This afternoon I put on the new boots, strapped my fitness tracker to my ankle (since mowing the lawn has my wrist in a stationary position on the push bar) and accomplished two things: after scooping and dumping a bunch of leaves from the gutter/curb area onto the lawn I mowed the grass and mulched in the leaves. Yesterday I pulled last year's stalks out of the canna beds and stuffed them into the large old trash bin, and this morning I shoveled some of the stuff in the big compost bin to the side, clearing access to the older finished compost in the bottom. Tomorrow I'll be able to empty that bin of cannas into the rearranged compost enclosure after digging out the good stuff to have it ready to spread in the vegetable garden. There is seldom a direct line between any two garden tasks, it always involves several steps.

I had something land in my eye this evening, probably snuck behind my goggles when I ran the trimmer, and however it shifted from my lashes to my left eye, it had a couple of uncomfortable hours before it finally dislodged from under the lid.

The contractor and painter came by and we looked at the house, at the spots that need repair before applying paint, discussing the prospect of what to list on the itemized list (I'll pay for some things out of pocket because they aren't part of the insurance repair). A door needs replacing, the bay window has a rotted spot and that will be repaired, and I may even put gutters back on the house. As we walked into the back yards the dogs met us, happy to have new people to jump on. I have a few repairs I can make myself before they start, and I'll have the patio cover taken down ahead of the work. They want to take the locking mail box off of the porch wall - I worked so hard to attach it that I have misgivings, but we'll see.

We discussed color. I'll probably stay with the main color being a yellow, but maybe go with on with more character than the stock color that was available before. They understand I'm looking for something to bring out the color in the stone on the front. The contractor was pointing out different color groups in the paint chip book, and there was one he liked that gave me pause. Taupe. "My mother painted everything either seafoam green or taupe when she had a chance. That color has a lot of baggage." As in, that's a hard "no."

I had asked the right colors at the paint stores, so when we talked about painting the house yellow I understood that the tint would have to be added to one of the few stock colors, a yellow they make to tint to other yellows. Those trips were worth the trouble.

I await a quote. It looks like late April or very early May for this work, so I'll garden accordingly, not planting near where ladders will need to be placed. I don't want them clobbering my cucumbers.