Aaaaachooooo!

Never fear, my friends. My allergies are the typical, run-of-the-mill hay fever, sneezing, runny nose type. Thankfully a dose of over-the-counter allergy tablets usually do alleviate the symptoms. It's funny that for the last couple of years they seem to have improved, only occurring when I've been outside working in the dirt and plants, which is quite a bit this time of year.

The general concensus here in the Tri-Cities is if you arrive here with no allergies, within five years you will develop them, and is does seem to be the case in lots of people here - me included. The wind blows quite a bit, as I've written about before, and starting in February would bring something along with it that would start the sneezing. Then I'd have a break in the summer, but fall would usher in another round of attacks. But things are better now. Perhaps I've just made the adjustment and am now a tried-and-true Tri-Citian!

No stitching has been accomplished the last couple of days. But I did dig out a thick patch of daylilies that have needed to be thinned out for several years. What a mass of roots, not just the lilies, but also from the maple and sycamore trees all around. Makes it really hard work - but muscles have gotten a work out, so that's a good thing. Getting the lilies out cleared the ground so DH could work on the irrigation line that burst a couple of weeks ago, which he fixed last night.

Wednesday I did a little shopping around and math to figure out what in the world we're going to do in our back yard and what it's going to cost. Now I need to call in some landscapers for bids so we can finally decide if it's going to be worth the savings to do part of the work ourselves or have someone else do all the hardscaping for us. Thinking, thinking . . .

Today the game plan is to prepare for my stamp club tonight as I'm the hostess and must provide the snackies - so a trip to Costco is in order. I've radically curtailed my Costco shopping in an effort to bring my spending in line with my budget, lol! So I'll have to be careful today and just get the things I NEED!

I'll also be ferrying the boys around to their play practice. A couple of my friends who homeschool teach a month's long class on a Shakespeare play (a couple of years they did Gilbert & Sullivan) then prepare to perform the play. This year's play is "Taming of the Shrew". They all do a phenomenal job and it's a great learning experience for the kids. But the play requires many hours of rehearsal each week which gets tiring for everyone - and that's the point I'm at today - tired of figuring who has practice and what can get done before rehearsal. But at performance time, all that hassle is forgotten in the joy of a job well done.

Today's weather is positively glorious and the weekend should be more of the same. I plan to enjoy as much of it as possible! I hope your weekend is beautiful too!