~ Martha, What Are You Smoking??? ~

Look, I love creativity.  I love, Love, LOVE domesticity.  I love being a full-time, totally engaged, all-in Mom, housewife, and sex-symbol.  (A girl can dream, can’t she?)

Often this includes nesting to the Nth degree.  Every season.  All over the house.  Creativity and a glue-gun complete me, is what I’m saying.

So when I decided to take on one of Dame Martha (Stewart’s) winter decorating ideas this December, nothing was amiss.  With deft efficiency, I lopped branches from our Frasier Fir Christmas tree, gathered several boughs from our many red-berried holly trees and rhododendrons located around the Little Cottage, gathered various pine cones from our Blue Spruce, bought some inexpensive red-glass ornaments, and artistically placed them in the large flower boxes My Captain lovingly built for me on our deck years ago.

Behold, the holiday beauty!

Doesn’t it make you feel festive as heck?

Now, Martha suggested also including ornaments made of different bird seeds in and amongst the greenery, for our winter flying friends.  I didn’t have the time, nor inclination, frankly, to set about moulding thistle and sunflowers mixed with peanut butter in a bell or star or heart shape, so I just sprinkled bird seed generously on top of each box.

Fast forward a couple of weeks.

The squirrels decimated the greenery, gleefully chucking it either on the deck or into the garden.  The sparkly red-glass ornaments chipped their most likely toxic, or at the very least, non-eco-friendly, made-in-China glaze into my garden and flower boxes. And after eating the birdseed, the boxes became some kind of nasty, slimy, bird poo ground.  I’m not kidding, my lovely flower boxes have turned into some kind of avian cess-pool.

I suppose by spring that will act as terrific fertilizer, but for now, it’s one hell of an eyesore that I do NOT want to fish my toxic ornaments out of.  As in, EVER.

Well, the whole decorate with boughs of holly and feed the birds a-la-Mary Poppins SOUNDED like a good idea.  One of these days, though, I’m going to have to learn to discern reality from fantasy.

Thanks Martha.  You’re a peach.