#now our summer holidays will just be driving lessons and actual fun stuff

[the-shape-shifting-system]

French celebratory post

On a eu notre BAC! Vouiiiiiii! Le soulagement du siècle, j'étais convaincu qu'on allait devoir passer au rattrapage, ce que je ne voulais absolument pas car c'est à Montauban (juste à une heure et quelques de chez nous, en plus c'est des oraux :/). On l'a eu mention Bien en plus! Ça par contre c'était pas prévu, vu comment on c'est loupé sur la philo et l'une de nos EDS (enseignement de spécialité) ^^'

Je suis hyper content, c'est franchement génial surtout qu'on va pouvoir faire la formation qu'on voulait dans le supérieur! Yay!

[trashmouth-tozier89]

Welcome to the Loser’s Club Asshole! - Ch.1 | ONE

Warnings: swearing, one homophobic slur (Bowers)

Word Count: 4,084

Pairing: Richie Tozier x Reader

A/N - the first official chapter of the first series on my page! oof, this is gonna be a ride. please know this is basically my interpretation of the two recent adaptations of IT that have come out, and so the cast of this exactly the same, with you as Y/N! I hope you enjoy this, and my interpretation of the film! 

If you wish to be added to the taglist, send in an ask or pop it in the comments! :)

Welcome to the Loser’s Club Asshole Masterlist 

Being the new girl was certainly the worst.

Y/N’s mum had decided her family needed a big change, and she assumed this would mean something like refurbishing the living room or getting a family pet, not moving to a completely different town on the opposite side of Maine. She had begged and pleaded, took every chance she could to convince her against the decision, but before she knew it, the house was bought and she was packing her bedroom into measly cardboard boxes.

Being a stickler for organisation, she had split everything she owned into 4 categories; clothing, books, cassette tapes and others. As she slipped her final book into the box labelled books, she sighed in relief; glad she was finally finished and could take a rest. It’s not like she owned much anyway, but she didn’t exactly like doing something which she didn’t want to do. Packing up her stuff meant that this was final, it was happening and nothing would change it.

Moving to a new city meant moving away from the place she called home; her friends, other family; she even considered the possibility that she’d miss the bullies at her school. She wasn’t exactly the most confident and outspoken person, so she wasn’t sure how easy it would be to make new friends. Especially considering the school her mum had enrolled her at, Derry High School, had taken one look at her grades and placed her in all the higher set classes. If she were to make friends, they would probably end up being nerds who were the pit of all jokes at the school. It’s not like she had any way of keeping in touch with her friends back home either; she wasn’t sure if her new house would have a telephone, and even if it did, catching up on the phone every night was not the idea of fun she had pictured for her summer holiday. She was utterly doomed to spend your summer indoors, alone, doing art to pass the time.

She lay back on the mattress that was once her bed, which annoyingly had no bedding on but it was better than nothing, and flipped to an empty page in her sketchbook, the pencil meeting the paper within seconds. She didn’t even have to think about what she was drawing, for the inspiration simply came without effort. Halfway through drawing, her mother barged into the bedroom, looking around to check she had completed what she had asked. Y/N could tell she was stressed, her decision quickly backfiring when she realised how much there was to do; the two were meant to be leaving for Derry tonight, and the moving truck was yet to arrive.

“Is it still not here yet?” Y/N questioned, looking to her mother’s worried expression and matching it. She nodded, shaking her head softly and sighing loudly. This really was taking a toll on her. “Is everything else packed up?”

It was just the 2 of them living in the house, though not for much longer. Y/N’s father had been out of the picture for about a year now, passing away after a terrible accident in one of the quarries across town, and it had taken a damaging toll on the whole family. Her mother had been feeling down for months, and she considered that this was probably the reason she wanted to move; the memory of her husband was bound to this town and if she were to move, maybe she could escape the pain. Y/N couldn’t deny, that really was the only reason she was happy to leave this town too, and so she went with her decisions with at least a little support.

“Thankfully it is. We are just waiting for the truck and then we can leave. I’d be happy to set off now, but I don’t know how I feel leaving all our stuff in the house by itself.” She explained, sitting down on the edge of the bed and resting her head in her hands. Like a miracle, the truck pulled in as soon as she finished her sentence, and Y/N could see the glee on her face when the middle-aged man from outside shouted “Is this the L/N residence” from the drive. She stuck her head out the window with a big grin, nodding yes and explaining she’d ‘be down in just a second’. It had all begun to set in; they really were moving, and they probably wouldn’t ever be coming back.

Making her way down, Y/N’s mother was in conversation with the truck driver, whilst other men rushed past her to grab all the furniture and boxes from inside the house. She only heard small snippets of her conversation, before sitting down in the car and closing the door. She didn’t want the big goodbyes and sadness; she wanted to get it over and done with before the emotions began to sit in. Thankfully, her friends had already said goodbye to her the day before; once she had left, she would be en route to Derry, no stops.

***

The new house was nice. It was nothing compared to her old one, but it was manageable. Y/N had her own room, and she could definitely fit all her furniture into it without too much of a squeeze. It just felt... strange. The whole town felt strange. Off. Like something wasn’t right.

Nevertheless, she lived here now and she wasn’t going to complain, because it would only upset her mother more and she didn’t want that to happen. Today was supposed to be Y/N’s first day at school, which she saw as extremely pointless considering the fact it was also the last day at school before summer. Her mother hadn’t picked the most opportune time to move house, but she wanted Y/N to at least get one or two friends before going into the summer, so she had someone to spend the time with. She understood the reasoning, she just didn’t exactly agree.

Especially considering she was 5 periods into the school day and yet to make any friends. Everyone either sent her a glance of disgust or confusion, questioning who she was and why the fuck she was even here. She peeked at her timetable to see her last lesson was easily the worst, Math. Being in the higher set didn’t make it much easier either. Apparently, the smart kids of Derry were much smarter than the smart kids of her hometown. Walking into the classroom, she recognised everyone from your previous classes, except one boy who sat right at the back of the class. His head was leant down, focused on a book, but she knew she didn’t know him based on the fact she hadn’t seen anyone with the same curly hair and blue shirt.  Due to the fact the only empty seat happened to be next to the boy, she made her way over.

“I-uh, is this seat taken?” Y/N asked, pointing to the vacant seat with a grin on her face. His head shot up at the sound of a girl’s voice, shaking his head slightly to indicate it wasn’t before looking back at his book. She sat herself down, pulling the math textbook out of her extremely light backpack and turned to face the boy. He seemed nice enough, and she thought she ought to begin making friends; at least then she could say she tried. “What are you reading?”

“Oh, it’s a book about birds.” He mumbled, almost like he didn’t want to be talking to her, but she wouldn’t let that put her off.

“Have you ever been birdwatching? I love to just sit in my back garden and watch them, sometimes I get my sketchbook out and draw them” she smiled at the thought, memories of her and her father sat in the garden with binoculars that were too big for her face hanging around her neck as he pointed out what each one was. Birdwatching soon became one of her favourite activities. That was the benefit of living near trees, and thankfully her new house also had that.

“Wait, you actually like birdwatching? I love it; b-but all my friends think it’s stupid!” He perked up, shocked to have found someone else with the same passion. She knew she was going to get along quite well with the boy, or she hoped at least. “I’m Stanley Uris, but you can call me Stan. That’s what my friends call me”

“I’m Y/N L/N. Hopefully we can birdwatch together sometime soon.”

“I-I’d like that” he grinned, cheeks blushing red at the idea of a pretty girl like her wanting to spend time with a boy like him. Her first official friend – Stanley Uris. Stan Uris. The boy from math class.

Maybe her summer wouldn’t be as lonely as she anticipated.

***

As the final bell of the day rang, the children of Derry High School spewed into the hallways, cheers and laughter filling what was previously silence. A collection of 3 boys rushed out of once classroom, carrying on down the corridor together; anyone around them could see very clearly that they were best of friends just from the way they interacted.

“So there’s like this church full of Jews right? And Stan has to take like this super Jew-y test” Eddie Kaspbrak, the smaller one of the 3, explained. The boy had a fanny pack tightly strapped around his waist, containing who knows what, and his backpack hanging over his shoulders. Some may have considered the extra accessory unnecessary for a school day, but they did not know Eddie and his hypochondriac personality well enough to make a judgement.

“But how’s it work?” Bill Denborough questioned; Bill was largely considered the leader of the pack due to his optimistic personality and valiance, also the fact that he was the tallest of the 3 gave him a slight advantage. Though, everyone has noticed the way Bill had been acting a lot more removed, and they immediately credited it to the fact Georgie, Bill’s younger brother, had gone missing only months earlier. No one dared to bring it up to the poor boy though.

“They slice the tip of his dick off!” Eddie pointed out, with a little too much enthusiasm. Bill pulled a face, as if to say Eddie was crazy, but the third boy simply scrunched his eyebrows together in a frown.

“But then Stan’ll have nothing left!” Richie Tozier, the final of the three, joked. Richie was the clown of the group, or as they liked to call him, the ‘trashmouth’. Mainly due to the amount of rubbish and vulgar words that came out of his mouth almost every second of every day. Richie couldn’t help it, it was his personality, but most people who met his for the first time didn’t expect such crude things due to the way he looked; the lens of his glasses were so thick, they made his eyes appear 5x bigger than they really were, meaning Richie was able to get away with a lot of the wreck he havocked.

“That’s true” Eddie started, before being interrupted from the touch of a hand grabbing his shoulder, and a familiar voice shouting “Wait up, you guys!” from behind him. The 3 turned to face Stanley, who had made his way out of maths a little late because he wanted to give Y/N his telephone number and address. That way, they would be able to birdwatch together.

“Hey Stan, what happens at the bar mitzvah anyways? Ed says they slice the tip of your d-d-d-dick off” Bill stuttered out, another stand out feature about the young boy. Bill had sported a stutter since he was a young child, which had earned him the nickname ‘Stuttering Bill’ from everyone at school. He hated the nickname, and he didn’t necessarily like his stutter either, but it had been getting better as time went on.

“Yeah, and I think the Rabbi’s gonna pull down your pants, turn to the crowd and say ‘Where’s the beef?” Richie exclaims, earning a small chuckle from the other two, while Stan simply stayed straight faced.

“At the bar mitzvah, I read from the Torah” Stan began, earning the attention from the other boys, “And then I make a speech, and suddenly I become a man”

The explanation seemed enough for Eddie and Bill, but of course, Richie slipped in one more joke with “I could think of funner ways to become a man”. That was before locking eyes with a group of boys, obviously older, who went by the name of the Bower’s gang; there was Patrick Hockstetter, a tall quite lanky boy, with black shady hair; Belch Huggins, overweight enough so that his belly always hung slightly over his belt, a baseball cap on his head and a grin of mischief on his face; Victor Criss, rather tall and thin like Patrick, but with hair as light as his pasty skin; and lastly, Henry Bowers. Sporting a brown mullet, wearing a t-shirt and a look of disgust on his face, Henry was the worst of them all.  Even the name, Henry Bowers, struck fear in almost every student at Derry High. It was common knowledge; do not cross Henry Bowers or any of his goons. Unless you have a death wish, that is.

Richie had been so distracted by the gang, he barely noticed when Stan corrected his grammar; “More fun, you mean”

The Bower’s gang stared at the smaller group as they passed by, Patrick licking his lips at Richie as if he was fresh meat. It is obvious from the boys faces they were frightened, Eddie even double-taking once or twice to ensure they weren’t following. Richie piped up, noticing how the group had been rendered silent; “Think they’ll sign my yearbook? ‘Dear Richie, sorry for taking a hot, steaming dump in your backpack last March, have a good summer!”

Eddie and Bill chuckled at the memory of Richie’s disgusted face having discovered Bowers had, in fact, taken a shit in his backpack without him knowing. Richie had learnt from that point that whenever the gang were in the toilets, it wasn’t a smart idea to also go in. And make a joke which is bound to aggravate them. Stan, however, was too preoccupied by Greta Keene who had knocked into his shoulder whilst barging towards the toilet at a speed that was simply unneeded for a school corridor. Greta was also a bit of a bully, but mostly to the girls of the school, considering she thought she was superior to them all. With the attitude of a stuck up brat, Greta was despised by the group of boys too. This was understandable.

 ***

“Best feeling ever” Stan grinned, as the 4 boys dumped everything and anything they could out of their backpacks and into the bins in front of the school. It was extremely relieving for them, knowing school was finally over.

“Oh yeah? Try tickling your pickle for the first time” Richie quipped, earning nothing but eye rolls and sniggers from the rest. Thankfully, Eddie was changing the subject before Richie could continue.

“Hey, what do you guys wanna do tomorrow?”

“I start my training” Richie explained, as if it was the most obvious thing that could’ve been said. This confused Eddie, and the remaining boys, as he questioned “Wha-what training?”

“Street Fighter” Richie answered, referring to the video game in the arcade Richie had practically dedicated his life to complete.

“Is that how you wanna spend your summer? Inside of an arcade” Eddie grimaced at the idea; he never understood the appeal of gaming, or the arcade for that matter, whereas Richie was the exact opposite. Richie looked at Eddie with a disappointed look on his face, huffing lightly.

“Beats spending it inside of your mother!” Richie exclaimed, chuckling at his own joke as he lifted his hand to high five Stan with an ‘Oh!’, only for his arm to be pulled down by Stan, who wasn’t joining in on any of Richie’s jokes, and instead making a more reasonable suggestion; “What if we go to the quarry?”

Eddie seemed on board with the idea, Richie too, but Bill was quick to remind them; “Guys, we have the b-b-b-Barrens”

“Right” Stan responded, understanding that going to the Barrens meant spending the day searching for Georgie.

“Betty Ripsom’s mom…” Eddie mumbled, changing the subject once again, as he spotted the woman stood next to a police car. She was looking around at all the children, searching for her daughter, who had also gone missing month before.

“Is she really expecting to see her come out of school?” Stan muttered, feeling a pang of guilt as he noticed the distraught expression on the woman’s face.

“I don’t know” Eddie answered, “As if Betty Ripsom’s been hiding in Home Ec. for the last few weeks”

“You think they’ll actually find her?” Stan asked again, eyes still pinned solely on the woman.

“Sure. In a ditch, all decomposed, covered in worms and maggots, smelling like Eddie’s mom’s underwear” Richie retorted, almost with a lack of humour to it.

“Shut up! That’s freaking disgusting” Eddie complains, the fact his mother is the pit of another one of Richie’s jokes getting on his nerves.

“Sh-she’s not dead. She’s m-m-m-m-missing” Bill insisted, turning back to Richie with a saddened look in his eye. The boy’s hearts dropped at the realisation of what they were talking about, and how sensitive it was for Bill. If Betty was dead, that meant Georgie probably was too, and Bill wasn’t ready to accept that.

Richie adjusted his glasses slightly, apologising quickly; “Sorry Bill. She’s missing.”

Bill turned to walk away from the bins and towards their bikes, with the others following behind – “You know the Barrens aren’t that bad. Who doesn’t love splashing around in shitty water?” Richie barely got out before a hand had grabbed onto the straps of his backpack and flung him backwards, sending him tumbling into Stanley. As they fell to the grass, Stanley’s kippah slipped off his head. Patrick noticed this, and grabbed the head cover before Stanley could stop him; “Nice Frisbee, flamer” Patrick mocked

“Give it back” Stan insisted, but Patrick had flung the small hat into a passing bus and shouted “Fucking losers” before Stan could grab it out his hand.

Belch approached an unsuspecting Eddie from behind, burping loudly into his ear. This caused Eddie to gag and run to the over side of Bill to get away from the boy. Bill, however, escaped any ridicule apart from a nudge from Henry as he passed by, mumbling “Loser” not so discreetly.

All the meanwhile, Y/N was stood at top of the path leading down to where the confrontation could be seen happening. She had been walking out of the building to head home, glad the day was finally over, before she witnessed the boy from math class being pushed over and bullied by the group of boys she didn’t even know. She usually would’ve left this kind of confrontation alone, but considering Stanley was the only friend she had managed to make yet, she kind of owed it to him. She rushed over to Stan’s side, helping him up off the ground, him mumbling a small ‘thank you’ in response. She watched as the bullies began to walk away, but she wasn’t going to let that happen; who were they to treat her friend like shit?

“What is your problem?” she shouted, capturing the attention of the rest of the Loser’s, but more importantly the Bower’s gang. They stopped in their tracks, turning back with a look of surprise on their face; surprise that someone would have the audacity to stand up to them. She couldn’t help but take a step back, feeling intimidated by the older boys, but that didn’t stop the girl from standing her ground with confidence.

“What did you say?” Henry scoffed.

“I said, what is your problem – need I repeat that again? Maybe a little slower so you and your pee brain friends can understand it a bit better this time?” she retorted, not letting the pit of fear she felt bubbling in her stomach show. Eddie, Richie, Stan and Bill cowered behind her, looking at each other in shock that this random girl was standing up to the school bullies, insulting them.

“Y/N, right? Only your first day at this school and I’ve heard all about you. You and your mom – I heard, she gave the principal a blowie so he would let you join the school. Not surprised, from the looks of you, your whole family are whores.” Henry muttered, making his way closer and closer to her face. Y/N felt sick at his words, the idea of a rumour like that being spread around school filling her with nothing but rage. With his final sentence, she watched as his hand went to reach under her skirt, before he had locked eyes with a police officer who stood against one of the cars. He pulled his hand away almost immediately, and she swore she saw a look of fear in the bully’s eyes. He began to back away, thankfully, but finished with one final sentence.

“This summer’s gonna be a hurt train, for you and your faggot friends” He threatened, before licking his palm and sliding it across Y/N’s cheek in one swift motion, eventually walking off towards their car and driving off. As soon as the group were far enough away, Y/N span around to check on the boys.

“A-are you guys okay?” she muttered, checking all 4 of them for grass stains or bruises. Meanwhile, they stood frozen, staring at the girl. It was starting to make her nervous, like she had done something wrong; “what?”

“That. Was. Hot” Richie muttered out, one word at a time, as his eyes remained solely on the girl in front of him. He thought the girl was the prettiest person he had ever seen; her e/c eyes which sparkled in the sunlight; her smile which stretched up to her eyes, that just seemed so genuinely sweet with just the right touch of shyness; her wavy h/c which flowed, it looked so soft, and he just wanted to run his fingers through- What was happening to Richie?

“Excuse me?” She questioned, furrowing her brows and giggling at the boy.

“Uh, thank you. He meant to say th-th-thank you” Bill stuttered out, the girls appearance setting him back a little too; nowhere near as much as Richie though. While the other boys had snapped back to reality, Richie still seemed in some kind of trance, until Stan nudged his side harshly.

“Oh that’s no problem, Stanley here is the only friend I’ve made so far, so I thought I’d help out. I guess I didn’t expect…”

“Henry, Henry Bowers” Eddie filled in, noticing she was racking her brain for a name she knew didn’t reside there. She nodded, smiling thankfully before continuing

“…Henry to be so, uh, psychotic. Is he always like that?”

“Pretty much, stay away from him as much as you can Y/N. He’s a dickhead” Stan warned her, watching as her head nodded in acceptance; he didn’t have to tell her twice. “Oh, we were going to head to the Barrens tomorrow, i-if you wanted to join?”

“The Barrens? What’s that?” she questioned, furrowing her eyebrows and looking around the group to see they were all staring at her in admiration.

“It’s a small tract of land still heavily covered in trees and plant life, but there’s a river that runs through it…” Stan explained, watching as she went to ask why anyone would want to spend their day splashing through shitty water, but his face said it all; don’t ask.

“Umm, yeah. I’d like that – you have my number right, Stan?” she asked, and he nodded quickly. “Right, well I guess I better be off – my mom’s probably sat at home, waiting to hear all about how shit my day was, so… I’ll see you guys tomorrow!”

She skipped off into the distance, Stan waving goodbye before turning back to the 3 boys who still stood shocked. Stan chuckled at the way they watched her leave, Richie’s mouth even falling open slightly, beginning to drool. He wiped it away quickly, before turning to Stan in an instant and almost yelling

“Who the fuck was that?”

[luvdsc]

so far we have mint, raisins, cantaloupe, cannoli, potato and lots more! we can make a whole picnic ashshja i can also add some chicken n_uggets, now all i need is you!!💞 my pick up lines have run out and i can't think of anymore huhu😖 ooh!! ive always loved playing basketball as a hobby and especially when PE rolled around. i can't relate much on the robotics but for piano i can! my parents forced me to play but i quit after 1 year of playing and tbh now i regret it sm :(( (1/3)

volunteering is such a lovely thing to do! what do you usually do? for me, school usually makes us volunteer once every year and like sometimes we go to orphanages, school for the disabled, nursing homes and other stuff! unfortunately i haven't had the chance to do it this year since covid struck and im missing all the activities!! omo from the way you say it, college really is jammed pack huh? im glad youre able to juggle it around well!! (im supposed to start this year eekkk) (2/3)

idk why but i have a feeling that our time zones differ a lot ahhzha but the weather isn't far different from mine!! its always around 85 - 95 degrees here, really warm and somewhat hot if you're not used to it, lots and lots of sunshine (i'm lucky if theres wind lol) i hope the weather is better for you today. don't forget to stay happy and have fun!♡ (i havent had the chance to read your newest fic yet but im going to rn!!!) (3/3)

✿ ✿ ✿

I LOVE CHICKEN NUGGETS OMG ESPECIALLY THE DINO SHAPED ONES!!!! Also, it’s official, we’re going on a picnic, whilst sitting six feet apart because social distancing is still important 💕 and that’s ok, honey bee!!! I have plenty to share :’) i hope you aren’t too tired because you’ve been running through my mind all day! 💓 omg yesss, basketball was always super fun in PE! Which position did you usually play? I also really liked pinball and soccer during PE. Omg aw ): well you can always get back into it! 💖 A couple of my friends are taught themselves the piano, and they’re really good!

I was able to experience all different types of volunteering! In 6th-12th grade, I volunteered often at a nonprofit that had a food bank where I package food and handed them out and a clothing donation center where I sorted through and hung up the clothes. I also volunteered at a nursing home in 8th grade regularly, and the seniors there were so lovely :’) And during the holidays, my family and I would volunteer at another place where we wrapped presents for little kids! I also volunteered weekly in a nearby hospital’s patient services for four years in hs where I discharged patients, talked to them regularly, and played the piano in various floors. And I helped with bake sales and donation drives through the community service club in hs! In college, I did a year long volunteering fellowship where I worked with students at a nonprofit trade school every week for 25 hours and helped them write resumes and cover letters and prepare for interviews! I also planned and organized two career fairs with over 50 businesses each and discussion panels!! And I worked with that trade school again for my senior project and came up with several lesson plans and revamped their old lesson materials :) oh, and I really enjoy community garden cleanups and coastal beach cleanups!!

your school sounds amazing! Does the whole class go together or do you get to choose where you want to volunteer? Ah yeah, unfortunately, covid halted everything ): college life is definitely hectic, but also one of the most fun years in your life! 💛 You get to experience the exciting parts of being an adult without actually being an adult if that makes sense?? I’m so excited for you, I hope you have the best time at college 💕💕 Omg wait does this mean you just graduated hs? if so, congratulations, honey bee!!! ✨

Oooo, my time zone is pst!!! What’s yours if you don’t mind me asking? Oh god, it’s always like that for you? Do you go outside a lot in that weather? It’s like that here in the summer, and I hate it, but I’m just grateful that there’s no humidity here :’) but yes, the weather is much better today!!! 🤩🤩 it’s 70, but it’s windy and cloudy 💗 how’s your weather like today? And thank you so much, sweetpea!!! 🥰 I hope you’re having a good weekend and having fun as well! And omg thank you for reading, lovebug!!! 🐝🌷 I hope it doesn’t disappoint :’)

[divinelydivorced]

Goodbye, Grandma

My grandma passed away yesterday morning. Even though we knew it was coming, it is still hard.  Tuesday around 3:50 am, I awoke suddenly and couldn’t quite get back to sleep until 4:30. Come to find out, the end started around four and she was gone around 4:20.  It’s amazing how souls are so connected that we can feel the loss happening at the exact moment it occurs.  The older I get, I am made more aware of how similar my grandma and I are.  I’m proud to have inherited so many of her quirky traits and have come to embrace them.  In fact, I see them as a tribute to the impact she had on my life.  So, in honor of the life my grandma lived, here are the 25 things she has taught me:

1.     Bladder problems ARE a joking matter.  My grandma was a hot mess, God love her. Whether it was peeing her pants in an elevator in front of a bunch of strangers or never leaving a restaurant without a huge stain on her top, she always managed to leave a trail.  Most people would cry or die of embarrassment, but she’d just hee-haw, laughing so hard she’d likely pee again.  She passed on her small bladder and the ability to find humor in the embarrassment to me, which has provided my friends with endless counts of entertaining stories. College friends still text from time to time, “Remember when Adam Harris finally asked you to hang out and you had to say no because you’d just peed on your long sweater and had to shower and change?”  Yes, yes, I remember.  

2.     If you want it, get it.  She always knew what she wanted and wasted no time in purchasing it.  I remember, around age ten, her saying how much she wanted a bird feeder.  I went home and made one out of an old milk carton.  When I showed up to proudly give it to her, only two days later, there in her front yard was a brand new gorgeous wooden one.    

3.     Eat it and get it over with.  My grandma was notorious for eating an entire watermelon in the course of an afternoon.  This also contributed to her bladder problems.  Once, my sister went to take a nap at her house.  While drifting in and out, she caught a whiff of the sweet smell of a butter braid (a very large pastry you’d take to a party).  When she awoke excited for dessert, she went out to discover my grandma had de-thawed it, cooked it, and ate 99% of it in the course of two hours.  To this day, whenever I make any dessert-I eat 99% of it while it’s still hot.  We all know what’s going to happen so just get it over with already.

4.     If it annoys you, get rid of it-no matter its practicality. My grandma loved buying things almost as much as she loved getting rid of those same things three months later.  One time she showed up at mom’s house with a car full of lamps.  She decided she hated lamps and wanted them all gone.  My mom, always the practical one, kept them so when my grandma realized later they were necessary, she wouldn’t have to buy more.  Any of my friends know I’m the same.  I served wine in a juice glass the other day.  My friend asked, “Don’t you have wine glasses?” “I did,” I said, “but just got rid of them.”  “Why? You didn’t use them?” he asked.  “No, I used them all the time.  I just got tired of looking at them.”

5.     Never stop moving.  My grandma moved all the time.  She’d often announce it at the latest holiday dinner.  She would wake up, be suddenly sick of her place, and a month later would be somewhere new.  She once left a home, only to return to it a few years later.  A constant mover myself, I was looking forward to staying in my current place for more than a year (a new record) until I recently found out I had to vacate in 30 days due to construction.  Although annoying and inconvenient, I was not surprised when I found myself thinking the other day, “Actually-I’m kind of over this place, so that worked out.”

6.     Crazy is charming.  My grandma was nuts, as am I.  Yet we embrace the crazy and combine it with big hearts.  That’s why people keep coming back.  A little crazy never hurt anyone…and we are a lot of fun on road trips.

7.     The flu is for sissies.  We’d often stay at her house when we had the flu. Grandma gave us whatever we wanted, which included the time my brother insisted he wanted to eat a bunch of tacos.  You can imagine my mother’s frustration when she arrived to pick him up and found him vomiting ground beef and shredded cheese everywhere.

8.     Pools and convertibles aren’t luxuries, they’re necessities.  Life’s too short.  GET THEM BOTH.

9.     Dogs are our children.  She had an antique cradle for her dog to sleep in and was the first to introduce me to a dog stroller.  I get it and think it makes absolute sense.

10.  You don’t need a man.  Most of my life she’s been single.  Men have chased after her and she’ll let them buy her lunch or keep her company, yet it goes no further.  Because at the end of the day, she’s her own woman and has no need for a full-time man dragging her down.  This is a lesson I’m still learning.

11.  Soap operas are good television.  She lived near the high school, so at lunchtime, my girlfriends and I would take our lunches to eat at her place and watch Days of Our Lives.  Those were some of my favorite memories.  If the show got really intense and it was time for us to go, she’d try convincing us to drive her car back, at age 14, so she didn’t have to leave.  She even took me and my aunt to a Days of Our Lives festival one summer.  When it came to idolizing celebrities, her and I saw eye to eye.

12.  Dairy Queen can be dinner.  When she helped move me to Michigan, we spent a week eating Dairy Queen snicker blizzards for every meal.  She was doing Weight Watchers at the time and, although two of these, met her quota for the day-she was willing to make the sacrifice.  I remember thinking how brilliant this was.  When we got tired of Dairy Queen (rare), we’d hit up the Chinese Buffet.  No excuses and no shame-it’s how we rolled.

13.  Why choose when you can have both.  My grandma loved driving with the windows down.  She also would sweat profusely.  Once, we got in the car on a blazing summer day and I asked if we should turn on the AC or roll down the windows.  Her answer?  Both. We cranked the radio up, let the wind tousle our hair as the cold AC blasted our faces.

14.  Underwear is optional.  In fact, it’s often preferred you go without.

15.  Sing loud and proud.  My grandma had one of those loud operatic voices which she’d use to pelt Amazing Grace in church.  We grandkids would chuckle, but in reality, I always loved how she simply didn’t care. She was singing for Jesus.

16.  Spend your time how you want.  There were years where she’d choose hours of Farmville over leaving the house.  I’ve been known to spend an entire 48 hour weekend playing Sims-taking breaks only to run to the bathroom and grab a snack.  It’s our time-we will do what we want with it, and if that means interacting with computerized lives over human ones, so be it.

17.  There’s always something burning in the oven.  Every holiday she left something in the oven.  EVERY. HOLIDAY.  How no one caught on, I don’t know.  How I managed to inherit this trait, despite being annoyed by it, beats me. It seems the rolls always take the biggest hit…who needs carbs anyway-more DQ.

18.  There’s no time for sentimentality.  At a family event, she once walked out with crates of old photographs-including her wedding photos-and announced to the family she was throwing them away the next morning, so, “grab what you want.”  Everyone started arguing with her and refusing to take anything.  Meanwhile I did a clean sweep, loading boxes into my car.  Later, everyone was grateful because she kept to her word and burned everything I didn’t get my hands on.  Years later, I marched out to the living room with a box full of the photos I’d taken and said to my mom, “I’m throwing all of these away tomorrow, so take what you want.”  You better believe she took them-lesson learned.

19.  Sausage gravy is love.  As long as I knew her, she had a part-time job of sitting with an elderly person, a job I’ve now inherited.  As soon as I could work, she started taking me along and then giving me some of her shifts.  She taught me how to make sausage gravy-the first meal I ever learned to cook.  “Old people love sausage gravy,” she told me. She was right.

20.  Rules are meant to be broken.  My grandma didn’t give a f***.  In fact, she invented the phrase.  Sometimes she’d do stuff simply to get a reaction out of you.  There was no rhyme or reason-she went with her urge. I remember walking through the shoe store with my mom a couple years ago and asking my mom, “Do you ever get a strong desire to just start knocking things over?”  

21.  If it can go in a blender, it should.  Grandma introduced me to smoothies and I’ve never looked back.  “Everything can go in a blender!” she once enthusiastically told me as she threw in leftovers along with fruit and hit “blend.”  Now I buy pineapple in bulk and enough produce to feed a small village for a month.

22.  New fads are meant to be tried.  My grandma purchased every diet pill and vitamin that existed, as well as any exercise devise.  She had one of those machines that shook you, vibrating a strap around your bottom and promising to eliminate cellulite by simply standing there.  She had the utmost confidence they would work.  Each time she’d pull the latest tool or pill out of the box, I’d watch in awe as she demonstrated its powers, believing she’d discovered the secret to staying fit and healthy.  She instilled this hope in me.  I carried a crystal around for weeks once after reading it’d get my period to finally to start.  I paid an obscene amount of money for Cindy Crawford’s miracle elixir, returning it 30 days later, and then surprising myself by purchasing it a second time years later during a 5 am workout binge when the infomercial reappeared.  My recent purchase was a $100 fascia blaster which I use with fervor, while watching Friends episodes, and later have to justify when explaining the bruises on my legs to friends with a, “Yeah, it hurts but I can feel it working!”

23.  Walk everywhere.  It’s great exercise, sure.  But, more importantly, it gives you a chance to catch up on the town gossip.

24.  Careful-you can give a man your yeast infection.  This statement alone is self-explanatory.  Yet my grandma felt the need to retell an in-depth twenty-minute story of how her and my grandpa discovered this to be factual, leaving me scarred for life.

25.  When life pushes back, you push harder.  The beginning of my grandma’s life was not easy.  In fact, as I understand it, it was quite hard. My grandpa rescued her and she fell madly in love.  When he died so young, it would have been easy to give up.  But she didn’t.  She found job after job, she gave of herself whenever she could, and always left people laughing.  She was resilient.  She didn’t take the easy way out and, in fact, often took the road less traveled. She made no apologies and left some scars.  Although I will miss her greatly, I am grateful she’s in heaven, reunited with my grandpa-right where she’s always wanted to be.  

So, sing loud, grandma.  Eat your fill of watermelons and leave your underwear here on earth.  I won’t say rest in peace because that never was your style and, besides, I can hear the hee-hawing from heaven already.  In the end, she had it right.  We don’t need all this stuff we carry around because it’s only temporary. All that matters is how you make people feel, the laughter over tears, and never giving up.  And, of course, always knowing where the nearest restroom is.

[markamlong895-blog]

What is about winter RV living?

There’s plenty to be said for being spontaneous while you are full-time RVing. But winter RV living is definitely going to turn out best with some planning and preparation.

We didn’t plan very far in advance as we traveled the continent in our travel trailer for 17 months.

Of course, we went from the initial idea of “possible” full-time RV living to actually moving into the RV in 100 days. So what do you expect? As we have aged, it seems that we have also grown more spontaneous. We make decisions quickly and act even quicker.

This new ability has put us in some fantastic situations and allowed some amazing things to take place in our lives. It has also put us into some stressful situations in the cold weather that could have been avoided with a little planning and preparation.

On our next big RV adventure, we might choose to follow an RV route that keeps us in constant 70 degree weather. But that’s not how it went for our maiden voyage, and now you can reap the benefits of the lessons we learned the hard way as we experienced winter RV living for the first time. How To Watch TV In RV While Driving https://www.rvlivingusa.com/how-to-watch-tv-in-rv-while-driving/

7 Hard Lessons We Learned About Winter RV Living

Let me start out by saying that I don’t have any true regrets about our full-time RV travels (with the exception of not being equipped to boondock extensively). All in all, our travels went about as smoothly as you can hope for and our family made memories that will last us several lifetimes.

Having said that, it’s not very hard to look back and find lessons that we did indeed learn the hard way. Some of those hard lessons could have been avoided with a bit more time and attention given to planning and execution. No doubt about it.

1. A Heated RV Water Hose Is Worth Its Weight In Gold

When we rolled out of the moderate climate of Sedona, Arizona in early December of 2017 and headed north toward Utah, we did not know what we were getting ourselves into.

Our campsite in Utah. It was very very cold! (Don’t let that blue sky fool you.)

Our stop in Williams, Arizona (west of Flagstaff) for a few days definitely got a bit chillier. We actually had the perfect temps to do some exploring around the Grand Canyon and fully enjoyed it. But then, things got real. Real chilly, that is. What Does Dry Bath Mean In An RV https://www.rvlivingusa.com/what-does-dry-bath-mean-in-an-rv/

When we rolled into Utah in that second week of December and put down roots for a week or so in Kanarraville (just south of Cedar City) and explore nearby national parks, the extreme temps arrived just behind us. We didn’t even know what hit us.

We woke up that first morning with no water coming out of our faucets, introducing us for the first time to true cold weather RVing. After two or three nights of disconnecting and draining the RV water hose at night and reconnecting in the morning, I decided it was time to look at alternatives.

Of course, I tried the cheapest route first

When I headed into Cedar City to try and track down a heating option for our water hose, I wasn’t even sure what I was looking for yet. I hadn’t even explored on Amazon because I wanted the solution NOW. So after a couple of unsuccessful stops at local stores, I found a farm and tool supply store that carried a couple of options that I thought might work: a heating plate normally put under pet beds (about $35), and an actual heated water hose (over $100). You can guess which one I chose. (Did I mention that I learn things the hard way sometimes?)

It only took one night, and another frozen hose, to understand that the heating plate option was not going to cut it in the low-teen temps we were experiencing.

Back to the store I went to exchange that first purchase for what should have been my first purchase: a heated RV water hose like this. That product worked great…but it wasn’t the end of our fight with frozen hoses that winter. You can see a bit more of that story and see some additional RV accessories I recommend in the “water” section of this post.

If you would prefer a DIY option for your heated hose, which I ended up choosing in the end and was very happy with, you can check out this YouTube tutorial.

2. Propane Tanks Will Only Run Out In the Middle of the Night I guess it’s human nature to push things as far as they can go. And that includes the limits of your propane tanks.

When I look back on it, it was kind of like playing a game of “chicken” with those tanks…betting that the morning would arrive before they could empty themselves.

And more than once, I paid the price for playing that ill-advised game. Well, I should say WE paid the price, because we all had some very chilly mornings due to my lack of planning. (Sorry family!) On our travel trailer, we had two 20-lb (5 gallon) tanks. Seemed like plenty to get us through just about anything. At least, it was for the summer and fall months.

But it didn’t take long for me to get a feel for just how much faster those tanks can run dry when the temps drop near zero. Or below zero as we experienced at our next long-term stop in Larkspur, Colorado. Yup, just as the extreme temps (record-setting, if I remember correctly) dropped in on us during our stay in Utah, it didn’t take long for them to find us in Colorado as well in mid-December. (Yeah, duh.)

Christmas with family is important…and challenging

We made the trek north so that we could spend the holidays with my brother and his extended family in the Denver area. The challenges we faced were all related to weather, not family.

We had lived in the area for three years before our move to Texas, so we were very familiar with the climate. There was no doubt it could get bitterly cold, but we also knew it could be remarkably mild as well in the winter months. We just needed a little bit of luck on our side to keep things in that mild category.

But luck had left the building.

Instead, we quickly found ourselves plunged into the numbing reality of sub-zero wind chills. Yes, I believe Colorado also set some record lows during our two-week stay there. (Yay for records.)

The bottom line is that my estimates for our propane usage just couldn’t keep up with the reality of the conditions. We were emptying both tanks every other day or so, and I was very thankful our RV park had an on-site propane station. Otherwise, we would have been in a world of hurt!

So please, if you are heading into some extreme conditions, spend an extra few bucks and get an extra propane tank to keep with your rig so that you don’t have any miserable and stressful mornings like we did. 3. An RV Electric Heater Will Keep the Whole Crew Comfortable Without a doubt, propane is your #1 friend when it comes to staying warm and comfy in your RV during the winter. If you don’t have it, you’ll quickly be a popsicle.

But having a backup/supplemental heat source also makes a lot of sense.

During our travels, we had a small RV electric heater like this one to add an extra layer of comfort. And it came in very handy on more than one occasion, that’s for sure.

If you have a larger RV, I would definitely recommend having at least two RV electric heaters this size, or a larger one with more output. This type is definitely for a small space and just won’t cut it in a Class A. Your toes will thank you if you follow this advice from the road. 4. Time Passes Slower When You RV In the Cold (Plan Accordingly) I love my family. I really do. We’ve been through plenty of stuff together and have come out the other side still tight.

But when you are “locked” in a small RV with any group of people without much hope of escape, let’s just say that things can get edgy. And occasionally ugly.

The reality is that you need to make some plans to get yourself and your family out of the RV for a decent amount of time each day or tensions will mount and things will blow. It’s like the human version of the Instant Pot, but the product is not nearly as enjoyable. 🙂 With the Instant Pot, the building pressure produces some very tasty meals that will actually be perfect for your cold weather RVing experience.

But when the RV becomes your own version of a pressurized Instant Pot, nothing good can really come out of it. So do yourself a favor and make some plans outside of the RV to keep everyone sane and satisfied during your RV travels.

(Purchasing the Instant Pot could have been a stand-alone lesson as well, because it was great to have for making soup and other dishes to warm the bones. Highly recommended!)

5. A 4 Seasons RV Still Has Its Limits (sorry water pump) Did you think I was done with sharing our winter RV living saga? Never fear…I have more!

Our campground in Colorado. Snow – fun to play in, not so much to RV in.

Colorado just kept on coming at us with its need to prove just how wintry and bitterly cold it could actually be. Clearly, we had severely underestimated its ability to do winter, despite having lived there! So here’s how it went down: For five days around Christmas, we actually decided to get an Airbnb in Denver so that we could have a more reasonable drive to visit family during that period (it was close to an hour from our RV park to their place).

We had made those plans before the extreme temps hit, but we actually extended our stay a bit longer to try and allow for the coldest conditions to pass.

I did some things right…

While we were away from the RV, I thought I was taking the necessary steps by keeping the thermostat set at 55 degrees to keep everything from freezing and also making sure the heated water hose was disconnected and stored inside and the water pump was turned off. I neglected to consider the location of our water pump in the travel trailer: in an enclosed space just inside the wall of the trailer, where it was more exposed to the cold temps and also cut off from the interior heat.

(I did make a trip back down to the RV during our time away so that I could refill the propane and make sure all was well. Such a genius.)

But I didn’t do all the things right

What I should have done (gotta love hindsight) is opened up the water pump enclosure so that heat could circulate into that space as well, attempted to close up gaps around the adjacent electrical cord to cut down on cold air intrusion, and also probably placed a small warming source (heat cable or a shop light) in that space with the water pump. But none of that happened. storage ideas for rv closets https://www.rvlivingusa.com/20-storage-ideas-for-rv-closets-with-pictures/

When we finally returned to the RV, we walked inside to find…that everything was perfect. No disasters, no messes, no issues. Yay! Time to warm it up and turn the water back on.

And that’s when it happened: a puddle of water started emerging from under our master bed.

Instant chaos and pandemonium ensued. There was yelling. People got upset. It wasn’t our finest moment.

As you can guess, that water pump had frozen and cracked. Even the city water passes through the water pump, so the water just spilled forth when it was turned back on. Since we got the water mopped up immediately, there was no damage to the travel trailer at all from the incident.

Luckily, I only had to drive about an hour away and spend $80 or so to get a replacement water pump and install it myself. This could have ended so much worse, but I hope that you are able to learn a lesson or three from our errors in this scenario and avoid the stress and expense.

[atomicsuperhero]

36 Things I Learned About Gardening in 2019

While gardening is something that's always been part of my life, 2019 was my first year of really embracing it fully. I've had lots of houseplants for many years, but while I've helped, I've never paid too much attention to outdoor gardening or tried to learn too much. Before this year I participated in some gardening with my mum, always filling a few pots of my own with bedding plants, and helping with some stuff (though never enough) in the vegetable garden, greenhouse, and flower beds. But I was never really involved in the planning or seed-starting or anything like that.

In 2019 I fully embraced gardening, and I started the year with plenty of good intentions. Of course, things don't usually go quite as you planned, sometimes for the worse, sometimes for the better. I learned plenty about gardening this year, from failures, successes, and surprises. Here are some of the lessons I learned over the course of 2019.

Don’t book a 21 day trip in the middle of your 120-day growing season. Since I launched into full-time freelance copywriting this year, I realized that I was technically location independent. Thanks to convenient holiday booking by a few friends, I had the opportunity to spend 3 weeks visiting my brother in his new town of Terrace, BC. I had plenty of fun. It was really cool to be able to work from somewhere else. But, my trip was from about July 21 to August 11. 

Guess what's happening in the garden in those weeks? Everything is starting to ripen. Particularly, peas need to be picked. Peas are a priority crop for us because we all love garden peas. I was gone and mum basically had to handle the whole harvest herself. It felt pretty shitty. I also missed several other things that were ready for harvest during those weeks. Next year I'll plan my visits before planting or after fall harvest.

I am not organized enough to keep a garden journal I fully intended to keep a garden journal, right from January when we started seedlings, through to the end of the season. It didn't intend it to have long entries, just notes about what, when, and where we planted, significant weather dates, interesting observations, and events. I managed to keep it updated from January 21 until May 12. I think I stopped when I went to Terrace for a week in May, and I never picked it back up. We'll see if I can keep it up in 2020. I did draw up diagrams, with rough estimations of where we planted different vegetable crops this year. I'll do that again next year. Now, I need to find those sheets and make sure they're glued into my garden journal notebook.

THIN the plants. Plant spacing recommendations are there for a reason. When I'm planting things with small seeds, like carrots, I tend to be a little heavy-handed... There's a reason your seed packages have plant spacing recommendations. Follow them. If you don't, you'll end up with smaller vegetables that are often very tangled together. We ended up with pretty small carrots this year, simply because mum and I didn't have the heart to thin them out. So, thin them out, or space your seeds more appropriately.

Garden vlogs are great, but I need to simplify them if I’m actually going to get them up I started a series of garden vlogs at the beginning of May. I enjoyed it, and I liked the idea but found that I didn't have a ton of time for editing the videos and actually getting them posted. My latest vlog went up on August 27. After that, I collected footage for several more end of season vlogs. And I've never got round to editing them together and posting them.

That there actually are plants I can grow in my dungeon basement apartment (more on that in the future) Sometime late in the summer or early in the fall I got the idea to start testing supposed low-light houseplants in my basement suite. My bedroom has two tiny windows, one facing west that gets a lot of shade from a large evergreen and a medium-sized chokecherry tree, and a north window that's under the overhang of a small patio. It's the brightest room in my suite. So, I've collected a variety of supposed low-light plants and I'm watching their progress. So far its been going surprisingly well. I'm hoping to develop these experiments into more regular blog content in 2020.

Follow seeding directions more closely Maybe my first gardening failure of the year was pansies. Seriously, the easiest garden flower to grow. But I screwed something up and lost a full tray of seedlings. I don't remember the exact details, now, but I realized after a couple of weeks that I hadn't followed the seeding directions correctly, which is probably what led to the failure of my pansy seedlings.

Keep your eyes peeled for pests We developed an aphid infestation in our seedlings early this spring. For whatever reason, we didn't notice it until we'd already had our seedlings in the greenhouse for a couple of weeks. Unfortunately, we lost quite a few plants because it was such an infestation when we finally noticed. We did get ladybugs, twice. And they did pretty well. But, we also ended up having to use insecticidal soap, after all our ladybugs had ditched the greenhouse, to finish the job.

Silver Sparkle Pilea is EXTREMELY temperature sensitive  Back to my houseplant experiment. I had a silver sparkle pilea. I loved it. But I accidentally let it dry too much once. It hadn't fully died yet, so I started watering it properly again and set it in my west window sill for a little more light. It had popped up one tiny set of new leaves that were looking promising. But then, we had the first night where it got to about -12. That one set of tiny leaves was toasted. The window sills are still pretty warm, and it wasn't touching the glass, but apparently, it was still too cold for it.

Poinsettias are not poisonous They're not. I've had to research this for several articles this year. Poinsettia is not poisonous to people or pets. A 50-pound child would have to eat 500 poinsettia leaves to be in danger. You're going to have issues long before a child eats 500 leaves, namely the fact that your child is clearly part bionic if they like to eat green things that could possibly be construed as healthy. For the record, I ate a leaf off our poinsettia about two weeks ago in the middle of lunch, because people were arguing about it. It is not a delightful flavour, but I had zero ill effects.

Marimo Moss balls are pretty cool I got one. They're fascinating. I'm not sure about the ethical implications of buying them. They seem to be dwindling in numbers in their natural habitat, so probably our fascination with them is not great for their natural survival. On the other hand, perhaps the popularity will help drive some research into them and maybe we'll be able to find out why their numbers are dwindling.

Writing about gardening is actually a real job Seriously. I actually get paid to write about gardening. I don't get paid to write about gardening on my own blog, but one of my main clients pays me to write gardening blogs on a wide variety of topics and it’s amazing.

The more you learn about gardening the more you realize you don’t know There's that quote from Einstein: "The more I learn, the more I realize how much I don't know." This is probably not surprising, but it’s true... I've learned more about gardening this year than in the rest of my life, probably. And the more I learn, the more I realize I know basically nothing about gardening.

Plant more sweet peas! Sweet peas are so easy, and rewarding. The more blossoms you cut, the more flowers they produce. So plant them everywhere. They do need something to climb, so don't plant them out in the open unless you're planning to put some stakes or trellises in for them.

Ferns are dicks Seriously, they just are. Don't try to keep them as houseplants unless you live somewhere that is naturally humid. Ours did fine all summer, and as soon as we started the furnace this fall they were like "NOOOOOOOOOO, I can't go on! I'm going to mope and look like shit forever-more."

Learn to love terra cotta Seriously. I had a few challenges with houseplants this year with overwatering. I have slowly been switching all my houseplants into terra cotta pots, and they're much happier in general. I don't love the orange of terra cotta, but once you have all of your plants in it, it just kind of fades into a background neutral colour and you don't notice it anymore. Terra cotta dries faster and allows you to bottom water.

Overwatering is worse than underwatering As mentioned above, I nearly drowned a few plants this year. They'll die more quickly from overwatering than they will from underwatering.

Freshley overalls from Dovetail are the only gardening pants you’ll ever need. Seriously, get yourself a pair. They are AMAZING.

Rubber gloves for weeding keep your hands and nails cleaner and more moisturized. Legit, these are better than any other gardening glove I've used. Most gardening gloves are too thick for weeding out little weeds, and your hands still end up dried out. Rubber gloves are thin enough that you can grab small weeds and seedlings, you can feel well through them, they keep your hands from drying out. They also last surprisingly longer than expected. The blue painting gloves you can buy at the hardware store are the best. You can take them off and re-use them for several days. Simply leave them inside out, then flip them the right way, blow a little air into them like a balloon to pop the fingers back the right away, and put them back on.

Buy the damn bulbs, you’ll regret it if you don’t  My grandma bought tulip bulbs for me and mum this fall. We got them in just in time, it legit started snowing as we covered the last bit up. But, I didn't get any Allium bulbs, because they were pretty pricey, and my budget has been tight this year, and I REALLY wish I had.

Ladybugs are fucking awesome Seriously, they're brutal little pest destroyers. If you have a greenhouse, get some.

Thrillers, Fillers, and Spillers A great guideline for filling planters. Thriller would be something tall and interesting, filler would be something shorter to fill in the mid-level height, and a spiller that trails over the sides of your pots.

Airplants are weird Tillandsia, they just are weird. I'm still learning more about them, and trying to keep mine alive through crazy dry Alberta winter.

Water culture for orchids is a thing Moss is really not that great a medium for orchids. I don't know much about water culture, but I pulled my orchids out of their saturated and rotting moss, and switched them to water culture, we'll see how it goes.

Lettuce is grown outside tasted even better than lettuce from the greenhouse Seriously. The lettuce we grew in the raised garden beds tasted way better than the stuff we grew in the greenhouse, which tastes way better than the stuff from the grocery store.

Fertilize the tomatoes We start the year with good intentions to fertilize our tomatoes in the greenhouse at least once a week. But, then we fall off the wagon and barely keep up with watering. But it’s important. We would have had a much better harvest this year if we'd kept it up. Tomatoes are hungry beasts.

Start your glads EARLY I started my Gladiolus bulbs in pans on April 3rd. I may actually start them even earlier in 2020. They started blooming towards the end of July and lasted all the way through August, and I think there were even a few stragglers left in September. I loved them.

Lemon cucumbers are delightful They're super yummy, try some.

Starbucks plastic to-go cups aren’t good planters They're top-heavy. They don't have drainage, and because they have so much soil, it tends to hang onto the water and not dry out fast enough.

DRAINAGE Everything needs better drainage than I thought it did, hence, switching to terra cotta.

Aphids are assholes Mealybugs are assholes Fungus gnats are assholes I don't think I need to expand on these.

You always need more houseplants Duh.

Tiny pots, like 5" and smaller need to be watered more than once a week in winter. Everyone says "oh you have to water your plants less in winter because they need a period of dormancy. This is true. But if you have lots of houseplants in tiny terra cotta pots, you have got to be vigilant. Terra cotta dries fast in normal humidity, but it dries even faster in dry furnace heated air in the winter. I water my small terra cotta potted plants at least twice a week. Some of the smaller ones even three times a week.

Bottom watering for the win. This is my solution to overwatering. Everything has trays or saucers or is set in a tray for watering. I fill the tray and let them soak up as much as they want. If the water is gone in 10 minutes, I add more, until they stop soaking it up. If there's water left sitting in the saucer after an hour, I dump it.

I am emotionally attached to our trees Late this fall my mum decided to cut down our ornamental crab apple tree. For good reason, it looks beautiful for 2 weeks of the year, and spends the other 50 dropping rotten crab apples on the sidewalk, my car, the driveway, the flower bed, the lawn… But I’m still sad about it. Unreasonably sad.

So there are just a fraction of things I learned about gardening this year. My goal for 2020 is to prioritize writing for my own blog a little more frequently. There are endless gardening things I can talk about, so cheers to more writing and learning about the topics that I'm most passionate about.

[jonasmaurer]

73 questions

Hey friends! Happy Thursday! Hope you’re enjoying the week. 

It’s been a fun and crazy one over here. The girls have had half-day camps, Liv auditioned for dance team, the Pilot has been flying nights, and madre’s birthday was on Tuesday! We got together for a *small* family dinner (we joke that we’re just a small party of 28), and ate Mexican food, cake, and sang “Happy Birthday” to the amazing lady who gives so much to everyone in our family.

 My fave picture from the night! 

(The cake was from Whole Foods bakery and so so good.)

Workout-wise, I’ve crushed every day this week. Sunday, we filmed Summer Shape Up videos (the party starts June 24)! Monday, I hopped on the Peloton bike for a 30-minute ride, Tuesday was barre, Wednesday was a BODYATTACK class On Demand (my link is good for 21 days FREE of the amazing Les Mills workouts), and today and tomorrow are off since I’m traveling to Chicago for a blog trip. I’m looking forward to catching up with Anne and Julie, and meeting some new blogger friends. I’ll be sure to share some of the adventures on IG stories!

I originally planned to post this one while we were on our cruise, but since internet was a bit sketchy – and I blasted through the ship’s plan in a mere 24 hours – I didn’t get the chance to get this one published. I originally saw this survey on my friend Ashley’s blog, and then Julie’s. I loved reading their answers so much, so I thought I’d join in the survey fun. 

1.  What’s the best thing that happened to you this month? Taking a Disney Cruise with the fam! 

2. What’s your favorite game? We don’t usually play board games at home, but our favorite games is a hide and seek and tag hybrid. I hide, the girls try to find me, I jump out and go “AHHH!” and they scream, I chase them around until I tag them, and then they hide. 

3. When are you most inspired? Mid-morning, usually after I’ve had breakfast and survived the school drop-off. 

4. If you could teach one subject in school what would it be? Math

5. What’s your favorite beverage? LaCroix 

6. What’s the best compliment you’ve ever received? A friend from the gym sent a text message while the Pilot was deployed and basically gave me a pep talk. She said she was proud of me for doing so well with work stuff and solo parenting. It was very unexpected and really made my whole month. It was a great reminder to let other people know when I’m inspired by them or think they’re crushing it. 

7. What is your favorite birthday cake? Yellow cake with chocolate buttercream

(That was my bday cake last year!)

8. What is one thing you still have from your childhood? A photo album that my mom made for me when I was 4 and we’d taken a trip to California. I was with all of my aunties, my parents were still married, and my uncle was still alive. Our dog chewed around the edges of it when I was younger, and the small plastic photo album contains quite a few happy memories from being a kid.

9. What is your favorite movie? Love, Actually

10. What is something you can’t do? Play the flute even though I faked it for an entire year in 5th grade. I could do all of the finger work, but no sound would come out. So I just pursed my lips and acted like I knew what I was doing. 

11. Window or aisle seat? Aisle so I can get up a thousand times if I feel like it. 

12. What makes you laugh no matter what? P makes the most ridiculous faces that make me laugh every day. We get a kick out of zooming in on photos that she’s in, because you never know what you’re going to get.

13. What does creativity mean to you? Free from any perceived restraints or judgments. 

14. What are your favorite lyrics of all time? “Look around, look around, how lucky we are to be alive right now.” I don’t think I’ll ever get sick of Hamilton.

Or hanging out with Betsy  

15. What is your favorite holiday? Thanksgiving

16. What’s heavily played on your music playlist right now? “Far Too Good” by John Smith. 

17. If you could raid one woman’s closet who would it be? My friend Annie’s! Whenever she posts Instagram posts, I want her outfit and her shoes

18. Must have purse item? Color Intense lipstick in at least 3 shades

19. What did you want to be when you grew up when you were 12? On Broadway

20. What is something you will not be doing in ten years? Wondering where the heck we’ll be living in a couple of years. It’s so crazy to be able to know and plan where we want to live. 

21. What is an important life lesson for someone to learn? Your gut instinct is always right.

22. How do you start your day? Scrolling through my phone with one eye closed.

23. Would you ever live anywhere besides Tucson? Yes! We’d love to make it back to San Diego one day but love being in Tucson for now.

24. What is your favorite dessert?  Anything super chocolaty.

25. Is there a dessert you don’t like? Creme brûlée is gross.

26. It’s brunch! What do you eat? Eggs, breakfast potatoes, turkey sausage, and a mimosa because brunch without cocktails is just a sad breakfast. <— words of wisdom from Prep & Pastry

27. Where was the best vacation you’ve ever taken? Positano

28. Favorite Disney animal? Stitch

29. What is a book you are planning on reading? “Educated” is downloaded on my Kindle but I haven’t started it yet

30. What did you read most recently? “Where the Crawdads Sing” and loooooved it

31. Favorite solo artist? Michael Bublé for life

32. What is something you’re tired of? The Instagram algorithm. They want to turn it into a “pay to play” platform, which was the downfall of Facebook

33. What’s a city you wish to visit? Paris

34. Heels or flats? Wedges

35.  Where does one go on a perfect road trip? To Sedona. It’s just an easy drive from us and has an incredible energy.

36. What do you do on a rainy day? Try to find indoor activities to entertain the kiddos! We’ll do art, visit a museum, go rock climbing, or see a movie

37. What’s your favorite exercise? Spin, barre and BODYPUMP are tied

38. What was your worst subject in school? English which is a hilarious thing since I write a blog for a living

39. What is your spirit animal? An otter. I want to spend the day in the pool, floating on my back, eating salad

40. What do you usually eat for breakfast? A giant egg patty and either oatmeal with almond butter or a brown rice tortilla

41. What do you usually eat for dinner? We change it up every night but some classics are salmon, sweet potato and salad, Harney Cobbs, or sushi roll bowls

42. Cooking or Baking? Both!

43. Favorite baked good? Cookie dough on the bottom, Oreo’s in the middle, and brownies on top

44. What is something you wish you could be good at? Organizing photos on my laptop. It’s a hot mess

45. Skiing or Surfing? Paddle boarding 

46. First celebrity crush? JTT — Jonathan Taylor Thomas — I became a vegetarian for him when I was 8

47. Most recent celebrity crush? Aaron Tveit. I love his voice!

48. What color was your prom dress? Junior year it was bright pink and senior year it was light purple and silver

49. How do you manage stress? Try to do the most challenging/inconvenient item on my to-do list first

50. What do you do to relax? Read or cook

51. Age when you were first kissed? 12

52. Place you were first kissed? Playing “spin the bottle” after musical theatre class

53. Favorite fashion trend of all time? Low-top sneakers with dresses

54. Best fashion advice you’ve ever received? If you have to convince yourself that you like it, you’ll never wear it, so don’t buy it

55. What is your current favorite piece of clothing that you own? These embellished sandals. I wear them all the time and am constantly asked where I bought them

56. Shoes or Bags? Bags! I love a good crossbody

57. How do you know if you’re in love? When you know, you know

58. Television show you’ve binged on recently? The Bachelorette! We’re almost caught up for the season

59. Who do you turn to when you’re sad? My mom – she always knows exactly what to say to make me feel better

60. Leather or lace? Lace

61. Vintage or new? New

62. What is your Kryptonite? Chocolate or guacamole

63. What are you most enchanted by? Surface level: Moms on social media who have 18 children, homeschool, are all matching in neutral clothing with zero stains, and elaborate mermaid braids in their hair. Deeper: I’m beyond enchanted with Liv and P. They surprise me, make me laugh, and make my heart explode every single day. I often find myself wondering how they’re so darn amazing?

64. What is your biggest strength? Hustle

65. What is your biggest weakness? Stressing over all of the details

66. What are 3 words to describe living in Tucson? Picturesque. Hot. Eccentric.

67. Cutest thing on planet earth? Baby koalas

68. Favorite color? Peach

69. Best first date idea? Something active, like a low-key hike, followed by dinner and drinks

70. Favorite time of day? Late.. probably around 9 or 10pm. I enjoy the quiet and downtime

71. What do you first notice about someone when you meet them? Their smile 

72. What’s your guilty pleasure? Take a jar of almond butter, sprinkle chocolate chips into the jar, scoop out with a spoon

73. Favorite band? I wouldn’t say I’m super into bands at the moment and my music taste is all over the place. Back in high school, I was obsessed with Dashboard Confessional

That was a fun one! I always love surveys because it gives me the chance to get to know you all better.

So, tell me friends:

When are you most inspired?

What’s the best compliment you’ve ever received? 

What’s one thing you cannot do? 

Cutest thing on planet earth?

What do you do to relax? 

Or pick any of the questions above and share your answers below! 

Have a lovely day.

xoxo

Gina

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[envirotravel]

The Great Escape: Month 59 Roundup

Oh, my monthly roundups. They are so ridiculously out of sync with real time now (this post is basically one year late, ha ha) that I recently considered axing the series, but I decided to play catch up instead — so brace yourself for a couple of these coming up! However, now that I’m writing on multiple timelines they do serve as a nice roadmap of my archives for those who want to follow my travels chronologically.

Apologies for the delay, but I suppose better is late than never… right?

Oh, how hard it was to leave my island life! This was my final month in Thailand before jetting off to Brazil and a stateside summer, and it was a struggle to say goodbye. Aside from one hellish visa run and one giggle-filled girl’s weekend in Samui, I stuck close to Koh Tao and enjoyed my last bit of stillness.

This is a simple post for a simple month!

Where I’ve Been

• One night in overnight transit

• Five nights on Koh Tao

• Two nights on Koh Samui

• Twenty-one days on Koh Tao

Highlights

• Breaking my Diet Coke addiction! Long time readers know that I’ve long considered the stuff to be carbonated gold, and I spent years jolting out of bed and immediately heading out on a mission to source a can if I happened to find myself without it. I was well and truly addicted.

When I started thinking about doing a DIY health retreat, I knew I wanted to kick my ridiculous Diet Coke habit. But it took me months to psych myself up for it! I knew that there was nowhere better than Thailand to do it, since I don’t actually love the Thai formula for Coke Light. And you know what? It was raging success — so much so that I extended my initial four weeks to six! I took a million notes and learned SO MUCH from the process. Literally one of the greatest gifts I’ve ever given myself. It’s basically not travel related at all, but give me a shout if you’d be interested in a post about getting un-addicted from diet soda!

• Crushing my 5K time. Well, perhaps crushing is a bit of an exaggeration. But I did semi-train for a run for the first time ever, and I saw the results! I set a new best pace for myself, and had a blast crossing the finish line. It wasn’t just that final moment of euphoria though — I also cherished my sunset jogs with my running buddy Amy leading up to it.

• Easter Brunch. Our whole Samui girl’s trip was divine — not because we did anything super special (apart from the race, of course) or ate or drank anywhere especially noteworthy. But we were together, and it was our last big hurrah before my summer departure, and I just loved it. The highlight was our Sunday brunch complete with DIY mimosas and endless toasts to friends and upcoming farewells.

• Not one but two diving courses! A sidemount speciality and an enriched air certification were the perfect courses to take side-by-side. I learned so much, I got excited about diving on Koh Tao again, and I got to cap it all off with a group trip to Sail Rock surrounded by friends. I couldn’t have asked for better days in the ocean.

• Celebrating Sonkgran! My first Songkran years ago was just days into a heart-wrenching breakup with my boyfriend of three years, so suffice it to say that was pretty bittersweet. And I’ve been just missing the big day ever since in my comings and goings from Thailand. Finally, in 2016, I got to have a big wet and wild, happiness-fueled do-ver. Travel BFF Heather even flew in from Bali! Honestly, it was the best day I could have asked for. It’s one of the greatest holidays I’ve had the privilege of celebrating!

• Calling quits on Photo of the Week. It had to happen! I didn’t regret it for a second and I’ve really enjoyed focused more on my Instagram and Facebook since. (My newsletter has been far less successful, unfortunately.) It just took so much pressure off!

• Getting enough sleep. It says something funny about our society that I write here every day about my travels around the world but I’m almost embarrassed to say that I get 7-8 hours of sleep a night when I’m on Koh Tao because I know what a luxury that is.

I’ve spent years with various degrees of sleep deprivation due to anxiety and extreme scheduling. Not that both those didn’t flare up occasionally over my time in Koh Tao — and not that I didn’t have the worst mattress on the planet — but overall it was the most well-rested half a year I’ve had.

Lowlights and Lessons

• Another hellish visa run to the Burmese border. Paying to spend twenty-four hours being motion sick and be bored to tears by a bureaucratic puppet show? I vowed then and there to never do another one — and so far I’ve stuck to it! (I take mini-vacations instead.)

• Our Samui hotel was pretty disappointing. After all the fabulous places we’ve stayed over the years, it was kind of a letdown to land somewhere so meh for such an epic trip — I really wanted to treat my girls to something special! Ah well, that’s what we get for booking last minute! We still had a blast.

• My Brazilian visa photo. Lol? I know it sounds like a funny thing to complain about, but I was legit horrified to learn that the awful passport photo I’d submitted with my Brazilian visa application was PRINTED ON THE VISA AND PASTED INTO MY PASSPORT. Of all the passport photos I’ve had to submit over the years, none but the original have actually ended up in my passport! Lesson learned: I’ll never settle for anything less than frame-worthy again. Tears were shed, guys. My vanity knows no bounds.

• The Boat Party… ugh. Honestly, this was so traumatizing of an event that this is the first time I’m mentioning it anywhere in public. And frankly, I’m still going to be super vague, because I’m always on edge writing negatively about anything pertaining to the Thai Government or authorities, considering the country’s track record of warmth towards free speech and criticism.

But basically, what happened was this: a yacht was hired for a private party of mostly long-term expats. We boarded the boat with much elation and enjoyed our fun at sea for about an hour before being approached by a police vessel which boarded the boat and forced it back to a pier other than the one we’d departed from. When docked, we headed for the end of the long pier — only to realize the police had locked it from the other side. We spent two hours in the hot sun with no water or access to bathrooms, portions of it on our knees with our hands over our head, while the police tossed the boat and tried to figure out what charges we could be held on. When we were released, we had to write down names, passport numbers, addresses, and more. It was incredibly traumatizing and I actually cried when we were finally freed. Anyway, that’s the short version — for the longer one, you’ll have to wait for an incredibly juicy chapter of the book I’ve finally accepted I’ll try to write someday.

• Leaving Koh Tao. Seriously, it never gets any easier. This was one of the best seasons I ever spent on the island, and leaving literally felt heart-wrenching. That said, a travel writer stranding herself on an island that is the isolation equivalent of being a 4-5 hour drive from the closest, most expensive airport and a 7-8 hour drive from the more reasonably priced one is not a sustainable business plan and I recognize that my time off the island is necessary for both my business and my mental health! Still, there are always things I long for when I’m away.

Best and Worst Beds of the Month

Best: Well I didn’t really travel much this month but I did soak up my last beautiful weeks of sleeping in my own apartment! Kind of a shame that I loathed, ya know, my actual bed.

Worst: Easy — my evening on the night boat with broken AC followed by a miserable motion-sickness inducing car ride to the edge on Thailand on my visa run. (Though frankly, the hotel in Samui was nothing much exciting either.)

Best and Worst Meals of the Month

Best: Our post-Songkran brunch at my friend Janine’s house! I made banana cinnamon pancakes and mango mimosas — hangover food in the tropics.

Worst: Sorry to be a broken record, but I’ll have to go with “whatever shitty snacks I compiled from a five-minute stop at 7-11 just over the Burmese border.” Yeah, I really hate those visa runs.

Spending

I had another nice and low-key month of expenditures (much needed before the spend-storm that was Brazil!). While Songkran and our trip to Samui were mild splurges, my day-to-day lifestyle on Koh Tao is so affordable it can definitely absorb the blow of a few fun activities thrown in per month. In Samui I also used some built up hotel credit I had — nothing special for being a blogger, just normal loyalty programs anyone can use! — to cover the majority of the cost of the rooms.

Unusually for me, two of my biggest splurges were clothes and accessories — new bikinis from local Koh Tao designer Flip Flop and Treacle, and some new jewelry from local island jeweler Amy Jennifer Jewellery. Had to send myself off in style!

Saving

Hallelujah! I doubled my income from the previous month thanks to a few big campaigns coming in with my regular blog partners, as well as a successful month for affiliate income. Again — right before Brazil, I seriously needed it.

Health and Fitness

Between my 5K, the training for it, and trying to use up all my gym and yoga passes before heading off to Brazil, I basically crushed it. Admittedly, Songkran was quite debaucherous, but overall

What Was Next

Six weeks in BRAZIL!

I simply couldn’t ask for better travel companions than all of you!

Since I left home for my Great Escape, I’ve been doing monthly roundups of my adventures filled with anecdotes, private little moments, and thoughts that are found nowhere else on this blog. As this site is not just a resource for other travelers but also my own personal travel diary, I like to take some time to reflect on not just what I did, but how I felt. You can read my previous roundups here.

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