Ok, it's been a while since my last update. The summer has been going good. We have been pretty busy getting our yard fixed up. We really tried to keep up on the weeding, but there was just so much rain this spring/early summer that we got overwhelmed with it. We decided to hire help to weed, and it worked out because we needed to take out a dead bush and sickly tree and replace it with a new one. 16 man hours later, and we realized that there was just no way we would have had time to do that between working and taking care of the kids. It has been nice to have that out of the way so we could have fun with the kids. We got them a small bounce house this summer. Liam does not know that we own it. We tell him if he's really good we will call up Mr. Bounceman to come set it up. Both of them have been having a blast with it. Although since Rowan is only 19 mo. her attention span is pretty short and she only is on it for a short time. But, she has decided that she LOVES to swing now. She asked to swing one day, and she grins ear to ear!! We are glad the swing-set is finally being enjoyed now...even Liam likes to swing sometimes.
Last month Mike had me pick up a new peach tree to replace the 2nd cherry tree that died on us. We gave up on getting any more cherry trees, and decided to get a different variety peach tree, since we LOVE peaches!! Ever since I picked out that cute tree, I have had a new interest in the yard. We had our yard put in almost 3 years ago, and this year is the first year that it is really looking great. The plants have filled in, and the trees are getting really big. I took Liam with me to pick out a new Tulip tree to replace the original Tulip tree that was not growing, and looked like it might be diseased. I was a little nervous to pick out a tree without Mike's input, but when it was delivered he loved it. It really has a great shape to it, and it's been in for a couple weeks now, and I have been really good about watering it, and it's looking great!! I will have to post pictures soon. Last week I had found this beautiful purple flower that I had been wanting. They had these huge ones at Home Depot, and I wish now I had bought more than one because when I went back a couple days later they only had one left. But I grabbed that one, and went to a few other nurseries and got several more. It's called Salvia nemorosa 'East Friesland'.
We have an electrical box in our front side yard. When we moved in there where some bushes that were already covering the area, so we just decided to leave them when we landscaped the yard. Unfortunately the bush died which surprised us because it survived no water when our house sat empty for many months...anyway, we were not sure what to plant over there to cover the unsightly boxes, but I did come across this really cool plant called 'Burning Bush'. It is green right now, but it's supposed to turn bright red in the fall. We had Blue Stakes come out and mark up the area since it's right by all the utility lines. The lines are a complete mess?! We have no clue if/where we can plant now. Anyway, hopefully we can figure it out soon!