. Dad had no plans for Easter, but I already knew that cooking for him is impractical because I'd need to start something in the oven, go pick him up (30 minutes, there and back at least) and then return home, get him up the stairs with his walker, finish cooking dinner, and then bring him back home. It was just too much, and right when I felt I could finally sit down and relax after dessert last time, Dad announced he was ready to go home.
This year I'm trying something different. It allows us to spend some quality time together on a holiday but without all the extra work of cooking. I'm taking dad on a driving tour of historic barns in the area. There's an interesting website that catalogs all the barns in the state. I searched the town where he lives, and 76 barns came up. We obviously won't get to all of them, but I picked the most interesting ones that had a written history, painstakingly mapped them all out on a map and decided we could probably check out 9 of them. It's just something for us to do together, and I often wrack my brains for how to entertain him, but he can't see or walk well, and I'm not a big fan of driving. So this is local enough for me to handle, and if we find a Starbucks or restaurant that's open without need of reservations, maybe we'll pop in.
I am pretty much done with my massive burning bush. I worked on it all winter, cutting branches with my pruner saw, but I could only do so much. A friend in town then came over twice with her "mini" chainsaw and did quite a bit more. Then, today, she returned with her husband, who wielded a full-size chainsaw to cut the burning bush to about a 2 foot high stump, which I promptly painted with an herbicide. Hopefully I won't get a lot of regrowth.
I made 3 trips to the transfer station today with my trunk filled with cut-up branches from the burning bush. No bigger than 4 feet long, cus that's what fits. Very time-consuming, but most of the lower branches have been hauled, and much of what remains are the cut-up trunks, which will be heavier to carry across my lawn but quicker to load in my trunk. It's a process. Luckily I'm fairly methodical about things like this and eventually, it gets done.
I'm actually glad to be wrapping up with it as I still have a very narrow window of time to work some more on pulling smaller burning bush out of the soft ground, as well as wineberry and multiflora rose. Once things leaf out, it's much harder to get in these brushy areas without risking contact with ticks, but the poison ivy is also coming up, but not let leafed out. (It's still toxic.)
I am behind the eight ball a bit on spring veggie planting, which I would have liked to start indoors. Then I discovered I have no more peat pots, so they are on order and I should have next week.
I also belatedly realized I needed to stratify the ironweed seeds I collected last fall before I plant them. It's a gorgeou plant and butterfly magnet. So the seeds are in the fridge now for at least a month.
March 30th, 2024 at 11:49 pm 1711842546
March 30th, 2024 at 11:49 pm 1711842572
March 31st, 2024 at 12:08 pm 1711886896
March 31st, 2024 at 01:06 pm 1711890400
March 31st, 2024 at 01:46 pm 1711892785
The only thing I will be doing is going to see my mom at the nursing home. Other than that, no Easter plans.
The last 5 or so years, we would go to my cousin's house for an Easter celebration with both sides of her family. This year, she and her immediate family went to Hawaii.