Before & After

I was lolling around in my pjs this morning when the phone rang.  It was the landscaper that I called yesterday to come do a "fall cleanup" of the retaining wall and trim a few shrubs.  He called to say that they'd be here within the hour.  Yikes!  No time for shilly-shallying, just get dressed and take a few last of the season pictures.  Here's the Before picture.  One-hundred-ten feet of greenery with a few yellow flowers in the middle.

And then the After.  It didn't take them long, barely an hour, and they'd cut down all of the plants all the way across the yard and trimmed everything that held still long enough.  I did remember to tell them to leave the mums so that the front of the house isn't denuded like the back is.  One wants a hint of color.

The trees across the street are shedding their leaves like mad.  Last week there were a few colored leaves and now they're falling like rain.  It was windy yesterday and Sunday so lots of leaves came down then, but there are lots of trees that are still green.  They do that on purpose so that you rake and rake and rake and then a whole tree's worth slams down just when you think you're getting a handle on it.  I hate raking.

The drawing lesson of the day was a room in one-point perspective.  That involved a ruler and I was happy to have a transparent ruler to use.  Not much room for creativity.

Once I had drawn the room twice (the first time was better, go figure), I pulled out the kids' drawing book to tackle a couple of those lessons.  Lots of room for creativity in those.  Fun!

I got a text from a friend that she had bins of yarn to get rid of so I tootled over and picked out a shopping bag full (not that I needed more yarn), but I found skeins of my preferred preemie hat yarn so I'm very glad to get that.

Watching TV tonight I added four rounds to the Eagle Eye Beanie.  It's getting there.

Today's toss was a toddler matching game I got at Goodwill that never intrigued LC and OJ.  Off with it!

The prompt today said to list words relating to stars.  Well, let's see, twinkle, night, light, sky, Polaris, constellation, Milky Way, telescope, Big Dipper, red dwarf.  That's about all I thought of.

I was very impressed that the landscaper came today when I'd just called him yesterday.  I think I'm going to have him come in the spring and take out the garden and seed it in grass.  I mostly gardened for Durwood and I can go to the Farmer's Market two blocks away to get fresh produce every week.  That will make lawn mowing so much easier.

--Barbara