Happy 4th of July!

Ahhh... July 4th. My most favoritist holiday (yes, I realize that is not proper grammar). How can you not love a day that basically gives you the freedom and independence to do what you do every day? What is better than that? In my opinion, nothing. I love Independence Day because so many have fought for our freedoms, thousands have lost their lives, and thousands more continue to fight for us every single day. So please, hug and thank a veteran or soldier today (and their families!). They are the reason we're here today.

And speaking of today, there's another reason today is so special. Three years ago today we moved back into our house after Hurricane Ike. We were bound and determined to make it happen, and we did. I still remember (like it was yesterday) that first shower back in our house. There is no better feeling. Just one more reason to love July 4th.

I hope you have a safe and happy holiday. We will be participating in the golf cart parade (pictures to follow), and then the island-wide picnic, and then it's WW V (aka Water Wars 5). That is where the battle line is drawn, it's east versus west, and it is on. If you're out in your golf cart between 2 p.m. and 8 p.m., you're subject to getting wet from a water gun. And I'm not talking the little squirt gun kind. It's an all-out water war, and it is so much fun. Reason #468 that I love living in Clear Lake Shores. And then we'll close out the evening with fireworks. Unfortunately, I can't go out on the boat these days, but that's OK. We'll hang with all our neighbors at Chicken Lickin, and watch the crazies in the boats.

Happy July 4th!

Harvest time!

Last year we planted fruit trees in our back yard to complete our spring planting. Today, we picked some of our harvest. So, so, SO excited about this! We had two lemons, a big orange, and a ton of little satsumas. The limes are just starting to sprout, so those will be next. We're going to use the orange and satsumas to make an orange sherbert in my new ice cream maker. Yum!

 Jay makes the first harvest!

 Lemons!

 This will soon become sherbert.

 Limes

We did it!!!!

WE PLACED IN THE LIGHTING CONTEST!! YAY!!!!! I'll be honest... I'm a little excited. To say the least. That was my goal this year after we got the landscaping done... to get yard of the month and to place in the Christmas lighting contest, and we did both this year! Sweet!

It was a lot of work, but as I mentioned before, it's worth it to us, even if we didn't place. But placing is the icing on the cake. We placed third, and now have this sign in our yard. And we're more than happy to display it!

Christmas Lights

Tonight is the annual judging of Christmas lights in our neighborhood. They award 1st, 2nd, and 3rde place, and one of these days, we will place. Mark my words.  Everyone says it we should have own last year, but we didn't. And that's OK. While the judging is in the back of my mind when we do put up the lights, that's not the reason I do it. The guy that won last year had a sequencer set up to his lights and you could tune in to 91.1 to hear the music and see how it matched the lights. He did it again this year, so we'll see what happens. Others that have won have inflatables in their yard, and that's just not our style. So, we'll continue to keep it classy and add a few bits of our style here and there. We like it, so as far as I'm concerned, that's all that matters.

Here are a few pics I took tonight. Enjoy!

Outside:

Inside:

Winter planting

Last weekend, Jay and I worked our asses off in our yard planting our winter plants. At the time we were thinking, "why in the world did we decide to do this landscaping?" But in the end, it's totally worth it. We were popping pills for about three days straight because we were so sore, but we think it looks great! And so do many of our neighbors that drive by. We did pansies again this year, but instead of just the purple and gold, we added white. We took out the dusty miller, and added really pretty snap dragons instead. And along the walkway I went with petunias.

We also replaced the two camellias that were on either side of the front windows (the other ones fried in the ridiculously hot summer we had here), and they are blooming now (thanks to two good soaking rains), and they are GORGEOUS!!!

In the back we pulled up the four camellias that died this summer, and replaced them with two hawthorns from the front, and two Mexican key lime bushes. Nice and pretty green!

This is the view we get to look at every time we sit on our patio. I LOVE IT!!!

New Yard Art

It hasn't rained more than one inch in 200 days. 200 days! We need some rain like nobody's business. Unfortunately, there isn't any on the horizon for the next two weeks. Which means more hot weather (we've also set a record for consecutive days above 100 degrees), and more of this awful drought. We're now under water restrictions, which include no outdoor watering whatsoever, so I can kiss my beautiful landscaping (what's left of it) good bye.

But at least my new yard art is cute!!!

New flowers!!

I spent most of the day on Saturday planting new summer flowers. I took a tour of Houston Garden Center Saturday morning to see what they had in stock, and came home with vinca, impatients, silva, and verbena. Looks good, if I do say so myself!!

The latest addition

Jay's mom surprised us this week with an addition to our yard (which, in case you're not aware, we are the April Yard of the Month for Clear Lake Shores). It's a fountain, and it's perfect! I love it! Jay and I were sitting out on our patio last night and it was calm and quiet and you could hear the trickle of the water. Very soothing.


Have a great week!!!

Yard of the Month!!!!!

FINALLY!!! We got yard of the month! WAHOO!!!!! I secretly made it a goal of mine to get yard of the month on the island, and to win our holiday lighting contest. One down, one to go! I've got about eight months to think about the lights...

The yard of the month sign was delivered earlier this week. Here are some pics, and click here to read the article in the monthly newsletter, The Islander (see pg. 16) . Enjoy!!

Hard work pays off

We are finally getting "there" with our yard - both the front and back! At the San Jacinto College Foundation golf tournament last November, we won landscaping in the silent auction. That landscaping was installed in the front yard in January. That really inspired Jay and I to keep up with it (right after is when we had the big freeze here, so we spent as much on sheets to cover the new landscaping as we did on the landscaping itself), and to work on the backyard. We're not totally there yet (we need new grass in the front, and some more work along the fence line in the back), but we're close

We've been working the last two days in the back digging up the old boxwoods that were next to the house, and replacing it with some color. We can't walk much right now, but I think it's worth it. It turned out well, if I do say so myself! Here are a few pics of the front and back... Hopefully that "Yard of the Month" sign is on its way to our house!!

Front yard

I can't wait to spend some time this week sitting right here!

Citrus trees in the back yard (they've been there for awhile, we just mulched them and cleaned everything up this weekend)

Yes, this smells as awesome as it looks!

The NEW back entrance to the house!!!!

We pulled this out of the ground... the last of the horse gate that used to be in our driveway. I totally did my happy dance when this came out!!!