Reason #101.....

why you can get a house that has been neglected CHEAP!!! OK, so our house was only 4 years old when we bought it this past November, so the neglect is really minimal. In fact, I am always impressed with how good of shape the house is in after hearing more horror stories about some people who rented the house for awhile. Man arrested... long story, lol. But still!! Yes, the entire house on the inside could use to be painted (well, minus the 3 rooms we have done so far... take that back, the hall bath needs to be re-painted b/c I hate the color, lol) as the paint the original contractor's paint (overall, this paint is in better condition than the brand new rental we lived in before though). There are a number of little things that need to be done to the house as well (part of the porch needs to be re-built, screens need to be re-placed... just to name a few).

Well, this weekend I learned reason #101.... that is that yard work MUST be kept up in order to have anything that looks good and is easy to maintain!! It is not like I didn't know this or anything... also knew that we needed to do some serious work with the yard, landscaping, etc. This all just just became very apparent to me this weekend!!! I spent 2 hours on Sat. and 4+ hours yesterday (still not a ton of time, I know) weeding and mowing. This was the first time I have mowed this yard (as I got a wild hair up my ass and told Mark I would do it). This allowed me the up close view of how crappy our crabby grass is, lol. We have sections of the yard that have great grass, but most of it is weeds. We have this issue with getting grass to grow where we want it to grow and not getting it to grow where we don't want it to grow (say that one ten times fast, lol).

Oh... and while all of my neighbor's were planting this Spring and watching the fruits of their labors grow....... I was busy growing a baby and laboring a 9+ pound baby!!!! Yes, I watched many neighbor's plant away thinking 'damn, I would love to get all this landscaping done now' but hello I was the size of a whale!!! Now, that I actually have the energy and desire to get this all done, it is HOTTER than hell, plus not really the time to plant anything, lol.

OK, I am done with that vent... I feel better, lol! At least my two flower beds are weed free at this moment.... give 'em a week though! Remember, neglect is a bitch on the outside too!! Everywhere (including the yard) needs soil, soil, and more soil (damn rocks everywhere) and black paper laid down before I do anything else. Until then, I will attempt to keep the weeds from eating us, lol.