Love...

...signs are what I have been working on this past week or two because we all KNOW what the next holiday is right?
Yep...Valentines Day. Don't forget your sweetheart!! :)

 I am making them out of pallet wood. One of my very favorite woods right now to work with. You too? I know
 a lot of people are using it and the sky is the limit. I have seen it on walls and floors. I have seen signs, tables,
 candle holders and all kinds of things made from it.

 If you are lucky you can find pallets for free, but they aren't very expensive if you have to purchase them.
 My hubby was coming home from work one day and saw a couple pallets in the ditch that must have fallen
off a truck at some point so he stopped to get them for me. Sad day because he had to leave them there.
They wouldn't fit in his vehicle. I miss our truck!! :(

Signs, signs, everywhere signs...lol

 I have sold a few on Facebook and I have taken several up to a friends store where I sold my pallet trees this
 past Christmas season. If you are interested in one just give me a shout out! The wood they are painted
on is approx. 28 inches long.

I thought I would show you a peek in a corner of my dining room right now. The lighting is
 horrible this time of year so I didn't get many good pictures. See that lamp shade?
$5...a steal! I love it.

I also wanted to show you what my youngest son made me for part of my Christmas gift.
See the lanterns off to the left. I LOVE them!  Our family doesn't spend a lot of money for Christmas
 gifts and we LOVE home made gifts so we try to do something along that line.

He loves to work with his hands and said he would love to do this kind of work all the time.
I think he has a bit of his mama in him. SMILE

I hope this post finds you well and healthy. Praying that you will have a wonderful New Year.
Blessings~ 

Please remove your shoes(and don't take a better pair when you leave!}

What do you think of this sign?

I just laughed and laughed when I first saw it, but I also thought I
NEEDED IT.

We just put new carpet in the living room that is light
colored and no shoes are allowed nor is any food or drinks.

First time I saw the sign it was marked down from 19.99 to 14.99.
I didn't get it.

Next time it was marked down to 9.99.
I got it...and I LOVE it!

I've been doing a little decorating here and there. This is really not exactly like I want it, but
I got tired of messing with it so it is what it is. Does that ever happen to you?  Most days
I love to decorate, but some days it just doesn't fall together so I give up. yep.
I guess I'm a quitter...of sorts. :)

You are probably wondering what the BELIEVE chalkboard has to do with the decor.
Absolutely nothing! HA! It is my word of the year and has been there since
January 1 and I just can't change it. It was a very appropriate word I might add.
With all the changes our family has been through this year I have to BELIEVE
that everything will be okay.

I also wanted to share a new fountain with you that was just installed in Bryan, Ohio.
I call it a local town because we are there every other day it seems. Okay, maybe
not quite the often, but a lot!  Isn't the fountain just beautiful?

This is kinda random, but this past week a HUGE part of our willow tree
FELL DOWN...GO BOOM!

Hubby was contemplating cutting this part of the tree down because it was splitting, but
he didn't have a chance. We woke up one morning and he looked out the window like he
always does and said, "Well, I guess I don't have to cut the tree down". We were
floored! HOW did we not hear this huge tree fall in the night? 

Thanking God that it didn't come down on the house!
As you can see it just missed it so someone was looking out for us that is for sure.
I am also very thankful that it didn't come down when hubby or I were mowing
underneath it. That would not have been good.

We have a lot of it cut up and hauled off to an area on our property, but we still have the largest
part of the trunk to get cut up. We do a little at a time because we are OLD and we just
 can't handle hours and hours at a time. :)

While we were outside working on the tree, hubby showed me this hornets nest in another tree
in front of our house. There doesn't appear to be any activity at all so it must be an old one.

I just can't believe it is almost the end of October already!! The fall colors this year were
spectacular in Michigan! I took a lot of photos and am overwhelmed by the beauty that
God creates for us every year.

Oh, one more thing...we have a new granddaughter!!! Grandchild #9!! She was born
yesterday to my oldest son and his family. They now have three sweeties.
Keira, Kanaan and now Korrah  Michelle Boothman. She weighed 6 lbs and 8 ounces
and was 19.5 inches long. Born around 4:30 pm. We hope to visit them on Sunday
and get a few snuggles in.

Happy fall day to each and every one of you!!
Blessings~

Rolling along...singing a song...

...SIDE BY SIDE!

I would love you to ride along with me today as I share a few more garden pics.
Did you hop on? Okay, here we go!!

Sweet Woodruff and the bicycle just go together, don't you think?

Yes, I got carried away taking bicycle pics. lol

First stop is near the door on the back deck.
This is a very favorite clay pot filled with flowers.

Next, we will pull up along the side of the house to show you all the work I did today.

I am telling you, I worked and worked trying to clean up the flower beds
and getting out the weeds and I am plumb worn out!

I had a garage sale this past Saturday and several people wanted to buy my yard art including
this Welcome to my Garden sign that is painted on an old screen. I told them it was not for sale.

 I also dug up hosta and sold them.
I had a big wheelbarrow full and people actually asked me if I would dig up more! {I didn't}
They sold like hot cakes for 50 cents a clump. I am thinking about going into the hosta business.

We are back to near the door again! We are sure getting a workout. Someone didn't plan
this bicycle trip very well. ha!

We are now riding past some creeping phlox that just keep spreading every year.

 I LOVE this time of year because
the back deck area looks wonderful with all the spring blooms. By mid summer it gets rather
dreary looking though so I have to enjoy it while I can.

Along the way we pass the Sweet Woodruff again...

{Some also wanted to buy this sign!! NOPE...not for sale!}

...and an herb pot that I made this year.

I tried something new by creating a tiered pot assemblage with herbs in each pot.
I thought up this idea all on my own, but I am sure it has been done somewhere before.
 I really like how it turned out.

A person can never have enough Lemon Thyme and it smells wonderful as it wafts
through the air.

We are now riding down the path that is strewn with crab apple blossoms. It smells
wonderful!!!

This was hubby's idea so I obliged him. He saw this basket sitting on the deck {from my last
years stash...it was green moss initially} and hung it on the tree so I planted an impatiens plant in
 it and an ivy plant. Hope it does well. It should because it gets nice shade here.

I hope you enjoyed "rolling" through my gardens today on my white bicycle.  Our ride ended
way too soon, but I do hope that you enjoyed it and that you will visit again soon.

 I have so much more work to do and I am just getting too old and worn out to keep up with all this.
 I may have to yank it all someday and put in stone, but for now I will enjoy the beauty.

Motherhood ...

Motherhood IS a glorious career...don't you think so?

 I know there are always the naysayers out there who don't think of
motherhood as a career, but boy is it ever! I remember expecting our first child who turned out
to be our one and only daughter. We headed for the hospital in the wee hours on a Sunday
morning and a little before 9 am we called my parents and told them that they were grandparents.
Of course they were overjoyed and this was just the beginning. Two more little ones eventually
came along...two sons with red hair! We were shocked when the first one had red hair, so even
more so when we had a second one with fiery red hair.  We sure adored these little people that
God had blessed us with. 

We loved each one of them the best way we knew how, even though we were NOT perfect parents.
We were beyond blessed to have very healthy children and we decided after three that our quiver
 was full...no more pitter patter of little feet at the Boothman household. This mama was very content
with her little family, living out on a dirt road in the country.

Kindergarten, elementary, jr. high, prom, dances, girlfriends, boyfriends, heartache,joy, tears,
laughter, secrets, college , weddings...

The days turned into months, the months into years, the years into decades and here we
are grandparents now to EIGHT. Eight amazing little bodies all full of life and each one
with their own unique personality.  I often wonder where the time has gone!!
It flew by so fast that is seemed just like a blip on the radar screen.

I know you young parents hear it so much until your eyes roll, but it really is true...
Cherish the times you have with your little ones now because before you know it
they will be going off to college , then getting married and you will hear the
pitter patter of little feet once again, but it will be the feet of  your precious little grands.

Yes, we are BLESSED beyond measure and I loved every minute{almost...lol} then
and I love it now. I certainly don't have the stamina I once had and it is good to ship those precious
little grands back home after they visit so I can catch my breath...but life is good!

Good times or bad times... each moment made us into the family we are today and I love it that we
love each other.

Wishing each and every one of my blogging pals the best Mothers Day ever!
Blink your eyes and it will be Mothers Day 2014 and we will start all over again. :)

Playing in the potting shed

I have been busy lately playing in my potting shed so I thought I would give you
a few more peeks at what I am doing.

Do you remember this old white shelf that I purchased a few weeks ago? It ended up out here and I
think it is just right for my goodies.

I did add a bit of fake greenery before I got the bright idea {DUH!} to add real plants. :)

My flowers are still doing just wonderful despite the awful heat we had this summer.

I love this chippy green chair. I purchased FOUR of these chairs at an estate sale
years ago for 50 cents each! Everything was cheap at that sale and I was carrying
my baby granddaughter who was living with us at the time so that was about 11 or 12
 years ago. This is the ONLY green one I have left. I have two more that I let set outside
and they lost all of their paint and I sold one in my booth {dumb thing to do I know!}
I am hanging onto this one!

I love real bird nests and this one is a beauty.

Still trying to figure out if this is too much shelving , but it is what it is right now
so it is staying for awhile anyways.

Did you notice what I had hubby do?? This shed does not have interior walls except
on the back wall. It is something we have always intended to do , but just have not
gotten around to it. I was tired of waiting so a week or two ago I grabbed some paint
that we had sitting around and painted the top two thirds of the walls white.
I painted OSB board, I painted old beams...I painted, painted, painted!

Then I had hubby put the fence around the bottom part of the walls! I love how it
turned out, but once again the whole shed is not done, so you are seeing this one
wall! ha! We replaced a few sections of fence this year that were rotting and I
wanted it all to match so we took the above fence down also even though we had
just put it up a year or two ago. I do LOVE to recycle!!

More fake greenery in this cast iron wall vase.

I realized I should have added some gardening gloves and clippers or scissors , but I had already
spent too long taking photos so I opted not to redo it. I don't know how photographers do it!!
It must take them DAYS to do some photo shoots.

I have lots of goodies so I have pottery and all kinds of treasures sitting around in here.

Still lovin' my burlap potting bench skirt. See the slats in the top of my bench?
When hubby made the bench he added a pull out plastic tub underneath the slats so
that after I pot my plants, I can just grab a whisk broom and brush all the soil
 down the holes and right into the tub. Then take it out and dump it and wa-la all
nice and clean! :)

My favorite chair again with my pretty pink impatiens.

Loving my little *GROW* knife that I made last year.

A little nest that I spray painted white. That ends the tour for now. I know it isn't the most perfect
shed in the world , but it is mine and I love it. I decided whatever I did to fix it up this year I was
NOT going to spend any money doing it and I am happy how it turned out. Now on to the other
walls...oh goodness. Woman's work is never done...:)