Wednesday, December 28, 2022

Making Plans

Last night, I fell asleep going through one of my favorite garden catalogs, Pinetree. 
Going through the pages brought a sense of creativity as I decompressed from work. Seeing all the rich colors of fruits, vegetables and flowers took me to my garden lab where I can start making plans for what to try this season, I save a lot of my seeds, but I also like trying new seeds, too. 

Pinetree doesn't have the big bold pictures like Baker's Creek(I love them, too!), but it has prices that fit my budget, if you've never ordered from Pinetree, I highly recommend giving them a try. You can find them over at www.superseeds.com. This isn't a paid post and also something went wrong when I was trying to add the link, but you have the website and can manually type it in. 

I hope you enjoy the catalog as much as I do! Let me know what you think of Pinetree Seeds. 

Keep Growing and Planning:)



-Shelly



#agreenhaven, #makingplans #garden catalog #Pinetree Seeds #supersedes #gardenbudget #growfood


Monday, December 26, 2022

Trying to make it through


Not an actual photo in my area, just wanted to post a winter wonderland photo.
So, no quote for the week once again, I'm working four tens once again this week, and its been mentally draining for me. So, on Friday I did some last minute grocery shopping, in the brutal cold; I hope everyone was able to stay safe and warm over the weekend. Went over to my sister's house to finish up cooking three pans of lasagna, on Saturday afternoon, my oven went out me, so I was able to use hers. Even though, I had a three day weekend, I really didn't feel like I had one. Sunday was my only full day to relax and do nothing, after a week of completing four tens and an array of technical problems during my training class, and a Monday morning training session that only gave our class one five minute break between 8 a.m. to 12 p.m. or 12:30 p.m., it became so hard to focus on the training at hand.
I'm already getting the vibe that this work at home position might be challenging for me, but the pay is pretty decent, even though, I'm starting to question that and the real flexibility of the job.
At this point, I'm paying down credit card and medical bills while putting away some savings and investing, too. My focus is paying off those debts and working hard to become an Independent Insurance agent. This is the first time I let you guys know what I'm doing. You know what, I'm also going to share the company, I work for, but I won't share the company that I'll be contracting for.
I, work for Ttec, and right now it seems like it can be hit or miss. Some people love it and others despise it. I'm somewhere in the middle, but leaning to the latter a bit.
I'm gonna have to cut this writing short, because it's a little after 7 a.m. and I need to get ready for work, bit I just wanted to highlight the beauty of winter with the picture above, from Pexel....oh no, I forgot to get the photographer's name....I'll try to go back and update later, but yeah, have a great week everyone and pray for my sanity for this week. But always believe, I'm going to keep swimming!



#winter wonderland #ttec #insurance agent, #life #keep swimming #getting through #pexels #training

Trying to make it through


Not an actual photo in my area, just wanted to post a winter wonderland photo.
So, no quote for the week once again, I'm working four tens once again this week, and its been mentally draining for me. So, on Friday I did some last minute grocery shopping, in the brutal cold; I hope everyone was able to stay safe and warm over the weekend. Went over to my sister's house to finish up cooking three pans of lasagna, on Saturday afternoon, my oven went out me, so I was able to use hers. Even though, I had a three day weekend, I really didn't feel like I had one. Sunday was my only full day to relax and do nothing, after a week of completing four tens and an array of technical problems during my training class, and a Monday morning training session that only gave our class one five minute break between 8 a.m. to 12 p.m. or 12:30 p.m., it became so hard to focus on the training at hand.
I'm already getting the vibe that this work at home position might be challenging for me, but the pay is pretty decent, even though, I'm starting to question that and the real flexibility of the job.
At this point, I'm paying down credit card and medical bills while putting away some savings and investing, too. My focus is paying off those debts and working hard to become an Independent Insurance agent. This is the first time I let you guys know what I'm doing. You know what, I'm also going to share the company, I work for, but I won't share the company that I'll be contracting for.
I, work for Ttec, and right now it seems like it can be hit or miss. Some people love it and others despise it. I'm somewhere in the middle, but leaning to the latter a bit.
I'm gonna have to cut this writing short, because it's a little after 7 a.m. and I need to get ready for work, bit I just wanted to highlight the beauty of winter with the picture above, from Pexel....oh no, I forgot to get the photographer's name....I'll try to go back and update later, but yeah, have a great week everyone and pray for my sanity for this week. But always believe, I'm going to keep swimming! 

Sunday, December 4, 2022

Some Encouragement

"Every dream begins with a dreamer. Always remember, you have within you the strength, the patience, and the passion to reach for the stars to change the world."

                     -Harriet Tubman

Monday, November 14, 2022

Quote of the Week


picture by Jacob Colvin

Winter is an etching, spring a watercolor, summer an oil painting and autumn a mosaic of them all.

-Stanley Horowitz




#gardenquotes #fall #StanleyHorowitz #JacobColvin

Monday, October 31, 2022

Quote of the Week


photo can be found on Pexels

Autumn is the mellower season, and what we lose in flowers we more than gain in fruits.
 
-Samuel Butler 

Monday, October 17, 2022

Quote of the Week


photo courtesy of Valiphotos

Autumn is a second spring when every leaf is a flower.

-Albert Camus




#gardenquotes #fall #Valiphotos
#Albert Camus

Monday, October 10, 2022

Quote of the Week


Photo from Pexels photo by Ioana Motoc

Autumn is the season to find contentment at home by paying attention to what we have already. 
-Unknown 


Back from Covid

It feels good to be back!! After almost three years of being covid free for the majority of my household. The last of us, came down with covid. My middle daughter got it before there was a vaccine while she was at college, so as a parent, that was truly terrifying for me. There wasn't a vaccine and my child was over 6 hours away from me, and I got the occasional text messages from her since talking was a laborious task.

My husband experienced covid overseas in London. He was on a business trip and had his stay extended for two weeks since he couldn't come back to the States until he had a negative test. The only thing he experienced was two days of extreme fatigue and a slight headache, however, he was having a hard time getting a negative test result. The crazy thing is everyone that he traveled with left the day before he was suppose to leave, so they made it through their test, but came down with covid the following day when they got back home.
Now myself and three of my other children came down with it and it was very different from my oldest son's experience vs. the rest of us. My oldest son could barely move, had an extremely high fever and excruciating headache. I seriously thought he had the flu at first, because he was experiencing a scratchy throat on Saturday that we were trying to ease with tea, however, Sunday morning he had a fever and could barely rollover in his bed.

Seeing my child in so much pain was painful to watch. My first thought was try to bring his fever down. He was burning up, however, his feet were ice cold. I went to the kitchen to cut up some onions to put in his socks---this is something my paternal grandmother used to do to bring down a fever. As I tried to adjust his legs and feet to put the onions in his socks, he would moan out in pain and apologize for his moaning, I told him not to apologize, I need to hear those sounds and need to know how he's feeling if we need to see a doctor or go to the ER.

I was finally able to get the onions in his socks, cover him backup and allow him to continue to rest. Four hours later, I decided to checkup on him---see if he wanted some water or something to eat, and to my surprise he was sitting straight up working on his laptop like nothing even happened while sitting in a room that smelt like sautéed onions. He expressed how much better he felt, but he still had a slight headache and hopefully it will be gone by morning, and that he was up for something to drink, but wasn't hungry.

Next morning, my son and his brother were up getting ready for their work and school week, and my oldest was feeling way better than he did over the weekend. However, he couldn't shake that headache and he was adamant about not missing work. He'd only been at this new job as a teaching assistant for 2 weeks, and didn't want to miss any days, fortunately, I was finally able to convince him to see a doctor.

I don't know about you, but having a headache is awful on its own and then add on having an excruciating headache while dealing with 15 toddlers is unimaginable. It's one thing to try and deal with your own children under that kind of stress/pain, it's totally different trying to do it with other people's children. If course my children should expect the best, however, they get me healthy or sick, someone whose paying for my service should get the best me possible and that's what I was relaying to my son, along with, he could possibly spread illness to the kids, if he has the flu(I still thought he had the flu).

So we headed to one of our local urgent care facilities, and on our way his headache and throat were started to hurt worse. As we walked in the center, he almost fell over from his headache. The lady at the front desk recommended us going to the hospital because they probably weren't able to help us since they have limited equipment, if he had something major going on since it looked like he could barely stand coming through the door.

So we left that facility with my son saying, "The ER, I don't feel that bad." I basically told him, she was doing her own assessment from how he looked coming into urgent care, that's all. I told him before we go to the ER, I need to eat something because two weeks prior, I sat in the ER with my youngest son and it took 9 1/2 hours before he was seen, and I didn't want to sit down there again going hours without something to eat.

I stopped to get something to eat and during that time my son asked to try another urgent care place in our neighborhood. I was okay with it, but if they say, no, we're headed to the ER.

We enter the facility which used to be our neighborhood Hospital where I birth three of my five kids. The service was amazing!

My son came back and gave me the news, he tested positive for covid. From his facial expression I could tell he was devastated---he was expecting the flu. He tried his hardest to figure out where he got it from. I on the other hand, did my best to reassure him about catching it at this time: there are vaccines, you're vaccinated, you're young and healthy and now it's time to rest up.

As the week went on(3rd day) he was slowly getting better, and my youngest son came down with a scratchy throat, which lead to a sore throat and really bad sinus issues. He never came down with a fever and only experienced one day of feeling sluggish. As my older son got better, I put the majority of my energy into my younger son and his care.

On the third day of caring for my baby boy, my throat became scratchy and I began having all the symptoms my youngest son had. I had really bad sinus pressure and no fever at all, and I had energy, however, I would tire out and need to rest a bit.

Around the 4th day of my illness my oldest daughter began to get a scratchy throat, sinus issues, sluggish feeling and slight body aches. I felt bad because I really couldn't take care of her, like I wanted to, but my oldest son helped out a lot.

So, that's our covid experience, I'm glad to be on the otherside of it now and glad to be back at my blog writing and can't wait to be back at my podcast, however, that might have to wait a bit since I still have coughing spells, but yeah, it feels good to be back!



Wednesday, September 21, 2022

Note to Self: Garlic

September is almost over and I still haven't purchased any garlic to be planted for next season's harvest. Time is still on my side, but I still need to get moving, so I won't be rushing trying to plant at the last minute or not even have anything planted for next year. That's what happened last year, I got sidetracked and forgot about picking up any garlic bulbs. 

I know you're probably rolling your eyes like, what's the big deal, it's still September and you live in zone 7, you have until November, so there's no worry, and you're right, but I just have so much on my mind right now---I felt like if I just came to write this down, I'll have a better time of remembering and getting the job done the week before Halloween. 

Garden On,

Shelly :)



Saturday, September 10, 2022

An Anniversary

Yesterday was my 1st Anniversary as a podcaster over at Anchor. Come over and check me out sometime. My channel name is A Green Haven.

Peace and Love,

Shelly

Thursday, September 1, 2022

Welcome to September

Boy, I can't believe we're here already, but I welcome September, happily.  August brought forth less time in the garden for me this year and more time in my house trying to pair down.....stuff. 

August was a mindshifting month and hopefully in September I'll accomplish all or most of my purging desires.

Happy September, y'all😊

Monday, August 1, 2022

Monday, July 11, 2022

Garden Pictures and Update


I decided to take a little break from, 'The Quote of the Week' , however, I'll be back to it in no time.
Yesterday I took a few pictures of some of the things growing in the garden. Please excuse all the weeds, I did some weeding, however, the rain has been abundant in the area the past two weeks. Its been a gardener's dream---some rain and sunshine wrapped up in a day.
So, if you look closely you can see the tomato plants that I started from seed in the garden in early May. I usually start my tomatoes in the house during the late winter months, but this year I ended up losing the plants that I started indoors.

Next up: Okra! All I can say is, they're doing great! They might be a bit too close, I've never grown them this close before, and I'm a bit nervous, however, I'm also very curious, too-- and that's the beauty of gardening!We shall see how this all needs in due time.

So let's end this blog post with the zucchinis. The plants are flourishing and I'm so excited to see a few flowers on one of the plants!

Well, that's my garden update and I can't wait to update everyone on the gardens progress.

See ya, soon and keep growing!

-Shelly 😊


#agreenhaven #tomatoes #zucchinis
#okra

Tuesday, June 21, 2022

Summer's Here: Zucchini Plants are Flourishing


Here we are, summer's officially here and my Zucchini patch needs serious weeding, but nevermind that--from the fantastic soil and temperatures in the 90's, and of course, the early morning and late evening soakings, the zukes have taken off.
Yesterday, I made a YouTube post, well, I made two separate videos showing the difference between summer squash growth in soil with less organic matter compared to the zucchini being grown in nutrient rich soil.
If you want to see the video, go to greenatlmom on YouTube and that's where you'll find me.

Sunday, June 12, 2022

Okra Update


After a few days of rain, the newer okra seeds that I planted are up and are ready for takeoff. The rain and sunshine mix is nice, now I need to make sure they're fed some compost or compost tea. Gotta get those nutrients in the soil and grow strong roots.

#agreenhaven

Monday, May 30, 2022

Quote of the Week


(Photo from Pexels)

Thank goodness for the hope that gardening gives us.

--Sandia Seed Company

Monday, May 9, 2022

Quote of the Week


photo by Eva Elijas courtesy of Pexels

It's become more readily apparent that we need to be growing our own food and growing more things organically.

--Nell Newman


#agreenhaven #growfood #Eva Elijas #Nell Newman #gardenquotes

Wednesday, April 13, 2022

The Future


Future home to the tomato and bell pepper plants. I'm pretty proud of the rock border since I collected them while clearing out my yard.

If you follow my YouTube channel at greenatlmom, you'll see a few videos about the yard clearing and my progress. It's slow and steady, but I'm getting it done.

Well, I really don't have anything else to say, but keep growing!

#agreenhaven


Monday, April 11, 2022

Quote of the Week


The first blooms of spring always make my heart sing.
 
-S. Brown




#gardenquotes #agreenhaven 
#spring

Monday, April 4, 2022

Today


First off, sorry for the bad picture of the arugula. I really thought it looked decent when I took it, but I was proven wrong....oh well.

Today was a beautiful morning, the sun was shining, the temperature was cool and crisp---a day made for a gardener.
Hey, can we say---no mosquitoes!

Today was made for creating more borders and toiling in the soil.

Today was made for mapping and planning.

Today was made, for me.




Monday, March 28, 2022

Spent time in the garden over the weekend planting some seeds. I planted: Blue Hopi Corn, Arugula and English Daisy.

Friday, March 25, 2022

Planted: Globe Artichoke

Planted about 10 Globe Artichoke seeds behind the peas and near the hydrangeas. This is my first time growing artichokes, so I don't know what I'm doing at all, but I'm here for all the lessons coming my way.

Monday, March 21, 2022

Growth


 The peas are looking good and the growth is really showing.

Sunday, March 20, 2022

Saturday, March 19, 2022

A Lazy Day

At the time of this writing, it's 6:24 p.m. and a Saturday, the sun is shining, the weather is sensational, and---I'm in the house.

I want to go outside to work in the yard and garden, now that the rain has left, I should be taking advantage of every clear day given to me, to dig holes, lay some compost, plant some arugula and add more peas and poles outside.

I say I want to......but my bedroom has kept me in the house. My energy level is up and I seriously want to be outside, but I also don't want to leave my house....my room....my bed and comfy throw and all while watching reality TV YouTubers reviews about last night's episode of Ready to Love. 

I guess I really didn't want to be outside today because I'm usually outside with a fully charged phone and the YouTubers chatting and spilling tea while I work the land. I'm not even the biggest reality TV watcher, but I have a few favorites that I watch and when their season comes around, I'm all in. 

As the day gets later, I know I'm not going anywhere, but to the kitchen to get some snacks----'yeah today's a happy lazy day. Salut!

Monday, March 14, 2022

Quote of the Week


In winter, I plot and plan. In spring, I move.
              -Henry Rollins



Friday, March 11, 2022

Welcome

Back home and it feels so good to sleep in my bed and no more living 
out of my backpack. The vacation time was much needed that brought back some great memories along with creating new ones. 

As you can tell, I'm happy to be home and seeing these pea sprouts made it even more beautiful. 



#agreenhaven 

Monday, February 28, 2022

Quote of the Week

 
Photo by Gary Barnes at Pexels 

Life is itself a school, and nature always a fresh study.
                             
                          -Hugh Miller


#AGreenHaven #gardenquotes 

Thursday, February 24, 2022

Planted: Peas


The first to go into the garden. If you're following me on YouTube(greenatlmom), you may know that I've been working on clearing up my yard after some plumbing work, and that work has been very slow and steady---but tremendously peaceful.

While taking a break from my regularly scheduled assignment, I took sometime to put soil down and setup some bamboo poles, they'll become support for my peas as they grow in the garden.

Yesterday evening, I'm happy to announce that some of the Sugar Magnolia Peas, made it in the garden.

Have you planted anything outside yet?

Happy Gardening 😊


#agreenhaven #growfood, #peas,

Monday, February 21, 2022

Quote of the Week


Organic farming is personal.

                                   -Dave Carter




Quote of the Week


photo by: Karolina Grabowska from Pexels

Gardening is learning, learning, learning. That's the fun of them. You're always learning.
                                 -Helen Mirren





#agreenhaven #Karolina Grabowska
#Helen Mirren #growfood

Monday, January 31, 2022

Quote of the Week


photo from Pexels by Greta Hoffman

I always see gardening as escape, as peace really. If you are angry or troubled, nothing provides the same solace as nurturing the soul.

                        -Monty Don


#gardenquotes #solace  #agreenhaven #Greta Hoffman
#Monty Don

Thursday, January 27, 2022

Slow and Steady: A Lady and a Shovel

Finally made it around to getting outside and filling in the hole the plumber dug up to replace pipes.

You might be wondering why I'm doing this job and not the plumber---well, for one, after the digging our area experienced several weeks of heavy rain, so that was cause for delay and finishing up completely.
However, the main reason became...my husband just told him not to worry about it, and I know we paid him to finish a job, but honestly I was getting tired of people being in my house and on my property, Monday through Friday and sometimes Saturdays, too.
Basically I want some space and time to myself to think and create without phone calls from my husband and contractors throughout the day.

Digging in the dirt and clearing up my yard is a tedious process, but it's opening up my creativity with garden and landscaping ideas.

This process is slow, but I'm steadily getting this hole filled and layered with compost. Can't say when I'll be completely done, but I'm getting closer to grass in the main area of my yard, so I almost have one area complete.



#agreenhaven #yardwork #solitude #compost




Monday, January 17, 2022

A Seed Starting Day

Just enjoying a little time at my messy and full kitchen table, 

starting a few seeds. 
Today's starts are the summer goodies of: beefsteak tomatoes, eggplants and jalapeno peppers.

These will be my only indoor starts for a few weeks until I get these varieties up and going and after that, I'll add another round of seeds to the mix. 

Have you started in seeds indoors, yet, and if so, what?



#agreenhaven #growfood
#seedstarting2022

Quote of the Week


photo by Cottonbro from Pexels

"If you've never experienced the joy of accomplishing more than you can imagine, plant a garden."

---Robert Brault

#gardenquotes #RobertBrault
#Cottonbro #plantagarden
#agreenhaven

Monday, January 10, 2022

Quote of The Week


photo provided by photos_by_ginny from Pexels 

"January is the quietest month in the garden. But just because it looks quiet doesn't mean that nothing is happening. The soil, open to the sky, absorbs the pure rainfall while microorganisms convert tilled under fodder into usable nutrients for the next crop of plants. The feasting earthworms tunnel along, aerating the soil and preparing it to welcome the seeds and bare roots to come."
                     -Rosalie Muller Wright


#garden quotes  #winter #gardening #photos_by_ginny #RosalieMullerWright
#agreenhaven