Everything is growing so quickly now that it’s gotten hot. Mounds of green, daffodils and tulips and an early rhododendron blooming. Weeds dotting the soil, dandelions galore. The rabbits are getting fat and lazy munching on grass and weeds–I watched one late this afternoon, munching and hopping and then stretching out in the cool grass to rest, sated at last I imagined after a long cold hungry winter.

Instead of doing my part toward the downsizing, which is marking the plants I want to keep and thinking through where they might go and maybe even transplanting some of them (no need to wait for Tom on that), I began to plan out a new garden. I know–that’s not exactly downsizing. But it’s hard to stop.

This one, if I carry through on the plans, will be more easily managed. There’s an l-shaped stretch of dirt that I’ve used for a cutting garden and for herbs. I created it on the site of a Norway maple that was cut down several years ago. I dug it out of lawn and added composted soil from my compost pile which is a cold pile and full of weed seeds.

I’ve paid the price with several years of cutting gardens that are so full of happy, healthy weeds it’s hard to see the flowers. And then there are those bunnies who love to munch tender new growth. So my fantasy now is to put in a raised bed or two with landscaping cloth underneath to keep those pesky weeds out and enough height to the beds to keep the bunnies from eating the plants (they seem to love sunflowers). It would mean work this summer but something will be in place for coming years that will be easy to maintain.

So, how do I feel about downsizing the garden? I’m there but not there.

I’m in the same in between place inside the house. I’ve been clearing and decluttering in my daydreams–but not in reality. I read somewhere online about the idea of a 30 day declutter. On day 1 you throw away or recycle one item, day 2, 2 items, and so on.

What a great idea I thought–but it hasn’t happened. Instead the detritus of a busy life continues to pile up around me. The bedroom is in its seasonal transitional mess–boxes with summer clothes in the corner, winter clothes piling up on the cedar chest waiting for the summer clothes to exit the plastic box, spring clothes in the closet, the down duvet on the floor where I flung it the other night when I realized it was just too warm these days for down, dirty clothes and bedding and towels overflowing the laundry bin, in spite of regular trips down to the washing machine. The seasonal identity crisis continues in the living room where wool scarves and hats and gloves still live in a basket near the front door at the same time as the world is exploding with heat and sun just outside the window. At least I put my boots away.