It's the Little Things That Make Me Happy!

That's for sure! I don't need lots of bells and whistles to put a smile on my face. Little things that people may think are dull and mundane--well, I can find the joy! We've been busy around here as I've said in my last post. Between school wrapping up shortly, Brownies coming to an end for the school year, exams, and gardening...oh, and a couple parties and bbqs..we've been on the go. But I love that it is a happy busy. The garden is almost in full bloom too!

I have picked a huge bowl of strawberries! Yummy! My peonys are opening:

The porch is bursting with color up front!

As soon as you open any of the three exits from my house, you smell LILACS!

I have lilacs in the front and rear. Beautiful and fluffy!

So, back to the title of this post,  as to one of those little things that make me happy..have you seen the square marshmallows for s'mores?????

Smoremallows they are called! :)  Love them! Why didn't they think of this before! 

We tried them out last weekend and they were just dandy. They fit perfectly on top of the graham cracker! S'mores Success! Smiles! Wish my son would let me photograph him :(  

My son and husband have decided their outdoor rec room will be in the shed....My son wants to decorate it with metal signs and oldie stuff. 

Dare I call it a man cave? 

Caitlin got a new bicycle last Saturday! It's a beauty. We bought it from our local bicycle store happily avoiding the big box store for the purchase. The bike store has been in business for 70 years selling thousands and thousands of bicycles to people in Northport and Commack. You just can't beat that old fashioned personal attention plus his old fashioned store. While I was bike shopping, it was 1955 in my mind! We had to order Caitlin's bike as she is too tall for the kid size bike but too small for a full size. My baby is growing but not too fast...Lets keep it that way. S-L-O-W... She's adjusting to her new ride. Her only demand was that the bike have a basket.

Field Day was Tuesday!

Caitlin competed in the frisbee relay, the 6x50 race, a jumping challenge and an egg on a spoon race. She did great! It was a beautiful day! 4th grade is just around the corner. 

Oh and here is Miss Molly Moo!

Doesn't she look like a cow? I mean that in the nicest of terms. When I adopted her  I named her Miss Molly Moo Moo because I think her markings are just like a cow. Here's the proof! Oh Miss Moo Moo! You are so cute. 

Last garden shot for today! ROSES! ROSES!ROSES! 

And my pretty hanging plant for the shed!

I hope you have a beautiful Saturday! It's picture perfect weather today here on Long Island! 

Go outside and have fun!

Good Things

I hope good things have been happening for all of you! I sure hate blogging with DAYS in between posts but I haven't had a moment to catch up and do a  post that I would be happy with. I had to have some time to gather my thoughts and match them with my photos too! Between enjoying Miss Molly and Jinxie boo and adjusting them to our house, Girl Scout plans, Memorial Day weekend, planting and a stomach virus (yuck) all rolled into the last two weeks it has been busy! This time of year is so fun though because as school winds down (it ends towards the end of June), there are a lot of fun things happening--some extra school trips, field day, end of year party and the same with Girl Scouts! My co-leader and I hosted a pizza party for our girls for our last "official" meeting of the school year but we still marched in the Memorial Day Parade and in June we are going to a frozen yogurt shop for an outing. Good stuff! Here are a few of my girls marching:

Caitlin, Ashley & Jackie (her two best friends)

Here are a few more of my troop of twelve girls marching. We made gift bags for our local VA Hospital filled with word search books, pens, snacks, and other goodies. We want the girls to know that Memorial Day is more than a bbq or beach trip. The weather has just been perfect. It was a great day for marching and also going places! We went to a nice bbq and also the Coney Island boardwalk!

I've mentioned that we live about an hour from NYC and though I rarely go, we did go to Brooklyn this weekend to Coney Island. My daughter has always heard my husband talk about riding the Cyclone roller coaster and she wanted to visit the park. Coney Island has been around forever and many of the historic structures are still there including some of the early bath houses/changing rooms. I couldn't help thinking of ladies and gents splashing around in 1910 in their " bathing clothes." Hurricane Sandy did a lot of damage but it has been restored and looking good. Very clean and orderly, I am happy to report. Caitlin was too short for the Cyclone but just the right size for the Wonder Wheel. My ,.husband and son enjoyed the Cyclone together. It was his first time on it. I wish he would let me take his picture :(

 She had so much fun riding the Wonder Wheel with Daddy. Several more rides and a nice walk on the beach made for a nice afternoon.

When you visit Coney Island you have to go to the original Nathans. We had hot dogs, clams on the half shell and french fries!

Then it was back to yard work! Billy and Billy power washed the patio, and our three porch decks! Love how sparkly clean they look! My husband put this white concrete bench by the chicken coop so that we can sit and enjoy our buddies. I have to say that Carol our rooster is the size of a (dare I say it) oven stuffer roaster! He likes to eat! The bunnies have also gotten very chunky! 

The garden is growing nicely around the coop too.

We also got our first strawberries! You can see one of them here:

Excitement! Never grew strawberries before!

And what would a post be without a garage sale /thrift store find? or a craft?

We stopped at a garage sale that I had actually missed! I don't know, I must've been looking down or drinking my coffee or whatever but my husband was driving along  when suddenly he pulled over to the side of the road to run into this garage sale and purchase this:

It's in perfect condition! $25! Here it is on my front porch before we moved her. Oh and a few more goodies came home with us too....

and

Caitlin picked up some beautiful Charles Wysocki puzzles and some books. A good sale. My son and husband have some ideas to turn the shed into a rustic game room  with couch, tv and games. They want to decorate the walls with metal signs and memorabilia. I'd say their garage sale find is a perfect addition! 

Three of us suffered a stomach virus in between all this fun stuff and that was not fun....emphasis on NOT FUN....Oh man...so not fun.....but then when I felt better I cheered myself up and made this:

It sits in my bathroom. Bears in bathtubs are just so darn cute. I think that about wraps up what has been happening here...The Christmas Tree Shoppe was another good stop... I picked up this cute banner to hang under my Americana shelf and an adorable lantern. I am lantern obsessed!

Love this little lantern! They also had it in navy blue.....

Now I'm really done. I covered it all! 

I hope you all had a great Memorial Day weekend and have a really wonderful week!

Loving the Sunshine!

Happy belated Mother's Day! That's my chicken/bunny coop above. Did lots of planting this weekend since the weather was ideal. With nice new soil and mulch, planting was easy and the mulch just neatens it all up nicely.

My husband is thinking of painting the coop a burgundy color. I'm excited about that. I think it'll be very nice in that color. Or we were going to paint it clay to match the siding of our house. I  opted for old fashioned prim burgundy.

Carol and Frankie marched around us as we planted supervising. I think they approve.

Saturday we went to Old Westbury Gardens in Old Westbury for a Ronald McDonald House Walk-a-thon. We all had a great time; we walked a couple miles on the beautiful property then barbecued and played frisbee and volleyball. Lots of fun and a good cause too! Ate lots of ribs and chicken! :)Caitlin was excited about all the give-aways! I recently taught her how to play solitaire and crazy 8's so she was excited to get several decks of cards. I also taught her how to play sudoku. She loves it! 

On the way home, we visited a nursery and picked up some good stuff then on Sunday we headed out east for a lovely seafood lunch/dinner and on to more nurseries! That has become our tradition for Mother's Day! Plant shopping, early dinner and planting. I had a delicious seafood bisque appetizer and clams on the half shell! For dinner I had a delicious pasta with shrimp and scallops. It was so good, I'm still thinking about it from yesterday! 

We picked up more perennials and and some vegetable plants and hanging baskets.

I loved this hanging bag of begonia. Perfect for my porch since begonia are shade lovers. And the colors go with my Americana theme. Usually they just sell the bags filled with impatiens. 

 Last year I picked up these metal planters at a garage sale. It was the end of the Summer when I got them so I never used them...till now! I planted Martha Washington Geraniums in them. Have you seen those kind? They sell out fast here!

Planted yellow double begonia in the driftwood

Here's the raised vegetable garden my husband made for me!

I planted eggplant, three kinds of peppers, tomatoes, parsley and basil...Oh and in another garden we have strawberry bushes! :) Marigolds help keep bugs away from the veggies....hence the border around them! Plus they were left over from the chicken coop. 

I hope you had a great weekend! 

Additions & Seasonal Changes

Thank you so much for all your thoughts and prayers for my Robin. As I wrote,  his loss has been so devastating to us. I knew we would be visiting our animal shelter shortly because the mood in our home has been so gloomy. Our goal was to adopt and love a new kitty not replace our Robin. Dixie and Red Cat have realized he is gone as well and the whole house has been out of sync. Please believe me--I'm not crazy but our pets play such important roles in our lives. The funny thing is when we went to the shelter with the intention of coming home with one, we ended up with two new loves. Two from their list of what is classified as "overlooked" cats--cats who are not inquired about for one reason or another. Sad. So here is our 11 month old little Jinx. Overlooked because he has one eye. What a sweetie. Affectionate, playful and loving. Are we all not imperfect in one way or another? Everyone who passed him up sure are missing out on a great pussycat!

We also added a four year old female we named Molly. I have to still photograph Miss Molly Moo Moo and when I write Moo Moo, you'll see why....she has the markings of a gray, black & white cow! She's petite and sweet and quite the chatterbox so more on Miss Molly Moo Moo next post :)

I know my Robin approves of our choices. 

The Easter decorations have been packed away and in between all the yard work we have been doing, I am transforming our home into one of my favorite themes--Americana for Spring and Summer. I do have a lot of Americana out all year. Old fashioned red, white and blue are ever present here. But out comes Betsy Ross and Ben Franklin for their annual visit. One of our favorite trips was visiting her house right in Philadelphia only two hours from here. Caitlin loved her house and tour so much she used Betsy Ross for her biography report. Ask Caitlin anything about Betsy and she can tell you! Just as a little side note, Betsy was ahead of her time in that when her husband passed away early in their marriage, it was "understood" that women could not own and run a business in the 1700's. Well, Betsy was not about to give up her seamstress business and kept it going! She was a success. And when George Washington came in to her shop to talk about his ideas for a flag, he had some rough sketches and she did not care for what he designed so she put forth her own thoughts! Amazing!

In the foyer, on my happy little chair that I love to decorate sits more Americana. I want to purchase a couple more of these chairs this Summer in Lancaster. So reasonably priced and perfect for my decor. Only $21! I have a black one so I would like to get a mustard colored one and a burgundy.

You never know what you are going to find where and I ran into Rite Aid with a girlfriend the other day as she had a prescription to pick up and I happened to see these adorable resin bird figures (which I collect) for 50% off! I have collected resin bird figures, bird houses, etc for years. I would always buy a bunch of different birds in Lancaster and put them all over the house.My Mom and I love them. I picked this adorable shovel with blue jays for me and for Mom I got her the same one but with cardinals. Never rule out stores like CVS or Walgreens or Rite Aid to find good decorating stuff.

I added some real cracked corn too. I have this in the house as I don't want it to get broken outside by all the wildlife that visits us at night! I'll have to hope the new kitties aren't interested in tipping it over :)  I set it on a little blue bench my Dad had made for me and added a decoration of a glass porch door that normally hangs on the wall. I thought it looked well together!

And that's not all I got....

This one is solar and the bubbles pump up and down. These are things that sure make me happy :) In between the decorating,  I did some crafting:

I took some of the girls in my Brownie troop to the Guide Dog Foundation last Saturday. Our girls got to hear about the importance of this organization that exists on donation only; providing dogs to the blind and visually impaired all across the country. They learned how the dogs are acquired, trained and cared for. We visited their facility and met handlers and even an  elderly woman who uses a guide dog. She actually suffers from the same eye disease I have in its advanced stage, retinal pigmentosa. A little startling to me at first. Thank goodness mine has been in remission for many years but at least I know in the future it'll be great to have help should I require it. I had never known you don't have to be blind to receive a dog. We had great experience at the Guide Dog Foundation and the girls learned never to disturb a dog when it is walking with it's owner. Distraction could be deadly. 

In the photo above, my Caitlin is the little one on the right with the blue jacket. What a nice day!

Before I run, one more thing I added. I took all the bonnets Caitlin wore as a baby and toddler and hung them in my hallway. How cute does that look? I used to buy her the bonnets in Lancaster and use them every day for her. They were perfect for keeping the sun out of her eyes and wind from her ears as a baby. She wore them till she was almost 4! I found they fit better than traditional baby hats sold in the stores. I was so glad to see them one again.

Have a beautiful weekend! Hope the sun shines for you! 

And the Winner of the Garage Sale Give Away is.....

.....the lovely Shirley Hatfield of Zetta's Apron Strings! Congratulations! You will be receiving a surprise box of items I have collected from garage sales that I hope you like. Please send your address to blackbird365@aol.com

Thanks everyone for participating! I plan to do more give aways soon. So much fun!