Day 2024

Today marks 2024 days of meeting (or exceeding) my step goal of 10K.  It was a nice day, not too cold nor too hot.  I spent part of the day checking out estate sales, looking for things that would work in my garden.  And then after lunch I headed downtown and took a walk in the Jefferson Westside neighborhood.  I started at Broadway and Monroe, ventured as far east as Charnelton and as far south as 17th.  I made several brief stops to photograph flowers I saw along the way.  

And then, I was heading to check out a lovely patch of poppies planted in the hellstrip along 15th between Lawrence St. & Lincoln St.  I've seen these flowers several times over the years, today they were especially stunning.  

As I approached the flowers I encountered a lady and her dog out for a stroll.  Come to find out, Patty lives right there in a house along that strip and one of her neighbors is the one who maintains the flowers.  We ended up talking for at least 20 minutes and I got to meet another neighbor, Rebecca, during that time.  By the time I left I had been invited to join their book group and when I said that I'm not good with book groups I was invited to just stop by for a visit anytime I see her car in the driveway.  

I truly enjoy meeting new and interesting people as I take walks in different neighborhoods throughout Eugene and Springfield.  Flowers and gardens are great conversation starters. 

Here are the other photos from my walk today, in the order I encountered them.

Day 2023

 Day 2023 - 10,000 steps or more!

Today I took more than one walk but the most memorable was in the Washburne District of Springfield.

Here's some of what I saw along the way. Some of the roses had such heavenly scents.  

Day 2000

 It started with a step forward, followed by another and another.

Today marks 2000 consecutive days of meeting (and usually far exceeding) my daily goal of 10,000 steps. I currently use a Garmin watch to track my progress.  (I'm on my 3rd Garmin, the first replacement was by choice to go to a more sleek design. The second replacement was by Garmin to replace a watch that kept having issues.)

In the past 12 months, I have recorded 676 activities with a total of 1341 miles but know that I have done many activities that for some reason didn't sync to the app.  Oh well, I know I did them and at least my daily steps were counted. 

I have had the opportunity to walk in many different parts of Eugene, always enjoying the new scenery as I walk or hike.  I've also put in MANY miles in Australia, Arizona, California, Oklahoma, and Washington as well as many cities and towns in Oregon.  Today I finished my steps in Bend, Oregon where Levi and I went to take Dad out for dinner and stay overnight.  

June 21, 2020 marked the most steps in a single day with 51,147.  

The week of December 23-29, 2019 marked the most in a week, with 189,932, most of which took place in Australia when Levi and I went to visit Cole.  We didn't get a rental car until Tad joined us on January 1st and of course the number of steps plummeted after that. 

May 2021 marked the month with the most steps, 643,618.  And I'm currently in my longest goal streak which I have been able to keep alive despite traveling, having a bout with Covid, and having many days where I just didn't "feel like it." 

If I have a day where I think I don't feel like walking I tell myself that it will NOT be the day my streak dies and I just get out and get some steps.  Somedays I barely clear my goal but my daily average for the past 6+ years is 16,256.  At one time I had a substantially higher average. 

More spring beauty from my garden

Water droplets on hosta 

In order to get these photos posted I'm going to restrain myself from saying much about them.  

New succulent garden beneath family room window.

I think we'll be eating a lot of lettuce this year!

Back yard border on the south side.

Christmas Velvet peony bud in center garden

Knotted (see the trunk) maple tree with metal art from Tad

The first of the alliums to bloom

Red twig dogwood blossom

Native iris-these came with the house 30+ years ago

Ah, the scent of this lovely wisteria. 

Climbing hydrangea. Once it got established it really took off! 
Purchased with Christmas gift card from Justin so I think
of him whenever I look at it.  It's going to have a good covering of 
blossoms this year!  So excited.

A new garden under development in the northwest corner of our backyard.  I see a view of it from my bedroom window so I'm trying to make it into something I can enjoy looking at as I make the bed in the morning.  

Looking to the east.

Oops! Found unplanted bulbs in late March.  They are doing surprisingly well for being planted at such a "late" date.

Such dainty flowers on the Pink Cow Parsley.  

Spring beauties in my garden

I bought this beautiful Axminster Gold comfrey at one of the many open gardens I attended last summer.  It's really coming up well this spring and should get quite large over the next few months.  It will eventually have small flowers though I really wanted it for the beautiful bright foliage colors it adds to the strip garden.  In the background, along the fence, you can see clusters of foliage from the hundreds of daffodils I planted along the fence last fall.  They gave a pretty good show this spring but I plan to add MORE for next spring and I look forward to them naturalizing and really providing a lot of spring color in years to come.  There are several clusters of allium planted along the fence that should bloom in the near future.  And to the top right of this photo is the first bearded iris to bloom in the strip.  It's a fragrant white with a bit of a blue undertone.  Eventually, those big strappy leaves in the middle right of the photo will have day lilies blooming amongst them.

This beautiful lilac was shared with me a few years ago by Deb whom I met through the Lane County Dahlia Society.  I can't believe how quickly the small start has grown to a 7-8 foot tall bush.  The dark blooms are so beautiful and the scent is lovely.

I don't remember when (2022 or 2023) I transplanted some of this Centaurea Amethyst in Snow from the back border garden to the strip garden but it has really taken off in the strip and will probably need to be divided soon.  It adds a lovely layer of color near ground level.  

Some of the beautiful tulips growing in the strip this year.  I need to remember to plant more tulips for next year!  

The Persicaria microcephala Red Dragon adds such a lovely intense color to the strip garden.  It's growing pretty rapidly and will soon need a wire cage around it to help support it throughout the summer.  The green foliage to the left is the butterfly bush that is just getting started.  It will eventually tower over everything around it. 
Back by the gate, you can see two columnar bushes that I received from a neighbor who was replanting a garden bed with rose bushes.  

Here's a wider view of the strip garden.  Mexican orange in the foreground, the red leaves behind it are on a lovely rose bush and then the bright colors of a small maple tree.  A little further away we can see the Persicaria and beyond that tulips and then a yellow twig dogwood and the very tall lilac bush.  

Clematis Vanso Blue Light 

This beauty is to the left of the gate into the backyard.  It has the most blooms it's ever had, the only bummer is that they are all way up high; there's nothing at eye level.  

Lastly, a sweet bouquet of lily of the valley, cerinthe, lungwort and forget-me-nots.

Truly, there's so much more going on in my garden that I've just not had time to document.  So much time has been spent on attempting to keep ahead of the weeds, a battle I'm already losing in some areas of the garden, as well as developing some new areas of garden beds around our property.

Until next time!  

 

A very productive week with redecorating the house

I worked really hard in all my free time last week and made a great deal of progress with the redecorating project.  There remains a lot to do but I'm at a good place for a little break now.  Want to see what I accomplished?

I spent much of my week sewing (or buying fabric for) throw pillows which all lead up to the "scary" job of covering two cushions for the wine barrel chairs Tad bought me some months ago. Scary because I'm not that much of a seamstress and the cushions involved circles AND zippers. I wasn't sure of my color scheme when I went fabric shopping.  My requirements were that it had to coordinate with the shade of gray used on the walls and it had to have at least a pop of color. When I found the 5 coordinating fabrics with the turquoise color I knew that I would go with them.  A while back I had painted our small bathroom a turquoise color and had used some of the extra paint on other projects, so it's obviously a color I like. The little dresser along the black wall in the entry/dining area was painted with a toned-down shade of that turquoise a few years ago.

Here's a picture of all (but one) of the throw pillows piled on one couch, staged especially for Levi because he wondered where people would sit if I kept making pillows. 😁 I made one of the yellow pillows and bought the other.  I picked up the solid turquoise pillow at a garage sale this summer and the cream-colored pillow is something I did quite a few years ago.

Before doing any sewing I had to take my machine to the shop and have a few adjustments made and buy a couple accessories.  I was relieved that it was all able to be done as I waited so that I could get right to my sewing.  The last time I tried sewing I had a disaster because the tension was all messed up and I had no clue how to fix it.  I guess I needed a new bobbin cartridge and I had been using bobbins that were the wrong shape for my machine.  Who knew?  I thought they were all the same! 

All that pillow sewing was helping me gather confidence for making the cushion covers. By the time I made them I had plenty of practice with zippers and I had found a couple tutorials on the internet on doing round cushions with boxed edges.  I was able to combine a couple techniques to come up with my covers.  Thankfully I took time to think it through and each one turned out on the first try!  I amazed myself and thought of how proud Mom would be of my work.  

And there's still room for people on the couches!  I really like my tulip painting on this wall because it can be seen from more of the house than when it was on the wall above the other couch. I need to decide what else will go on the wall but I'm trying to not rush into it.  The reason the picture isn't centered over the couch is that there is just one screw sunk into the wall and it is centered over the fireplace which I've placed the couch in front of.  I'll either decorate to the left of the picture to balance it or I will get a new hanger and move it over because leaving it the way it is will bother me. 

When I first started the redecorating I ordered a stencil for my bedroom.  I had not noticed that it was being shipped from Istanbul, Turkey so was a little surprised when it didn't show up within a week.  Eventually, I saw that it got stuck in Germany for a few days.  It finally arrived Friday afternoon and I got the wall done in about an hour and 45 minutes on Saturday morning.  I love how it turned out! Tad loved it too.   

I originally thought I might do the closet doors with the stencil but decided to do the wall so that if I get tired of it someday it will be the easier thing to cover up.  I'm kinda lazy that way.  That cool dresser belonged to my grandparents.  It was passed to me by my parents at some point.  A few years ago I sanded off the varnish (or whatever it was), stained the body of the dresser, painted and distressed the top, and then changed out the handles. It was in Cole's room for a few years and then I decided I wanted something different in my room so I took it last year.  I'm not gonna lie, the top of it is not usually this clean.  But after seeing how nice it looks in the picture I just might make it a goal to keep it cleaned off!  There is a little nightstand on Tad's side of the bed that needs to be painted to match the new decor.  Soon... 

Looking from the front door to the back of the house. You can see a snippet of the hallway wall.

Another project done last week was to paint the dresser on the left side of the above photo. The French White (light pink, which you can see if you look at the post from last week) just didn't go with the new color scheme and I had lots of paint left from that bathroom done years ago.  I purchased a sample pot of dark gray and mixed up 6 jars of chalk paint to get the job done.  I've been wanting to do the ombre look on this dresser for a while now.  What better time!  This is where we store cloth napkins (used daily), placemats (not so often), tablecloths (rarely) cards and dice (a winter staple), and a few odds & ends.

Looking from the living room toward the front door.

I must say that I just love how it's all turning out!  It feels very calm to me and for some reason seems to make the spaces feel larger.  Granted, I have gotten rid of some clutter (or at least moved it to the garage to be gone through.) 

For the first day in a few weeks, I don't have a decorating plan for today.  I think I'll take a day off and contemplate what needs to be done next.  Perhaps I'll inspect the walls for areas that need touching up. I know that I have a lot of trim to get painted but that's my least favorite so I think I will take a breather before I dive into it.  Eventually, most of the trim will be coming down to be replaced by more modern trim when we replace the doors throughout the house, but until then there are a couple areas that have the WRONG color and that's going to bug me. 

Maybe I will eventually post some before photos to have a record of what a dramatic difference this has made.  I just need to go "digging" through old photos to find each area.  

Cheers!