Meanwhile. . . .

. . . in the rose bed

I'm still weeding it.  It looks small in that photo, but it's the entire length of the kitchen wall. 

 I managed to spend an hour and pull out the 7 foot thistle though.  We are enamored in sweat bees this year, and I can only stand being out there so long, especially in the heat.  Nothing works to keep the bees off me - not homemade bug spray, nor water with peppermint essential oil.  They are horrible, and I cannot even enjoy the front porch now.  They are driving us all insane.  I will try setting a citronella candle out there later if I remember to do it. So far the winning numbers are, flyswatter-4,000, spider webs - 4.  

As for the vegetable garden.  I give up.  The weeds will come out when the plants come out and that's all the time I'm putting into it. I put out a plea for anyone's extra zucchini, yellow squash (we got zero from those plants that looked so good weeks and weeks ago), and hot banana peppers.  I'll be posting about what happened to our potatoes soon too.  Yeah, a really, really stinky, unsuccessful garden year.  

I still have flower beds to weed, pull giant weeds by my barns, mailbox and other various places.  You should see my chicken run, ha ha!  It must appear to the chickens as a jungle.  At least they have shade, ha ha!

It rained, so Thursday I woke up confused.  I had zero produce or fruit laying around my kitchen awaiting work.  I had my kitchen spotless.  Front room spotless.  Front porch unbearable.  So I decided to start back in my utility room/new craft storage area.  I have narrowed the extreme clean list down to: utility room, bedroom, bedroom closet and garage. I actually got a little done in each room too.  I have a few touch ups to do in the kitchen bathroom.  

I mended a hole in one of my favorite shirts, un-buried a bunch of empty 1/2 pint and 4 oz. canning jars, discovered more small balls of yarn....I am starting to see the floor of my closet.  Almost.

I refilled my homemade dry taco mix.  I use my homegrown, minced and dehydrated garlic for this recipe, as well as others.

My car still has a flat tire.  Hubby has had one excuse after another (or it's raining) to remove it and plug it, and it's driving me mad not having a vehicle to get things done.  I asked him to finally make a library pick up for me.  He told everyone that the library was "closed until" I bring them all back, ha ha ha!