A Vintage Fourth of July!

I just love vintage and the Fourth of July!  Red, white, and blue just stir my heart and bring a tear to my eye.  I sometimes get choked up when my third graders sing God Bless America, so clearly I am a sentimental bee.  

So pour yourself a cool glass of Blackberry Lemonade and I hope you enjoy a visit to Stars and Stripes aka Sweet Bee Cottage! 

One of my favorite ways to show the holiday or season we are in is with pillows on our banquette (or I like to think of them as window seats) in our kitchen nook.

Shout out to you Carol!  This pillow always makes me think of you.

None of the pillows are truly vintage, but some of them are made out of vintage fabrics.

For our next stop on the patriotic tour of Sweet Bee Cottage, we'll drop in on the library.

I just love these little milkglass urns.  I'm not sure how old these are.  The flags are ones I tea-dyed about 10 years ago.  The GLORY banner I bought from Notes from a Cottage Industry a couple of years ago.

While GLORY can be found in the library.......FREEDOM is waiting in the living room.  

This banner is also from Tracey at Notes from a Cottage Industry.

These glasses sit on our game cabinet.  I usually put sunflowers in them, but they aren't quite blooming yet this year.  Don't they look like they are from the Bicentennial?  I picked them up at an antique mall about 15 years ago.  They just have a 70s vibe to me.  If anyone knows more about these I'd love to hear.

Don't you just love this little hat?  Oops!  The "J" in July is covered up, but trust me it's there.  Laurie from Magpie Ethel is the artist.  Be sure to drop by and see the wonderful creativity going on in her sweet studio.  

Looking for an easy apothecary jar filler?

I took some garland from Dollar Tree and just stuffed them in.  

And one of my favorites I love to get out every year is this Country issue of Ideals.  It's from 1967 and I can't even imagine where I might have picked this up.  Maybe my mom, the Sewing Bee, gave it to me.  She knows I like things like this.

This is just one poem from this sweet book.  The more I look at it now I don't think I'll put it away after this holiday.  I like what it says and I think this might deserve to be released from the patriotic decor bins and shared year round.  Congratulations little book - you've earned a promotion.

Well I hope you enjoyed your little visit to Sweet Bee Cottage!  I know I enjoyed our visit.  

Be sure to see the other celebrants over at Joan's Anything Goes Here

for her Fabulous Vintage Fourth of July Blog Party!

It's never too early to start the party is it?  Nah, I didn't think so either.

And who doesn't love TWO parties?  C'mon over to It's a Very Cherry World and celebrate the RED, white and blue for Rednesday!

What's this?  A THIRD party?  Are you crazy Sweet Bee?  Naw - I just want to spread that patriotic fever all over blogland.  I'm joining up with the most delightful Cindy at My Romantic Home for Show and Tell Friday!

P.S.  I forgot to mention the winner of my Fourth of July giveaway was Kim at Starshine Chic!  Thank you to all of you who entered.  Happy Fourth of July!

Teaching Shapes in the Prettiest Way Possible

Hello my pink friends (and not so pink friends)!

I wanted to share with you today one of my favorite bracelets and it just happens to be pink.

It is made out of bits of broken china and set in sterling silver (which needs polishing - just keepin' it real).

I wear this a lot in the spring with all my pink sweaters and tops.  

When Baby Bee was a wee toddler she loved to play with this bracelet while it was on my wrist.  I taught her the names of many shapes with just this bracelet.  Those are some sweet memories.

Thank you Baby Bee for modeling this bracelet today.  Maybe one day -in the far distant future- you will use it with your children to teach them shapes.

I picked this up several years ago at a craft show.  The next year I bought some earrings from the same vendor, but sadly I haven't been back in several years so I don't know if he is still in business.

Thank you so much for coming by for Pink Saturday.  Please be sure to stop by some of the other delightful participants in Beverly's Pink Saturday at How Sweet the Sound.

Our little visits together are always such a treat.

My Kitchen Garden

I have to start out here by saying that I love gardens, but I have never been the best gardener.  I live in climate that has very hot summers and so unless I wake up very early, there's not a lot that gets done in the garden in the summer.  Summer is my project time since I'm a teacher and that's when I can get things done - things in the air conditioning that is.  :)

But this year is different.  We have always had a VERY shady home, in fact, that's one of the main reasons we bought this house - the trees.  But this year we had to take out two liquidambar trees that were destroying our driveway and working their way towards the foundation of our sweet cottage.  You can read and see about the end of Mr. and Mrs. Liquidambar here.

So Worker Bee and I decided to tackle square foot gardening.  We built raised beds, filled them with compost, and planted seeds and a few transplants.  This is what it looked like in April.

Then there was a little more progress in early May.

And now today we're already harvesting!  

We're even trying to grow corn!

Did I mention we're also growing a cutting garden?

These two gardens are just steps out my kitchen side door and if I decide I need some fresh herbs I can just walk out and snip some.  The other night we were having some marinated grilled flank steak, a green salad and some of our baby squash when I decided to liven things up a bit and make an herb butter to put on our baguette.  Just a short stroll, a little bit of chiffonade, and we had a tasty little accent to our delicious dinner. 

Can you tell I love my new kitchen garden? 

Today I'm joining the parties at Cindy's My Romantic Home

and

Tootsie's Fertilizer Friday at Tootsie's Time.

Hope you can stop by and see what's going in at both parties.  

And, if you ever need me to chiffonade for you, come on by!

 

Vintage Nighttime Yahtzee!

Tonight was a lovely evening outside.  

The Sewing Bee went out to dinner with us and when we came back to Sweet Bee Cottage we decided to play a little Yahtzee!   Such a fun game for Baby Bee and it really helps her adding skills.

My Yahtzee game was originally my parents.  They were married in 1960 and the game instructions say it's from 1961.   Pretty vintage, don't you think?  Apparently the game was invented by a wealthy Canadian couple to play on their yacht.  Thanks Canada!

Can you see how yellowed the scorepads are?  As I was handing them out to everyone I found old scorepads from my childhood.   

One said Kari on it.  I haven't seen Kari since the 8th grade.  Another said Stephanie on it and I can't even remember the last time I saw Stephanie.  Fun to see how my handwriting has changed over the years - from printing to just learning cursive to my signature today.

While we were outside playing the game we had some yummy chocolate ice cream and some tasty Trader Joe's Joe-Joes.  (Joe-Joes are just like Oreos only better!)

What games have you enjoyed all your life?  

Do you ever play games outside?  I highly recommend it.  It was just a lovely and pleasant summer evening.

Well come on out and enjoy Suzanne's Colorado Lady Vintage Thingie Thursday.  

I'm sure you'll find many fun vintage finds.

Thanks so much for coming by!  And don't worry there's still plenty of ice cream left for you although the Joe-Joes are going pretty fast.

Don't Break the Plate on Rednesday

Hey!  You CAN'T break these plates.  Well, I suppose if you really put some effort into it you could.

My family - seemingly like many other families around the world - really enjoys eating outside.

So who wants to pick up broken dishes when you're out enjoying an al fresco meal?  Not me!

And can you guess what color all my plates have in common?  You guys are getting too smart - that's right RED!

We'll start with my cherry plates!  Part of the Target Summer product line from about 5 years ago.  My nieces and daughter enjoy these quite a bit.

The strawberry dishes are part of a coordinated set I also picked up from Target about 4 years ago. They are salad size.

These are the dinner plates.  Used these just last night for dinner.  

Here are the matching bowls.

And finally these were in a swap from Denise at Bloomin' at Beagle Run Cottage.  

Just perfect for the Fourth of July!

Fun summer reds!

Let's see now I can invite 11 of you over and we won't have to worry about broken dishes on the patio.  Who wants to come?  We could have salad with fresh strawberries, field greens, chicken breast, and homemade poppyseed dressing.  Maybe some buttermilk spice muffins with honey butter?  Just a nice light lunch with some sparkling berry lemonade and you.

Won't you come join Sue from It's a Very Cherry World for the brightest party in blogland?

Thanks for dropping in for a visit.  It's always so fun to hear from you.