Busy as a Bee

Hey y'all,
Well, it seems like this summer is off to a great start. If you like HEAT, that is!  I love spring and usually May is a wonderful month with days around 80 and nights in the 60's - we skipped right to the 90's! Now, I am cold natured, meaning that I am always cold. I take a sweater with me everywhere in the summer because if I'm in air conditioning- I am COLD. So, I am not complaining about the heat, but really just making an observation. I have baked in the heat to get a few outside projects done - 

 Putting out annuals 

Lobelia- I've tried this before and it really doesn't like our heat but it was so pretty I had to give it another try!

Geraniums for the front and Impatiens for our shady back yard

Some beautiful red verbena

AHHHH! Red Geraniums, my favorite!

 

 

 

 

I'll get some pics with them in the ground after I mulch.

Next, I painted a white PVC plastic fence section to look like weathered wood for my in-laws new house. They are going to use it as a headboard in their master bedroom.

I didn't have very high expectations for this project when my mother-in-law brought this to me with her clever idea, but it actually turned out just fine. I'll take some pictures when they get to move in.

Lastly, I pressure washed the back porch deck. It WAS GROSS! We are getting ready to have it screened in so we can actually sit out there without being carried off by the mosquitoes. It is my favorite part of our house with all the trees around and an outdoor fireplace and we want to be able to enjoy it. We've been talking about it for years but we are actually going to do it! Thankfully it won't start for a few weeks because we have a visitor on our mantle.  Do you see it? Next to the candle?

It's a bird nest with a momma sitting on 5 eggs! Of course she didn't choose the birdhouse!

She actually started the nest inside our GRILL and I found it when I was turning on the gas tank. At that time it only had one egg so I moved it up onto the mantle (I couldn't get it inside the birdhouse.LOL) . It is a house wren and they have built there before. She returned to it and laid 4 more eggs!!! She stayed on it the whole time I was cleaning the porch, which was very loud! She only leaves when I get really close -she flew out when I put my camera up to take a picture of her. Don't worry...she came RIGHT BACK. I will give you baby updates when they hatch. I LOVE animals!

With all of these projects going on I have been doing my crocheting in the evenings and I am almost finished with my bunting. Pics to come soon.

Other updates:
-The artroom is basically finished but I have spent very little time in there so far. It is wonderful to know that it is all organized and I can find all of my things now.
-I will be leaving for the beach this Saturday for a week at the beach and I will post lots of pictures while I'm there.

I will leave you with a picture of the sunset as I drove home the other night.

Blessings to you and yours xxxxxxoooxxxxxxxxxxooo

Romans 8:28 "And we know that all things work together for good to those who love God, to those who are the called according to His purpose."

New Hooky Bunting

I am having a fling with COLOR. I am in love with anything bright and happy! My husband said I was trying to make our house too "girly". I think that's ok since I live with two men (my 20 year old son and my hubby). I will say that I am finding  a new love with all things that are colorful. I think it started when I discovered Lucy and her beautiful blog.  She even has a group of followers on Ravelry which is a sharing sight for knitting and crochet. She is quite a color celebrity!She also happens to live in England and I am obsessed with all things British so just reading her VERY English wording is a joy to me. They say "whilst" instead of "while".  Isn't that adorable? Another thing I have discovered on many of the English blogs is BUNTING. We call them banners, pennants,  or flags but I think bunting is a much cuter word. I found one pattern for bunting at Pink Milk and am looking for a simple flower pattern to go on each flag. I'm still playing around with it but I thought I would show what I have so far.

I am using my new yarn purchase and will be adding some warm tones to the flowers. You will see some yummy colors!

colors are a little washed out here

A truer representation of the colors

I am also in the process of cleaning off my back porch. I'll give you a peek of the material I am going to use to recover the cushions. This is a BIG project and deserves a post of its own but I will give a little peekaboo. COLOR!

I usually like solid backgrounds in furniture. I love this but it is definitely an OUTDOOR fabric. Come back and see the finished cushions and the CLEAN back porch.

I love that you take the time to stop by and see what's going on here, and I love recording things so I can look back and see the past.   

Galatians 5:22,23,25  "But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. Against such things there is no law...Since we live by the Spirit, let us keep in step with the Spirit."

Pulling Up Pansies

It is time to pull up my pansies for the summer. I planted them in October and they have been a bright spot of color in my yard for most of this winter. They curled up and hid on the coldest days but their perky little heads popped right up when the sun came out. It really grieves me to pull up blooming flowers but they are really ratty looking and I need to get the geraniums in the ground.

With our crazy hot weather here these babies would get fried! Sooo.... I started pulling.

Since I was pulling, I kept going with all the weeds!

All of the brown leaves are from our magnolia tree. It is so beautiful but it drops leaves all year long. I actually pulled weeds last week and they're back with a vengeance. The number one job this weekend is to get down a heavy layer of mulch! Here is why the magnolia tree is worth it.... behold....

 I really wish you could smell it! It is so sweet and a little lemony. MMMMM.... It's a nice place to work.

Right beside the Magnolia is the LAVENDER.

After all the pulling the weeds are gone.... for now.

 In April we had record breaking temps here and all most everyday was 80 deg. or above (that's 26.6 in Celsius) so the weeds are "growing like weeds". Tomorrow I'm heading to the garden center to get some HEAT and SUN loving plants to take their place.

In the wooded lot next to our house there is another heat lovin' weed that is actually welcome.
Blackberries. Way ahead of schedule this year.

Maybe a cobbler in a couple of weeks? My grandmother made a killer blackberry cobbler so I think I will try it. FYI - I HATE cooking. I really do. I see these awesome recipes on Pinterest and think " I should make that" but the fact is I don't WANT to.  I want to eat it, I'll clean up the dishes, but I want somebody else to cook it for me. If I am ever REALLY wealthy I will hire a CHEF. My poor son's future wife (if he ever finds her) will have no problem competing with my cooking. He was raised on take-out.

Y'all come back tomorrow and see my new yarn purchases. I am starting a new hooky project. I am in love! Thanks so much for visiting.

Cuteness

Last fall I found a baby rabbit. It was sitting in the street and was very small. I stopped- went over to it-  and just picked it up. I looked all around but could not find the momma or any other babies. It was a little squirmy so I wrapped it in my shirt and drove home. I didn't have a clue what to do with it. Is there anything CUTER than a baby rabbit?  Really?

See his tiny white patch of fur on his forehead?

I mean SERIOUSLY!!!

I went straight to the internet to do a little research. The bunny had a small white patch of fur on his forehead and I read that orphan rabbit babies are able to be released to the wild when the white patch is gone. So... I needed to  keep him until then. I went to the pet store and bought milk for kittens that need supplementing and a tiny bottle for that purpose. It looked perfect but was WAY to big. I switched to a small medicine dropper. Also, this bunny seemed to be a little, "not right". He was either injured or born without a good sense of direction because he hopped sideways ( I think the spinning is normal for escaping predators) . He looked a little loopy. CUTENESS!
 I am so sorry but this video won't play on my ipad or iphone (I don't know about Mac). It is worth watching on your PC

Don't worry. My dog, a 3 pound Yorkshire Terrier named Smokey, is 11 years old and has had all of his teeth removed (dental problems are common with small breeds and evidently I should have been brushing his teeth??) He is CUTENESS, too, but he HATES CAMERAS so I can never get a good picture of him because he runs when I get it out.  I only got this because the bunny was distracting him.
ALSO, my son and I are talking on this video and I realize how SOUTHERN we sound. We are from Tennessee!

Anyway...  I kept him for about 3 weeks and fed him with a medicine dropper until he started eating timothy grass very well and seemed to be okay (I was still giving him a little milk at this point) .  We have a wooded lot next to us which was a perfect bunny habitat so I thought I would try to release him.  Well he didn't go anywhere! And he looked way to little to be on his own (even though his little white patch was gone). So... BACK in the box he went for another 2 weeks.

 Don't you HATE hearing your voice recorded?! I DO!

The day came when I finally let him go with a large batch of timothy grass and he hopped into the woods and I never saw him again.  Until, THIS SPRING I saw a bunny in my front yard and he let me come up to him to take a few pictures. I am CONVINCED it was him.   

You can see the woods where he lives in the background

This photo is not zoomed. I just walked that close. Our local wild rabbits do NOT let you do that. He is back in the wild and seems to be doing well. The reality is that "wild things" need to be just that- WILD. We had him for about 4-5 weeks and he never became tame in any way. When I fed him I had to wrap him in a towel so he wouldn't jump away.  As much as I wanted to keep him he was definitely not PET material. For better or worse he had to make it on his own.  
"All good things are wild and free." Henry David Thoreau

PS  I will be posting some photos of my art room soon. It is coming along very well.

Thank you so much for visiting here today and I hope you enjoy the videos.

Feathering MY Nest

I knew it was going to be a big job.  I really didn't know HOW BIG! The art room is an average sized bedroom, but the mess was colossal, gargantuan, immense, mammoth, prodigious, supersized, WALLOPING!
Remember this?

PLEASE, DON'T JUDGE ME :-)

 I'm still amazed that I put pictures of it on the internet and into blog wonderland. I can say I have worked on the mess for a solid week and I have made a lot of progress. I'm not there yet, but today I started getting excited! I have seen some people who work with wool put out their colorful scraps for the birds to use for nesting. A multihued "FEATHERING OF THE NEST". I am doing the same in MY nest- my ART ROOM. Ohhhh it makes me so ... happy!
       I have always loved decorating any/everything. Adorning, decorating, prettifying, EMBELLISHING. I start to feel like a bee that has been visiting so many flowers that it is satiated and drowsy. It is so much better than the sleepy, drowsy state that keeps me planted on the couch--- not a good kind of drowsy.   SO,  let the great sort begin...

I am NOT showing you the piles of stuff that went to the local trash site or the piles that went to a charity shop. I AM showing the warm-fuzzy color that lifts me up when I walk in the new and improved art room.
TURQUOISE!

Not the true color here (bad light)

 It is like being inside a robin's egg.

I have a long way to go but for the first time I am actually delighted to be in this space. My husband keeps coming upstairs to see what's going on - FEATHERING!  Stay tuned for the next progress report....

Thank you so much for visiting and I love hearing from you!
 xoxoxoxoxoxoxox's

Philippians 4:4-6 "Always be full of joy in the Lord. I say it again- rejoice. Let everyone see that you are considerate in all you do. Remember, the Lord is coming soon. Don't worry about anything; instead, pray about everything. Tell God what you need, and thank him for all he has done."