giggles  Sounds like your wife is like my hubby, patient overall =D

OC tendencies... i'm that way without having been in the military (they told me i was TOO SHORT!)... but I am always cleaning the house - not from germ-phobias, but because I like things to be in their place. My craft area tends to be more of a mess than any other place, only because I always have a project or two on my work table!  But, the rest of the area - everything neat and tidy and in its place.

 Yards... agh, don't get me STARTED on that!  We're renting, and so we're only allowed to do soooo much... but trying to get the two men who live here to MOW!  yeesh. (to give them credit, though, the days they manage to have free it tends to rain...) Every time I walk the dog or step outside for anything, I'm pulling up some weed or another out of the few flower beds here.  

Unfortunately, that OC tendency doesn't always extend to finishing something in a timely manner... I've had to teach myself to let that one go, because my health is always fluctuating (bad days, good days, etc).  If I have an actual deadline, however, health be darned... I'm gonna finish it on time.  I'm also the one who ends up showing up for appointments up to an hour early.  (Dad was military, and boy howdy if us kids were late for ANYTHING)

Your yard sounds like its coming along beautifully, though... pics when its done?? =D

As for your daughter... mine is turning 14 this year... actually in less than a month, and according to my mom, has turned into the moodiest thing on the face of the planet.  You and your daughter may not get along very well right now... but keep trying.  Girls NEED their fathers even when they refuse to admit it.  My own teen years, I rejected my dad so often I'm pretty sure he was afraid he'd never be close to me again... but I settled down eventually, and he's still one of my favorite people on the planet - and he will never stop being my super-hero.  all i can say is... just keep reminding her no matter what's going on in her life, you love her no matter what and you'll always be there for her - and follow through with it. =D  it'll pay off in the long run.  Of my parents, my dad was always the one I could count on to keep an even head, no matter how angry he was at my actions.  my mom tended to turn into a banshee.. "you... WHAT?!?!?!?!?!?! HOW DARE YOU!" while my dad would (USUALLY) sigh, tell me he'd talk to me in a short while, go out and mow some grass or whatever else he could do to calm himself, and then he'd come back and sit and discuss what was going on.  Not to say he's perfect... he's as apt to roar as be calm over something... but he always TRIES, and now that I'm older, I have to appreciate that.  My mom & I are like oil & water - probably because we're so much alike that we dislike the same traits in each other!  (You're a BEECH!  no, YOU'RE the beech!  LOL)

I think (changing subject) one of the reasons I have fallen in love with this area is the fluctuating temps - you can have a few days of intense heat, and then it breaks, and like today, chilly enough I have the windows closed and am thinking of dragging out a pair of sweat pants!  At my mom's, its much like there in Atlanta... starting in early June, the heat rises and doesn't ever seem to go away... until the beginning of october!  Last summer was one of the most miserable heat-wise I have lived through... after having lived in Alaska for almost 6 years straight, stepping off the plane into a heat index of 115... i was ready to run back inside the terminal and HIDE.  WIthin the first few days at my parents, I had suffered severe heat exhaustion, not once, but several times.. and then came the sunburns.  And all that was WITH my parents have a pool, and me being in it ... a LOT.  We also had A/C on the school bus we were living on... in?  and it cracked me up how often people would "stop by" to "talk".  The main house didn't have A/C, but my parents & bro realized that it would take my husband a while to adapt (he's lived in Alaska all his life...) - but it wasn't HIM who needed the A/C... it was ME LOL.  That first week was sooooo horrible for me.  Recovering from a cold I caught the day before we left, coupled with a severe temperature difference (it was 60 degrees when we left alaska...), excitement from the move, spending time with not only my daughter, but our young cousin as well - and if 1 child has a ton of energy, two has two thousand time that... 

What's kind of ironic is I lived in Athens, GA, for a while in my early twenties.  The heat never fazed me... now, any time the temps soar above about 86 or 87, I have to be extremely careful, or I end up with heat exhaustion and sickness.  Hubby just goes "I'm thawing out still!"  

Evenings and early mornings are best for yard work on hot summer days ;)  Be careful and don't go all ninja on the yard! grins

Rarer than a hairy egg and madder than a box of frogs....

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