100 happy days: days 1-10

It's been a fun 10 days trying to identify something each day that makes me happy. It really does remind me to pay attention to the small things and challenges me to find something that makes me happy or feel good when I don't have something obvious staring me in the face (brunch, cocktails, dinner plans). There's a couple things I've noticed over the past 10 days about myself:

• A lot of my happy moments involve food and alcohol. I guess I've always known this -- I wholeheartedly embrace a "live to eat" mentality. It's just interesting to see that half of my posts through day 10 involved food and/or drinks. 
• It's A LOT harder to find something to post when I don't have an event planned ... and it's a really good challenge to look for things in every day life. I think this is really what the challenge is about. It's easy to be happy when you're out with friends and family or enjoying your favorite things, but what truly makes you happy the rest of the time? I don't have that answer yet as my other 5 posts have been a hodgepodge of activities. 
• It's hard to post every day. So far, there have been 2 days where I haven't posted and I think it's because there wasn't an obviously happy moment staring me in the face. For those two days I didn't post and it took some reflection the next morning to really come up with a happy moment. 
• I'm embarrassed to take photos. Yep, the constantly-has-her-camera-ready-at-every-moment girl has been shy to whip out my phone and take pictures -- especially of myself. The lesson I take from this is that it's important to live in the moment and I need to stop caring what every one else thinks.
• It's been a lot of fun. My sister decided to join in on the challenge with me after seeing my first post and I have to say that I look forward to seeing what makes her happy every day. It's also a lot of fun trying to challenge myself to create happy moments every day, which lately have translated into some selfish moments for me (hello bubble baths!). I think that's ok and it reminds me that taking care of me and making sure that I'm happy and healthy only improves my relationship with my husband, friends and family. 

100 Happy Days

Down, frustrated, bitter, sad, moody. Call it what you will, I've been in a funk lately. Little things bother me more than they should. I get disappointed too easily. I've been unfocused both at work and at home. I'm temperamental and bitchy. Basically, a real joy to be around. Something needs to change.

I've noticed a couple friends who have posted #100happydays photos and I thought I'd check it out to see if it could help shift my attitude and remind me how good life truly is.

What do I hope to accomplish? I hope to get out of this funk, and appreciate what I have and the little moments in life. I really want to find out what makes me happy. I'll be posting daily photos to Instagram and do a weekly recap here. Wish me luck!

Do we have black thumbs?

It's safe to say that watching our yard grow (and fail) has been one of the most exciting, most frustrating experiences of buying our new house. Some areas are thriving and others ... well, they're a big fat fail.

Let's talk about those fails. Our yard has a pretty steep grade, which our landscaper accommodated for by building some berms, which have been helpful where water gathers and pools (not great for new shrub's roots). We actually had to build a couple of the berms higher due to standing water, which killed two of our forsythias -- and possibly the third.

We ended up replacing two of our forsythias with some beautiful Ninebark Center Glow. We have our fingers crossed they do well, but right now we're not sure if the leaves have leaf scorch or are just drying up because we had a week of pretty cool temps.

We also added a new tall lilac bush, replaced some plants that weren't doing well with some dwarf burning bushes, added a new mulch area in the back for additional perennials, moved a couple of native grasses, added some new boxwood and had our landscaper finish up his work by adding 36 perennials -- mainly to our front yard.

So our game plan for the rest of this year and into next summer: wait it out. We'll make sure to water the shrubs well during the winter months when our drip system is off, and keep our fingers crossed that they come back strong in the spring. I also have a pretty lengthy list of things I want to complete next year to fill some gaps in the yard, move around a couple plants and replace anything that continues to do poorly (already have two on our watch list)

Exciting news -- all of our neighbors (except for the still empty lot next us) completed their landscaping and it truly makes such a difference, as you'll be able to see by the photos (as a reminder, here's the last look at the yard).

You can really see the difference our neighbors' landscaping makes. That back corner is also on our list for improvements next year, including building up a berm to deal with standing water and adding some feather reed grasses.

WIN! This area of our backyard grows like a weed. You can really see the difference between May and now, and can see where we removed some rock and added a new mulch bed for perennials.

WIN! We moved the three maiden grasses we had in various places throughout the backyard together and I love the way it looks.

Right behind the rock in the corner, you can just barely see our new lilac bush.

FAIL! These are two of the same plants and you can see how one has grown and one hasn't. We're looking to move the thriving plant to a new location, build up some tiny berms and add two new plants.

The red plants on either side of the tree are the new Ninebark shrubs we added. Keep your fingers crossed they thrive next year!

The new boxwood we added in front of our front window. Can't wait to see everything grow!! Hopefully, when mature, the tops will be at the white trim of the window.

FAIL! We originally had 3 Blue Mist Spireas here that did not do well. We're thinking of trying some irises that are supposed to do well in wet soil, or possibly just extend the grass. One of the spireas was re-located to a new home and is doing ok(ish). We'll see what happens next year (I feel like a broken record).