Ahh...

Sunday..and I finished my work yesterday. Lucky me. Actually didn't get as much as I expected to do so today I actually have some free time.  Although I did clean a little, I am planning on trying to get someone to clean for me again.  I have been working weekends for a while now and as long as there is going to be extra work, I can justify hiring a cleaner.  I hate spending all my spare time cleaning....in fact I hate cleaning period. 

I know some who actually like to clean but not me, especially dusting.  That has always been something I've hated to do because in no time the dust accumulates again.  It just seems like a lost cause. 

I did bake a peach pie today with the help of my youngest who had some time to help me before she headed out to work.  Hard to believe June is almost over already....August is going to come all too soon!  Anyway, also made 5 minute fudge which is always really good. The fudge I made for hubby because he doesn't like peach pie.  Both turned out really well.

I also have a turkey breast in the crock pot and that is making the living room smell really nice about now. I broke down and turned on the A/C late morning.  I've been turning it off when we get up and leaving it off until about 4:30pm or 5:00pm but the heat index today is suppose to get to 100 or more and I knew I would have the oven on, so I have the A/C set at 80 and it is perfect.  I do not like it cold in here and I know a lot of folks have theirs set at 70 all the time.  I'd be wearing long sleeves and probably sweaters if it were that cool in the house.

I've been doing laundry today too, but otherwise am going to lounge and not do any more cleaning. Hope to have someone doing that for me by next week.  ;-)

Hub is at our store and we only have another month until we are closed.  I think he is going to be happy he isn't tethered to the store 6 days a week all day much longer too. 

Looking forward to next Saturday as that is when my youngest and I plan to see Eclipse!  I have been looking forward to it for months. :)...

....off to do..whatever I want.

Happy Summer!

Today is the first day of summer although around here in Central Texas it already has seemed like summer for a while.  My balcony garden this year is doing much better than last year at least so far...now if I can just remember to keep watering it! :)   I spend more time on the back balcony now that we've made it so inviting, that I sometimes forget about my front balcony garden.

I have been working weekends again lately so I haven't had as much time to blog. But got to take the OT while it is available..that is my motto!  

I did take a little time away from work yesterday and took my dad a Father's Day card and some peaches and plums that I bought at a local stand. The peaches were Fredricksburg peaches which are suppose to be Da Bomb....around here. .. It was nice visiting my folks for a little bit. 

Mondays are somewhat hard on me when it comes to work after I've worked all weekend.  It is a little hard to get into the groove...but got through it okay.  Two of the furkids had a vet appointment this afternoon.  I am proud to say that Obi will be 11 on August 7th!  I have not had a dog live that long.  The closest was Reebok who died 6 months before he would be 10.  Obi is pretty healthy too so maybe he's got a good 3-4 years left.  He got his rabies shot today so he is good on that for the next 3 years.

I don't mean to sound like a teen, but I am really looking forward to the next Twilight movie.  I even read the 4th book which only took me a few days.  Well I better get back to watching The Bachelorette before my hubby thinks I'm not paying attention and changes the channel!

~ Closing ~

After 4 years of trying to get our store out of the Red, we are going to close the doors come the end of July...and frankly I couldn't be happier.  The monthly drain on my pay check to keep it open has been stressful if not depressing.  I blame myself partly, because when we had the store in Liberty Hill, the rent was much cheaper and the 2nd year in business we actually has a teensy net income to show on the tax return.

Stupid me thought that if we moved the store to what I would consider the main drag of this town, that surely we'd do wonderfully.  I couldn't have been more wrong.  The rent was more than double, the traffic on the road was I can't even say how many times over MORE than Rt 29, but it didn't make more people come in than at the old store and it has slowly been sucking the life out of my hubby who graciously has been at the store long hours, nearly daily for all those years.  We keep hearing how this town and whole area is great for those who wish to pursue a dream, but we've seen a lot of places closing including some favorite restaurants despite what we hear about the economy getting better.  Just don't have the means or desire to try to wait and see if it is just the economy that is the reason for the last bad 2 years..

Oh sure there are a concerned few in the community that keep coming in trying to give us suggestions for doing better, but none of them are anything we haven't already thought of ourselves and all of them, even the so called business grants in town we heard about, involve money or owing back.  Nope. Not going to happen. Not going into even more debt for a lost cause.

See me hubby had a wonderful idea 4 years ago, at my prompting to open a store nearly exclusively with wood furniture and art.  He is a wonderful wood burning artist and we had pictures hung in our garage that were just wasting away.  He opened up the store to include other wood artisans/furniture makers on a consignment basis and like I said, it really wasn't nearly as draining those first few years. The store filled up with beautiful works of mesquite, pine, and other woods I've never even heard of.  Beautifully lathe-turned hand made lamps, bowls, coffee tables, just beautiful pieces most, one-of-a-kind!

When I mentioned moving it to Georgetown, we were both excited at the prospects. This little cottage like building with the rusty metal roof needed a lot of help to make it presentable, but we were up to the challenge.  Hubby even personally installed some laminate flooring, spruced up the inside and painted it too. We did do what advertising we could including several months worth at the local movie theater, but alas, folks are just not interested enough in coming and buying something.  There are some occasional sales but not enough to make much difference.  Many folks ooohh and ahhh and say the all too familiar "We'll be back".  Those folks will probably be the same ones who turn into the entryway at Christmas and think "Oh no, why did they close?"  Simple, because promises of coming back, doesn't pay the bills!

Anyway, I need to get to work now but wanted to get off my chest how relieved I will be once what feels like an oil well leak will finally be plugged up!!

Balcony Before ~ After

I'm taking a little work break to post some photos! :-)
Here are 2 Before pictures and 3 After pictures of our back balcony after sprucing it up will things we already had except for the flowers and rugs which were bought.  We will still be adding some things here and there...but the bulk of it is done.  I am very pleased with how it turned out.

Improvments done consisted of: 3 pots that had nothing but weeds in them, planted flowers and also a tall plant my folks gave me because they got it from a neighbor and didn't want it; Long planters that were empty that were bought last year to grow vegetables in, filled with flowers. (I already have some planters in the front with veges..so these were not being used yet.); a glider and one rocker we took up from the back porch that were not used much; and a wrought iron rocking chair that was a rusting white paint and had been stored in the shed that hubby cleaned up and spray painted a color that matched the seat cover we already had for it too.!!  

  

Love it!!
 

Honest...

...I did NOT set out to make this a 'picture' blog....but I just have to post a few of the sunset photos I took from my back balcony Thursday night. This is the balcony that we are sprucing up and I will post MORE pictures when I post the Before and After of that.

  I was actually working at my desk when I saw this sunset and bolted to get the camera!

I better get to work now.  I took on a little work this weekend since the house was screaming CLEAN ME!  I spent the first half of today cleaning the downstairs and even scrubbed the kitchen floor so that now it is clean enough to eat off of : -)    I just got back from going to the local Farm Supply store to get dog food and they had some nice flowers on sale at 50% !  Woo hoo!  I love SALES!  I bought a flat of them to plant...you guessed it up on the back balcony.  I already have 2 ceramic planters that we had just sitting outside the garage with nothing but weeds in it, and also already had bought last year some wide short planters for vegetables but I think I'll use two for flowers as well.  So the only thing I had to buy was the flowers.  I will try to get them potted tonight because I need to get half my work done today as planned.

Tomorrow I am cleaning the upstairs, doing the last half of my work and attend for a few hours a Sheltie Rescue picnic with some great people and a great organization I belong to. 

Gotta get to work...

Can it really be June?..

June already?!  Wow, this year is going quickly.  Summer has arrived in Texas and I turned the A/C on for the first time this past week.  We still only turn it on in the early evening as I can stand an open window and small fan during the day while I work here at my desk.

Although I worked all weekend, I did take some breaks to tend to the balcony garden, do some laundry and clean up the back porch some.  I had also mopped the entire back balcony last month and was thinking about what we could do with it without spending a lot of money.  Hubby suggested moving some of the furniture we had on the back porch that we didn't really use much up there and that got me thinking about it. Now hubby is going to repaint a metal rocking chair that we have in the shed, I potted a plant my folks gave me that was sitting in a bucket on the back porch, and I am really excited about pulling it all together.  The back balcony has much more privacy than the front and the sun sets in the back too.  We are being creative using things we already have and the only thing that I have purchased is some indoor/outdoor rugs that I am waiting to get from RugsDirect.com to put underneath the furniture.  I took a few 'before' photos and will post them when I have it all set up with 'before and 'after' photos. 

Yesterday morning while I was weeding a bit of the flower area by the front porch, I spotted a beautiful spider web that was glistening with rainbow colors from the way the sun was shining through it.  I ran and got the camera and hope these show up well enough here.  The one taken further away shows the shimmery rainbow colors of the web the best.