a little rearranging and reorganizing

It's been hot, muggy and stormy here in Illinois these past few days. Thunderstorms woke me up way too early this morning. I'm also "recovering" from getting a crown at the dentist yesterday. This was my fifth crown and for whatever reason, this one was the worst. Maybe because it was the back bottom molar. My gums and jaw are still a little sore today. I'm eating soft foods...healthy smoothies, scrambled eggs, soup; rinsing with warm salt water; and taking healing supplements ~ which is part of my normal routine, anyway. Then in three weeks, I get to go back to the dentist, have more injections (the dentist told me this was the hardest spot for a dentist to have to inject numbing medication ~ thanks a lot for making my dental phobia even worse, Dr. T!), the temporary crown removed, and the  permanent one put on. Oh well, at least the worst of it is over.

On to better things...our spare bedroom - what used to be Phil's room - is used for my yoga room, a quiet reading spot, doing paperwork, holding extra clothes (in a dresser and in the closet), and corralling my scrapbooking and art journaling supplies. I never liked the look of the plastic storage bins under Phil's memory shelf and the clutter of my yoga supplies in the corner. 

I wanted the plastic bins to go and perhaps put a small dresser underneath Phil's memory shelf instead. I was going to organize the scrapbooking and art supplies in the dresser drawers. But I didn't have a small dresser, so I shopped the house to figure out what else I could do.

This black IKEA cube was in the basement. It used to be in Tim's room when he was away at college, but when he moved back home, he didn't want it in his room. At first, I put this cube in the spare bedroom closet. I thought I could organize some of the art supplies and yoga gear in here.

After moving the cube into the closet (and by this time, I had a lot of things organized in the cube, too), I realized it didn't leave enough room to get into the other side of the closet. And I needed to store the vacuum cleaner in this closet. That would mean having to lift the vacuum cleaner up and over the cube every time I needed to vacuum. Not such a good idea.

I took all the stuff back out of the cube and moved it underneath the memory shelf. Much better! I also removed the garland of heart lights that were hanging from the shelf, which gave this area a neater look. Brian's Crosley record player was also in the basement, so now there's room for that on top of the cube. 

I still have yoga mats and a bolster, and now a basket of my purses in the corner, but once Tim moves into his own apartment (which should be soon), we'll have his bedroom and closet for more storage space.

The plastic bins went into the closet. We don't have doors on this closet, but when the bedroom door is open, it covers the opening to the closet, so you can't see the inside.

And now I have enough room for the vacuum cleaner! (As well as more art supplies and boxes of photos.)

Next organizing project is to clean out my files in the desk drawer, which is the perfect project to work on while I don't feel like going anywhere and it's too hot and humid to work outside.

Have a great week!

birthday celebrations and saturday night live

My birthday was last week and Brian's was at the end of July. We don't make a huge deal out of birthdays, but we do like to recognize them by doing something special. For my birthday, I simply wanted to spend the day in a charming town that's about an hour away, just walking around and popping into certain shops, relaxing on the outdoor patio with a drink, and going out for a nice lunch. 

Now this is my kind of bike: flowers in the front and a crate of wine in the back!

I could be the neighborhood wine lady, sort of like the ice cream man, but for grownups. 😉

I love the way shopping areas in some towns have stunning displays of flowers in the summer.

For Brian's birthday, we went to Chicago to the Museum of Broadcast Communications, specifically to tour the Saturday Night Live exhibit which will be there until the end of the year.

We're both huge SNL fans, having grown up with the best of it in the 1970's - early 80's. I will never forget watching Gilda Radner, John Belushi, Chevy Chase, Eddie Murphy, Dan Aykroyd, Jane Curtin, etc. The exhibit was amazing. It took you through many different rooms filled with this history of SNL, from the characters to the costumes to the props to the staging to the design to the brains behind the show - Lorne Michaels and Dick Ebersol. I took a lot of photos and they aren't the best, since we were in a dark museum and the costumes and props were behind glass. But here's a few of my faves, where I'll let the photos do the talking...

Do you remember the charcter, Turd Ferguson?! You can watch the clip here. So stupidly hilarious. (I think you had to grow up with this stuff to appreciate it.)

The Coneheads were some of my favorite characters...

Some of the silly products from the SNL commercial parodies...

The Bass-o-matic was hilarious!

A replica of the control room....

RIP, Gilda...

The regular part of the Museum of Broadcast Communications was very cool and interesting, too, but I'll save that for another day.

Happy Monday - have a great week!

the language of kindness

This afternoon I was in my garage, hunting for my pruning shears. I heard a sweet, quiet voice behind me say, "Excuse me!" I turned and saw two young Mexican girls, one holding a large metal tin of fresh peaches. I knew who these girls were. Their family lives down the street and even though the mother doesn't speak much English, we always smile and say hello to each other. The girl holding the peaches said, "Would you like some peaches?"

This family has four peach trees in their yard. I wasn't sure if they were selling them or gifting them. I replied, "I would love a few peaches!" The girl looked at me shyly and said, "You can have all of them!" I said, "Really? This entire container?" Both girls giggled and said, "Yes!" I told them I was going into the house to get a big bowl and I'd be right back.

As I was gingerly plucking the peaches from the metal tin and putting them into my bowl, I was chatting to the girls about how appreciative I was; to tell their mother I said thank you; and that I might have to make a peach pie. I'm not sure how much they understood, but the whole while, I was being gazed up at with two pairs of big, brown, adoring eyes and the sweetest smiles. They skipped away as I clutched the bowl of prized jewels to my chest and went into my house.

There is no language barrier when it comes to kindness.
Pass it on. 💓

please don't rush summer

I've already seen posts all over social media about fall and even - *gasp* - preparing for Christmas!

I just don't understand the rush. It is only the beginning of August. We have over six weeks of summer left. I am not thinking about pumpkins, leaves changing colors, cool days, Halloween, or anything even remotely associated with Christmas.

Maybe it's because I live in an area that has long, dark, cold - even sometimes brutal - winters. It makes us appreciate summer even more.

Our lives are always so rush-rush as it is; why do we find it so hard to slow down and be mindful of what is going on around us now? It's so easy to get in that mindset of what is coming next instead of being present in the moment - whether it's rushing the seasons or even the activity of our everyday lives.

To me, August is the epitome of summer. Everything here in the Midwest is so lush and green and brilliant flowers abound. The roadsides are filled with Queen Anne's Lace, Purple Loosestrife, and some kind of small yellow wildflower that appears in late summer. If the humidity is low, the sky is a brilliant blue and if the humidity is high (which it often is), the sky is dotted with fluffy, cotton candy-like clouds.

I also crave a lot of light and sun, and this is the season to revel in that.

I love when I'm in the kitchen making a meal and decide I need fresh herbs, and being able to slip outside and snip herbs from my containers or little backyard herb garden. Even better when I do it with bare feet. 

And then the fresh produce...another reason I wish summer lasted a lot longer. We are surrounded by corn fields here in northern Illinois. Of course, most of it is GMO and used for animal feed (one reason to buy grass-fed beef, if you can), but two of the local farm stands here carry non-GMO corn that is picked fresh every day.

My own tomato plants are doing terrible this year and I've heard the same comments echoing from others in the area. We think it's from the erratic weather. At the start of summer, we had a deluge of rain to the point of local flooding. Lately, it's been a dry spell. Can't seem to get that nice mix of dry and wet weather. So I've been getting my tomatoes (and peppers) from the local farm stand, too. This is the only time of year I eat raw tomatoes. I can't stand the waxy, tasteless supermarket ones.

I have a friend who gardens on her farmer friend's huge plot of land. My friend is out of town right now, so she had posted on Facebook that she needed people to come every few days and pick veggies. There were about seven of us who volunteered, so my friend set up a schedule for picking.

Brian and I went yesterday morning and came home with onions, swiss chard, jalapeno peppers, tomatoes, beets, carrots, zucchini, one little cucumber, and a ton of green beans. And a couple of sunflowers for the kitchen table. (Yes, she said we could help ourselves to those, too.) Last night we feasted on corn-on-the-cob, sliced tomatoes and steamed green beans. It was a perfect summer meal. Nothing tastes better than vegetables that were just picked that day. I remember when I was little, my grandma grew yellow tomatoes in her garden. I had never tasted one before. She told me how they were a bit sweeter than red tomatoes. She picked a yellow tomato and brought it inside, sliced it up and sprinkled with a little bit of salt. We feasted on the juicy slices, still warm from the sun. To this day, I still prefer sliced yellow tomatoes over red, and I always think of my grandma when I eat them.

On the evenings where Brian's home from work, we walk down to the lake and watch the sunset. Such a beautiful way to end the day.

Oh, the summer night, 

Has a smile of light,

And she sits on a sapphire throne.
(Bryan Procter)

Happy Wednesday, happy summer.

xoxo