I love to garden, but my busy work season is also spring planting and summer harvesting season, so vegetable gardening is not something that works for me. My flower and herb beds are perennials, self-seeding or hardy annuals. So, lately I have been receiving in the mail all of these catalogues for fall bulb planting. “Buy in Bulk and Save” or “Plan Now for Fall Planting” or “Buy Now, Pay Later” the front page headlines read. These headlines have a lot of things in common with everyday life.
Planning now for 3 -4 months down the road is a good reminder for all areas of life. What do you want to be doing come September? Children will be back in school – hopefully – and life will look different than it did in February, which was the last full month of our old normal. We don’t know what the future will bring, but what part of this whole Covid-19 do you want to make sure you hang on to? Family dinners? Sunday facetime calls with parents, grandchildren, other family members or friends? Plan now! If you don’t, the craziness that we were forced to eliminate from our lives will return.
Buying in bulk is also a really good idea IF you need things in bulk and you have somewhere to safely store things you buy in bulk! If I bought all the bulbs for all the beautiful flowers I see in these catalogues, and I don’t have anywhere to plant them, I have not only wasted these resources, kept someone else from being able to obtain them, but also thrown money right out the window. I have walked into homes over the last few months and seen so many “bales” of toilet paper sitting on shelves. Yes, it will eventually get used, but how much did someone overpay during a shortage and how many people didn’t have toilet paper. Panic buying usually leads to some kind of remorse.
Finally, buy now pay later? We hear that over and over again from cars to flower bulbs. Go back to planning for the future. Yes, you might get that raise at work, or you might finally get your stimulus check. What we forget is how many times we have spent that same future dollar. We don’t know what the future holds as we so quickly learned this past March. There are a lot of good deals out there from 0% interest, 3 months no payments, etc. It is a great time to buy something if it is part of the plan or if your situation makes it necessary. Just remember what the plan is. If the plan is to go to Disneyland with the family, don’t substitute 3 months no payments for that. Remember that buying now so you can pay later might cost you more than you bargained for.
I have been marking my favorites in all of the catalogues. I have been looking at my fall schedule, where I want to plant any new flowers and drawing a diagram so I remember. I have until the middle of July to make a decision about what I am going to order or if I am going to order anything. I need to make sure that I will have time when they arrive to plant them and a place to put them. If I don’t, buying now will cost me more than I want to pay.
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