Gearing Up for Gardening

Since Thursday was the first official day of Spring, I decided I should start gearing up for my gardening. School was out Thursday and Friday for Beta Convention so I spent my days preparing my flower beds by putting down garden edging, shopping for shrubs, and researching what would grow best in our front yard. I visited a nursery and was given a lot of great advice for our yard. I have decided that during mid-April I am going to be planting hydrangeas and laurels in front of our porch and along the sidewalk I am planting firepower shrubs and some flowering plants. I have already bought the shrubs but I am going to wait until after tomorrow evening to plant them because there is another chance of snow! The weather sure has been crazy this year. The hydrangeas and laurels and flowering plants have to be bought and planted after the last frost which is apparently around mid-April. I am taking all precautions to keep these plants alive. I have a one year guarantee on the shrubs, thank goodness. Bryan even helped me yesterday test the soil to determine the pH level and the nutrients our yard needs. We have determined that between now and mid-April we are going to have to increase the acid level for the hydrangeas and laurels to live. We also have no nitrogen in our yard thus the reason no grass will grow and only clover will. Apparently clover can absorb nitrogen from the air but grass cannot. So we are going to be sowing grass seed after the last frost date too along with lots of fertilizer. Hopefully in a few months I can post some pictures of a beautiful green and flowery yard. Just keep your fingers crossed! :)

Heading Home on a Crazy, Snowy Day

I headed up to Louisville for the Kentucky Teaching and Learning Conference on Wednesday right after school. I was looking forward to the trip because Louisville has some great places to shop and eat and I get to enjoy those things during any free time. I had a wonderful meal at P.F. Chang's Wednesday evening (thanks to the suggestion of Kelly and Nathan). I enjoyed a delicious meal at Lynn's Paradise Cafe on Thursday (probably my most favorite restaurant ever). Then Thursday evening I did some shopping at Mall St. Matthews and we finished the day at the Cheesecake Factory. I also got to visit the Whole Foods Market that was right beside the mall. It was amazing and although I was only able to purchase some black grapes and organic honey I was quite pleased with my first visit. I will definitely be going back for a larger shopping trip soon.

Today when I woke up at 5:15 eastern time (4:15 ours) my friend Tamara and I realized that we might possibly get snowed in if we stayed for the rest of the conference. We did some major debating and then around seven we decided we better eat breakfast and hit the road. When we left at close to nine, there was already several inches of snow on the ground and even more was coming down. The forcast said that they should expect 10-12 inches by tomorrow! They are even expecting thundersnow. Just when I thought spring was coming, we have some crazy, snowy weather.

As we were driving south the roads were very slick until we got close to Munfordsville and then there was mostly water. I decided I would stop by the grocery store in BG just in case we also get some measurable precipitation. It is supposed to start later this evening so I can't wait to see. For the rest of the day I am going to cuddle up on the couch in a warm blanket, watch Lost (I didn't get to see it last night), and then take a nice long nap. :)

Here are some pictures of the snow:

This was from my hotel window, just when the snow was starting this morning.

This was the Lousiville Airport as I was driving by. As you can see the snow is so thick you cannot see the planes or the runway like you normally can.

The Interstate signs were very quickly being covered with snow.

More snow!!!

My Brother the Runner

My brother has had a surprising few months. He has become quite the runner. He ran in the St. Jude Marathon on Dec. 1, 2007 which was amazing because he had only run a few 5K's previously. He qualified for the Boston Marathon during that race, but he also had a personal goal. He wanted his store, Dick's Sporting Goods where he is the Running Specialist, to raise $10,000 to support the St. Jude Children's Research Hospital in Memphis, TN. He told them that if they raised that amount he would run from the Jackson, TN store to the hospital which is 85 miles! The event was an incentive and a way to publicize the fundraiser. There was an article in the local newspaper, he had several interviews from local radio stations, and the tv news crew also helped to publicize the run. On January 31, 2008 he took off on his two day journey. He couldn't realistically run the whole thing so he said he would run five miles and then walk one until he got there. He was able to run (he didn't have to walk) 42 miles the first day before the weather got so bad that he had to stop. The next day he made it to St. Jude and was welcomed by the hospital staff. His friend John followed him the whole way and he also had a police escort for most of the journey. Here is a link to the video of the event:

http://myspacetv.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=vids.individual&videoid=27978948

Since then he has been raising money for the Lance Armstrong Foundation. The Lance Armstrong Foundation, also known as LIVESTRONG has sponsored him to run in the Boston marathon and he is trying to raise $3500 for research of cancer. If you would like to donate to support him and the Lance Armstrong Foundation you can click on the link.

www.livestrong.org/grassroots2008/mricherson

I am very proud of my little brother the runner! :)

Exhaustion

This week and the weekend have been so busy and full of so many late nights that exhaustion has taken over. I don't really know why it has been so busy other than the fact that I had meetings and gatherings that took place amongst my usually normal busy schedule. I spent the day in Louisville at a Kentucky Reading Association board meeting for instance instead of catching up on sleep like I normally do after class on Saturday mornings. Every other day this past week has had some kind of extra squeezed into it too. I am trying to be restful today but I have all my graduate classwork to work on today.

I am attending the Kentucky Teaching and Learning Conference this week. I will head up to Lousiville again Wednesday evening and will enjoy lots of learning until Friday evening. I am hoping that this will be a nice little break from the normal hustle and bustle since I had no choice about going. I am required to go because of a grant that our school receives for the Lit. Lab. Yes, although it doesn't seem like it sometimes because 3rd takes up more of my day, I am still a part-time Literacy Lab teacher. It makes for a very strange day, but fun nonetheless.

On a different subject, while I was gone yesterday Bryan and our friend Nathan tore the garage down. Bryan almost broke his back by falling off a ladder and he is incredibly sore now, but he is going to be fine. I will try to post some pictures soon of the garage destruction. :)