New "Toys"

Remember how I told you to make note of two of the items I have posted recently? One was a late birthday gift - I told you I know how to milk a birthday - and one was an early Mother's Day present. I think I have also told you how my girls "get" me. Sometimes they even know I will love something before I do!

Case in point. Here is my late birthday present...

When I first opened this, I knew I loved it because it meets my usual criteria: rusty and rustic! But, I wasn't sure how I would use it or where. It is a gift from daughter #1 and her family. As soon as I opened it she said, "When I saw it, it looked like you. I can just see it full of autumn leaves and pumpkins or beautiful Christmas balls". And I felt the "heavens open and the light flood in". Immediately, I "saw" something for every holiday or season filling the scale and then knew it had to go by the front door as a visual hint to visitors as to what they would see in the rest of the house. I am already thinking about what goodies will fill this as 4th of July fast approaches.

Next, we have this little beauty. Have I said before how much I love cloches? For this display I have the cloche sitting on the bottom of the mossy bowl. If I flip the bowl over, the cloche nestles right down inside. And, I guess I could even use them independently of each other. So many possibilities! I love both of my gifts. Only sorry that my birthday is really over now. Oh well, only 9 more months and I'll have another!

Heading out of town for the rest of the day and then have plans for a fun evening as well. I will fill you in soon. Stay tuned.

MIA

I have been "missing in action" the last few days for a very good reason! Our weather has been picture perfect and it could be spent NO WHERE but OUTDOORS! And, that is exactly what I did. Had a hot date that lasted two days with this guy...

I really don't know what is wrong with me but I LOVE to pressure clean. I will clean anything that stands still once I get going. I think I love it so much because nothing much else gives you such immediate gratification and such obvious results.

I know this looks horrible and you are wondering how I could possibly have lived like that but that is what the brick path in my back yard looks like one year after it was last cleaned. I live in Florida and algae and mold grow quickly-especially in areas that get the benefit of the irrigation system and are fairly porous. The Kool Decking on our pool doesn't get this bad but it does grow algae in the dips (the parts that are there to keep the deck cool to the feet).

About once a year I grab the old pressure cleaner and we spend a few days together. It is a hard job but I enjoy it. I push that machine to its limits. This year, I found out how resiliant my little friend actually is. At the end of day 1, I was a bit tired and had pulled the cleaner (attached to the power cord and HEAVY, water filled hose) along with the nozzle and hose for the nozzle, to the far side of the pool. I should have disconnected stuff and re-routed the hose, but as I said, I was tired. And so, I just tugged a little while I was starting on the pool slide and heard a "funny" noise. I turned around just in time to see the pressure cleaner slip off the edge of the deck and glide ever so graciously into the deep end of the pool. It was very surreal but I gathered my wits in time to run and pull the power plug out. Then, I gazed at it 8' below the surface and figured I had just seen the last of this little guy.

I called my husband and we fished it out of the pool and I immediately called my son-in-law to ask his advice. Had I killed it for good or was there hope? He is an engineer and he reassured me that it would probably dry out and be just fine-and, if not, I would not electrocute myself attempting to plug it in after giving it some time to dry out.

And he was right. It started right up the next morning and helped me clean the slide, the pergola, the brick walls around the plants, the pathways.....

So that was pretty much my weekend. In the few extra minutes I had, I decided to find a place to hang the sconces that I took down from my fireplace wall. In walking around my house, I discovered that the only place they would still work was the front guest room. Luckily, these are easy to hang and took no time at all.

I really like them there. What do you think? Of course, now I have the two pedestal shelves that I took down from here.......Stay tuned.

How Did We Miss This?

I am talking about my kitchen. I was trying to think ahead a bit to what some of my next posts would be in this season of "holiday desert". No new big projects on the immediate horizon. Then I remembered that I haven't shown you what the kitchen is looking like these days. I guess that is because it is not very "springy".

For some reason, when I get to the kitchen decor this time of year I want to go back to my wine theme-hmmm, think there might be some correlation there between the stress of this time of year with our endless things to do and the theme desire??? Just saying. And before any of my family members call me on that one, I need to come up with a better word than "stress" when I am talking about all of our family goings-on. Maybe "busyness" would be better? I don't mean to imply that I don't love every minute of the "busyness" with you all!

That being said, come on along.

I love those ORANGE tulips! My favorite color in my favorite flower!! And, those gerbera daisies came from MY garden!

Hard to see, but that picture in the wooden box is an old cross stitch that I did MANY years ago-my eyes couldn't even come close these days. I happened upon it when I was digging for something else. I really thought I had thrown it away ages ago. Decided it needed to find a place in the daylight once again-if even for just a short time as 4th of July will be creeping out around the 1st of June.

Still love my "fingerprint" flower pot made by daughter #3 and her children.

I haven't used my "faux" olive trees for awhile, so I decided to stick one in the olive jar to see if I liked it. It is still there so I guess it isn't bothering me too much.

O.K. So that part of my kitchen is fine with me, but now I want to make a few changes. I know I have been talking about changing the color but I can't pick one. Every time I think I have found a winner, I realize I still like the red. Maybe I should just find a slightly different hue of red to give it an update??!

Then, I am thinking about taking down the "wall" of bulletin board pictures I have on the side of my pantry cabinet. It is large and when I view it  with a "new eye", it is a mess. But, when I view it with my "Nana eye", I love looking at all of those sweet faces looking back at me.

I am thinking about possibly moving the chalk board-which I do use for grocery reminders-to the pantry wall and adding some large, chunky open shelves to the wall over the phone. That would give me more mercandising space-as if I really need that, but.... Can't seem to make up my mind. What do you think?

We had a fun evening last night at our grandson's school spaghetti dinner. We got to hear him sing and view his artwork. Then, the kids got to run off some of their chocolate chip cookie dessert induced "energy" on the playground. It was fun and reminded me of just how many years we have been doing this. It started in 1969 when I was on the serving line as a teacher and continued through oh so many years of P.T.A. The spaghetti last night was really good. Don't know if the schools are using healthier recipes or what, but I ate all of mine!

Harrison is the second from the left in the top row. He is singing his heart out. Perhaps a future Pavarotti...or Justin Bieber...

...or perhaps another Picasso?

You will have to look in the back of this photo to see my beautiful grand daughter. For some reason, Little Miss Sassy Pants did NOT want her picture taken. And, since this is #7 for us, we now know when to "cut our losses"!

Today is Friday! Yeah!! Not sure where the rest of the day will take me, but if it turns out to be anywhere fun, I'll be sure to bring you along. Stay tuned.

Rainbow of Spring...

....but look quick!! I just got in from a bit of work in the garden and I realized that right at this moment, I probably have the most colors that my garden will produce all year. All of the newly planted flowers are thriving AND, not only have many of the perennials now come back but many of the autumn and winter plants are still hanging on.

This is just one of many pentas that I have. I have red, white, lavender and pink. This particular plant is way too big. It is in my front garden and actually higher than the sprinkler head behind it. That is usually my cue that it is time for some pruning but for some reason, the hummingbirds love this plant. Almost every time I look out the front window, I will see one hovering. They are just so beautiful that I can't bring myself to grab the clippers. Hopefully soon they will discover all of the new blooms in the back and I can get this plant under control again.

Unfortunately, the reality of the situation is that I live in Florida. Even though we have an irrigation system, we are only allowed to water twice a week and that will not be enough in the heat that will soon be upon us. I really have to hand water every day to keep things looking lush and even then, some of this rainbow will succumb.

As I was walking around the yard, I spied these beauties. Not quite the color I am hoping for but soon, very soon.

I am hoping to get to the pool deck pressure cleaning this weekend. It is a big job but I enjoy it because of the "immediate gratification". Then, all I will need is for the water temperature of the pool to go up-way up-and I will be good to go. Stay tuned.

Serendipity...Fate...Meant to Be!

O.K. You all know I am getting old and lead a pretty simple, run-of-the-mill Nana kind of life. So, when something spookily eery happens-unless it is during the 6 weeks of the year that my house is decorated for Halloween (yes, that's right! I love Halloween! Don't judge!!)-I get excited.

And, that is exactly what happened yesterday. If you read my post yesterday, you will remember me talking about the amber mosaic sconces that hang hung on either side of the mantle. I really still love them but was just getting tired of the whole look. Honestly, I was thinking of changing out the mirror as well, but that seemed like a larger challenge to me, so I set my sights on the sconces.

I had TRULY just hit the word "publish" on my blog, clicked out of that site and went straight to my facebook page to see what was happening. A new link had JUST come in and it was from Tres Chic-the very place I had fallen in love with some new sconces that were just too expensive for me to justify buying them! They were offering me 30% off everything in the boutique...and staring right back at me was their phone number. Can't get any easier than that. So I called, they were still there and just that fast, they were on hold for me!

Now this place is seriously only a few minutes from my house but since I had been doing a bit of spring cleaning, I did have to make myself a tad more presentable before running out the door!

Once I was home with those beauties, I went right at removing the old ones and remembered how much "fun" I had had drilling into the brick of my fireplace. And, this is where my luck stopped.

It would have been too much to ask for to be able to use the same screw and anchor. Plus, I couldn't hold the new sconce up by myself to step back and see where it needed to go. I knew my husband was working late and would come home tired and hungry-and not in the mood to mess with this little project of mine-and I wanted them up "yesterday". So, I did the next best thing-put out a plea to my son-in-law. He came over and between the two of us we got the job done!

There really wasn't much repair for me to do and since I am a "do-it-now" kind of girl, I went with what I had. Knew I could make it work. Then, I just mixed up a few colors of craft paint and got it pretty close. In doing this project, I decided I wanted to paint the whole fireplace again-still thinking about the color-so this is fine with me until then.

 As much as I love candles, I am going with the battery operated, on a timer ones. It is just too cumbersome to climb up and light and then blow out real ones every night. I do love how these things just "turn on and off" by themeselves and they give a nice flicker to the room while we are watching TV. I do wish they were taller-and I will be on the look out for some. If anyone knows where I might find them, please let me know.

And that is how projects sometimes start in my little mundane life. Serendipity...Fate....Meant to be. I think I feel the need for a few more makeovers in this room as well. My husband always says, I can do anything I want as long as it doesn't cost him a lot of $$$. I will have to see what I can come up with next. Stay tuned.