Thyme Crunch

With Rose's baptism tomorrow on the 4th of July, we had family arrive to celebrate her religious rite of passage with fireworks and hot dogs. I had hoped our courtyard might look somewhat finished. The concrete stones had been colored and sealed, Bruder was dutifully (O.K., he was being paid) spread topsoil, and all I needed to do was plant thyme--eight flats of thyme with 18 plants per flat. And since I knew 144 thyme plants would never do, I cut each plant into 4 plugs, thinking we might just make it with 576.

I greatly underestimated 2 things. 1) How much thyme it takes to plant a 2,700 foot courtyard, and 2) How much time it takes to plant a 2,700 foot courtyard. I don't have enough of either.

I took this picture after about 3 hours of sweat and dirt and you can see the full flats waiting to be touched. And three more nearly full flats on the steps. Three hours to plant 2 flats. If you could see Cholita in full frame in this picture, you'd see she's holding a bag of candy--Japanese candy courtesy of Bruder to be specific--and knowing that my children were eating candy for lunch didn't help me to stay focused on the job at hand (or under foot I guess). The noises from the house also led me to believe that the necessary cleaning tasks that I'd laid out for my children were not getting done and that our house would be in shambles when the relatives arrived. Needless to say, I was forced to abandon the courtyard. But.....

someday when I have enough thyme/time, won't it be gorgeous?