We had a nice Mexican dinner last night at a place that seems to have replaced Chi-chi’s called Don Pablos. The guys had shrimp fajitas and I had fried lobster ones. Before we went to din din, we took back moulding and under the counter lights that we didn’t use in the kitchen and got a $146 credit to our account at the Home Depot. : ) We did manage to blow another $100 on stuff we needed for the tile and tin work, plus we bought more plants, grass seed, a doorbell (I am sick of people pounding on my screen door) and a new mailbox. Gotta get the place all spiffy. I completely forgot the stain for the wood on the new windows, but I can get that nearer to home. We were also looking at toilets as the one we have is approaching 50 and it looks it. That’s another project for the future.
Sean finally used some of his graduation money (from last year!) and bought a Ipod nano. He was tinkering with that most of the evening. I worked on ‘Cape May’, my piece on the pretty Ocean fantasy Silkweaver fabric.
Looking for a ton of rain tomorrow.

All the ‘season finales’ are rounding up this week-mostly the reality shows. I know, you can love them or hate them. I’ve watched Survivor from the ‘get go’ and what’s cool-so does my brother Don in Florida. So Aras Baskauskas,25,a former basketball player and now yoga instructor won Survivor. I like Aras! He always came in 2nd losing out to Terry, a 46 yr old Navy fighter pilot. That always bugged me. Danielle, who came in second, only won the ‘lily pad’ challenge because she was lighter than the guys and we all know the guys on Survivor can never keep their balance well.
So here is a photo of Aras, the grandson of McDonald Carey (late soap opera doctor on Days of Our Lives).

Well, I have all my cabinets hung, but I am waiting for a replacement door and a pantry drawer too. The Home Depot guy Bob came today and it took him an entire hour to hang 1 door and put in about 6 knobs. I was suppose get to my mom’s by 2 and Bob left at 1:45. The guys went over to Bri’s dad’s for a visit and to give him our old microwave (that he is ‘scared’ of-he prefers his 23 yr old one) and Bri planted some tomatoes too.
I quickly ate lunch, put on a little makeup and loaded mom’s planter and gifts for Mother’s Day in the van. I was in a good mood and called from the bank parking lot to say I was on my way. I was headed north and in front of me were menacing black rain clouds. It dawned on me that my windshield wipers had been acting weird and I got a bit nervous. I had every right to feel this way as I drove right into the rain and had to pull over twice because my left blade just flopped around. It was quite scary. I called the guys up on my cell and told them what happened. Thank goodness I was headed to my brother’s house-the mechanic bro. After the rain eased up I finally got on the road and landed in a traffic jam and more rain. By the time I got to my brother’s house I was strung out. Ken’s kids were cute and I enjoyed spending time with them. Also got to see Ken’s handiwork-his kitchen is shaping up! Most of the cabinets are in place!
Brian and Sean decided to come down. On the way from his granddad’s house, Sean’s windshield wiper blade, on the same side as my broken one, started to flop around!I couldn’t believe it! Sean had to pull off the road about 5 times. Ken got out his wrench and just tightened the mechanism under the hood (in like 5 minutes) and they both were fine.
We went out for brick oven pizza and ran into rain on the way home. The wipers were fine! At home, it was rather dry and I watered my newly planted garden.
So check your wipers if you haven’t used them for a while!

Update-Su, my pal from England, is sending me the cross stitch magazine that I thought I was getting my photo printed in. Unfortunately I’m not in it, they picked an English lady. Not surprised, but Cyperstitcher.com got some nice coverage.

That is the name of this iris. I think it’s totally awesome.

We were blessed with some rain last night. The weird thing is we lost power twice the night before-right in the middle of ‘Invasion’ the only show Bri and I watch together. A few hours later the cable modem pooped out. It was working by the next morning.

I got my herb/veggie/flower garden planted tonight. A total joy to plant as the dirt was moist. I have 3 eggplants, one purple pepper, a lilac aster, a pink carnation, red salvia and assorted herbs.

My gladiolus popping up-I think I see about 8 grass-like sprouts now. They will be intermingled with marigold, cosmos and zinnia seedings that are coming up from the ‘crop circle’ of last year. I plan to do another crop circle. I need Bri to rototill the garden where the ‘purple’ (not blue) alliums are. I will sprinkle some zinnias behind the iris in the older circle. I am thinking about making that a box hedge garden there. I know it takes a while to get it to take shape, but they are so visually interesting.

Nancy wondered if I got my green thumb from my mom (thanks for your sweet comments, coz). Mom isn’t a big gardener, but she loves certain flowers like lilies and her hanging baskets. She tries to dig up gardens, but they usually fail as she needs to enrich the soil and use a mulch. I want to do a shade garden for her under her lamp post where I see mostly hosta. I want to give her some delicate heart-shaped barrenwort and maybe some white flowering plants to brighten that space up. I’ll probably see mom tomorrow. Bet we go to her Boscovs (I am loving what I got there). My gr grandmom Caroline had the green thumb and her daughter Ruth was a fair gardener (from what photos I have seen of her).

See how the little windows open on the sides? I need a step ladder to use this inside.

Oh Cos, what am I going to do with you?

You can see ‘the red firecracker’ (because it makes popping sounds in the warmer weather) with the red M&M guy on the antenna.

This makes the living room look larger and the house look newer.

The local paper comes out every Thursday (part of the group of papers that Bri works for) and he said ‘hey Martha Stewart was in Delaware on Sunday at Point to Point’-(a yearly steeplechase horse event)held near Winterthur, less then 10 miles from here. Rats! My baking and gardening mentor so close and I didn’t get to see her!
Anyway, here’s a photo from another online paper, but this one’s from Delaware. I’m dying to know what MS is sipping. I’ve never been to this snooty event, but they have a carriage procession and the one MS was in broke down and she was rather annoyed.

…finally!
I think our sinuses are going to explode from all the tree pollen! Our vehicles are dusted lime green from it all.
Sean and I had a hankering for Olive Garden today and were going to go for lunch. When 1:30 rolled around, we decided to go for an early dinner. It was a celebration of sorts because Sean did well with his grades-3.3 gpa, pretty good. The restaurant wasn’t crowded and we were finished eating by 5:25. We went to Kohls where I got some sterling silver jewelry for $7.99-including 4 pairs (3 on one card) for my niece Tori who just got her ears pierced.
We headed for Boscov’s, but only the garden center. Sean went to Best Buy while I looked at their really nice offerings which were priced to sell! I got my mom beautiful flowers in one big pot- pink snapdragons, purple Johnny Jumps Ups, yellow petunias, ivy and maybe one or two other flowers. I got one with mainly yellow and white flowers for myself. Only $15.99 each. I also got some more herbs, red salvia, portulaca, hens and chickens and petunias. The annuals-99¢ a four pack. I better snap up the purse now as spending on flowers is getting expensive. The same store will be selling off their stock by July for dirt cheap.
So I will be happy for the rain as I refuse to dig in the soil right now. It’s just too hard. I will be mulching with the pretty red cedar (like Carol uses).
Stitchingwise-I’ve been working on the Neighborhood RR-slowly but surely. I am changing the design a bit to fit the square. I like how it includes meandering roads. Also am up to the letter ‘J’ on Walk in the Woods that I started last year. I really want to complete that this year.
The blacksplash tin arrived today. Seems we have to put up plywood before we can put up the tin. We don’t need that much plywood. And the new switch covers arrived, but we need longer screws for them. I can’t seem to talk to the carpenter guy from Home Depot to get him here for the sink base fix-up. He always calls when I’m not home. The floor guys are suppose to add a few pieces of moulding and the window guys will hopefully be able to install the new windows on Friday-crossing fingers.