The Joys of Owning a Home, OR Attack of the Yellow Jackets

Sunday has become lawn and garden work day for us at the little yellow house on Church Street. Each Sunday afternoon, Chris gases up the lawnmower and walks up and down the lawn with it while I attempt to garden.

Last week, I planted two hostas and some other flowery plant in two different locations around the yard. By today, the two planted in the back of the yard were dead, and the hosta I planted next to the swing under the pine tree is flourishing. It's even growing a second stem of flowers. So I decided I should move the other two plants over there before they die completely. It seems like the dirt in the back of the yard is just too sandy, not to mention overrun with weeds.

Anyway, I relocated the plants pretty easily and headed inside so Chris could mow over in that area. After a couple minutes of cleaning up, I walked by the kitchen door and glanced out to see how Chris was doing.

Not well.

I saw him shut of the mower, start smacking at his leg, and then come running toward the house with his arms flailing wildly around his head! I ran out the door to see if he was okay, and he suddenly stopped in the middle of the yard. He reached down, ripped off his shoe and threw it across the yard. Then he yanked his sock off and looked at his poor swollen leg.

It was the yellow jackets. They've burrowed a nest in the ground at the back of the yard. He must have run over it with the mower and pissed them off, because he got stung a couple times. :-( His leg suffered the worst sting, so we iced it while looking up ways to kill bees on the internet. lol We actually found a pretty useful article here. So we'll probably give that a try this week.

We're pretty sure it was the yellow jackets that also stung Mike and Erin's dog, Miley, yesterday morning when she was running around in our backyard. She suddenly started walking funny, sort of lopsided, and she ran inside and laid down on our cat's bed and didn't want to move at all. We found a large red bump on her side eventually though, and assumed that she got stung or bit by something.

So I guess this is war. Time to kill those ornry little insects out back, and maybe those darn weeds too. I have a feeling by the time this is over, there isn't going to be anything left out there but the two trees and some crappy, too-sandy dirt. Hopefully after we triumph we can mix in a little bit better topsoil and then grow some real grass (sans weeds) in that back section. Oh the joy! lol

Pictures of the past week to come soon. Need to finish my article on the history of New York City first, though. :-)