Most of you who know me, know how much I loved living in a no maintenance loft in the Crossroads for years. When I got married to John 2 years ago, I moved to Westwood Hills. Anyone who has driven through this beautiful little city knows that residents are obsessed with their landscaping. Everything is perfect – mowed, clipped, pruned and planted.

Now I’m obsessed with gardening.

Honestly, I had never planted anything and always scoffed when friends talked about spending all weekend in their yards. Now I’m texting John… “STAND BY!!! multiple plants, bushes and trees arriving in 30 minutes, need to be unloaded.”

I’m constantly driving around town with my SUV loaded with something new and fun. I too, have become obsessed with gardening.

The other thing I am obsessed with are pests.

I always thought those bunnies were so cute. Now I want to kill them all. They eat everything and multiply like… rabbits – ha! I recently planted several drift roses and within a week they had eaten half of them. Now I’m the crazy lady with chicken wire in my front yard.

I’ve started buying flowers and plants that rabbits hate: sweet alyssum, lantana, marigolds and geraniums – not my favorite flowers, but they will survive the buffet line.

Caterpillars, mites, bagworms, Japanese beetles (the worst), moths, aphids, ants and snakes have arrived. I don’t like to use a pesticide because of my bee friends, so I’ve been using Neem oil and dishwashing liquid. I don’t know if it’s because of all the rain, but they’re feasting on everything – some plants look like the leaves are made of lace.

We built a beautiful patio with a stone wall last summer – now it’s home to numerous chipmunks who have burrowed tunnels everywhere. So cute, and so destructive.

Last year, I had a huge vegetable garden with my daughter Amy because of the pandemic – I had a chicken wire fence completely around it, but the squirrels would climb in and take one bite out of a perfect tomato or pepper and leave the rest to rot. Not attempting that again this year because it’s so easy to go to the Farmer’s Market every weekend.

Even though I may sound like I’m complaining – I am LOVING every minute of it!