Patrick, Veronica, Brett and Summer came over this afternoon loaded with steaks, macaroni salad, and potato salad.  We had a nice cookout in the backyard after they swam in the pool for a bit.  It was a very pleasant and relaxing way to end the weekend.

I got lots of cleaning done yesterday and am finishing up the laundry this evening.  Didn’t get my errands run, but that’s ok.  I’ll just make a few stops on the way home from work on Monday and Tuesday.  Since I have most everything done here at the house, I won’t have tons to do here when I get home…so getting home a bit later than normal will be alright.

Sorted out all the paperwork that had been accumulating on my desk and in other spots around the house last night.  Had planned to do this early in the evening, but had a wealth of phone calls prior to getting started.  First Kelly called around 7:30 pm.  While I was on the phone with her, Tom called.  I called him back after finishing talking with Kelly and, while I was on the phone with him, Kevin called.  So I called him back after finishing talking with Tom.  It was a wonder the battery in the phone didn’t give out when I finally finished up at 10:30 pm!  I still had to sort all that paperwork, so I started in.  Since I had let everything pile up since mid-August due to the influx of visitors, I had a lot to go through.  Finally got to bed around 2 am.  I slept in this morning until 10:00, and it felt good to stay in bed and then get up to a clean office.

Almost forgot to mention that the new gardener I hired showed up yesterday morning…and, OMG he was great!  He cut and edged the front yard, trimmed the front hedge, trimmed the ficus tree next to the front door, and then started in on the back!  He trimmed the bushes along the back fence–the ones I HATE to trim ’cause it takes me forever–as well as all the miscellaneous shoots that continue to grow through my fence.  Then he cleaned all the leaves and other residue from the concrete decking around the pool.  He could only do about half the bushes in the backyard, but says I will feel like I have a new yard when I return from Seattle.  Oh…he’s also going to replace about 1/2 dozen of the sprinkler heads in my front yard that are leaking.  I am so glad I decided to do this.  Knowing I no longer have to do all this work in the backyard is fabulous!  While I like working in the yard, it was getting a bit ridiculous.  Every time I stopped doing yard work for a few weeks, it would become overwhelming, requiring that I do nothing but work out there non-stop for days.  This is great.  Now all I have to do is water and put in new plants occasionally.