Ah, that brief period of time while the purple sandcherry in our front garden is in bloom, and the Japanese beetles haven’t taken over yet…and when there are weeds every where because it’s been raining constantly and I’ve been too busy to get out and stick my hands in the dirt.

I gotta do some gardening today. I know we complain about this every year in the northeastern US (and of course New Yorkers in particular loooove to complain about the weather…okay, and everything else, too), but did we just go straight from winter to summer and skip spring completely? I don’t understand why we never have temperatures in the 60–65° range, for example. It’s like it’s 45° and disgusting one day, and then it’s 85° (and still disgusting, just in a different way) the next.

But today is nice. Really nice. So I need to get out there and take advantage of it. I already spent an hour pulling some teeny-weeny little weeds, and there’s lots more let to do!

TODAY!
• pancakes
• laundry
• grocery shopping
• pull weeds in front and back garden
• turn compost
• trim grass strip next to sidewalk?
• rake/sweep
• iced coffee ♡♡♡
• put away winter coats
• FREELANCE WORK
• manicure/pedicure
• write up a planting plan for the back garden
• figure out how many bags of rocks/mulch we need

Oh yeah, and check out how crazy and bouncy and BRIGHT GREEN the creeping Jenny is looking already this year! Having our porch gutter drain directly into this corner of the front garden (via our rain chain, which has been working like a champ for a year now) was such a good idea. The Jenny is a-creepin’ like nobody’s business, and this pleases me greatly.

Look how much snow there is in the garden! I love how pristine it is. Not even a single squirrel has ventured to cross. I know I should probably bring the Hardoy chairs into the basement during the winter, but I always forget. It doesn’t help that our basement is such a crazy mess; I’m not even sure where we’d put them. (By the way, I’m determined to clean up the basement this spring. I think we need to take a week off and just spend 10 hours a day down there cleaning and organizing and scraping and sanding and maybe even painting. It’s basically a dungeon at the moment. I hate going down there to do laundry.)

The weekend is already slipping away, but I’m determined to make a little dent in my ever-mounting list of winter projects. I’m not sure how realistic this is (I blame the dogs—they’re just sooooo warm and snuggly…), but I’m going to do my best.

BY TOMORROW AFTERNOON:
• Clean out/organize the kitchen cabinets and pantry.
• Sand plaster on ceiling in upstairs hallway.
• Install new medallion and change light fixture.
• Caulk, prime, and paint ceiling/medallion.
• Measure and cut shades for living room windows. (I did one!)
• Have Mommy and Bernie over for dinner.
• Grocery shopping, laundry, cleaning, etc.

Not so crazy, right? I figure if I can do everything but the shades and the priming/painting today (i.e., within the next five hours, in order to have time for dinner guest), I’ll be in pretty good shape.

Tonight I’m going to make Eggplant & Lentil Chili Mole from my new favorite cookbook. I asked my mother to bring dessert, and I think it’s going to be baked apples. My mother is one of those people who can make something delicious out of any two ingredients that happen to be in her house, so I’m sure they’ll be super yummy.

P.S.: I have a tiny blurb over on the Elle Decor blog this week. I don’t usually do things like that, and this is a perfect example of why—all of the other “design insiders” commented on, well, things related to decor (which makes sense, of course), and I shared a link to a blog about pencils and talked about my affinity for school supplies. Sigh. Once a nerd, always a nerd.