Buying shingles, yard work, and chemical fertilizer

Darling son went with me to buy shingles for the roof.  I'm not good with decisions, but I had kind of narrowed things down by the little 1 x 1 1/4" samples I had been given.  Now let me ask you what self-respecting woman who knows she will be looking at a roof every day for the next twenty years will plunk down $1200 for roofing materials and make the color decision on the basis of the dinky little 1 x 1 1/4" sample?  Apparently the clerk expected me to because he explained that I wasn't going to get any better than those little samples because their shingles were sold in wrapped packages.  In my mind I was calling this guy "Face" from the "A-Team."  I thought "Face" was coming across as a bit of a twerp.  So, in my best radio voice, I began to read the recommendation on the sample folder.  (DS said it was the most irritating voice he had ever heard, but that he was "only a little" embarrassed):  "FINAL COLOR SELECTIONS SHOULD BE MADE USING ACTUAL SHINGLES.  Because of their size, swatches cannot accurately depict the color clarity.  Please consult your Atlas distributor for specific color availability...."
So "Face" took me back into the warehouse and cut open (just a little ways) two packages to compare.  Somehow I just don't think it would be unreasonable to have a full size shingle on display.  Really, of all the nerve to try to sell a pig in a poke!
"Face" softened just a bit when he realized I had already gotten a quote and when he realized who the roofer is who will be doing our work.  "Gary is a good guy," he said.  When we were back in the car I reminded ds about the verse in Proverbs, "a good name is to be chosen rather than riches."  I told him that Gary had a good reputation with them for his business dealings with them.
Well, that was one thing to check off the "to do" list--on to the yard work!
I'm "only mostly organic" in my yard and garden, so I had a bag of standard 10-10-10 chemical fertilizer that has been languishing for ages in the shed.  With all the hail damage, I thought I would help the maples out with a little nitrogen.  I split about a pint jar of the fertilizer between the two small maples.  That would be considered a very light application. 

 

I had screened some compost--lovely, rich compost--into the wheelbarrow.  

It was such a delight to have Caleb helping me.  He fetched the jar of fertilizer for me as well as a few wood ashes in the bucket.  Then he spread most of the compost.  I couldn't resist throwing some directly from the wheelbarrow (like a little dog scatters dirt when he digs a hole).

 

Then it was on to taking the twigs I had raked yesterday to the compost pile.  I had tired myself out yesterday raking up twigs that had fallen in the hail storm.  I tossed some larger branches, which I will collect later and burn, onto the mulched area.  Besides the larger branches I had picked up, I had 11 little piles of twigs along with some dried weeds I had pulled a while back.  I weeded a little grass out of the mulched area and put a little on several twig piles (to have some green with my brown).

 

Dh thought I was crazy when I said I was going to take pictures of the wheelbarrow loads, but this is documenting my life; this is what I do.  Caleb forked the twigs into the wheelbarrow and hauled it to the compost pile.  I had rake duty and cleaned up the final dribbles of each pile.

 

Six loads!

 

Load 1...

 

Load 2...

 

Load 3...

 

 Load 4...

Load 5...

 

Load 6...



 

Of course, there is quite a bit more in the backyard.  There is a huge number of twigs under the crepe myrtle.  It probably needed to have some of those twigs removed anyway.  I might work on that just a little this evening.  Then there are all the pine needles in the upper part of the backyard.

As one lady I know said about her never ending yard work, "Job security!"