First Day of Summer

 

It's the first day of Summer! 

I can take no credit for these flowers. Mother Nature is in charge of my favorite ditch lilies ( a red letter day at my house when they first start flowering).  My mother and I used to strap my kids in car seats, put the shovels in the trunk and head to country railroad crossing to dig them up in clumps. I understand from a law enforcement officer that I gave birth to that there are hefty fines for this behavior these days! 

I have six of these wonderful hanging baskets. I have 3 similar to the one in front. My youngest daughter purchased one for me for Mother's Day and I purchased two more. My middle son and his wife purchased two equally gorgeous ones with pink geraniums that are inbetween the multicolored baskets. I have one that is mostly yellow transplanted in the basket of the pink bicycle I have strapped to my tree. We purchase all the baskets early in May from local Amish warehouses that sell wholesale to walk in customers. 

Mr. Merry has taken over the care and feeding of all the flowers and it is eye popping! I get so many compliments from neighbors, passersby and on Facebook about my lovely flowers. I have absolutely nothing to do with them once they leave the back of my vehicle. 

Meanwhile we are very busy in the grandchild care business. My middle son has a new job and was just sent out of state for two weeks for training. We have his two elementary boys every day now. My youngest sons three boys, aged 6, 5, and 2 are coming this week since teacher mom has a mandatory class and their other grandfather is back in the hospital. My oldest daughter's daughter (one of my two granddaughters) does not have camp this week. She is eleven and is at the age where you really aren't comfortable to leave her home for an eight hour day and this week they have workers coming in to work on her kitchen. We picked her up from two hours away today and she will be here until Friday.  So - busy busy. 

I am also waging war with city hall in my free time. It is a long story involving changing zoning and trying to destroy our property values. We have lived in this single story house for 42 years and remodeled every inch into our forever home and I am pretty much over the edge.  

So, anyway, enjoy your summer! 

Mother's Day Tea

 

This was going to be a happy post! A return to the New Normal Post. A record of my second time out in the real world and the first get together with family (who are also my girl squad!). 

I had gathered my two daughters, my two granddaughters, my two daughter-in-loves, my co-gramma and my daughter's sister-in-love and niece.  I made reservations for tea at the most elegant tearoom and my most favorite tearoom, Sweet Shalom in Sylvania, Ohio. 

We started with the scone course. Our cream scones were served with butter and jam. We were so eager to sample them, I forgot to get a picture without a bite! 

Our delicious scones were following by the soup course. This broccoli cheese soup was every bit as delicious as it looks in the photo. The list of teas is to my right. With such a large table we were able to order three separate teas in refillable pots so that we could sample several varieties of Harney and Sons teas. Or should I say vari it teas? 

My youngest granddaughter had the "child's tea". Here we see some peanut butter and jelly tea sandwiches served with a fruit cup, cookie and dessert. The younger ladies could also choose pink lemonade instead of tea. 

Our tea trays (this one is for four)

We each sampled a cucumber tea sandwich, vegetable confetti popover, egg salad tea sandwich, spring fruit salad and an Irish lace cookie on our Johnson and Johnson china dinner plate. 

Followed by a Daffodil Cake served in a glass goblet. 

Followed by .  .  . Decadent Chocolate Cream Pie with Whipped Topping. And yes - forks and spoons were immediately inserted into the pie; this was the best photo I could grab before they disappeared!!

The Sweet Shalom Tearoom hosted teas on Fridays and Sundays with a themed high tea menu each month. During the pandemic they even had carryout teas available for preorder. Unfortunately they are almost two hours away which was too far to pickup.  

I was eagerly stalking their webpage for details on the summer teas in the coming months. Unfortunately they announced last week that the very tea we attended was the last seating of their last tea. The two proprietress' are retiring and closing the tea room. The tea room was worth every second of the drive to and from their adorable Victorian home turned tea room and was only a few blocks from my oldest daughter's home. 

I am so glad we were able to make time to visit but I am pretty devastated that the tearoom is closing.