Weeds

Somehow neglecting the outside of the house for over a year has created these giant avalanche of weeds that have consumed the grounds surrounding the house.

Fortunately for me and my organized ways the outside is arranged into areas that are separated by paving stones. We have the future garden area, which is our largest area that we're still working on weeding, turning the soil and removing the stones from this area. The next two largest areas are the stones next to the house, which I cleaned out last week by raking, removing weeds, spreading newspaper and returning the stones. (I still have the blisters.)

Then there's the patch of stones, recently removed and mulched around our only tree in back. And then of course, there are all of the nasty little weeds that decided to spring up between the paving stones. I think I got most of them.

All of my work in the back led us to the side of the house, which I started working on with Kevin. I'll admit pulling weeds, because every other method is ineffective and getting to the root of the problem (pun intended!) is not fun. I usually chat on the phone while I do it, because honestly 2 hours of wedding on your hands and feet would get to anyone who's actually paying attention to it.

Friday, Kevin and I attempted to do this together. Um, bad move. Kevin ended up yankng out giant swatchs of the old matting under the old mulch and throwing it in trash bags. So much for delicately pulling each weed, uncovering down to the mat ,laying newspaper, recovering and mulching. His approach is much more straightforward. Throw it all away and start over...sigh.