A Working Weekend

In spite of our wonderful new RV, we very responsibly stayed home and did lots of chores this weekend. It was the annual Tangent dump day, and once again we came up with some junk we were willing to part with. The boys helped haul stuff to the pickup and then got to put together a new wheelbarrow after Will decided the old one wasn't repairable. Nick and Craig worked surprisingly well together. They have both recently taken a course identifying personality types/spiritual gifts and at lunch they had compared notes, discovering that there is a valid reason they have had a hard time getting along at times in the past. (Nick: "You're an I?! I can't stand I's!") Whatever that means.

They decided they had to test it after complete the task. Don't tell Will.

We did manage to put our new RV to some use this weekend. Temperatures were in the 90s on Friday and there was no evening breeze to cool things off. No problem, we slept out there where it was air conditioned. We all took an afternoon break in there Saturday afternoon and watched the last two episodes of Lost in the air conditioned comfort of the RV living room. It was fun.

A lot was accomplished, but there was a slight mishap. I decided to get rid of a shrub in front of the house (an emerald euonymous) that sprawls all over the place. I am constantly having to cut it back and I realized I just don't like the way it looks. In fact, I had grown to hate it. I asked Nick to dig it up and I walked behind the house for something. When I came back a few minutes later he said, "I'm done." I was amazed because I thought it would take a long time due to its' size. I started to exclaim about how awesome he was, then I saw that he had dug up my fragrant, well-behaved, appropriately sized daphne odora that was next to the ugly shrub. Sorry honey, you get to start over. I put the daphne around the corner to leave more room for Nick to work digging up the nasty big shrub, thinking I would replant it after he was done. I'm pretty sure I even mentioned that I would replant it. I took off to run a brief errand. While I was gone, Nick and Will made the last trip to the dump. Upon my return, I saw that Nick had completed the job and went around the corner to get the daphne. It was gone. Can you believe, Nick put it in the pickup with the other junk and took it to the dump?!!

I was going to plant a variegated boxwood between the two daphne bushes, but I was unable to find any at Tom's, Lowe's, or Home Depot. Anybody have any good ideas for an attractive shrub that stays green all year, doesn't get too big, and does well on the east side of the house? I've had miniature rhodies and azaleas and there and they all failed to thrive. I transplanted the scrawny ones that survived and they have done well in other locations.