Watermelon Smoothie

I started my day with a cocktail!

The watermelon is beginning to come in now. We've had two test melons so far. They have been wonderful.

I have a great book - 100 Health Boosting Drinks - and there's a recipe in it called Juicy Lucy that I made today. It calls for watermelon, strawberries (I used frozen) and a sprig of mint. I didn't have the mint, but wouldn't it have been pretty?

Apparently, watermelon is a wonderful detoxifier. It also has plenty of beta-carotene, Vitamin C, zinc and potassium. It's also refreshingly tasty!

A few days ago, I made a drink with just watermelon (no strawberries). It was delicious, too.

Zucchini Bread - Mmmmmmm!

We've had LOTS of fresh zucchini from our garden. One thing that we've been using it for is zucchini bread. It's so good.

Thank goodness for my food processor. Today I had a ton of zucchini to put away. My recipe calls for 2 cups of shredded zucchini so I put 2 cups in each freezer bag.

Oops - I didn't take a picture of the bread,
but here's the recipe.

Zucchini Bread

INGREDIENTS

3 eggs
1 cup vegetable oil
2 cups white sugar
2 cups grated zucchini
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
3 cups all-purpose flour
3 teaspoons ground cinnamon
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup chopped walnuts

DIRECTIONS

Preheat oven to 325 degrees. Grease and flour two 8x4 inch loaf pans. In a large bowl, beat eggs until light and frothy. Mix in oil and sugar. Stir in zucchini and vanilla. Combine flour, cinnamon, soda, baking powder, salt and nuts; stir into the egg mixture. Divide batter into prepared pans.
Bake for 60 to 70 minutes, or until done.

Pantry Cleanout

I love my pantry. It's humongous. One day, we'll build nicer shelves, possibly with counters. I'm in no rush. It makes me happy just the way it is.

Today, one thing led to another in the pantry. It started when I brought home an interesting chest from a yard sale. I won't be painting it anytime soon since I have other more important projects to finish first. Instead of putting it up the attic to wait it's turn, I decided it was a good height for our microwave and breadmaker.
Right now, the chest is a brown color that I'm not crazy about at all. I had a white metal hoosier counter that wasn't being used, so I put that on top of the chest. I didn't get a good picture of the chest. It's on the right in the picture above.

I put some small seldom used appliances in the drawers and of course labeled each drawer. I love my label maker, but that's another story.
Once I moved those appliances into drawers, that left room on the shelves, so I rearranged, added more baskets and tidied up a bit.

I also did a bit of a cleanout in the hoosier.

You would think that as much as I love organizing that my house would be fabulously neat & organized all the time. It's not. And my closest friends and family would laugh hysterically if I said otherwise.

Flowers in the Vegetable Garden

I love flowers in the vegetable garden. They are pretty, but also useful. I don't say I'm decorating the garden. I tell people we are practicing companion planting. Depending on the flower, they attract bees, deter pests, attract beneficial insects, give shade to shade loving plants and more.
We put zinnias at the ends of some of our rows. Next year we'll intermingle them more.

We didn't plant the morning glories - they came up on their own in a number of places. Luckily they are a good companion plant used for attracting pollinating insects.

This has nothing to do with my topic for today, but the watermelon will be ready soon!

Muddy Buddy

This is what I found on my doorstep today - Muddy Buddy. He must have taken a stroll in the pond.

I seldom where solid white shirts. Whenever I do, I usually drip something on it at some point during the day. I guess it's fitting that I have a white dog who loves to get really messy.

He looks sort of like a sheep, doesn't he?

Looking Forward to Closing a Chapter

The old house is on the market, sort of. It won't officially be listed on MLS til July 14th, but it's on Craigslist and Access Coweta and I even have a web page with tons of photos. It's been painted inside and out. Rudy and I have given one last blast of love to the sweet little house. I have put as much love into it as I could, imagining what the new owner might think of each improvement.

We've done a few things that we wanted to do, but never got around to doing for ourselves. I'm pleased that these things will be done for the new owners, but I've been pondering... why we didn't do it for us???

As an example, we put a new ceiling fan in the living room. The old one - I should have taken a photo - was uuugggllyyy! It was ugly when we purchased the house in 1986. It had loads of brass and curly gold designs on the blades. I hated it for over 20 years. You'd think that somewhere in that time span, we would have found the time to replace it. Oh well, no need to dwell on that. Isn't the new one pretty? I love bronze.

It was a great place to live. We had great neighbors. It was home for 22 years. Now that we've moved, I want to close that chapter. I'm tired of traveling back and forth between two houses. I'm tired of paying bills on two houses. I'm ready to put all my focus into our new house and our new chapter!

The market is bad, but I am using prayers, positive thinking, law of attraction, more prayers, visualization, and mind power to get the old house sold. I am convinced that the huge workshop and pole barn will be the thing that sets our house apart. There is someone out there looking for a home with a workshop or looking for a house with a place to store a boat or tractor or vintage car. They are out there and they will find our house soon!

Leaving the Nest

Today, Rudy came across a little bird (a wren?) who had apparently fallen into our garden wagon while attempting to fly. Flying down is easy. Flying up... not so easy.

The poor little thing was so scared. We put all the cats and dogs up and waited. Hours later -still there. It was getting late. We could keep all our babies indoors, but there are plenty of scary predators lurking around at night.

Rudy attempted to put him in a hanging basket up higher in the tree, but he wasn't going for that at all. Plus, the moma and daddy birds didn't like the idea at all. They were dive bombing Rudy like crazy. We just had to hope for the best.

Rudy continued to check on it through the evening. Somewhere in that process he found another one on the ground. Oh dear.

The next morning, the wagon was empty. It had moved to the ground and was hiding in the grass. Oh dear. Rudy and I had to go to work. All the cats and dogs would be kept inside. Before we left, we saw one of the birds had flown away. The original, slower learner was still hiding. When we came home, it too had flown off. We could hear the happy family in the tree above.

And they all lived happily ever after.
The End

Finally... Rain!

Finally... rain!It rained and rained.
It poured.
It was a real gully-washer!
No complaints here.