Read S'more books!

Our library's Reading Program theme is 'Read S'more Books'.  The decor is camping, the kids get to put paper s'mores on a big board when they bring books back and once a week when they return books they get a s'more to take home.  Here is Middle Sister thoroughly enjoying her first one!

Vanilla Ice Cream

Why is it that someone can make, say, Mocha Almond Fudge ice cream every time they get the freezer out and no one finds it a bit remarkable.  Someone who always makes their ice cream with fuit in it - no one says a word.  But make vanilla a few times and they label you boring and uninteresting and you never hear the end of it!!!  They always have to comment on the fact that it is 'just' vanilla.

There are some little females, besides the one male, in this household that don't seem to mind the 'always' vanilla. (I do have to insert here that we DID make oreo ice cream just last weekend)

What you see in these photos, however, IS indeed, vanilla. 

And it was delicious.  Think about it - with vanilla, you can top it with any fruit you choose - sometimes we choose several fresh fruits!  You can add any flavor ice cream topping you want - caramel, chocolate, butterscotch, peanut butter, etc.  Leftover vanilla can be turned into any kind of shake you desire.  The possibilities are endless.  Make a flavored ice cream and you have - a flavored ice cream.  A whole ice cream freezer of it.  And you can't really change that flavor until it's gone and you whip up a new batch.  Vanilla isn't boring or common, it is versatile and oh so much fun to play with and dress up.  So next time you think vanilla is 'just' vanilla - think again, and get out the fresh fruit!!!!

More Vintage Sewing Notions

I have been needing a couple of things at Smith's and had also seen and heard about the cool vintage stuff they had for sale there.  So today I made the trip over to Arcanum and loaded up!  Talk about Seamstress heaven - this was it if you like all things vintage:)
All that seam vintage seam binding -120 unopened packages of it-$10.  Those huge rolls of lace seam binding? $1 each.  And I now have my first red tomato pin cushion!!  Brings my pin cushion collection up to 5.  Too bad they didn't have any vintage scissors.  There are tons of old buttons there, I'm thinking about calling them and asking what they want for the whole lot of them.
Anyway, I came home a happy girl today.  And I had beautiful new baskets from McMaster and Storm to organize it all in.  I highly recommend these baskets.

More Garage Sale finds

Not much gets me out of bed early enough on a Saturday morning to go somewhere at 8:00.  Or any morning for that matter!!!  But when there is a garage sale listed that has fabric and sewing notions and it's just across town - well you can bet I'll be there:)

I was a little after 8, maybe 15 minutes or so, but don't ya know a sweet friend of mine was there ahead of me and grabbed some fun stuff for me as others were snatching things right and left!!  I ended up with a large bag of goodies to take home:)

Love the packaging on this elastic - it's the old bendable metal.

Fun red buttons

Red white and blue:)

I just love the cards these buttons are on.  Gotta come up with a cute way to use these.

puffy satin letters

Large wooden buttons  fun fun!!

old tools used to put in grommets and snaps, jar of grommets and some iron-on dots.

Iron-ons.  My girls want some shirts with these on them.  Can you see how the eyes move when you move the object?  How vintage!

Bright, vintage fabric

More iron-ons.  Girls want these too:)

vintage lace seam binding. This is the best to fancy up a gift

lots of leaves, florist stems and tape.  girls took off with the ribbon and I haven't seen it since.

Some of the stuff that came out of the bag of leftover scraps from making clothes for plays/pageants.  The Sisters took off with all of that too.  I now see small pieces everywhere.  Must get the sweeper out soon.

Big Sister decorated the living room like this.  They were having a party.  She somehow forgot though, that when the party is over you have to clean up.  Guess what the sisters will be doing tomorrow afternoon??

Little Sister wanted her picture taken.  And since I think she is a cutie I obliged her.

And just a sneak peek of what else was going on around here today.  More to come when I can post pics from beginning to end:)

Unfortunately...

...the time has come to enable the comment moderation option for my blog.  I didn't want to have to do this but I feel it best at this time.  I prefer to see my own comments on other blogs appear immediately and have left mine the same.  But because of an increasing number of unfavorable comments that lead to trashy sites I am making this decision to protect my readers.  I've been deleting the comments in the past but I'm busy and don't always catch them right away, and they have been getting more and more frequent.  So, for now anyway, comment moderation is on.

I did it again...

UPDATE:  What do you think I should do with the chair?  Slipcover?  Been there, done that.  I'm thinking of trying my hand at reupholstering it.  I mean, really, why not??  What do you think???

...I hauled home another old chair.  I just can't resist!  Especially when the price is right - this one was $10 and it is a heavy, old, well-made chair.  Travis even likes it!  I emailed him at work and told him I went to a couple garage sales and he would be just delighted with what I brought home:)  His response: 'If it needs worked on I might get to it by 2012.' !!!! He is just a tad bit overwhelmed with projects right now and I informed him that I wouldn't do that to him.

Really liking this old metal can.  I've got an idea for our 4th of July party.  If it all comes together I will show you in a couple of weeks:)

'The Sisters' found some old dress gloves and wooden bowls that they HAD to have.  No idea where they get a trait like that.

I have an ongoing love for old picture frames, and I found a pile of them today:)  So fun to find them cheap - I paid $7.10 for all of these together.

Big Sister found this box.  She wants to use it to pretend it is Josephina(one of her American Girls dolls) treasure box.  After we got it she discovered that it says 'Haiti' on the top.

And a couple tiny old bottles.  The one on the left says 'Little Boy Blue' around the top in raised letters.

Chairs from the Flea.

The green chairs I bought at the Springfield Flea are now red.  I bet you are shocked!!
So this is my porch look for now.  Not totally into the look but it works for now!  I'd like to get a table sometime but the bench works and I already had.  I would like to at least paint it white but I've been a bit lazy about getting to it.  A little sewing has kept me busy enough I guess.  I think I am going to take a book and go relax in this spot for awhile tonight:)

Buy your flowers at Sink's 'Secret Garden'!!

Just a couple posts ago I posted this picture of one of the petunias I planted this spring.  A few years ago we started buying our flowers from Sinks near Pleasant Hill and I refuse to buy them anywhere else now!  I get the same results every time.  One plant sold in a 3 or 4 inch pot (I can't remember the size for sure)

here is the the newly planted pot in the beginning of May when it was first planted...

...and here is what it looked like today when I was out taking pictures. Same single plant, same pot. pot? what pot? there is a pot under that??? LOVE LOVE LOVE the way these flowers grow:) And all they ask of me is some watering every day:) (I also buy my potting soil from Sinks - it's the best!)

Another single plant in another pot. This pot isn't quite as big but still I think it's just as amazing how this thing is growing! So next year - BUY YOUR FLOWERS AND POTTING SOIL AT SINKS! (I really should get a discount for the advertising don't ya think;)

Landscaping project finally finished!

You might remember this picture from an earlier post?  Can you see the pot of flowers clear down at the end of the row of boxwood?  It and it's sister were put there 'for the time being' till I could purchase what I really wanted there.  The flower you can barely see in this photo is WAY bigger now.  But that is another post, coming soon.

So, what I wanted on either side of my walk was urns.  I looked at some really cute ones at the Springfield flea, but the price was a little more than I was willing to shell out. So...I kept looking. Then a friend called to say she was in town and had found some but they only had one in brown and one in grey. So I told another friend to keep her eye out for me and voila!!! She found them! Thanks Kara!

So they were bought and hauled home and there they sat for a few weeks.

I have been blessed with a hard working perfectionist husband:)  Before the urns could be placed where I wanted them, he poured a couple concrete bases and glued old bricks to the top to give the urns a flat, level surface.  And it does look wonderful if I do say so myself.  Thanks honey, I love you sooooo much:)

Measure and level...

pull it up, add more dirt...

a little glue...

and there you have it!

I am VERY happy with it:)

'

One for each side