I still haven’t been writing as much. I’ve been super busy with work, and I’d love to blame it on that, but I don’t really believe that is the real story. I think it has more to do with finances.
You see, this is the time of year that I get things done, financially. It’s when I have the most money coming in, so it makes sense. Unfortunately, it appears that if I am in a financial state of mind, that whole super responsible state of being, I seem to lose touch with my creative side. I guess I just haven’t figured out how to have both in my life at the same time, yet. This makes me even more grateful for my garden.
I’ve come to realize that having something creative in my life is sort of like taking vitamins every day. I don’t have to take vitamins every day but, when I do, I feel better, have more energy, am a bit more focused. When there is nothing creative in my world, it just makes it that much harder to trudge through the sludge of every day living. Again, this is where my garden comes in beautifully (pun intended) at this time of year.
I haven’t been quite as active in my gardens, this year. I water them every morning, occasionally do a little bit of weeding (not as much as I should), dead head spent blooms, remove things at the end of their cycle, but…well, I feel like I have been way more active than this in the past. I’m more in the ‘just enjoying it’ mode, which I think is ok. It brings me smiles and, since I walk my gardens every evening, I find that much-needed time away from the have to’s. I know this is not really actively creative, but, for now, it’s just going to have to be close enough.
I’ve been working on rebuilding my credit over the past year. It’s a slow, mentally arduous process, but I’ve been making headway, which is the real pay off. I have to admit I’ve become a little bit obsessed with the whole process, too. I have two credit tracking apps on my phone, that I check daily.
I’ve started picking at the lower amounts on my credit report and paying them off. Since these are at the smaller end of things, there isn’t a whole lot of visual confirmation when I look at the total dollar amount on my credit report. The visual payoff? Seeing my score going up – over 100 points in the past year. YAY!!
I went and looked at a car at a dealership yesterday. I wanted to see if financing a car is a possibility. I found out it is, though the payments that would be set at this point are more than I’m comfortable adding to the budget, at this point, especially with the slower season of work for me just around the corner. Maybe I’ll check back into this next spring or summer. It sure would be nice to be driving a car, again, that doesn’t cause me angst every time I get in it. I’ll get there.
The gardens seem to winding down. The radiant beauty they were a couple of weeks ago is gone, though I’m still enjoying the blooms that are left and happening. I even had a gift this morning while watering: a sunflower, incredibly stunted in its growth, that’s had a bud on it for quite some time, finally bloomed. As you can see, it is quite small, only about a foot to a foot and a half tall. Those are Gladioli looking like giants right next to it.
My pumpkins have been turning orange and are now more orange than green. They are very big and I even have one that isn’t even as big as a baseball…lol. Its cute. There are two pumpkins that are white, and I haven’t expected them to last, but they are almost as big as the orange ones, so I’m thinking they will be part of my pumpkin harvest. Yay!
My Mammoth sunflowers are ready to be cut down. I would normally hang the flower heads on the fence so the birds could come get all the seeds, but there is no need this year. The little winged beauties have already eaten all the seeds. I have wanted to catch them doing this, just to watch, perhaps get a photo or two, but they are sneaky about it. Well, plus I haven’t really been home much to catch them in action. Oh well. Maybe next year.
Well, I have a clean today. I had better get myself together and get going. Have a great day, Everyone!!
Dragonfly Gypsy USA 