Flowers For/From Mom

Monday. Decidedly not Saturday or Sunday, and when you have a great Saturday and Sunday, that makes today rather blah. Especially when the skies are grey and the threat of rain is ever-present. So I won't talk much about today, rather, I'd prefer to explain my absence this weekend. Think 80-degree weather, think not of the computer. Or writing. Not when you can be out playing.

I started off my Saturday with a 5-miler, deciding right off the bat to ditch the path I had chosen. Thankfully, I had iMapMyRun with me. I opted for an out-and-back route and turned around at 2.25 miles which, if you double that up, does not equal 5 miles. (I was never good at math, thus the writing.) So I had to reroute myself down a side street. I had no idea if I'd hit the five-mile mark, but I did. And I had the sweat to show for it. (Proof at right. Yuck.) In the end, I went 4.75 miles in 47 minutes and 14 seconds. That's just under a 10-minute mile, which was fine by me in the heat. Stupid me decided to wear a cotton t-shirt instead of a dry-wick shirt of sorts. Hello, dumb girl.

Anyway, the rest of Saturday was spent putzin' about at home. Doing laundry, enjoying the sunshine, grocery shopping, kissing Hannah's sweet little face a thousand times a minute...that sort of thing.

But on Sunday, this happened:

We bought our house last summer, and when we moved in, we did so with the mindset that we'd just maintain the existing greens in the yard. We had boxes to unpack and a baby's room to decorate. And honestly, it wasn't really the right time to do any significant planting. So we didn't. Fast forward to this year. Baby Hannah is here, all the boxes are unpacked and it's finally nice out—so we've been focusing on the yard more than ever before. And for Mother's Day, my mother offered to help me out in the flower department because I clearly know nothing about planting flowers. I just know they're pretty. So after a not-so-quick trip to the garden center (I'm like a kid in a candy store when it comes to flowers)...

...we successfully surrounded our house with flowers. Well, I should say that she did with some help from the husband.

I was on baby duty, and then dinner duty.

So excited about my herb pots:

Rosemary, pineapple sage and chives. (I have no idea what i'll do with the pineapple sage, but it smelled so good that I just had to have it. Any suggestions?)

Parsley, basil and oregano. Classics that I hate buying because I hate buying them...they inevitably just go bad. Now I don't have to worry about it!

But that's enough about that. Now here I sit, reminding myself to go out and water said plants...but it looks like rain, so maybe I'll tackle some other things on the to-do list first. Back tomorrow with a how-to post on group strength classes.

Until then, I wish you the happiest of Mondays! (Is that possible? A happy Monday? I think so...)

Question: Do you have an herb garden? If so, did you plant any that aren't so traditional (like the pineapple sage)? What do you use them for?