Summer windchime!

A few posts ago, I indicated that I would be making a wind chime from pot lids and silverware. I finally got down to business and here it is. I opted not to use the large spoon, but will save it for another project. When the breezes blow, the silver pieces make a delicate little chime. Hanging outside my kitchen, it reflects my love for old things and I have re-purposed something!!! Thank you to my friend who brought hers to me to use as a model. With the dog days of summer upon us, we are taking every opportunity to work out of doors in the yard. A split-rail fence is now being constructed in the back yard and a small section, purely decorative, will find residence in the front of the house. We have planted numerous bushes and trees, mostly of the small, cheap, beg, borrow and steal type. (that's me--cheap, cheap or as I prefer, thrifty!) Usually with a lot of luck, we have success! We are looking forward to visits this summer from friends and family and perhaps a few day trips with the furkids and a picnic lunch or two. The weather has been wonderful and my flowers are in full bloom. I will be posting pics, but it is always difficult for me to get to the computer when mother nature is so kind!!!

The Amen! of nature is always a flower. ~ Oliver Wendell Holmes

Summer

Feed me! Feed me! Look at those little babies waiting for more lunch. Mom and Dad are very diligent and when our weather was so wet, Mom kept the babies warm. There are 3 little hatchlings in the nest and the way they are starting to flap their wings, I hope they don't fall out.

The Mr. and I have been very busy, finishing the den flooring, planting...we put in a silver poplar, two barberries, two yucca, a Russian sage and a sand cherry.

These are the cakes I made and we delivered to Rawlins last week in the rain. The celebration was to be held out of doors in a beautiful yard, but alas, people crowded in doors. In spite of the weather, there were so many people who came to share in the celebration of 50 years of wedded bliss by one of my BFF and her wonderful husband. It was so good to see so many of our old friends and there were about twice as many as first estimated. Nearly 150 people came.
So with summer officially arriving in a few hours, and Father's day also on the horizon, it is finally beginning to seem that winter has given up.

Mom nature

Good ol' mother nature never ceases to amaze me. We have had such a long winter...and snow up until 3 weeks ago. Suddenly everything is blooming as if to catch up. We literally went from freezing to 80 degrees. The rhubarb above is from my mother's plants. I have carefully moved it to a new home whenever we moved for the last 30 years. I have shared it with others and left it in gardens to be nurtured by new occupants and always kept a piece for me. It is the best deep red rhubarb!! Like all gardeners, I watch for buds and cut them off so that the energy needed to produce is not wasted on flowers which go to seed. For some reason this plant has done nothing but try to bloom despite my efforts to encourage it to do otherwise. I discovered this pretty little flower hiding deep within the center of the plant. Since my lilacs for the most part froze...I was delighted to see how pretty this flower was. (I did however pluck it from it's mother plant shortly after I took the picture.) Below, is another of mother natures wonders. I found the plans for this robin box which we mounted on a dead aspen just outside our window last spring, but alas, it was too late for nesting I guess. I dutifully watched every day this spring for signs of a robin and when I was not looking, the Mr. informed me we had a nest. She has been sitting on eggs for a couple of weeks now and the male robin has begun to take his post on a branch above the nest when she leaves to feed or take a bath in the birdbath I provided for her.
We don't want to disturb her too much, so this picture was taken through our window and screen. But you can see what a wonderful view we will have of the babies when they hatch.

"Look deep, deep into nature, and then you will understand everything better." ~ Albert Einstein

Before and after

As you can see the first picture is the "before" and the second is the "after". We discovered broken floor tiles also, and of course couldn't match the old ones, so we decided to put a "tile rug" down. Nothing has been grouted yet, but that should be tomorrow. Since we really weren't planning this repair, we didn't tear everything out. Eventually, we will have to do that. I put in bedding plants today. My neighbor and I found some really good plants for cheap and I am known to be a cheapskate. I have also been working on a quilt repair which was not going well for me, but is now done. I did get to go to Denver with a couple of dear friends on Saturday and visited an elderly cousin. It pains me to see everyone getting so old. She has gotten frail, but still retains a good sense of humor. This is just a catch-up blog and I hope to get back to some "fun" things.

More bath blog

Not to bore you all too much, but after all, this is what we do! Tile is going on after the drywall was replaced with the wonder board and the holes were filled and primed!! Yeah!
We had ten inches of snow a couple of days ago, it is raining cats and dogs as I type and tomorrow there are two big plant sales taking place down at the botanical gardens and the depot. I don't know if I am in the mood to get plants yet although by this time, I usually have some bedding plants in the soil. We have had freezing weather this week at night. Summer, summer where are you? (Still in the bathroom I bet!)

Bathroom renovation

Just a quick post for my "friends" who follow our flipping processes. As you can see from the bottom picture, all that was holding the tile on the wall, was the paper from the drywall and the grout! There was NO drywall behind the area around the spout. This is our main bathroom and for those who don't know this story, one of the tiles seemed a little loose, so in exploring the reason, we found that the drywall had dissolved as a result of a prior leak. Unable to get all of the tile in that area off without breaking them has forced us to totally re-tile the area and more pictures will be posted. This is our 3rd bathroom renovation this year! The Mr. has become quite an expert!

Happy Mother's Day

Happy Mother's Day to all mothers....even if your children have 4 legs. For some....those little fur babies are their children! My mother has passed on to another life, but I do remember that our Dad always made it a special day. Dad would take us to the drug store in the neighboring town and we could pick out a box of candy which we proudly presented to her, knowing very well that we would get the better portion of the box of chocolates. Even though life was a struggle for our parents, Dad loved our mother and us very much and we always knew that we were loved. There was never money for luxuries, only necessities and then not always. I remember Mother wearing a pair of shoes and seeing the soles "flopping" loose when she walked. She sacrificed a lot for us, but there were a lot of people then like us, struggling to make a good life. Mother had a very difficult childhood from what we know now, having a mother who had come to the states from Belgium and a father who had been murdered when she was a small child. The life Dad provided for her was so much better than what she had known growing up. She continued to struggle with some issues from her past I know...but Dad was her pillar of strength.
As her oldest and firstborn, I think my birth was the easiest for her, but my other 3 siblings were all difficult births, each having serious complications. She stayed strong (that is what mothers do) with the support of our Dad and we all survived with happy childhood memories. However he managed it, Dad would load us up on these special days and take "Mom" out to dinner which was a treat for all. I cherish the "good time" memories with Mom, and there were so many! Mom's come in all shapes and sizes but it is one of the most difficult and rewarding jobs of all!

"Of course I can do anything. I'm a mother." ~ unknown