Mulch Madness

What a weekend.

It started off HUGE for me, with my Ohio University Bobcats beating Michigan in the first round of the NCAA Tournament. It also ended with another Bobcat win - against USF, sending my alma mater to the Sweet 16. This is gigantic for these "little guys," and I couldn't be prouder to be a Bobcat.

It also happened to be an incredibly gorgeous weekend, weather wise. Saturday, I finished a fantastic 10-mile training run then immediately got ready for St. Patrick's Day fun. Now, you'd think after a beautiful day spent enjoying a Guinness or two would mean the Sunday after would be shot - but no! Eric and I woke up and decided to make a trip to Home Depot. And after our random shopping spree there, spent the rest of the 80-degree day in the sun, working in the backyard.

We went to Home Depot for spray paint and a twine, and ended up with 20 bags of red mulch and some new solar lanterns to line the yard out back. 

Eric did the heavy mulch work.

 While I groomed our yard by raking up dead leaves and fallen sticks.

Can you believe the difference the bright red mulch makes out there? It brightens everything up and makes the yard pop. I can't wait to see how it looks when all our flowers and plants (not just the now fully-bloomed daffodils) have bloomed! 

After Eric was done mulching, I went ahead and assembled and installed the solar lanterns. 

They add such a polished garden feel to the yard. They only had a couple of hours to charge so we didn't get to see how brightly they will light the yard last night, but they just look so nice. We definitely needed to add more light around the perimeter of the yard for our upcoming nights spent outside by the fire pit.

On top of these projects, we added some grass seed, cleaned up the front sidewalk and walkway up to our house and finished a few other odds and ends outside. I still can't believe how much we got done, and can't believe the gorgeous weather we had on a mid-March day. 

Apologies to all neighbors who had to see my exposed, shorts-wearing legs, which currently sport the pastiest shade of winter white imaginable...

Here's to hoping we don't get a huge cold snap or snowstorm so we won't have to do this all over again in May...