How NOT to Help a Potted Lemon Tree

A few months ago, my husband and I were doing some Yard Plant shopping together. As I strolled through aisles and aisles of perennials and annuals, my husband called across the square, “Honey! You have to come smell this!” It was a Dwarf Meyer Lemon tree, and it smelled amazing. Best part?  It was half off. So, for a meager $30 we brought the thing home.

 

It had a rough start at our house. First off, the stress of the move caused the tree to throw most of its fruit. Two months later, we went on vacation and left the tree to fend for itself. During the hottest week of the summer. Oops. When we got back, I gave it a good long drink. The tree threw all of its fruit, and half of its leaves for good measure.

Determined to do better, I studied the plant. The roots were beginning to show through the soil on the top. Surely, this was a sign of bad parenting, right? I dug around in the garage and came up with a bag of MiracleGrow moisture managing soil, a third full. My mother swears by this stuff, and dumps bags of it into her large garden every year, with spectacular results. I scooped out handfuls of the rich, black soil and lovingly patted it into the pot, covering up the (obviously inferior) soil the nursery had given this poor tree. It looked like a mixture of sand and sawdust, and held water like a sieve. No wonder my tree couldn’t keep its fruit! It was dying of thirst!

You know where this is going, right?

 

A few weeks later, as our pathetic Seattle Summer began to come to a close, I took pity in our citrus-y friend, and brought it indoors. My bathroom has a large (opaque) West-facing window next to the tub…and the tub is rarely used. I thought it would be a perfect home-away-from-home for the tree, to weather out the cold, dreary winter.

 

Then I noticed the bugs.

Shortly after that, it was the mold.

 

 

I think it was a mixture of fruit flies and fungus gnats. Or maybe the fruit flies were just interlopers, lured away from the kitchen (and its own infestation) by the Gnat Shindig going on in our bathroom? I did research. And then some more. And then I pondered. And then I realized what had happened.

 

First off, Meyer Lemon trees need sandy, well-drained soil. So that awful sandy soil the tree came with? Was perfect. Fungus gnats, on the other hand, need moist soil. Which, obviously, the MiracleGrow was. Oh, and fungus, of which we apparently had an abundance. Someone, on a forum somewhere, suggested that sprinkling cinnamon on the soil would kill the fungus, and thus starve out the fungus gnats.

 

Perhaps I’m not patient enough, but all I ended up with was a cinnamon scented bathroom that seemed to say Hi! I’m your consolation prize! Enjoy your gnats! It did smell lovely, though.

 

After much more pondering, I decided surgery was in order. I lugged the tree back down the stairs and out the back door. I pulled out my gardening gloves, and got to work scooping out all of the MiracleGrow soil, right back down to the sandy soil. Roots showing and all. (Oh, and as it turns out, the soil on a Meyer Lemon tree should just BARELY cover the roots. Otherwise your trunk will rot. Bet you didn’t know THAT, did you??!) That dirt was then put into the compost “Death Star” to aid in the decomposition endeavors, and the tree was put into the garage next to a South-facing window. In isolation, if you will. 

 

It has been a week now, and there is not a gnat, fruit fly or any other winged beasty in sight.

 

Hindsight is 20/20, right?? *sigh*

Single Dad Laughing: Memoirs of a Bullied Kid

Single Dad Laughing: Memoirs of a Bullied Kid

Everybody. Go read this. Now. I'll wait. (It's long, and seems rambling, but it's SO important.)

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I don't have a lot to add. Anybody who's ever been bullied, ever given birth to a child in the past 18 years, or ever worked with children needs to read this. It's important.

I have two children, who I adore. Neither one is old enough to join the education system yet. I do work with school aged children, though, as a piano teacher. You can bet that I will be taking the time to really talk to the kids. To tell them how great they're doing. To let them know how much I enjoy teaching them.

We have to do our part. And we have to do it today.

Celebrate: The Husband

Hello, mamas. I have this crazy idea. I want to Celebrate. I want to celebrate lots of things…and if I don’t want to, I want to celebrate until I FEEL like celebrating. There are things that are easy for me to celebrate – my husband/best friend, living close to family, and rainy fall weather. (Yes, really.) There are other things that are harder to celebrate…but I’m going to celebrate them until I remember that it’s true. I’m not going to tell you this things right now because, frankly, I’m embarrassed. We’ll get to those later.

 

So, I’m going to start with something easy. My husband. Nearly 6 years ago, I was in a choir, and I was showing off, and I was sassy…and I met my match. I met my best friend. He could stand up to my teasing, and he could ignore it or throw it back. He went shopping with me and carried my bags…containing nail polish and hair spray. He was everything I was looking for, and everything I didn’t know I wanted. We were married later that same year, and started our family soon after. Now he’s not only my husband, he’s Daddy to two little kids who adore him. He’s incredible in those awkward First Impression scenarios. He’s a sharp dresser, and frequently lends me his skills. (Read: He takes me shopping and picks out my clothes. I’m hopeless when it comes to clothing myself.) He loves to play video games…which fits in rather nicely with my little blogging habit. He calls his mother every. single. day, and I know that he’ll teach his children to do the same for me.

Housewives, how do you celebrate your husbands? What do you love about him? Leave a comment, write a post and link back, or drop me a line. Think about it. If things aren’t perfect, tell us about the good stuff. Tell us what you love.  Nobody, and no thing, is perfect. But let’s give this a shot.

How Does Your Garden Grow…..

 

All in all, fairly well. I forgot to stake my tomatoes…and my Meyer lemon tree is throwing its baby lemons off, left and right. My basil flowered, and my hydrangeas look a little sunburnt. Still, for our first year in the space…I’m rather pleased!

Showing: Pretty

Still Showing. This time…Showing Pretty.

A new skirt (Nordstrom Rack) with a tank that’s several years old (Target), a shrug from a dress that makes me feel like a princess (Dress Barn), red shoes my daughter tried on and I fell in love with (clearance, Dress Barn) and jewelry my parents brought back from a cruise.

Being told you look like a Movie Star at church?

Priceless.

(Mamas, please play along! Do something that makes you feel pretty…and then let me know in the comments. I’m doing these posts to play along with another bloggy friend who is trying to show…she’s still Her, she’s still Hot, and she’s still Here, at home, waiting for her husband at the end of the day. You know, in case he forgets while he’s at work.)

Food as Family History

This video is long (about 9 minutes, 45 seconds) but I really enjoyed it. In case you don't have 9 minutes ad 45 seconds to devote to watching YouTube...I'll break it down for you.

Miss Schenone had a deep rooted jealousy for people with old "family recipes", and she wished that she could unearth one. As it turns out, she could. Kind of. Miss Schenone had a grandmother, named Adelle Giza (I have no idea how to spell that, but it's pronoused Ah-dell Jee-zuh). Adelle used to make ravioli, using an enormous 3 foot rolling pin and a lot of elbow grease. By the time Miss Schenone developed an interest in things Family History related, Adelle Giza had already passed on, leaving behind only the memory of her ravioli...and an enormous rolling pin. Through three separate trips to the mountainous regions of Italy, Miss S. learned how to make ravioli using this enormous rolling pin, plus Grandma's ravioli cutter (unearthed by a kind cousin). She made ravioli every day for a month before she could say that she had mastered the recipe. And now? It's hers. She can make up that little bit of family history every day if she wants to.

It got me thinking - what foods have I got that could serve as Family History? My grandmother, on my mother's side, was a master at...well, I'm not sure what you call it. She's the lady that could throw together Jell-O salad like nobody's business...and a mean casserole....everything from a can or a box. My favorite recipe from her, though, would have to be her tuna sandwiches. She grew up on a sharecropping farm in Alabama. Cans of tuna were, relatively, expensive. Eggs, apples, pecans...those all grew, for nearly free, around the yard! Her tuna salad was about 1/3 tuna, and 2/3 chopped apple, nuts and boiled eggs. It's divine.

What recipes do you have, lurking in your grandmother or mother's recipe files?

A Bit o' Thrifting Fun

(Whee!!!! Just found this post, that I started in APRIL. Thought I might as well get it out there. heh.)


Just a quick, fun idea for those of you with little "Princesses" at home. My little girl loves "tea parties." Fortunately, for me, she has a very loose definition of a Tea Party. Small slices of bread, cheese and lunch meat, placed on a cutting board with sliced strawberries....et voila! Tea Party.

I wanted to maker her very happy one afternoon, so I told her to grab her piggy bank and load into the car. We went off to our local thrift store, and headed for the housewares section. We found just what I was looking for - scads of mismatched teacups and other nice things. We found these pretty cups, half off, plus that lovely little creamer. (Have you guessed yet? It's her "teapot", and does its job nicely. Most teapots are simply too bulky and heavy for a three year old to safely use.) She spent about $3, I believe, and bought herself two tea cups, two saucers and one little creamer.

Nice things, and a lesson on Money, all in the same day? That's pretty good, my friends.