Preparations have been underway for the annual Jane Austen tea party that will be happening tomorrow afternoon. My kitchen smells fantastic. My carpets have been vacuumed (though Abby has now pulled every last toy out of her toy box again). I even pulled the slipcover off the couch and threw it in the washer (oh, how I love slipcovers). A few random tasks remain, along with a bit of sewing, but most of them have to wait until Abby is in bed for the night so I've got a little lull. Just long enough to blog.

I'll try to share some pictures tomorrow.

We've actually been home since Saturday night but somehow I haven't been able to get complete sentences to come out of my head onto my screen. It might have something to do with the very excited critters that want so much of our attention - how could I deny them -I missed them too.

We had a nice vacation and there are some pictures from it below. The weather was wonderful; hot and sunny on days we were out and about and cool and smelling of rain* on days we weren't. We met up with some good friends but didn't plan quite well enough to see everyone. We gave ourselves plenty of lazy time because it was a short vacation and the only one we'll be taking this summer. We ate lots of good food; I bought three new pairs of shoes; we sat in coffee shops knitting and reading; and I discovered far too many fun things in the art store near our hotel (more on those later).
























It was good to get home. To see our house and our critters and sleep in our bed.

*Rain is one of my favourite smells after the winter. It is so fresh and a part of summer for me. It looks as though we will be having some rain here today. It will be good for our grass.

... posted several days late because at the end of the weekend I decided to rearrange my desk and it took way longer than I expected to get back to some sort of order.

This weekend (the one that just pasted) was our first summery weekend of the year. Saturday was sunny with just a touch of wind and 13 degrees. It doesn't sound all that warm but after the winter it feel quite balmy and we ventured outside without coats or hats. It felt so liberating to be just wearing a sweater and some shoes (no boots needed). We went to Canadian Tire and got a bird feeder and some birdseed.


We let Abby out to run around the yard off-leash while we set up the feeder and checked around our emerging lawn. She was pretty good at staying near where we were but did run across the street to meet a new person and next door to try our neighbour's garden remains once. More practice is required (getting a fence up will help too). It was a lot of fun to watch her explore the back yard. It's full of fun things likes sticks and water right now. She particularly enjoyed the snow that remains on our back deck and in the yard. Running all over and then laying on it belly down to cool off. She gleefully found and ate most of the birdseed we'd dropped on the snow while trying to close the feeder (she also really likes peas).


The most exciting part of the day was to be found hiding in the front lawn. Yep, there is grass growing in there. The snow wasn't even completely gone but I could already catch a hint of that grassy summer smell. So good.


We had such a lazy Sunday morning. Zeke slept on the bed. Abby slept on the couch. We ate pancakes right out of the pan. Eventually I got around to the stack of fabric I'd picked out last week and made myself a chair cushion but I'll save the details for another post.


Our kitchen table is currently decorated with the first vase of goodness from our very own yard. A bunch of pussy willows in all their woody, fuzzy beauty.