It's a long summer.

Jack and I talked on the phone last night and we both agreed - this is getting harder. We're in the end of the race, as it were, with just a month and 2/3 to go before the normal end of season. But that doesn't include a possible extension.

In view of that, and in combination with having just received a copy of "The Happiness Project" in the mail thanks to a B&N gift card from my mother-in-law, I have decided that it's time to start a happiness project. This may turn out to be more of a happiness boot camp. I'm doing it for at least two weeks, and then we'll see from there. My overall goals include: developing happiness-boosting routines, adjusting my attitude, keeping the house clean, cultivating my friendships, getting out of the house more, and creating and exploring. I put five "action items" under each header (seven under "Create + Explore"), and those include everything from having breakfast outside in bare feet to playing jazz music whenever I do the dishes, and from playing one hymn on the piano every day to standing up straight and smiling in the silent moments. I even including "take a deep breath and count down from 3 before answering an August visitor" on there. Yesterday was day 1, and I didn't do everything, but I did most of them, so that was good.

I've successfully reinstated my index card program, after being totally incapable of tracking down the missing cards (I have a sneaking suspicion Jack may have thrown them out), I figured out what they were and made them so that I have a full set again. Hopefully this means that by the time my friend Jenna comes over the beginning of September I will have a clean house in which to host her.

I'll let you know how all of this goes.

In the meantime, the garden continues to produce (another action item: "eat something from the garden every day"). Green beans are coming, even on the tiniest bean bushes. My little eggplants are starting to develop (I had the first one in a stir fry last week). The spinach I planted appears to be coming up, along with the beets, and I'm really getting excited about the garden again. The strawberry is sending out runners and I'm directing them down the side of the garden. I think if they stay on the edge they'll make a nice, tasty border. Granted, that means critters might take a shine to them, too, but it just seems easier to keep the berries out of the way over there than to have them run rampant over the middle of the garden (which was where they were headed). Speaking of running rampant, my tomatoes are downright spooky in how wide they've grown. The roma, being weighed down with unripe fruit, has started to spill down across the carrots and is headed for the brassicas... It's almost as if the more I cut it back, the more it decides to grow. The cherry tomato is as tall as I am, and is stretching up the siding and over in front of the screen door. It'd probably come in the house if I let it! But I can't complain a bit about all the delicious goodies coming out of my garden - this is certainly the time of year that it's truly fun to have a vegetable garden.

Most of this harvest went into dinner last week: beans, peas, celery, cherry tomatoes, basil, eggplant, and even some kale (not pictured). The oregano is drying, and the rosemary I used later in the week.

I weeded a big section from the raspberries to the strawberries to the eggplant to the pepper plant to the end of the beans this morning. The weedy middle of the garden is almost entirely gone now - I've just got one 2x3 or 4 foot section left. I think I may get some of that weed-free fabric and tack it along the bottom of the fence, since I have a lot of difficulty with the creepers and crabgrasses coming through from the lawn and I think that would help significantly. I'll have to go to the store and price that out next paycheck. If I could get a cheap, narrow roll of the stuff, I'd probably be good to go.

Anyhow, I'd better keep moving. I've got a lot on my list for today. The lawn has to get mowed after 3 weeks off - not because the grass grew, but because the dandelions are at least a foot tall!

Until next time!