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Sweet Millions Cherry Tomatoes

Christine

A bowl full of cherries!

Cherry tomatoes, that is. Our all-time favourite sweet summer snacker, the Sweet Millions variety of cherry tomato is one we didn’t even plant this year. But enough volunteers came up to keep us well supplied for tomato-basil-mozzarella salad. And we still had enough to share with our neighbor.

But I can tell you, I will definitely plant this variety- on purpose- next year. Picking through the tangle of volunteers sprawled all over the ground was no fun. I have half a mind to try them in the hanging baskets on my porch…

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How Oliver Spent His Summer

Christine

Sorry we’ve been gone for so long. But we are going to get back into the swing of things. I have lots of pictures to post; tomatoes, embroidery, clean living room, and of course, Oliver.

Oli spent as much time as possible on the porch this summer. He does so enjoy sunning himself. Even when it is too hot for the rest of us, he wants to be out.

He particularly loves lying in wait on the front porch to jump out and startle passers-by. I’m always surprised how many people know him by name.

We’ll have more posts very soon, I promise. And we’ll try to keep up with our blogging a bit better.

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Hex and Square and Pennyround Tiles!

Christine

My dear friend Josh is hard at work on his old house. His upcoming project is the downstairs bath. Tucked in under the staircase to the second floor, it is a tiny space. Currently, it has a sink and toilet, but Josh plans to steal enough space from the adjoining kitchen to add a shower stall.

Josh also plans to revamp his upstairs bath in the future, so just like us, he is making sure he has all the necessities covered before he tears things out upstairs.

For his tiny downstairs bath, Josh has his mind set on 8″ square tiles. Normally, everything Josh does to his antique house is perfect, so I was surprised at this. I think he should use small mosaic tiles, be it hex, square or penny round.

To this, I have compiled a short list of links to help sway him to my way of thinking. I thought I would share them with you, too.

Loads of gorgeous pictures at American Restoration Tile:
http://www.restorationtile.com/index.html

For the love of marble tile:
http://www.besttile.com/index.php?mact=Products,cntnt01,details,0&cntnt01category=Marble%20Collection&cntnt01pagelimit=12&cntnt01summarytemplate=Category-Line-List&cntnt01productid=285&cntnt01returnid=99

Envision your room with American Olean:
http://ao.swatchbox.com/EnvisionYourRoom/main.asp
http://americanolean.com/catalog.cfm?c=51

If you feel like playing with patterns, check out Freestyle from marbledesigner.com:
http://www.marbledesigner.com/index.html
Or mosaic maximizer:
http://www.mosaicmaximizer.com/max/MaxP.html

I haven’t sent him my list yet. I remember playing with a mosaic tile pattern creator that was even better than the two above. I thought it might have been DalTile or American Olean, but no. Can anybody help me out?

Any other links I can send to Josh to help him fall in love with mosaic tiles?

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The Best Ever Birthday Present

Christine

Yesterday morning Oliver hopped up in bed with me, giving me kisses, nuzzling and cuddling with me. So sweet. He listened attentively while I told him this story:

“Oliver, did you know that five years ago today, you came to live with mommy and daddy? Do you even remember that? Mommy remembers that day very well.”

It was my birthday, middle of the week, a Thursday, and we had nothing special going on, so I worked as normal. Lewis had the day off, so I set some chicken aside in the fridge and all the dry ingredients and tools out on the counter for him to make no-peek-chicken casserole. It takes about two hours in the oven, and I wanted him to have it ready to eat as soon as I got home because grandma Gloria was expecting us for birthday cake dessert that evening.

I hadn’t been feeling well all day, and I just wanted to get home, eat and rest. I called Lewis on our drive home, sitting in traffic. He was cagey, wouldn’t give me a straight answer about where he was or what he was doing. I got annoyed. I could tell he was in the car, which meant there was no way dinner was ready.

Hot, tired, sick and very grouchy, I stormed into the house to tell him something like, it’s my birthday, the least you could do is have dinner ready for me when I got home!

Halfway to the kitchen I stopped in my tracks. I had spotted this: A little puffball of golden fluff dashing across the kitchen floor.

“Is that a puppy?!?!”

Lewis tells me I skidded across the kitchen on my knees to greet Oli. I don’t even remember. By then I was cuddling, kissing and crying into his downy fur.

My 27th birthday present:We eventually made it to dessert at grandma Gloria’s. Everyone forgave us for being late when we walked in with this little guy.That night he slept in a laundry basket. Can you imagine? He was so tiny, only 7 weeks old when he came home to us. What an angel.