I'm sooooo glad it's Friday finally. I walked for 35 mins today during my break. I might walk on the treadmill later tonight when I go home...lets see how I feel.

Our future? This is insane!

Amarie, sorry your back's hurting. Hope you feel better soon and don't worry about not meeting the challenge. Sh** happens As for cakes its my weakness. I have a huge sweet tooth. In fact, ice cream doesn't do it for me. I like ice creams but its not what I want for dessert all the time. I usually pair little bit of ice cream with something else like brownie...now I want one

Josephine, please take the rain, it's all yours Hope your knee feels better soon. And I promise I'll have the recipe on my blog soon...

Carp! Me too

** Think steamed broccoli and snow peas**

Garden questions....If you are just trying to get a taste of gardening before you start building beds, I would do a container or trellis garden of the things you like to eat. My kids eat bell peppers of every color, so that is what they have in their plot. They also wanted to do tomatoes and carrots. If you are not going to enjoy your product, why bother? I don't plant potatoes or beans, even though they are incredibly easy. They make me gag.

The other nice thing about a container garden is that you will probably use potting soil, so your dirt quality will not be an issue.

If you were to start this weekend in pots, I would do cherry tomatoes, bell peppers and whatever I really liked. Another idea is to do a pot herb garden. I don't do herbs because I always say I will dry and freeze them, but I do not. Or I say I will make pesto with my mountains of basil and freeze it, then I don't. I would love to be able to cut them from a pot on my back porch, but I don't take care of them.

Another option is to get or make a trellis. Peas, beans and cucumbers could still go in and give you a good yield. As they start to grow just help them with a loose twist tie or string to grow up instead of out. It won't take up yard space.

Chelle-trellises would be good for most fall veggies, but your growing season is long enough that you could so some of the containers as well. For fall veggies, like pie pumpkins and squash, you could have climbers. As the weather cools, you can do more with greens like spinach and leaf lettuce. They don't do well in the middle of summer, but they start and finish the season nicely.

If you want to prepare for a larger garden next year, you have some options. I did all of mine in raised beds this year. I had the boxes built. Or you can plot where you want to have it next year.

The main thing is to NOT disturb existing soil. Put down newspaper and top it with mulch for next year, either in a box or on the ground. DO NOT TILL! When I see people tilling, it makes me nuts. All they do is disturb the nutrients and stress their soil. Kill your grass with the paper and compost and mulch on top. By next year, the mulch will have decomposed and you can add compost and soil then.

Full instructions here:
http://www.motherearthnews.com/Organ...-Can-Make.aspx

Our civilization is on a steady decline in the age of when its "kosher" to have sex. People used to wait until they got married, then the majority were trying it at 17 or 18 and its gone down ever since.

A lot of my friends are all 3 to 4 years older than me and its weird when you ask them how old they were for their first time and most of them say between 16 and 18. Then when I answer my number is lower then theres. (Not that I'm of it or anything, it just is a fact of conversation.)

I think someone was saying not to long ago that 10 and 11 year old girls are getting pregnant and having babies now.

What is this world coming to?

I was just telling my hubby today we needed to get a tiller for the garden.

I really need to get my flower beds in the front moving... its nothing but dirt up there but its so hard I think I might have to till it.

OMG! And one of the grandmothers blamed the school? Um... when did monitoring in-class sexual activity become part of a teacher's job description?!?

Thanks Chellez You've given me the motivation to actually TRY for this week's badge...was not sure I could make it, but if I know I can back off a bit next week I might be able to make it!

Just wanted to say thanks for all you DO online! Hang in there and hey, take a break from time to time!

Ok, yeah...maybe taking this beach hopping a bit too seriously and all? I LOVE Monaco, I was there once when I was 18 (too young to do much) but it was beautiful! Magical princess castles and paths along the shore line!

Here...some random person's Pictures

Exactly, this is getting out of hand and I think the system here is taking a downhill track. Parents are supposed to be responsible for what their kids do or don't do. And kids after a certain age are responsible for their own actions. There are so many restrictions and insane rules where it is getting harder to discipline your own child. Why should someone tell me how I can or cannot discipline my kid? If I want to discipline my child I should have the freedom to do it without being threatened by my child that he/she will call the cops if I laid a finger on them. I'm not talking about parents who abuse their kids thats crazy and they should be taken care of. But children are getting more arrogant and smarter and they know if the parents try to say or do anything they'll call the cops. Then you have incidents where a student beats the crap out of a teacher in front of other students IN CLASS and being cheered on by other students. Not to mention, in another case, student text messages her mom saying the teacher is not being nice or something and the mother comes to school and takes care of the teacher. Where's the damn respect? This is becoming a joke! And then one wonders why there's a problem? go figure!

BayScaping
BayScapes are environmentally-sound landscapes benefiting people, wildlife, and the Chesapeake Bay. Developed by the Alliance for the Chesapeake Bay and the York Watershed Council, BayScapes are low-input landscapes, requiring less mowing, less fertilizing, and less pesticide use while providing diverse habitats for songbirds, small mammals, butterflies, and other creatures.

We live in a temperate region, with hundreds of native, hardy and drought tolerant trees, flowers, annuals, perennials, shrubs, and vines that will look great in your landscape. Local nurseries carry many of these plants, and can help you select the right ones for your landscape.

BayScaping Fundamentals include:

Planning and design for water conservation and beauty from the start.
Creating practical turf areas of manageable sizes, shapes, and appropriate grasses.
Selecting low-water requirement plants... and grouping plants of similar water needs together.
Using appropriate soil amendments like compost or manure as needed by the site and the type of plants used.
Using mulches to reduce evaporation and to keep the soil cool.
Irrigating efficiently with properly designed systems and by applying the right amount of water at the right time.
Maintaining the landscape by mowing, weeding, pruning and fertilizing properly. For more information on BayScaping, click here: http://www.acb-online.org/bayscapes.cfm

Virginia Cooperative Extension. Your first stop for local conservation and landscaping tips. http://www.ext.vt.edu

As for the comments about the kids....

All of what you say would require parents to take their kids out from in front of the TV and actually parent. With 24-hour children's programming, that will not ever happen. When people let TV raise their kids, their kids learn values that are not consistent with a healthy society.

Exactly what I say when I threaten to disconnect the cable when I hear that crap disney theme song music from those stupid tween shoes. We got rid of nick jr long ago. I would disconnect the whole cable except for dh's protest. I wish i could block certain channels, but no. I only need NBC!!! lol But yes, some of the tamer shoes are just mind-numbing drivel and senseless (and mean) humor.

It takes a village...

My mother remembers a time when if you were in trouble at school, you were in trouble at home automatically. At that point, the teacher was always right.

From the news I do read about the trouble with schools (and children) and I see that often their parents (the ones in the news) would like for the schools to raise their kids... and at the same time never reprimand them. If a child gets in trouble at school, but claims the teacher was being mean, the child is right.

Neither situation is ideal, but at the very least earlier on a child knew that the adults were together in raising him/her. An adult was the authority, and while not necessarily always right, they were to be respected.

I hear a lot lately about parents trying harder and harder to be friends with their own children, rather than authority figures. Often because these parents didn't like having authority figures as their parents. But you don't have to be mean in order to get across a point, or correct behavior. These parents now are all grown up and taking care of themselves. They actually grew up to be responsible people. But, they're training their children to be children forever. The children are acting like adults without any of the consequences. This is the biggest concern. Being an adult comes with responsibility, and actions come with consequences. They're not being taught to actually grow up, take action and accept that, well... yeah life IS unfair. So what? Everyone's life is unfair! Either do something about the problems, or move on.