This weekend we’ve had our share of fun and games. Yesterday the weather was cool and rainy but today it was perfect: sunny and in the high 60s. In addition to getting another van, which was exciting enough on its own, we made a trip to the Chicago Botanic Garden along with [...]

Last night was special because I was able to pick and eat the very first ripe tomatoes of the season from our small garden.  The plant that is furthest along in terms of ripe tomatoes is the ‘Lemon Boy’ variety, which is a yellow tomato.  Keegan and Michele agreed with me that it tasted very [...]

People say this all the time, but…Man, this summer has gone by fast! I’m not thrilled that it’s August already.  Somehow I’ve never gotten over the feeling that August brought to me when I was still going to school.  Whenever I see those dreaded words — Back to School Sale — plastered all over stores, [...]

Here are a few photos of flowers and such in our garden:

I haven’t been having very productive weekends of late. Usually I am slow to wake up and quick to go back to sleep, much to the chagrin of my wife and kids This weekend, however — particularly Saturday — I got something accomplished that I’ve wanted to do for a long time: [...]

Yesterday, the weather was perfect, sunny and not too hot. We decided to make a trip to Racine, WI to buy plants at Milaeger’s Gardens. It is about an hour’s drive and well worth it. The kids were all restless and ill-behaved but we still managed to get several nice window boxes and a nice [...]

I derived a lot of enjoyment from reading an article (available to subscribers only) in The Chronicle of Higher Education on the topic of procrastination. Misery loves company, I guess, because I felt comforted by the author’s description of his life of always being late with some project or another. My thoughts as [...]

Here are some photos from our trip to the Chicago Botanic Gardens on Columbus Day.

Thanks to having yesterday off (it was Columbus Day here in the U.S.), we enjoyed a longer-than-usual weekend. Rather than try to finish unpacking boxes from the move and clean up the general mess, we decided to try to do some fun things. Saturday we visited a Japanese market called Mitsuwa Marketplace in [...]

Today is another in a string of beautiful weather days. The sun is shining, the temperature is in the upper 60s/lower 70s, and spring flowers are blooming. It is nice to see cheerful daffodils and forsythia shrubs in bloom. The lawn is a mess, though, needing the first mowing of the season. [...]