisher and typed it up, then started pondering a good mountain image to go with it.  Within seconds, I'd thought of Tolkien's mountain drawings (since Justin and I are both big fans) and found a JPG of the cover of our own edition of The Hobbit.  Popped it in behind the quote, made the text box less transparent so you could read the words better, agonized for a little while over fonts & degree of transparency, and voila!

And in other big news, we painted the nursery today!  I'm going to take better photos tomorrow in the daylight, with the furniture back in place, but here's a sneak peek.  The color is a no-VOC match to Valspar's "Balsam," which seemed fitting for a woodland nursery.