I know I’m just now closing my garden down for the winter months. But my mind is already filled with garden thoughts. This is a sign that you’re a true gardener at heart.

This is the first garden catalog I have received via mail so far…

I still had green tomatoes on my tomato plant when we had a light freeze. I truly enjoyed my fresh patio tomatoes. And I still have chives.

I am already thinking about color combos for flowers. Plus perennials I want to add and annuals I want to repeat. 
 
I really loved the black petunias I had this past season. They were so pretty and looked and felt like velvet. They were the perfect backdrop for the pastel lavender petunias. 

I don’t think I’d tried the frilly style of petunias before, as you see below. But I really loved the look. Reminds me of old-fashioned petticoat layers.

I always have daisies. They’ve been my favorite flower since childhood. 

I have some perennial daisies I planted this past year. I’m hoping they will come back up in the containers. I left so many of those behind in Texas six years ago.

What I’m Reading…


“The Resurrection Of Joan Ashby” spans the years when Joan Ashby gets married through the young adulthood of her sons.
 

Joan Ashby had begun a stellar career as a writer of short stories, winning awards in her early twenties, and had not planned on getting married or having children.

But she meets a charming doctor who captures her heart. And then she finds herself having her first child, though she really never wanted to have children. 

The first part of the book focuses on her doubts and reservations about motherhood. She embraced motherhood, but still missed her old life. 

What I find exceptional about this book is that Joan Ashby makes no apologies about not wanting to have children. 

Though she truly enjoyed and loved her sons, still she could hardly wait until they were grown so she could resume the “writerly” life.

I found this rather refreshing. Too often women are looked down on as being selfish if they don’t want to be mothers.

Yet motherhood does not have to be the focus of every woman’s life. Men who don’t want children are treated differently. It is rationalized that they are just focusing on their career and don’t have the time.

Women get kicked in the butt about a lot of things. 

Food For Thought:

If you worry or loved ones worry that you are alone too much, here’s something that might make you (and them) feel better.

Studies show that your need to be alone might just be a sign of your intelligence.

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I'm Brenda, creator of Cozy Little House. I live with my cat, Ivy, who keeps me laughing. I graduated from journalism school with a degree in professional writing and won awards for feature writing. I practice gratitude and enjoy my solitude. The glass is always half-full.

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7 Comments

  1. I love the beautiful flowers but the deer just this year discovered my pansies on the edge of the deck and ate them down to the nub. A few years back they ate all my impatients down to the nub and they had turned out so beautiful. Therefore, I am only going to buy cut flowers for the inside of my home and savor them with my husband! lol

  2. i envy people who can be in a group of people and make it work for them. I’m just a solitary soul, I guess.

  3. I absolutely treasure my time alone. If I don't get enough of it I become impatient and cranky. I don't know if that means I am really intelligent. I think I"m pretty smart, but not more than many other people. I just know that emotionally I am wired to be a semi-hermit! I enjoy solitary pursuits which need concentration and if I'm not by myself I get easily distracted. Then I feel all off-kilter. My oldest daughter is much the opposite like her dad and she's pretty bright, too. It's interesting to compare notes with her on our preferences in the area of solitariness versus socializing. She gets energized by being with other people; I get tired, especially if I don't have a balance of alone time. My younger daughter is more like me. We both like to be by ourselves and really experience it as a need in order to be happy.

    I always wanted to have children, but I certainly didn't know how hard and exhausting caring for them would be. I don't think anyone really understands what they are signing up for before they actually become parents. There's no way to know what your individual experience of parenthood until you are in it. Even caring for other people's children a lot like I did only prepares you to a certain extent. It's the unrelenting and constant needs of a child that can wear you down if you don't have adequate help. I can understand very well why a woman might choose not to become a parent. I have a couple of friends who do not have children and don't care to. I am fine with their choices. The thing that I'm not very accepting of is the one friend's attitude toward children in general. She says she dislikes children and doesn't want to be around them at all. She has a right to feel that way, but it rubs me the wrong way. I think it's as discriminatory as hating people with a different skin color and is a sort of slap in the face to those of us who have children and love them. I don't feel a need to discuss it with her. I value her friendship for other common interests, but I don't quite understand her negative feelings toward children in general. Do you know anyone who feels that way about children? What do you think about that attitude?

  5. Yes, women get kicked in the butt ALOT! Even though I am married I like and need alone time. It's hard because my husband is retired which has been a big adjustment for me!

  6. I love when I have my house to myself, I need that time to refresh and recharge. I haven't started looking through the seed catalogues yet, I'll wait until after Christmas, but I have been pinning garden images that make me anxious already for the next gardening season! I have a palette of blocks sitting in my driveway for a spring project…it will be back breaking work, but hopefully worth every bit of it!

  7. Have you seen the Baker Creek Heirloom seed catalog yet? just gorgeous. Getting that in the mail is like getting the old Sears Catalog at Christmas time when we were kids, remember that?

    Good point about women and having children – and I have to confess, because I absolutely love motherhood and consider it my best work in life, (truth!) I often catch myself feeling sorry for women who chose not to have children – and that is a ridiculous thought, I know it. The same can be said for being alone – the truth is the more comfortable you are with your OWN company, the better grounded you probably are overall.

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