Happy Memorial Day!

Something I Love: I've said it before but I will say it again, thank you men and women in our military we very much appreciate your sacrifice and your families sacrifice in sharing you with us. Did you know Memorial Day was originally called Decoration Day? Well, you do now. Then and now it serves as a day of remembrance for those who have died in our nation's service.

I love getting a poppy to wear or keep in my car on this weekend. In 1915, inspired by the poem "In Flanders Fields," Moina Michael replied with her own poem: 

We cherish too, the Poppy red That grows on fields where valor led, It seems to signal to the skies That blood of heroes never dies.

She then conceived of an idea to wear red poppies on Memorial day in honor of those who died serving the nation during war. She was the first to wear one, and sold poppies to her friends and co-workers with the money going to benefit servicemen in need. Later a Madam Guerin from France was visiting the United States and learned of this new custom started by Ms.Michael and when she returned to France, made artificial red poppies to raise money for war orphaned children and widowed women. This tradition spread to other countries. In 1921, the Franco-American Children's League sold poppies nationally to benefit war orphans of France and Belgium. The League disbanded a year later and Madam Guerin approached the VFW for help. Shortly before Memorial Day in 1922 the VFW became the first veterans' organization to nationally sell poppies. Two years later their "Buddy" Poppy program was selling artificial poppies made by disabled veterans. In 1948 the US Post Office honored Ms Michael for her role in founding the National Poppy movement by issuing a red 3 cent postage stamp with her likeness on it. {Source} 

{Source}

Finally, please enjoy a burger today as it is National Hamburger Day!! Check out some interesting burger recipes at my friend Amanda's Beef Daily Blog.

Oh wait, here is my final thing...grab some kleenex and go to Pioneer Woman's photography section and check out all the amazing photos in the contest titled, "Coming home." It will move you, I promise.

Wordless Wednesday via Thursday

Weddings & Showers

Something I Love: Wedding season. It's true, I do love a good wedding to attend or bridal shower especially when it's for people I love. This weekend was no different as I carry on through the 2010 wedding season. Saturday night my good friend from college Erin got married in her parents yard. They have a beautiful home and large open yard area right in the middle of one of their farm fields. The bride was gorgeous and other than the wind and it getting a tad chilly for a May Yuma night it was a delight. Here are some highlights...

The candy bar! My dearest Holly will be having one at her wedding in 2 weeks so I had to snap a picture of this. Please note she is a nurse and he is a firefighter so their cookies match that...adorable:)

My dear friend Erin and her hubby Jason cutting their cake. Isn't she just a doll?!

They had fireworks!! They opted for strings of lights, chinese lanterns, and the stars in the sky annnddd surprised us all with a wonderful little show!

Then Sunday took me to one of my best friends bridal showers in Globe {eastern az}. I am truly honored to stand next to her as she receives the sacrament of marriage.

The bride and me. Please ignore my unruly hair it was a tad windy there as well.

Mattie's sister Hillary and her mama threw a wonderful afternoon shower in their garden. They had an amazing iced tea and italian soda bar {an idea I will use at a future partay} that consisted of mint ice cubes, lemon ice cubes and regular cubes should you think the others would get too overpowering; you could make your italian soda from raspberry, mango or peach flavoring. I seriously was in love. I started with a raspberry italian soda {we got to mix them ourselves and make exactly as we wished} then I moved on to iced tea but stuck with mint and lemon cubes and really enjoyed the flavor it brought to the tea.

The lemon cubes top left and mint below. The seltzer water {or whatever you use in italian sodas are wrapped in pink}

They had wonderful little tea sandwiches {5 different kinds} and fresh fruit. Hillary made some of the bread seen below...

They also had a cake for dessert that was known as "Kathy's rum cake" I believe and is somewhat famous for being at bridal showers...I had a wonderful time and cannot wait for her big day in July!!

Wordless Wednesday

*I'm copying some other friends who do this...I'm excited to participate!*

DIY...My Hutch

Something I Love: When me and the hubbs were engaged and he was moving into our home we were blessed with many gifts and "donations" to our home, mainly furniture. One of them is a hutch that was his grandmothers {his mom's mom} that had spent the last several years in his aunt and uncle's house but they were done with it. So we took it and decided to love it. My husband was very excited because this was the place in his Nonie's house where she would keep the candy in one drawer, he immediately requested that we do the same. I asked if he minded if I painted it and he said no so I went on a little DIY adventure...

Shoot me because I do not have a "before picture" whoops. But I do have some midway pictures...imagine it with white knobs and just your standard brown wood-pretty but not enough oomph for me. I began by "trying" to sand it...I thought that's what I was supposed to do before I painted. It didn't really need it though so I omitted that step. I painted it red...

Then I painted a layer of crackle on it...and over that with black. {I confess I was VERY nervous about using black paint...it seems very irreversible but I did not like the idea of brown and red and knew I wanted red...nonetheless I was very pleased with the outcome}

Next came a nice layer of polyutherene to seal it...

The drawers up close...I bought new hardware at target. Simple little knobs.

And here is my finished product in my house. I absolutely love it. I love that it was the hubby's Nonie's, I love that it was handmade for her and now passed to us and has it's own little flair for our home.

And one final up close...

Please ignore the dust:) 

Oh and I painted the hutch before I bought my dining room table and chairs, it just worked perfectly to get red chairs. The dining room/area is seriously one of if not my favorite part of our house.

Heaven on Earth

Recipe: WOW.Get ready for bliss. This recipe right here is straight up heaven on earth. I would have taken pictures if it wasn't a big rush...as I always am. Here are the deets of it all...I made them Thursday evening in a rush because I wanted to get them in the oven before I made bruschetta for a church potluck {perfect grape tomato/basil spread and an out of the box artichoke heart/orange bell pepper spread--again no pictures! I'm firing myself from blogging...}

Anyway, if you have never visited Bakerella I suggest you do so...and fast! She has an amazing array of baked goods and is extremely talented. The recipe I just did are called Congo bars - I guess. But I feel like they need another name...to me "Congo Bars" just sounds like something a gorilla made and I am certain angels had a hand in creating these. Here is an excerpt from her blog, "They’re cookies. They’re brownies. They’re brookies. Whatever you want to call them they’re good. They combine the taste of a chocolate chip cookie and with the texture of a moist brownie. The best of both worlds. Actually, they do have a name. They’re called Congo Bars."

I adapted the recipe a tad and used dark chocolate chips {based on a recommendation from a friend at work who ONLY uses dark chocolate chips--I may be converting to her ways, except my husband says he can tell when they are dark chips and he doesn't like it...we will be having a blind taste test shortly-and yes, I will take pictures} and I added a bag of Heath Bar toffee chips. I DID follow the recommendation to hand mix since she said they were better that way. 

I left some with my husband as I headed to San Diego for a bachelorette partay/girls weekend and took the rest with us. I feel like I had a real vacation this weekend and this is what did it...

our view from our condo--NO zooming here just straight off our balcony:)

Making Banana Pancakes...err Bread

Recipe: Made some homemade banana bread this morning. I haven't ever made it and I didn't think it would be difficult and let me tell you it takes me longer to get my oil changed than it did to make these little babies.

Thank you my little Better Homes & Garden cookbook for the easy recipe. I did make another mini loaf and one regular size loaf but my hubby dug into the mini before I could snap a picture. I did not do anything fancy or add nuts.

Here's my rundown on the whole nuts thing...my husband doesn't really like them too much, which makes it easier on me because I generally omit them now from recipes, which means I don't have to wonder if I have nuts in the cupboard, how long they've been there and if I bought walnuts or pecans if they are whole or chopped or any of those other minute details:) Thanks best husband.


Did you notice my Jack Johnson shout out in the title of the post? I love that song and make my husband endure it and now he sings it once in a while and it makes me happy. Too bad I don't really like banana pancakes...I really only like bananas by themselves or in banana bread. Not that you need to know all this...I'm stopping my post now.

MK Winner is...

The two winners were selected by the random.org number generator...#7 and #2. Petie at Pie Ranch and the Pickled Peach Cafe and Whitney at The Daily Daws. Congrats ladies I will get these in the mail to you today!! Thanks for all who entered, I do love giving away some Mary Kay. Happy Friday!

A Little MK Giveaway...

Hi folks, happy Tuesday:) I wish it were Friday already so in honor of that I want to give you some fun in the sun giveaways. I probably haven't mentioned it but I sell Mary Kay, just enough to cover my own habit...ahem. Actually, when I started I was making money and working hard but since getting engaged, married and moved it has become more of a hobby. But that's okay I love the product and enjoy the people I have met through it and maybe someday I will go at it more aggressively.

For now...I would like to give some lucky followers some treats. One person will receive this travel microderm abrasion set also included is one Golden Creme Lipstick.

And another lucky reader will receive a lip lovers set. One spf 15 lip protector balm and one golden creme lipstick in this cute little bag perfect for your purse or traveling.

Giveaway is open until Friday 5/14...to enter just leave a comment about your fave face/makeup product - any brand! Leave a separate comment if you are a follower. And another chance to enter leave another comment if you link this to a blog or facebook post:)

If you ever need any other product feel free to email me or check out my little MK website.

Another giveaway for you to check out over at Kristin's at Faded Prairie - beautiful barbed wire cross.

Flowers

Something I Love: Flowers. I can't believe it's been a week since my last post...I have been so busy with work and life I barely have time to breath. I asked my hubby last week if I could leave my job to go full time in my volunteer work. He just laughed at me...so I'm taking that as a maybe.

It's getting ready to be super duper hot down here in Yuma county so for Easter I took home my geraniums to my mom. They will live happily all summer long at the ranch and for winter come back to my house. So instead of being smart and taking pictures of my little flower delights when they were flourishing I'm going to show off some of my mama's flowers I took a couple weeks ago.

In a old wheelbarrow...with some protection from the dogs...

oh the weeping willow and vincas how I love them

love these old wash buckets

one final wheelbarrow. 

I have 2 wheelbarrows at my house...a large cat or small dog recently took an all day nap in my snap dragons in my wheelbarrow and sadly the dragons did not prevail:(