Sunday in the garden

WARNING: Hayley and Lindsey, you will find this boring and should probably skip this post. ;)

I say this every year, but I was a bit behind on my spring gardening adventures so I spent a lovely Sunday catching up. I planted:
- 3 tomato plants - Early Girl (supposed to be ready in just 50 days!), an heirloom variety, and yellow cherry
- Basil - one established plant, plus seeds in a deck container
- Flowers - 12 marigolds, 6 wave petunias, 4 lantana, plus seeds of morning glory, zinnias, and alyssum.

Then I mulched four of the small beds, which required a trip to Menard's first. I'm still not done, though. The rosebushes in front need pruning, and the "big garden" in back is a weed pit right now. Plus, I'd like to add a few more deck containers. I'm hoping I can finish those projects during some weeknight.

I am TIRED! As much as I enjoy gardening, I think I have more beds than I can realistically handle -- especially since we spend so many weekends at the lake. I enjoy tending my small beds because they're filled with good dirt and are easy to fill and maintain. The big bed is a gardener's nightmare, though, because it's filled with this awful, heavy clay soil that covers the outlying areas of Lincoln. It's a gift (ha) from the previous owner, and it's still a semi-disaster after six years of mulching, composting, and adding topsoil. My rookie mistake was trying to make the best of it. In hindsight, I should've paid for dirt removal and started from scratch.

Oh well. I'm hoping it's not my problem next year. I've threatened to take a soil sample test kit to open houses so we don't buy another home that's plagued with crappy clay soil. ;)

An opportunity for growth ... or something

The nice thing about our pregnancy being mostly a secret is that we haven't been bombarded with well-intended (yet annoying) unsolicited advice yet.

This ignorance-is-bliss period is soon coming to an end, however. That became oh-so-clear today when I told my great-aunt Nancy that I was pregnant. One of the first questions out of her mouth was whether I would continue working. I said that I planned to, and her response was, "Oh, these days nobody wants to take care of their kids!" [Insert uncomfortable laugh.]

W.T.F. If I considered the source and took this at face value, I could roll my eyes and move on with my day. Aunt Nancy is not known for having great tact. To say that she's fairly ignorant about the world in general is a gross understatement. (Just ask Hayley about what happened when she told Aunt Nancy about her Costa Rica trip.)

It wouldn't bother me much, except that I know there are other people in my life (whose opinions I actually care about) who feel the same way. At least two of my friends are fully on the stay-at-home-mom track, which I think is great. They've always wanted to be SAHMs and will probably do a fabulous job. However, both of them make remarks to justify their choices, like, "Well, I just don’t want anybody else raising my kids." The great irony is that one is a teacher, and the other was a nanny until she gave birth 5 days ago. Do they really think they're "raising" other people's kids?

If you operate under the whole "it takes a village to raise a child" mentality, yes, nannies, teachers, babysitters, and nice little church ladies definitely play a role in raising children. But surely we can all agree that parents have the greatest influence on their children, regardless of their employment status. Right?

I know really need to get over feeling slighted by those comments because Lord knows I'll hear plenty more for the next 20 years of my life. I guess I'm a little sensitive because it makes me feel like the people closest to me already think I'm unfit to be a mother. Does leaving Baby Washburn in someone else's care make me a little nervous, and even a little bit sad? Yes, it does. But I still believe that having two breadwinners is a better situation for our family, and you better believe that anyone caring for Baby W. will be carefully evaluated.

Venting makes me feel better already. I need to either a) grow a thicker skin, or b) become very comfortable telling people to STFU. ;)