Iced Tea Chat: May Flowers

Hello, dears...Come in and let's have a glass of iced tea.  Our temperatures here in the South are firmly set towards the 90-degree mark and humidity has increased.  We stepped out on the porch yesterday morning, and I immediately felt damp sticky, and too warm.  I hadn't even started work!  All I'd done was step outdoors.  

April is finished and May has begun.  April was unusually pleasant for us in so many ways.  Well, most of April was unusually pleasant.  We darn near spoiled it for ourselves by worrying about that destination wedding we attended the first weekend.   We didn't enjoy that trip nearly as much as we should have.  That's a shame because it will be months before we can do that again.  We can't turn back the clock and do it over, so we move on.

The rest of the month was just lovely with flowers, family visits, great weather for the most part, and busy work days, all mixed in together.  The lack of drama was more than welcomed. Both family drama and personal drama were at an all-time low this month... We have operated in drama for so long that I kept wanting to look over my shoulder to see what was sneaking up behind us.

It is the season of the year when I go outdoors daily and paint, plant, or putter and then come indoors fully done.  I worry that this is a sign of aging but honestly, I think it's more a sign of high humidity, heat, and physical labor.  Today I made a huge push and planted all but four of the new plants.  The containers all look so pretty at the moment...Well, they will when the plants recover from the shock of having been potted up.  

I redid the little flower bed at the back steps as my first gardening project.  I removed every single item and then leveled the area as best I could.  I put down fresh mulch, and then carefully made a pretty potted bed from the space.  I do not plant things in the ground in that area because there are water and electric lines running under it. I should take a picture of it but there are three bags of wet mulch lying in front of it at the moment and I haven't enough 'want-to' left in me to move them so I could get a good photo.  I promise one will be posted.  

Just as my style indoors has changed somewhat, I'm altering how things look outdoors.  Most of the 'junk' items were removed.   I'm pushing for more color in that space with flowers and plants.  That's just one small area though.  There's so much work I must do and more I'd like to do.  I remind myself to do what I can and try to make it the best I can with what I have.  

The perennials that I potted last year have all returned and look healthy.  Those are all on the patio and that area needs as much work as any other.  Again, I'll remind myself to go slow, do what I can, and make it look the best I can using what I have.  I'm also making sure I finish a space as fully as I can for now before moving on.  Otherwise, I end up with a lot of messy-looking spaces and that really makes the sense of overwhelm kick in.  

I expect I'll end up using some pots of flowers in other flower beds but transplanting things in the ground is also in my plans.  I have a small forsythia, an offshoot of one that Granny had given me that has decided to thrive.  It put a branch on the ground and started a whole new plant.  I want to get the  forsythia out of the pot, trim the branch that has rooted, and plant them both.  Ditto for the hydrangea I rooted.  In fact, I think I may have TWO hydrangea in pots that need to be planted in the ground.

In the movie "To Catch A Thief", Cary Grant walked around the pool of a home in Monte Carlo and the pool area had pots of hydrangea in alternating blues and pinks lining the edges of the concrete pool surround that were STUNNING.  Alas, I don't have a pool, in-ground or otherwise but it would also be a lovely way to border a patio.  Simple, effective, unusual, and not limited to any one style. It would work as well for a simple country cottage as for a mid-century modern as for a Ranch House in the middle of a suburb.  All one must do is choose the right pots to display them.  

I'm amazed, as I usually am, at how much difference a fresh coat of paint can make on so many things.  On furniture, planters, pots, picture frames.  I've been using up a variety of colors of paint I have on hand, spray paint, and quarts.  I wouldn't say any of them are the perfect color but the colors help make things look pretty and for that I'm thankful.  I console myself that, I can buy different colors when I paint in a year or two since I'll have to buy.

Millie sat on one of the chairs on the back porch and looked at me hard.  I asked her if she was comfortable.  "No...I think it needs a cushion!"  I've found that if I have cushions on the chairs the dog sits in them...Not something I want to encourage.  But I can't deny that having cushions would make them much more comfortable.  

This year for our anniversary, we've decided to purchase two rockers or an old-fashioned glider.  I'd like the glider but finding one that fits our space is a consideration.  We hang clothes on the front porch so any furniture there has to be moveable.  And the back porch is long and narrow, so fitting it there would be hard.  We've been looking around.  Our criteria are that we want to be able to afford the item(s), it must fit our space and whoever we buy from must be willing to deliver.  

As you can tell,  I've been heavily focused on the outdoors.  It has gotten so warm that I'm quickly realizing it would be better to go out early in the morning to work.  It's also got warm enough that I am about to revert to my 'summer cookery'.  No oven except very early in the day, using the slow cooker, microwave, toaster oven, and grill, to eliminate heating up the house, etc. 

I finally made out a warm-weather menu.  It's not complete but was just a listing of ideas for meals that aren't as heavy as our cool weather Menu.  Meals rely less on heavy starches and more on salads and fresh seasonal vegetables.  I should work out a breakfast menu as well that is a little less heavy.  We don't eat a lot of cold cereal but we do eat more of it in the warmer months.  I find a cold bowl of cereal disheartening when the weather is also cold, don't you?

Speaking of eating cold cereal, it's a 'thing' just now to make your own cereal  Not the muesli/granola type of cereal which I think is very good, but homemade cinnamon toast crunch.  It doesn't look like commercial cereal but those who make it seem to think it tastes good.  You're just making a sweet cracker and then pouring milk over it. Do you know what I thought would be good?   Broken bits of cinnamon graham crackers.  I think that would taste really good!

John will not touch yogurt unless it's blueberry.  And store-bought.  He will not eat my homemade yogurt at all.  He tends to view yogurt more as a sweet treat than a breakfast item which is a shame, too.  Although, really, the store-bought flavored yogurts are very sweet so who can blame him for thinking they are more of a dessert or sweet snack?

I've been stocking up on blueberries for the freezer this month.  I've found decent prices on them and each time I go to a grocery where they are on sale,  I buy two or more packages.  I bought four today and put all of the washed berries in the freezer.  Do you know what I've been really enjoying?  Mid-afternoon when I want a little something sweet, I'll take a handful of frozen blueberries from the freezer, allow them to thaw for perhaps five minutes, and then eat the still frozen berries.  They are sweet and cold and really satisfy my urge to have a sweet snack.

Today while we were out at lunch, John did something he does occasionally.  "Are you okay?  Is your life good?"  I tried to explain to him today how I feel a stranger in my own body just now.  Not, "Oh I don't know who I am or what I mean" sort of identity crisis but more that I don't understand the aging process.  

For 40 years I had oily skin and oily hair.  One reason I have been so proactive with skincare was because I was so prone to breakouts until I hit my 50s and then things settled down.  But here in my 60s, my skin is drier and my hair is thin and dry.  In winter I have to be especially careful to moisturize heavily.  And I am daresome to wash my hair more than once every 10 days.

I retain fluid.  I've gained a few pounds.  And we won't discuss body aches and pains which shift from body part to body part as a month changes over...

But it's also emotional in a way that I hadn't expected it to be.  I'm not new to menopause. I've been fully menopausal for twelve years.  Yet I find myself unreasonably irritable, fretful, and weepy.  Why?  No reason I can perceive.  Not having been in my 60s before I don't know if this is normal or not.  

Or is all the irritability, fretfulness, and tears due to the things going on in our lives?  

I don't know.  

I didn't expect to be raising a child in my 60s.  I found that to be very hard.  I'm not sorry I helped with that because I think we all benefitted in many ways.  I don't grieve that Katie and Caleb have moved on.  Sam doesn't require the same sort of hands-on help that Katie did at this time.  He might in the future but whose to say he will?  

One thing I appreciate about this stage of life is the willingness to let things play out before I start to worry.  I very seldom think of "What if...?" scenarios.  Mostly if those things pop up in my mind, I remind myself that seldom do the things I worry about come to be.  

I think that's also why I refuse to listen to 'preppers' and those who urge us to be prepared for all scenarios.  We can't be.  It's impossible.  Whatever we are prepared for there will be five things we aren't prepared for at all.  We can only do the best we can do.  

I am not saying to not make any effort to be prepared.  I prefer to know how I'd manage if things were to need to live without electricity, for instance.  I've paid attention to the things we missed, the places where we were lacking.  We've done what we can to prepare for future outages but I can say assuredly we are not fully prepared.  We've touched a base on most things, but not all.

I confess at the moment, there are very few things I want to worry about.  Few things I want to be bothered thinking about.  For this season, perhaps this year, I am content to just watch things unfold.  To take each week, each month with whatever it offers up.  I'm not being lazy.  I'm just resting.  I feel strongly that is a season of rest.

Ironic isn't it when we're in the throes of a busy time of year?  

I'm going to watch the flowers bloom.

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