be productive

Okay, I'm a follower of the blog, The Happiness Project.

I read her book while sprawled on various lawn chairs in Puerto Vallarta, Mexico, in December a couple years ago.

That's a good place for the contemplation of happiness.

Anyway, when I first discovered The Happiness Project, we were in the free fall of the construction industry, and when that's your livelihood, it's hard to contemplate happiness when financial survival is your main agenda.

But when survival is no longer the main issue, then panic subsides and happiness has a place again.

This past weekend, I was thinking about my life as I was working and grabbed a post it note and all at once these four things were written down:

Be productive
Be organized
Be disciplined
Be kind

Is that the path to happiness for me?

I think it might be, since a lack of all those things makes me extremely unhappy.

So Monday morning, I dragged myself out of my gorgeous, comfortable bed after Curious George was over.   (Heidi has said Curious George is like crack to p.j.  That's a total exaggeration, but she does love him. Today's episode was about plumbing and the kids found that hilarious.  "He should not touch the plumbing! He's a monkey!")

Little Jay was entirely consumed by George Curious too when he was small.

And I put on clothes and doused myself head to foot with bug spray and found a pair of gloves and headed out to this hell-hole.  Who EVER thought perennials would be a good idea, anyway?  But productive and disciplined were on the list, so get going.

An old contractor we love generously brought us a load of black dirt for our garden a couple years ago.

Well, it was not normal black dirt. It was raw, so to speak, full of nettles and swamp grass and holy hell, we've fought atrocious, vigorous weeds ever since.  So I pulled all those weeds, even when I was dizzy from heat and sweat dripped into my eyes and caused me to become very whiny.

This picture looks good, but tonight I bought fresh mulch, ten bags, and spread it all around the garden.  I'll take a picture tomorrow. It looks even better.

This morning Kari (aka Lydia Karina)  had her archery class:

When they asked her name, she told them Lydia.   I love how, no matter how Kari she is around the house, in formal situations, she always chooses Lydia.   It makes me smile for Jay's grandma Lydia, who she was named after.

The drive back home along the Mississippi River--gorgeous in the morning sun.   The river is only a mile from our house, and a mile from the city,  and I'd like to see it someday as it heads south from here.

After lunch I took files to the office and then we went to to the LITTLE POOL.

 No idea who this little cutie is, but she volunteered to smile for a picture.

Here they are eating snacks out by the trees.   In all the years past we could bring crackers and bottled water, non-messy-type snacks to the pool.

Well.

This year Erica is gone and these new high school girls told us that because some people had left a crumb mess,  no snacks in the pool area--only in the grass outside.

I can live with this, but there were some other mothers with younger babies who were pretty annoyed.

I even said, "It's a world run by 18 year olds. What do they do all afternoon? Sit on a bench and count people?  Like it would kill them to take a bucket and rinse goldfish cracker crumbs off the cement at the end of the day?"

But whatever.

 Here's Tim, amusing some young goofy guy.

What a beautiful day this was.

July approaches very near.  Glad June made it after all.  love, Val