I LOVE my perennial garden this time of year. The look of it changes weekly with what's flowering and also the colors in the garden. This week, there's a lot of pink and lavender flowers.
Everything is just so fresh looking. Come summer, I won't be saying that!
Pansy
Seed head of an Allium
Flowering Allium
Clematis

Peony
Clematis
Foxglove

These little 'balls' are the coolest thing! They are called Bio Gel Crystals. We picked up a few packets of these things at the Flower & Garden Festival in Epcot when we were visiting Brooke.
http://www.dhgate.com/bio-gel-crystals-for-plants-plant-food-soil/k-ff8080812697cbf60126983feb532bf0.html#todescription
You put the balls into a vase with water and leave for 8 hours.
They start absorbing the water and grow....
and grow......
and they grew so much I had to put them into a bowl!

You then put cut flowers or rooted houseplants in the vase and you don't have to water them for 4-6 weeks! They feel so cool... like balls of wet Jello! We'll see if these thinks really work. I put some Peony's in the vase.

Last night some of my friends and I decided to grab some sandwiches and head down to the beach for dinner. It was such a hot day and this was the perfect place to be! We had to move our chairs 3 times because the water kept coming up more and more. At one point Louann said "oh look, someones sandals are floating away". We all turned around to see. There were 2 sandals being taken by the tide and Kris running to grab them! They were hers!
It was so nice, sitting, chatting and laughing with the gang! We'll have to do this more often during the summer.

WHEN HUMANS SLEEP, THE CATS WILL PLAY....

I woke up this morning to see a wonderful sight... DIRT and CAT GRASS all over my dining room floor and rug! Alyssa was growing it for Huck to EAT. It was growing nicely outside. PJ brought it in the house and Huck seemed to enjoy eating it. I guess something got him a bit mad to make this mess!!!

This morning was spent machine quilting what will become the 'Belmont Blanket'. It took a bit longer than usual and was a bit trickier to sew (maybe a different brand of velveteen) but I got it done.
This afternoon I reconnected with a dear college friend. We've friended e/o on Facebook along with the other dorm gals. What fun... 30 years later!

Mine & Alyssa's Night in the ER

Last night I went to the ER to get Alyssa's foot checked. She fell down 2 cement steps while subbing. As we were sitting in the waiting room, we started to actually enjoy our time there.
At one point a man with long dark hair in a pony tail came to sit in front of us. I was checking out his head. I asked Alyssa if she had a pen and she didn't so I told her that I wanted to tell her something but I couldn't verbally tell her. She gave me her cell so I could text it. As I was writing... "I think the man in front of us uses that spray on hair" she started to laugh. She replied that "it's peeling off"! And it was! We had a nice laugh with that. Then these 2 obese women came in and sat 2 rows in front of us. Why do they think they look nice wearing skin tight clothes (that was the style of these clothes not that they just fit tight) when they're VERY LARGE? Alyssa was at the registration desk. I noticed the 'back fat' on the fattest lady. She had so much back fat that it looked like 2 huge boobs in the back! As she sat there, the 'boobs' were on each side of the chair sticking out.... but it gets better. You know the plastic small rectangle thing on the bra straps, well hers was in the back of each strap and PERFECTLY situated to be in the middle of each back boob to look like NIPPLES! I was dieing! All I kept thinking of was that I forgot my cell at home and I need Alyssa to get back here so we can get a picture of that sight! I was having a very hard time sitting quietly!
Then we go into the triage room. A nice boy gives me a chair and puts it close to the curtain separating Alyssa from the lady in the next partition. We're chatting and all of a sudden we hear gagging, then spitting, then throwing up RIGHT NEXT TO ME on the other side of the curtain. It got so bad that Alyssa wasn't holding back saying sounds like ugh etc. I don't remember what the lady did but she made some noise that made Alyssa and I BURST out laughing so hard. We couldn't control ourselves! It was so funny. We had tears rolling down our faces!
When Alyssa was getting X ray'd, an ambulance transport guy came in to take an old lady back to her nursing home. She obviously had dementia and the ambulance guy had quite a sense of humor. She was yelling "where are you taking me"? and "Who are you"? He explained that he was taking her back to the nursing home which was good but answered the who are you part with "I'm the Angel of Death". OMG! Then she asked where she was and he said St Josephs Hosp. We were at New Island! Then he was bringing the blanket up around her shoulders and she started to yell at him "get those hands off of me. Those 2 things belong to ME, NOT your hands, so get them off"! The guy explained what he was doing with the blanket and she said "I know you men, it's all you think about"! Then they took her away.
I have to say, we were in the ER for 4 hours and we had so many laughs it made it feel like 1 hour! I never realized how much fun you could have in an ER!
Alyssa's foot is fine!

SIMSBURY INN 2010

WHAT A WEEKEND!!!! Judy and I arrived at the Simsbury Inn on Friday night (thank you Judy) instead of our usual Saturday crack of dawn arrival time. We had all intentions of working on our first layout but we ended up just relaxing. We had wine and beer and we ordered in and got Chicken Parm heros for dinner. What a nice time!
The room was beautiful as always. Saturday morning started the crop. We're off and running. Judy and I both decided to not rush, just enjoy the time there, which we did! Our hostesses, Becky and Sandi were as charming as ever. They are just so sweet! They always manage to put on a great weekend!
DING DING DING goes the bell and everyone gets excited! That's when Becky and Sandi come to each room delivering GIFTS! Everyone gets a gift at some point during Saturday!

Judy getting her gift!


Dessert after LUNCH!
After dinner on Saturday night, everyone was treated to an ice cream sundae bar given to us all from a woman that goes to these crops that's a breast cancer survivor.
Fireplace in the lobby room where we have breakfast.

The front of the Simsbury Inn. Our room was the one above the white car (the second window).

Our favorite stairway
My Epcot Flower and Garden Festival layout that won FIRST PLACE !
Judy's BEAUTIFUL layout of her trip w/ Larry to Essex, CT.
Our table mates, Jen and Kristie. Very sweet girls. We love Conneticut girls. They're so sweet.

We had such a nice time. I can't believe it's over. Hopefully by the end of the week I will catch up on all of the sleep lost and then I'll have very happy memories!!! Until next year....

Mother's day was a lot of fun. First the Wii said that I lost 3.5 lbs! WhaHooo! Then Alyssa asked PJ to teach her to change the oil in her car. So they did hers and SHE did my car! Then Alyssa and I went to St Jude's where they were going to be filming for an episode of Cake Boss!
Danny with Buddy's son
Me, Buddy, Alyssa and Buddy's son
Danny. I LOVE this picture!
The cake was beautiful!



The Waldvogels just happened to be driving by to go bowling when Jonathan's girlfriend noticed the Carlo's bakery sign on the truch. The pulled right over to join us.
It was a lot of fun. The show is I think the 12th of the new season and will probably be aired in August.

Happy Mother's Day!

Two years ago I planted Allium Giganteum. Last year I was so excited that they were coming up but not happy when we had a bad rain storm that snapped both of the stems! So this year I was so happy to see that they look healthy and are now blooming! They are about 2 1/2 feet tall and the flowers are like the size of a softball. I wish the flowers would stay all through the summer but the seed heads are equally beautiful.... in their own way!

Yesterday was weigh in day for our Zukowski Biggest Loser contest. I think Alyssa's Wii must not be working right. It said that I lost 6.4 lbs this past week. I KNOW I didn't lose that much! I think we have to buy a scale and check our weigh ins with that. It had Alyssa gaining 7.8 lbs. IN ONE DAY! We do have it on the living room rug which I know we're not supposed to do. PJ is going to have a stand made at work and hopefully having it on a hard surface will make it be more accurate.

Yesterday we went to Mike and Kathy's son Michael's, wedding. It was a beautiful ceremony. Mike even played a song on the piano.
It was so nice seeing everyone again. It was just like 'old times'.









Mike and Kathy













View from the reception place "The View on the Hudson" in Piermont, NY













Mike and Meagan and to the right is George and one of his daughters.