Little Bitty...Bits of Beauty

I don't recall where I found this tiny little bitty blue bottle...one my favorite colors of blue there is.


It may have come from under one of the old barns we've torn down on this place, I don't know--I've had it seems like forever!  


But what I do know is that it's the perfect size for tiny spring blooms:  violets, grape hyacinths, and of course, Lilly of the Valley...


And the nice thing about it is that it fits on my narrow windowsill--just a couple inches tall.

Sometimes when I look at my spring blossoms, I get so giddy, I want to bring bitty bits of beauty inside with me for a little while, to wonder at.  

Do they affect you that way, too?

And this little scene really makes me smile each time I glance up at it, in my kitchen window.


Happy Monday, friends!

Simple Pleasures: Bacon in the Morning

It's rare around here when we can say on Friday night :  "There's nothing to get up for, we can SLEEP IN!"  My husband works every other Saturday, and lately, he's been working six days a week.  It's was a long January.


But how I love that feeling!  Tucked in after the basketball game on Friday night, with nothing to awaken for (unless it's that pesky telemarketer that calls at NINE A.M.  Ugh!).

So, am I the only mama who gets giddy when she knows that her family is going to awaken to the smell of bacon on the morning?


Why does that make me so happy?


(Have you ever, ever, ever met a boy or a man that doesn't like bacon?  I never have.  There's a Facebook page called "BACON".  It has almost two million "Likes", and I'd bet most of them are men.)

Yes, eating a gigantic bacon, egg and pancake breakfast at noon with your family is one of life's precious little treasures.  

There is magic in the ordinary.

Laughing and talking with all those feet together under the old oak kitchen table is priceless.

And for me, imagining their memories later in life when they remember sunny Saturday mornings, waking to the smell of bacon and pancakes, well, that's just a little gift I can give them.  

And I gladly do.

Simple Pleasures: Dancing in the Kitchen

I am a woman of simple tastes.  
And I married the man with the same inclination.

I don't need a lot of dates, a couple times a year is fine, a movie, or dinner, but never both at one time, except for a rare occasion.

I enjoy drives in the country, and appreciate his patience in stopping to let me take pictures; but the best thing in the world, for me, is an occasional slow-dance in the kitchen to the tunes on the radio.  


No one can make me as sentimental as Alan Jackson when he sings "Remember When"...

How about you?

Is It Monday Again? Life Is Just....

...wonderful,
especially with
a
quiet spot,
a gentle breeze,
a comfy chair and a cup of
sweet black Michigan cherries...

Oh, the simple pleasures that come 'round one time a year!

What's your favorite fresh-picked fruit this season?

Sunshine Sheets

It's that time of year again,
when I torture you,
my captive audience,
with my photos of sheets
flappin' in the wind
against the blue spring skies
and freshly born leaves
on the awakening trees.


As I was taking these, my husband walked up on me and said:
"Are you totally whacked?!"
(Whacked means downright crazy according to him.)
"Well, yes, yes I am!"


He would even think it was weirder yet
if he knew what I was thinking
as I lay on the ground to get this shot.

But do you?

Would you think I was strange
if I told you that I've always secretly wanted to ...

Choose a sunny, yet cool spring day that is breezy...
Lay a soft and cozy quilt underneath the laundry lines
loaded with FRESHLY WASHED SHEETS,
and just lay my head on a pillow,
cover up,
close my eyes,
and take a nap
and camp out
underneath the flapping fabric
and stay there until they were all dry?

Something about the sound of it seems to be so soothing,
such a lullaby of its own,
that I've wished at times
I was little teensy and could lay in the fold of the sheet
and use it for my giant hammock
as it gently blew in the wind.
That I would be rocked to sleep by the motion.

But to sleep underneath the lines
on the fresh spring green grass
and listen to the


"flap
flap
flap
flutter
(still...)
flap
(still...)
flap
flap
flutter
flutter"
...

would

be

so

dreamy!

Line dried sheets
are a pleasure
reserved for
only those willing
to go to the trouble.

(We are greatly rewarded for our efforts.)

And...

A little story that will make you smile, it's so sweet!

I know someone that is six feet four inches tall
A manly man who has gone on a drive through Iraq
in gigantic Bradley tank wrecker
with his Army battalion and
is a mechanic who now that's he's home again
works on logging equipment
and lifts wrenches the length of a shovel
only many, many, many tens of pounds heavier
every single day.

You would never guess it,
but...
he loves to have his sheets dried on the line
and he invented a term for the heavenly smell
he lays on that night
when he pulls back the covers
and goes to bed
and I think it's the dearest thing
to know that a big, burly, manly man
calls them

"SUNSHINE
SHEETS"!


It's a term I'm going to borrow and it makes me SMILE.

So, do you like
SUNSHINE SHEETS?