Memorial Day Mulch and More

What a great weekend!  The brick patio is finished, I (re)planted a holly bush destroyed by the dog-that-no-longer-lives-here and planted some Russian sage and dianthus annuals, and then mulched the yard.  A mulched and landscaped yard is so satisfying, maybe as satisfying as harvesting vegetables from my garden.  Maybe.  Okay, a tie then.

Here's what I get to enjoy now:

When we weren't working in the yard, here's what the kids were up to:

Also, I received the proof of the cover of my new poetry book!  I was worried about this part of the process because I work with every step of production including cover design for Ashland, and my contract for this book said the design is entirely up to the publisher.  This made me a little nervous but I figured their other books are very attractive.  All worries disappeared, though, because I love the cover and couldn't have selected anything better.  The cover design prompted me to start a Facebook page for myself, the author (lol).  So, go ahead, "like" me.  Please. :)

I am daily discovering new things about Google and the web that fascinate me.  I consider myself to be a tech-savvy gal, but this whole phone-connected-to-Facebook-connected-to-blogger-connected-to-Google+-connected-to-camera-connected-to-email thing just blows me away.  Now I can upload photos directly from my phone to the blog using Google+.  This is amazing.  Before, I had to download my photos from my camera to my computer and then upload them to blogger.  Or to Facebook.  Not anymore!  And I'm still amazed that Gmail asks me whether I meant to attach something to my email if I said "attached" - and almost always I meant to attach something and forgot.  Woah.  Craziness.

It's BW's birthday today and he's at the doc, hopefully just diagnosed with seasonal allergies and prescribed a heavy-duty allergy medicine.  We're making steaks for dinner in his honor and then celebrating with some friends later on.  His birthday gift to himself was a basketball hoop in our driveway.

Time to head back to work.