Here are some pictures of my new garden. I have flowers, herbs and veggies.  We planted 6 tomato plants, crookneck squash, rosemary, parsley, lavander, dianthus, and a few others. I still want to plant sage, cucumbers, and beans. Oh! And I think some basil. It should be really good. I still need to mulch, but that is all that I have left. I will do a little of that today, but I am still trying to stay out of the sun so it won't be until this evening. I will let you know how it turns out. I hope it works really good, but we shall see. Have a great Tuesday!!  

Yeah!! It only took... FOREVER!!!! I have been wanting to use this for quite a while. After a frantic search for the missing laundry rope, and my triumphant discovery, our first load is up. Yes, you have my permission to think me a strange cookie, but if we all tasted the same... where would the variety be? I want to plant something near the laundry line and against the house, but have no idea what. I have thought of lavender, but wonder about the bees. Anyone have any ideas?? 

I am just glad that is one more thing I can cross off my list!! :) Now I only have 3 or 4 more loads to do..... and that is just for today....




I finally got everything in the garden, now I just need to figure out what all I want in there. I know I want climbers that can climb on the chain link fence and I want it to be organic, so I will be researching companion planting a lot this week. I put in 3 marigolds already, and I know I want tomatoes, pole beans, bush beans, nasturtium, cabbage, lettuce, chives, basil, squash and egg plant (if I can manage them) but I make no absolute promises. I just know this will be a lot of fun. Really it depends on what started plants I can find around here. I waited too long to start a lot of it from seed. Next year it should all be from seed. Anyway, here is how it look planted with only 3 marigolds. Next weekend it should be fully planted. Now if I could just stop getting sunburns on top of my sunburns.... ;)

I get to string the clothesline today. I am really excited about this. Very Betty Homemaker of me, I know. That's ok cause I am a Betty Homemaker.... except I am a Kelly Homemaker. Why is it always a put down to refer to someone as a homemaker? Aren't our fondest memories frequently of someone who made a lovely home? Anyway.... lots of stuff to get done today. All this gardening and you now have to wade through my house. Oh well.... ;) Have a great weekend!!!


It was supposed to be so easy. And it is, really. The hardest part was digging in the wood border. Unfortunately, I thought I had enough dirt and compost. Haha!! Not quite. So today I have to go and get about another 12 bags of top soil and 6 bags of compost. At least I have enough peat moss. :) Here she lies so far. She is 18x6. Much bigger than in my mind. I am really bad about size. Still, it should be a lot of fun. I had better be going. I hafta get to Lowe's to buy more dirt and poop (my kids think that is crazy!!). Have a great day!! :)




This week has been crazy busy. I have not officially gotten over my first sunburn, but added to it yesterday by working on a lasagna garden. Yup, you guessed it. I was peeling last night. I have to chase my kids away from my neck... they won't leave me alone!! :) A lasagna garden is where you don't have to dig out the turf or rototill, you layer on right over the grass... newspaper, top soil, compost, sphagnum moss, other soil amendments. I haven't built a bed around here is a while because the old way is just too laborious for me. I can't throw my back out, I have the kids to take care of. I have heard nothing but good things about lasagna gardening, so we are setting one up for our vegetable garden. I will wait to plant until next weekend, or next week depending on rain. Frankly, I am tired and burnt. But we got the poles for the clothesline installed and most of the garden done. I only have about 12 more bags of top soil and 9 bags of compost to add. Plus the moss. Not bad though. It should go pretty fast. Certainly faster than the old school method. If this works, I will be doing beds all around my house this fall. So exciting....

Big news!! Michael sat in the wooden high chair for the first time this week!! Part of me is very sad and the other is very proud. He is the happiest baby ever. He smiles like the sun unless he is sick. Chloe is potty training. It started out REALLY rocky, but she has been in only panties the last two days with no accidents. She has only worn diapers at night and this morning she woke up dry, removed her diaper, put on her panties and went to the bathroom and went potty. I am one super proud Momma today. :) She sweetly requested a surprise for all her hard work. In a hushed whisper, she informed me she would like to be surprised with Burger KIng for lunch. It is the first time she has specified what she wants for her surprise. Kinda funny, me thinks!! :0 )
So, I will post pictures later today or tomorrow morning with the finished bed. Some pretty good Earth Day projects I think. I hope everyone is doing really well and had a wonderful last week!! I will try not to be gone so long this week.... 

One bed down!!!!
















I finally got to one of the beds!! I didn't dig it up like I originally planned. I don't think it really needed it. I removed the gardenias. They never really bloomed. I would only get maybe 5 or 6 blooms. This spring they turned brown and yellow. I gave up. It was a beast to pull the out of the ground. For dead plants, they sure had a great root system. I was, however, the triumphant party.The boxwood by the japanese maple will be trimmed down into a small ball. I put a bird bath where one of the gardenias was and the other gardenia was replaced with a plant of unknown origin. Actually, I had the plant tag, but it has mysteriously disappeared and nobody knows anything about it. It is a form of ligustrum (maybe I spelled it right...) that should grow 7 feet tall and 4 feet wide. I also planted a little princess spirea (spiraea japonica 'Little Princess') and a variegated weigela (weigela florida 'variegata'). I will have to post pictures for those later. 
I had several helpers. Faith and Gabe have decided they want an allowance, so I told them we would pay them for doing things that are helpful to other people. I won't pay them to keep their rooms clean, they are required to do that. They are really excited and are very motivated and helpful kids right now. Of course, I keep hearing the question "How much do I get for that?".  They definitely earned their money today. I am very sunburnt right now, and my neck is very hot. It is a good thing I am used to sunburns or this would be pretty awful. 
Anyway, I hope that everyone is having a great Friday and have a wonderful weekend!! I will post more garden pictures tomorrow. We have a bbq to do now!! :) 

Have you ever felt like this? i am feeling so very restless today. If I had a bucket of paint today, I would feel so much better. Alas, it is not to be. I have the paint, but it is too humid to paint. With 5 kids, you have to really watch the humidity. If it takes too long to dry, well... you pretty much just set yourself up. My kids love to help decorate the cabinets. Crayons, markers, pens.... nothing is too creative for them. In the next coupla weeks we will be painting the cabinets. The only problem is we plan on moving in the next year or two. Should I go for the red anyway? It might hurt resale. I love the idea of black, but it might make the kitchen too dark. I just need to remember that it is only paint. If I need to repaint it before the selling of the house, then I do. No biggie there.It would probably be better to do it white for resale anyway. White, for me, is not really a color choice. At least not for now. Not with them as artistically inclined as they are. Maybe I should give in and paint them with chalkboard paint. Haha!! Boy would that be a great selling point!! :) We have lots of plans for this weekend, so I will be posting a lot more this weekend. Until then, my dears....;) 


I love Easter. It is such a relaxed holiday, with some of the deepest meaning. Without it, there would be no point to living at all. In fact, when you think about it.... Easter in every way means life. Without the death of Jesus, there would be no life. Yet, we would have no life had he not come back again. Not a snowballs chance in, well... you know. I know in this country, we tend to casually refer to the crucifixion, death and burial. When you stop to concentrate on what he truly must have felt, it becomes consumingly overwhelming. The first time I had even an inkling of the suffering of Christ was when I watched the movie, "The Passion of the Christ". I had never really thought about all the pain Jesus must have felt those last days of his life. Going through all the torture and then hearing one of his own disciples disown Him must have been so devastatingly painful. I have heard it said that when you are emotionally upset, it magnifies the pain. The intense emotional pain He was suffering would have been far more than I know I could ever bear. I thank Him every day for doing that for me. I know had it been left to me, well... we would all be up a creek of... you know... without a paddle. Thank you God for being perfect!! And thank you for loving me and accepting me even though I am so imperfect and worthless. Your worth gives me mine.

HAPPY EASTER!!!!!!

I won this the other day from Debra at the Bunny's Bungalow!! It is stunningly adorable!! I would never have come up with this idea in a million years.... and it is wonderful!! We decided it would be fun to put over one of the bunnies, and then my three year old pretended he was in jail for being a bad bunny. Too funny!

Thank you so much, Debra!! This is such a neat treasure!
There has been a lot of severe
weather in the area today. A lot of tornadoes and some serious lightning. We even got some baseball sized hail. Luckily it didn't break any windows or damage the cars. It sure did make a lo
t of noise!! The neighbors must have thought I was crazy running out there trying to get some of t
he hail for the kids to see. After a while,
other parents went out to scoop some
up for their kids, too. Yeah! I am not the neighborhood idiot!! :)
I hope that everyone has a safe and blessed Easter! And go to the Bunny's Bungalow and check out all the great ideas that Debra comes up with. She is a very creative and talented lady!!




Thank you Dixie for hosting wordless wednesday!! Check out http://frenchlique.blogspot.com/ to join in or to see other photos!! :)






I wasn't sure what to title today's post. So I asked my daughter, Chloe, what to call it. She said:"polka dots". So I went with it.

I love polka dots. It may make me seem like I am 12 forever, and I am totally ok with that. I promise not to be an old woman trying to wear a mini-skirt... but I will be that old woman wearing polka dots. They just make me smile. :)
Our footstool was originally pink. I have no problem with pink, but it was old and dirty. No matter how much I cleaned it, it wouldn't perk up. So we covered it. The cheap, easy way. With a yard of discount fabric and staples. You can get really nice fabric in the discount bin, especially when you don't need much. I only needed a yard, so everything was good.
We have had it covered with the stars and stripes for the 4th, red and green plaid for Christmas... brown pattered for Thanksgiving... fall leaves.... you name it! Well, I finally gave in to my polka dot fever. I asked my Hunny to recover the footstool in red and white polka dots and he did!! He is so much better at stuff like that than I am!! I think it looks so fun now. I am just not sure what color to paint the legs now.... note the large and lovely display of discarded shoes. I have a rather lovely collection of them. They just seem to pop up everywhere!! I think they add that little extra oomph to the picture... don't you think??
So, what color should I paint the legs? I was thinking white, but am afraid it might be too summery. Black is another option... but then so is red. I am so schizophrenic when it comes to paint. I am still trying to paint my kitchen cabinets. Layla from the Lettered Cottage has black cabinets which I just love. Kim at One Woman's Cottage Life has beautiful red cabinets. I want them both, darn it!! Maybe I will post a picture of my awful looking kitchen and everyone can help me decide. My kitchen has a great layout, but it is ugly right now. Once I paint it will be so much better. I tried to use a tropical foliage green, but it didn't work like I had in my head. Thankfully it was only paint. :) Now I just am totally immobilized with indecision! Aurgh!!
I hope everyone has a wonderful Tuesday!!
TTFN!!

Grill recipes

I am joining a grill party over at Poofing the Pillows. I love to grill. I think anything can be grilled. Even pizza. One of the ideas I really want to start making more of is grilled dessert. I found this recipe a while ago and plan on trying it out on Sunday. I try to make Sundays relaxed, so if I could manage to cook everything outdoors... well... that's a good thing.


Pound Cake with Grilled Pears and Caramel-Rum Sauce


1/2 cup granulated sugar
1/2 cup heavy cream
1/4 cup unsalted butter
1/4 cup dark rum
4 fresh pears, cored and quartered
Powdered sugar
4 slices pound cake, cut 2 inches thick
Whipped cream (optional)
Fresh mint (optional)

Place the sugar in a non-reactive pan and caramelise over medium heat. When it liquefies and is dark brown in colour, add the cream and reduce heat. Add the butter and rum. Stir until butter is melted; set mixture aside.

Dust pears with powdered sugar and place in centre of cooking grate. Grill pears 10 to 15 minutes, until tender, turning once halfway through grilling time.

Sprinkle each slice of pound cake with powdered sugar; tap off any excess. Place cake slices in centre of cooking grate. Grill 2 minutes, turning once halfway through grilling time. Transfer to warming rack and continue grilling for about 2 minutes to warm through.

Cut cake slices in half on an angle. To serve, cross each half piece with the other half on a serving plate. Arrange pears around cake and drizzle with caramel sauce. Garnish with whipped cream and mint, if desired.

Makes 4 servings.

Thanks to www.weber.com


Camping also gave me several ideas for grilling or cooking over an open fire. I really enjoy the flavor of vegetables, any, wrapped in foil and slow cooked over the fire. Add a little butter and it is delicious. There is just such a nice, smoky flavor with dishes cooked over the fire.

I am really looking forward to reading everyone else's recipes. Grilling season is a comin'!! Yippee!! :)









I admit. I took pictures outside yesterday for today since the weather was so awful yesterday. When I saw awful, I mean HORRIBLE. I had to take Gabe to the allergist, one of our friends is an ENT, and it was already lightly raining when we left. Yet, my cell phone was set at emergency calls only. So strange. OK, well we have to go pick up pizza on the way home so we went to do that. Little did I know that the cell issue was a foreshadowing of what was to come. It was only lightly raining when I went inside, so I told Gabe to stay in the van and I would be right back out. I was inside for about 5 minutes. When I opened the door, the wind was so strong it slammed the door back on me. I had to fight it to keep it open so I could go out with the pizzas, while holding the pizza as tight as I could so they wouldn't blow away. I was parked right in front of the store, yet I was completely drenched by the time I got in the van. On the way home, I was worried the wind would blow the van over on it's side. It got so heavy that you couldn't see in front of you. It was way worse than the tulle fog in California's central valley. On a good note, I don't have to water my plants!! :) Oh, lightning also struck somewhere around our house. The streets totally flooded and we almost didn't make it home. Still, I don't have to water my plants. And when I finally get to weed, it should be easy. I think they said we were getting about an inch of rain every 10 minutes. Oh, how fun it was. My weeping willow tree is loving all this rain, though. :) I took a few pictures of some of our plants (most need to be moved or replaced... I am just having trouble getting motivated...:) that I thought were looking nice. My rosemary is doing so well. I haven't done much for her, but she loves where I put her I guess. She is perfect all year long and has lovely blue flowers right now. She is also very useful for the kitchen. I have lots of visitors requesting some of her for their cooking in the fall. Next to her is an azalea with lovely pink flowers. I think I will need to transplant her. I want her to be bigger so I may plant her in a berm... burm... whatever. The kids helped me with a planter. It is small right now but it should be really nice in a month or so. They were so proud so I placed it by the front door so everyone would see it. This other one is of a japanese maple that I think I will have to transplant. He is growing much bigger than they said. Such a beautiful tree... This won't let me move my pictures or anything!! Oh frustration!!


I had to go to the grocery store yesterday. I was so not motivated to go. So, I decided to go to Aldi's. I am always motivated to go there. Why? Because the downtown rescue mission is right across the street. It used to be, and sometimes still is, my favorite thrift store. I would say used to be because their prices have gone up so much. Seriously, I shouldn't be able to go to WalMart or Target and spend the same amount of money or less. I can still get better deals at garage sales and estate sales so I will make sure I save time every Saturday morning. As a SAH mom who homeschools, I think I should be given a few hours every Saturday morning. I love the terra cotta bunnies. And I am not positive what the "red thing" is, but I plan on hanging tea cups off it. We also found an old blue apron that my 3 year old went crazy for. She has to wear it a lot right now. She was not pleased that I washed it before letting her play with it. That's ok. Her attention span is pretty short. :) I hope everyone is having a wonderful Thursday. We are supposed to have more bad weather today, so I hope everyone stays safe. If it isn't tornados then it is snow. I love spring, but the confusing weather is a bit... well... confusing!! :) TTFN!!




I just love Bunny on a stick!! My son Gabe went with me to Pier 1 and we just thought they were the cutest thing. And soft. So, of course, I had to put them where they can't rub them all the time...

I put these on the table.... but where I can watch them. We like the way it looks like the bunnies are chasing each other!! :) The other one is guarding a plant.... let's see if I can get this to post where it is supposed to... nope!! It won't do it. Oh well!! We love our bunnies!! And I don't have to clean up after them... or feed them... just enjoy them. It makes it more fun for the kids, too! The love animals being around the house. I think we will need to get some frogs soon. Maybe one of those piggies that I see in lots of kitchens. I know my kids would love that!! :) Check out more on Grits n Glamour!! There are some very creative people out there!! And... who doesn't want to see more BUNNIES!!!???