Making Progress:

I'm feeling good about progress in several areas over the last few days.

First, on a personal note; I have actually exercised both of the last 2 days. Yesterday I set up my laptop on our treadmill and walked for over an hour while I caught up on email. Then today, Terry and I went for about a 5 mile hike at the Phoenix Mountain Preserve. If you look at the map we were on trails # 100, 8 and 8A. We entered off of 40th Street, just south of Shea. Fortunately, it cooled down a little after hitting 100 degrees earlier in the week. It was probably in the mid-70's with a really nice breeze most of the time. So I'm feeling good right now. I'll probably be sore tomorrow though, but at least it's for a good reason.

We've also made progress on the outside of the house. Here's the new paint job above. It turned out more pale than I expected, but I think I'm o.k. with it. I would really like to get some shutters for the front windows to add a little more of the dark green trim color to the mix, but otherwise I'm happy with it. And at least it's not beige like all the other houses on the street. I also think that when we get more landscaping in it will be a nice background for the plants.

Speaking of landscaping...we're beginning to make progress there too, even if it's just baby steps.

First, we were able to use an old french door to replace the ugly wooden gate to the little atrium in our back yard. This is the walled-in area that looks out from the picture window in our master bathroom shower. The view below is from inside the atrium looking out to the yard.

Also, after almost 5 years of living in this house we finally put some plants in the atrium. This is a similar color scheme of blues, purples and white that I'm hoping to do in the front yard. We bought a Blue Plumbago, (thanks Linda for the idea). I'm hoping to get a trellis and see if I can get it to grow up over the wall so we can see it in the backyard too. We also bought this nice Mystic Spires Blue Salvia, as well as purple and white African Daisies.

I am envisioning a gorgeous view of this beautiful cottage garden from the master bath once everything starts to grow and fill in. Now Terry just needs to keep it alive. I'm terrible at remembering to water outdoor plants, but he usually does a great job at it and keeps the plants going that I've planted. Of course, this area doesn't get a ton of sun, but I'm hoping the light reflecting off the walls will be enough, so we'll see how these do.

Keep your fingers crossed that they will thrive and grow and make this little corner of our world pleasing to look at. If they do well, I'd love to add a bird bath in this area as well. Can you picture a sweet little birdbath fountain in there? It would be nice, especially since the salvias and plumbagos both attract hummingbirds and butterflies.