Appliances....

What a day for a refrigerator to quit! 100* today and tomorrow and food in ice chest's. We'll see what my luck is getting one delivered tomorrow. Probably not great but I can try! I wonder if I could get a better deal if I did the hot water heater (on the 4th reset) at the same time..... I did find out that there's a chamber discount at Sears!

On another note the hydrangea's are doing awesome this year!!! Although I think I'll give them a drink tomorrow morning. They don't like 100* F plus weather too much!! These are actually planted in the same area so the color difference is quite interesting!

Painting!! and misc.

I've wanted to do this paint job for a few years now and thanks to Christina it is done! See below for the picture. Thanks to unusually warm June days it dried fast and we were able to easily do both coats in the same day. She did the living room area and I did the area that needed the ladder. It's not perfect but I really like it! :)  Hopefully before the summer is over we can paint the white walls and cover up the oops area's!

The garden is doing awesome!! It sure love's this heat! In other area's our heat would be nothing but we've been in high 70's to 90's all month. When the average is 75*F those temps are nice and warm. This weekend supposed to reach close to 100*. Tomorrow morning the garden is getting a water! Today the cucumbers did since they're growing and they need water to not get bitter. It's amazing the growth that they've had in just the last week or two.  I think I'm really liking this new fertilizer!!

I've been very pleased with the response form my buyout of the bookkeeping clients from another lady. We sign Saturday, it was going to be last Saturday but there was one addition to the contract. Exciting times! We'll find out if I'm guessing right in the next couple of months but I believe I should be pretty much full time! Yea!!

Picking blueberries already!

Tomato Plants are growing quick!

Peppers!

Squash growing like crazy

My herb pot has grown A LOT the last couple of weeks!

Trailing geranium pot that I put together.

Happy girls!! :)

Much needed break!

A much needed convention break was needed this last week. I'm so thankful that I was able to do it before everything thing gets beyond crazy!! I wasn't really expecting to know very many people since it's so far north but there were a few more familiar faces then I was expecting! My friend that saved me bench space and a bed said this was the biggest Post Falls convention that she can remember. It sounds like there was a lot of people, like me, that decided to go there for the first time. I love how there's so much fellowship, even when you don't know very many people. A couple of really cute things happened. One was a elderly (80's) couple in front of us. He was doing everything he could to make sure his wife was good and at one point she told him something along the lines of " I love having you next to me". The really cute part was she smiled and put her hand over her mouth and giggled. It reminded me of something a young person would do. I found out the next day that they just got married two weeks ago! The other was an elderly worker that is in a care home run by some friends. They brought him to convention and he is really quite the character! :)  He decided Christina and I were twins and it become a running joke between us for pretty much the whole convention. He asked at one point where my 'twin' was and informed me that twins belong together! :) It was altogether a very lovely time!

So many thoughts were special thoughts were shared. What's been on my heart in not letting my business completely take over my life was covered in the first meeting!! First things first! I love the confirmation. My Father knows exactly what I need. A lot was spoken about the struggles that come and the things that we have to go through. Our Father is in complete control and he knows exactly what we need to grow stronger and get deeper roots. Don't question why! Simply go and ask for strength. Don't question why things are the way they are in the world. Our Father is in complete control and everything that happens is either planned or allowed. Another thought I really liked was we're either making progress in this way or not making progress. You can't stay in one place!

Now back to the daily grind! It's going to be one busy summer!

It's summer!!

A bit early this year but summer it is! The portable air conditioning came out today so it feels much better now!! So far we've had two days of 90 or above and tomorrow will make a third before it goes down to more reasonable Northwest temps. I think this is one of the earlier 3 days running of over 90 if tomorrow does indeed happen! But the garden is loving it! :) Here in Portland we'll typically get around 15 days over 90 for the whole summer. If tomorrow is over 90 that's a pretty good start!

For my work break yesterday I went out and got my pots planted. I used my new fertilizer so I took some before pictures to see what happens. They're posted below. I did get lots of work done yesterday, of which a lot of it was 3 years of receipts for a client. There's a few left to finish but most are done! They need sorted since there's a decent amount of cash receipts that can be used for expenses. It looks like I may be buying out a lady that's going to go to work for someone else. She doesn't have a lot of clients but it looks like just enough to fill the space that I have available. We'll see what happens this next week with the contract! Hopefully by August I'll have a good sense of where I am at! I've made many, many connections over the last 4 years and I've got to say they're starting to bring some business in. There's one guy who is a regional manager of a franchise that I've talked with off and on for 3 years. I think it's 3 years anyway! He bought one down in our area and just called me up a week and a half ago asking for bookkeeping help so that was really exciting!! I'm anxious to see where it all will go! But once again I need to be really, really careful that it doesn't take over my life!!

Fuchsia's 

Basil (This pot is on it's last legs!!)

Parsley, basil and lemon thyme

Geraniums 

Stevia

Trailing Geraniums 

First pick, 2 day's later I picked two more containers. Yum!!!

What will tomorrow bring?

Business is going quite well right now! It's actually pretty exciting! Once I get everyone caught up after the last month and a half of issues then I'll be very curious to see where I sit! Between new business and growing client businesses exciting and busy times are ahead! There's a potential for a big deal that may happen tomorrow. If it does I didn't need to wait too long for the time to fill up that has now opened up because of no longer babysitting Scarlet two days a week. It'd be pretty amazing I think! :)

Now for the garden.... I planted beans, squash and cucumbers last Wednesday. They are already coming up! I think this is the quickest I've ever had vegetables pop up. Of course it was a tad warm until yesterday. Yesterday and today have been pretty cool and rainy. But tomorrow starts warming up and then into the 90's??? for a couple of days this weekend. I'll be interested to see what this summer brings. Will it really be as hot as they are predicting? 

Christina's job is going pretty well. It's pretty awesome that she got a job at the same place Erika worked about 5 years ago. There's actually a guy still working there that was there when Erika was there. She'll be working there for at least the next year (if she doesn't get another job that is) and then we'll see what happens!!

The thought that has kept me going lately.... How quickly things can change if I don't do what I need to spiritually. It's scary how easy it is to let life take over and before you know it there's appears to be no time for our Father. I say appears, because in reality there is time. It's up to us what we make time for and in reality.... what will happen to everything that is accumulated here one day? It stays behind when our time for eternity comes. So what really is important? It's something that I keep reminding myself, especially now that I'm busy.

Garden Pics (the start, 2015)

I love gardening, it's a place I can go out and just lose myself and de-stress. As I mentioned before, I am really excited to see what happens this year with the new fertilizer. And this year has been such an odd year weather wise. We've had just over a 1/2 inch of rain all month. I believe they're saying it's the driest May on record. I picked raspberries today and I really can't remember ever doing that since I planted them. I think it's been 10 years since I planted them. Not many but give it another week and I'll be getting a good pick! I've also started picking my honey berries. So yummy! They're on the tart side but I love tart fruits so it's perfect! :)  Below are the pictures for the start. We'll see where everything is in a month!!

Ripening raspberries! 

Kind of hard to tell but lots of raspberries!

Tomatoes- They're grafted tomatoes with two types each- It's the first time I've done this so we'll see how it goes!

Peppers! These are grafted as well- We'll see how they do!

Roses- These roses do unbelievably well! Very little black spot, unlike most the other's.

And they're loaded with blooms!!

One of my lavender bushes and the biggest one by far.

A dianthus that has been coming back year after year in this pot.

This is an above view of this pot. There's also Agastache. I very nearly lost the Agastache in 2013-2014 winter but a little bit of it survived and it's thriving this year! I think this pot has been going since before Dave left. Poor pot needs replaced, it's literally breaking apart!

This is kind of a fake fuschia and unfortunately invasive if you don't stay on top of it! But the hummingbirds love it! :) 

Hydrangea- such a pretty purple!

A close up of a Hydrangea bloom

My blue Hydrangea 

This is the whole Hydrangea bush with the blue flowers. It's loaded!!

Lots of Hydrangea blooms posted but I really liked this one as well!

A beautiful pot that someone got me. So gorgeous!!

I never remember to do before pictures so I'm actually remembering! I'm hoping to get this bed area cleaned out tomorrow. This is where I had apple trees for years.

Jumping back in

After a month of getting almost nothing done work wise, it leaves me wondering where in the world to start!! Truth to tell, I'm fighting being overwhelmed. I'm really hoping that there isn't anything real big in my future for a while so I can get everyone caught up in the next month. We'll see what happens but I have 2 possible new clients and one for sure new client and a couple of expanding clients! Add that to everything and I foresee a very busy month coming up! The good news is that I'm actually gaining a couple of days a week since I won't be babysitting Scarlet any longer. I'm going to miss that kid!! Friday is the last babysitting day. She's really starting to talk now. Does a lot of copying. :) And for now her blood sugars are stable. When she isn't teething or sick it's actually not all that hard to keep them good. She really only needs the long lasting insulin at that point. I have found the trick is making sure she's eating a 'free' (5g of carbs and under) food along with something that can affect her sugar. That helps counter act the sugar and then it doesn't go quite as high. Our favorite right now is Apple (not a whole one but about a 1/4-1/3 of one) and cheese.

I'm really hoping to go to Post Falls this year, I really need a convention break after this last month! It'd help me get myself back into order and help me focus! I have really appreciated the comfort and assurance that my Father has given. Sometimes it's so easy to start thinking of everything that needs done but if I leave it in His hands then it'll work out exactly as it needs to! I just need to make sure to do my part!!!

I got the garden planted today! YEA!!! I'm going to take pictures tomorrow and post them. I planted it while Scarlet was napping and she woke up just as I finished planting! I'm so excited to see what happens. I'm using a different fertilizer this year and hoping for wonderful results. :)