I have a confession to make. I cannot grow things. Everything I try to plant fails. Even things that are given to me alive end up dead. Am I doomed to a lifetime of plant life massacre? I do admit, I am lazy. That’s right I said it, LAZY! I am not one who wants a high maintenance plant. I want one that you just plant and it is happy. One you cannot kill from lack of feeding or not watering for a couple of days. What I’m saying is I need a flower that will live from the droplets it receives from the sprinklers every few days. Is this too much to ask? I want a pretty yard minus the lovingly wrapping it in dung and talking to it.

Do you know any flowers of this variety? Can you give me any advice on how to get out of this plant life massacre? Does it just take a lot of work or am I missing a key ingredient? Do I just need miracle gro?

Here are some of my recent failures:

I really did have good intentions this year. I was going to start small with two sets of Poppies and a stem of raspberries. I thought I could handle two new items. When I went to Home Depot they said anything they have there will work great in this climate. I walked through the flowers for something that said Perennial on the tag to lessen the work for me in the future. I literally had to ask the worker if Perennial or annual comes back each year. I loved the look of the poppies and it said they could handle hot weather and only had to be watered once a week. BINGO! As for raspberries, well they are raspberries, YUM. I brought them home all proud of myself and well here they are now:

I received some beautiful tulips one Valentine’s day from my Visiting Teacher. I saved the bulbs until fall and planted them awaiting their wonderful blooms in spring. Here is what I got:

I got a delightful poinsettia at a work party over Christmas. It lasted a bit longer than most, but here is the poor doll after a few months with us. It has since lost all it’s red and been transplanted to a pot I painted blue. It ended up looking kind of like a Bonsai tree. I should have taken a pic. It has taken a permanent field trip to my hubby’s cubicle. (He will not give up on things as you will see)

My neighbor gave me an Amaryllis she had received as a gift because “she did not have time for it.” Granted this one was partly not my fault. When I opened the box it had already started to bloom and the stem was growing at a 90 degree angle from the bulb. So naturally I tried to coax it to being somewhat straight. Bye bye flower. It completely broke off. Just in time for me to read on the box that they bloom once a year. Yay. I hoped by some miracle it might turn into something beautiful. I had always wanted an amaryllis. Here it is now, literally 2 1/2 feet of leaf.

Here’s one that came in to the marriage with my husband. This plant is over five years old, so I guess it is our one “success.” This thing was deader than dead in my husbands apartment. It was literally a dry stem sticking out of the dirt, but my hubby does not like to give up on things (thus all the other ugly plants hanging around). We decided to nurse it back to health so we stuck an artichoke leaf in the dirt for some compost food (no idea what we were doing obviously) and he watered it religiously. That little stem grew in to a leaf and then another and then another. That little stem is now one really long stem that we wrap around and around until it somewhat resembles a plant.

I do have two plants that seem to thrive pretty well. Notice the life support. I bought myself some of those blown glass watering globes and they seem to work pretty well.

So, let’s review…five failures, a one stem wonder and two on life support. Thank goodness the only nursery I will ever be in charge of is my son’s. And he is still thriving. 🙂

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Don’t they look so much happier in their little pot?

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Yep, you heard right! I took a trip down to the hillbilly nation this Mother’s Day! I got a good laugh out of the following and hope you will too!

First off, my hubby was so thoughtful to take my little guy in the morning so I could sleep in. He was up at 6:50 and let me sleep until a wonderful 8:35!! It was amazing, until I realized I had 25 minutes to get ready and get to church. Luckily, I had showered the night before, so we made it on time!!

My church ward wanted to show appreciation to all the mothers in the ward with a small token of gratitude. They had a budget of $1 each. When my hubby told me they were trying to think of ideas for the gift I told him they should do a nice chocolate covered strawberry. I have to admit I laughed a little when I picked up the gift on Mother’s Day. They literally took a flat of flowers and cut them up in to singles. The young men handed me a napkin and said to choose a flower. I actually got out a little late and was lucky enough to be one of the last so they let me take two.

I’m not going to lie, I coveted my sister’s little bag of Chocolate truffles from her church ward. Don’t get me wrong, I appreciate my flowers and plan to put them in a cute little pot soon!

The fun and laughs continued when we got home from church. My hubby let me open the present he got me. It was sitting on the kitchen table in the box it was shipped in. (It’s all about presentation, right? lol) I opened it up to see this.

I said, “Wow honey, I can take it hunting with me.” (Can you imagine me hunting? now, that is comical in itself!) He came over in a frenzy promising that the one he ordered was black. I thought maybe just the picture on the front was off so I opened up the box to find this.

At this point, we were both laughing and he kept apologizing and swearing the one he ordered was black. There was an interchangeable piece that does make it black, but I had to show you the beauty of nature that came out of the box. I was so excited to get a digital picture frame because I have wanted one FOREVER!

I also got a very special present when I came home from Kohl’s on Saturday after an afternoon of shopping with my sis. I walked in with a giant bag and my hubby didn’t cringe one bit and even asked what I got! I pulled out four shirts, two pairs of shorts and a little 3/4 sleeve jacket. I thought I would get “the look.” You know, the you are in trouble, why in the world did you buy all this stuff look. The only thing he said was that since I got a new jacket I had to donate one of my old ones. (He made this rule about clothes after I bought new hangers like five times) To which I justified that it is not actually a jacket, but a 3/4 hoodie that is pretty much just a shirt. 😉

Here are some great deals for those of you in the Utah area!

My friend Melissa told me about this one. Right now, K-BULL 93 has $50 gift certificates for Jason’s deli for $25 listed in their Incredi-bull deals.

97.1 ZHT has Half Off hookups that change every so often. Right now, they have $50 gift certificates for Hollywood Connection for $18. They also have a deal for people without dental insurance to go to Apex Family Dental for a cleaning and exam for $5 (value $159). AMAZING! The funny thing is this is my dentist! Out of all the dentists in the Salt Lake Valley it is mine who is doing it so I can tell you from experience they are great!There are a ton of other listings too, so go see what might interest you.

Utah’s Real Deals posts a new deal every Monday. It is announced on Good Things Utah on ABC4 between 10 and 11am. Right now the deal is half off a Utah Kids Club Membership. For just $6, you get discounts to over 100 family fun centers.

Do you have a favorite “deal” site?