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By Aimee, March 3, 2010 9:00 pm

I recently got a very fun Shironeko Holga camera to review (here). The camera has a kitty face, and even makes kitty sounds and lights up with a push of a button. Baby was very intrigued when she heard a meow.

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By Aimee, March 2, 2010 9:44 am

And sadly, so is the ficus.

We suspected that it was the ficus. This same tree in which our bird loves to play (and hence why we cannot use chemicals on it). The tree I have had for over 10 years. It was indeed infested again. We moved it out to the garage last night, and this morning we woke to find our windowsill free from gnats!

What a glorious feeling to not have to kill hundreds and hundreds of bugs today. Sadly, the tree will likely not survive the cold of the garage. Bittersweet… but Buggageddon is over!

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By Aimee, March 1, 2010 9:39 am

We are knee deep in what I am now calling “Buggageddon”!

Buggageddon! from Aimeeroo on Vimeo.

Every morning I wake up and hope that I will see something other than bugs when I enter my office. And every morning for the past 5 days I have been disappointed. Oh, and the smell. Did I mention that there is a weird sweet, and also icky, smell? The first time I smelled it it smelled like a cake, but I knew I hadn’t made a cake, especially in my office. The smell got worse and stronger from that moment on.

I spent all day Saturday clearing my office of anything I could think of that would attract bugs. I swept, mopped, and then did it again. The smell was still there. We opened the window for a few hours… still smelly. The bird wasn’t too happy about being moved into the living room from “her room”, but she didn’t have a choice, for safety reasons.

Yesterday the smell got super strong and it was starting to make us feel sick. We tracked it down (we think) to the windowsill area. I poured Clorox cleaner into the window track and let it soak for an hour. I then cleaned it out (totally gross by the way), and even found a pencil hidden in the track. We thought for sure the bugs were coming from this area and that we would be bug free this morning. No luck.

It does at least smell better in my office, but I need to do it all again I think. And we still aren’t sure of the source. I removed the Aerogarden, which has at least helped to concentrate the bugs to the windowsill (they were very attracted to the UV light). We thought they may be coming from the tree that had fungus gnats before, which we totally repotted with new soil and pot, but they don’t seem to be coming from there. Then we thought maybe they are coming in from the outside, but it doesn’t appear that way. We are baffled.

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By Aimee, February 26, 2010 8:36 am

I hear spring is right around the corner. I am more than ready. Winters are not my favorite. It’s cold, the air is dry, the ground is wet, my hands get cracked, bleed, and hurt a lot. It’s hard to find the motivation to do much. All that sounds good is to sip hot chocolate, watch old movies, and try to keep warm.

Granted, this winter has been fairly mild. Other than some very cold weather in December, and a few big snow storms, we have had it much better than last year. I have even seen a lot of our daffodils and iris starting to come up (and we are still getting snow off and on). It’s still cold though. And I miss my garden and being able to play outside.

My husband got me these flowers for our anniversary. A gorgeous bouquet that has all my favorites, including Gerber daisies (which aren’t in the photo). They are bringing a bit of spring to our home. I really loved how the sunset coming through the window was highlighting the flowers. One of those magical moments.

It’s too bad humans don’t take a cue from bears. Hibernation sounds appealing right now, doesn’t it?

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By Aimee, February 25, 2010 11:48 am

We have an icky problem in my office. It’s a problem that we had in the past in my ficus tree. We thought we had fixed it by repotting the tree in brand new, dry dirt (even washing off it’s roots). We remained free from pests for several months, until now.

The problem returned recently after I finally set up our Aerogarden. It hasn’t even been set up for that long, and BOOM! We are deep in an icky infestation of fungus gnats! Here is just a taste of what has been going on (if you find bugs to be gross, you might not want to watch):

Icky infestation from Aimeeroo on Vimeo.

I had actually vacuumed the windowsill, drapes, and the top of the garden about 15 mins before I shot this video. It was actually much worse this morning, which I had to show my hubby. Gross isn’t it? I could not believe how many more there were in such a short amount of time.

I vacuumed again right after, and have also taken wet towels to the windowsill twice again, removing more than I could ever count. I can already see more. Where they are coming from now is anyone’s guess, since the Aerogarden has been emptied and cleaned, and is now banished to the basement. I’m sad though, my plants were doing so well, but if the larvae were in the sponges, the problem would have just kept coming and coming. RIP tomatoes.

And I don’t even know how many little gnats I have squished by hand. They are attracted to light, like most bugs, and come to the computer often. I even think one went in my nose.  I’m pretty sure our bird has been snacking on them as well. It’s gross.

How are things in your neck of the woods?

*Update: We still have tons of gnats, and it looks like the Aerogarden just attracted them from another source. They are still flooding the windowsill and drapes. I see them crawling in the tree pot again, and I am now worried that other plants may be infected as well. Sad.