i'm gonna be a mama again......

nah, not really......  :D

but

there are some new babies brewing in my old grill....

this isn't the first time that our feathered friends have tried to pimp their nest in this hunk of metal.  usually two or three times in the spring i had to de-nest, disinfect and deter the birds from 

using our grill as their love shack!

after we got this

a couple of weeks ago, our old grill was set aside for the trash. 

monday morning i grabbed our old grill to take to the curb for the trash men and a bird flew out of the side of it.
when i opened it i saw this...

holy crap!!!!  the nest was huge...i have no idea where they got this nesting material from....

 nestled down in all of that was this...

new family-to-be.  

because the bird flying out of the side of the grill scares the poop out of me every time i walk near it

i usually cringe and duck so i haven't seen what kind of bird it is but i'm thinking that 

it is some sort of starling.
like this one....
 

i am going to keep tabs on these eggs and hopefully we will have 

a new bunch of babies around here soon....

what i love about the internet......

there are good things and bad things about the internet.....i focus on the good things....the amazing blogs that cover any and all topics that interest you, photography, food, decorating, sewing, crafts, 

the plethora of information at your fingertips, the way you can connect with family and friends through social media websites, email and skype... the fact that the internet is the biggest black hole of shopping on earth, that it is the most complete cookbook available  and the mind boggling and almost incomprehensible amount of images that are there for everyone to see and access....

one of my favorite new ways to catalog these images is 

PINTEREST

have you heard about this site?  it is a virtual bulletin board that you can create and "pin" images taken from the internet in any subject that piques your "interest" to individual "boards".

how many of us have overfilled binders full of pictures, ripped out pages from magazines, paint chips, etc, when we are decorating our houses....or we are looking for that perfect setting for a photo shoot that you see online.  or simply an idea or recipe that strikes your fancy, so you "add to favorites" bar but then, if you are like me, you have hundreds of favorites and can't find anything???

what i love about this site is the ability to place these images into visual files that you can access and add to at any time. 

 i have a friend who is having me do a photo shoot for her two daughters birthdays later this summer and she wants to have a tea party theme for the party....i put together a "tea party" board to give her ideas for decor, food and set-up.

sometimes i just want to look at pretty things, so i have a board called pretty pretty.  i had no idea that there were so many beautiful and fantastic images on the internet.... i also have one for home decorating ideas and one for diy projects, food and just plain crazy fun stuff... 

 once you are set up with pinterest, you can "pin" any image you want from anywhere on the internet...onto your "boards".

my pinterest boards are here

cindy's pinterest boards

one of my favorite boards is "the word".  it is full of inspirational quotes and sayings and lots of really funny ones....

check it out...you are going to love it...but be forewarned....it can be addicting..

finally, a nice day....

 there was a strange yellow glow to the day today.....and there was a large bright orb in the sky that emitted warm rays and made us squint our eyes.....it was later determined to be something that has not been seen in these parts for a really long time...

the sun!!!!

today was a nice day, weather wise....finally.

temps were in the high 60's but quite windy.  but for most of the day, the wind was warm.

when 7:00 pm hit, the wind got cold and temps dropped into the 40's. but at least we saw the sun.

i finished another piece of furniture for my friend lisa.

it was a bench that she had in her mudroom but was rather nondescript and borning...

it was whitewashed and had some tiny leaves stenciled on the back top rail.  

she had found some fabric that she wanted to use as a cushion and it was up to me to find a paint to match. 

i had seen this spray paint and thought it might match...it was perfect....

rust-oleum painter's touch, which i believe is a new color "eden"

this was what it looked like when it was done...

a little distressing (because she has a 3 year old boy who rides his scooter in the house) 

and some brown glaze

 and i love how it turned out.

when i brought  it to her house she put on the cushion that she made for it and 

 it was perfection....

and she loves it!!!

this is the next piece i'm working on for her...

 a cool triangular table with a great wood pattern on the top.

i'll be staining the top and painting the bottom.

i also made a fun summer scarf project.  i had seen this scarf from a t-shirt here 

and had a t-shirt that i bought from walmart and decided that i didn't like.  the sleeves were funky and instead of letting it rot in the back of my closet, i thought i'd give it a try.  it was just too easy!!!

i forgot to take a before picture so just imagine this as a whole shirt.....

i cut it just below the armpits and discarded that part.  i placed a strip of masking tape across the middle where i wanted the strips to stop.  

 using my rotary cutter and ruler, i cut the bottom of the shirt into strips about 1/2 inch all the way across.

 once the strips were cut, i simply pulled them to stretch them.  

 this curled them a little and gave them some texture.  i stretched the entire thing wide-ways and 

twisted it twice around my neck....

 it's light, airy and colorful.  perfect for summer or any time of the year....

i have a couple more projects to share in the next couple of days....

in the meantime,

have a very happy easter.....

can i have some cheese with that whine???.......

because.....

 this was yesterday.....

 just a little bit of accumulation that melted pretty quickly....but the wind blew gustily (is that a word?) all day long.  in fact... 

 our grill is up against the house because the wind blew it across the yard yesterday.....our brand new grill, all dented up now....

 these pictures are from this morning....not so lucky in the melting department today....

 we are expecting an inch or more and snow until noon....

  i just need to remember this.......

photo source

no matter how hard that is!!!!!

busy, busy week

i can't believe that a week has already flown by... this has been a very busy week around here.  

the weather has actually warmed up a bit....in fact, it was in the mid 80's this past sunday..just two days after i whined like a baby about how cold its been lately.

however...

the following day it was back into the 50's and has stayed there since.  

and it was windy which makes it feel like the 40's...

i digress..

sunday's temps allowed us to finally spend some time outdoors.  

here is how our family spend the day...

don could not wait to get out into his garden

pruning the gardens and the rose bushes

did i tell you that our dog eats rose bushes???

it's true...when he was a puppy and before we had any control over him at all....he would yank the rose bushes out of the ground, roots and all, and drag them through the yard....

at least he doesn't eat his own poop....

austen spent most of the day golfing in the yard...

or as we like to call it

 fishing for balls in the pond..

doesn't the pond have a lovely green hue???  he could have teed off on the scum in there!!!

we went to home depot for some replacement parts to fix our 7 year old ( falling apart, burn everything you put on it, birds nest of a grill)

and came home with 

this

heaven, i tell ya!!!!  4 burners and a spit (that we still have to buy)

and the flames don't flare up and engulf our food and burn it to crispy ashes..ahhhh!!!

i scored an end table in someone's garbage pile...yup, totally slammed on the brakes,

pulled to the side of the road and hauled this baby into the back seat. because our cars were small and had no trunk space to be able to accommodate furniture....

so yesterday, we came home with this

an uplander with lots and lots of room

and seating for 7....people or pieces of furniture....

oops, how did that get in there???

i also worked on another piece of furniture for my friend lisa...

and when i uploaded this picture to send to her for a progress report yesterday, i noticed that there were some funky vertical lines on the picture....i googled it and learned that this is a major camera malfunction.  i was hoping that google was goggled in the head and bee-lined it to my beloved camera store where i bought my canon 7D.  they hadn't seen anything like that before and thought that it was an electronic problem and packed it off to the manufacturer......  :(

and i had a photo shoot to do this morning.....

so i got out my old canon xti and couldn't remember how to use it.  so i had to google that too.  but it worked and i was able to do the little mini easter shoot of these two lovelies.....

 so clear it almost looks like they are coming right out of the picture, doesn't it???

hey, how did that get in there???

it was actually warm enough to be outside in summer clothes....
i asked don to take a picture of me in my painting apron.  because it is a cute apron.

notice that he didn't get the apron....

hey, my eyes are up here.....(because i am so hugely endowed)

there we go.....

so i had to set it up so he could get the whole apron in the picture (i do wear it when i paint)

a bicycle, a couple of ladders, wading boots for the pond, the snow blower that hasn't been put away yet (i told don to get that dang thing into the shed before it jinks us again...crap..too late, they are calling for snow on saturday night, for reals!!!) a wooden sofa on its side, and numerous oil and paint stains on the garage floor. lovely isn't it?  hmmmmm...maybe the garage could use a little feminine touch, some pretty paint on the walls, and some curtains in the windows?????

nah, just a good power washing.....

i know your butt is cute, but can you keep it out of my post please???

i leave you today with an oxymoron of sorts

ruffles and skulls!!!

they are the same shoes as the raspberry ones in the photo above, only in mushroom.  

ok, i'm hungry now...

have a great weekend, friends!!!

seriously now!!!!