The First Week of Summer Vacation

Kids everywhere are excited at the prospect of summer vacation.  Our daughter, Katie, is no exception.  Just in time for summer break, the weather has cleared up a bit--like so many parts of the country, we have had endless days of rain.

We celebrated with a fun little tea party, in the backyard, under our expansive maple tree, under the safety of the mosquito netting.  Lots of rain = lots of mosquitoes.  I convinced Katie to wear some vintage jewellry as we dined on tiny slices of french bread, strawberries fresh from our garden, pink lemonade and tiny pecan cookies.  Hardly nutritious, but oh so fun.........

During the endless weekends of dreary rain this spring, I created a selection of tiny little placemats, napkins, napkin rings and bread basket liners.  My latest design is a bright green picot with tiny white daisies.  And to showcase the wonderful green, I choose two small dessert plates in yellow.  They are Harlequin dishes by the Homer Laughlin company.  My Great Grandmother, Maude Armstrong Goodman, owned a set of these, which were handed down to my mother.  She has added to them over the years and gave several boxes to me just recently, a culling of the herd so to speak.  The colors are very bright and cheery--yellow, green, aqua, periwinkle and orange are among my favorites.  The colors are similiar to those of FiestaWare dishes, and not surprisingly they also made by the Homer Laughlin company.

I love the tiny little napkin rings and the bread basket liner.  So fun.  If you have alot of fabric scraps, you might consider making some yourself.

We even splurged and used the tiny crystal glasses for our pink lemonade.  Katie loved using them!



The best part of the day for Katie (and me, secretly) was actually picking strawberries from our tiny strawberry patch.  Last year was the first year for our square foot garden attempt.  We planted only about a dozen tiny plants that yielded about 3 strawberries.  This year, we've already picked 18 berries and still have lots more on the way (relatively speaking anyway).  The amount of plants have easily doubled this spring, thanks to the precocious little runners that have sprouted from last years established plants.

Just this past week, Katie FINALLY lost her other front tooth.  Like the one before it, her tooth had been hanging on loosely for what seemed an eternity.  She is delighted to be missing both front teeth now and isn't afraid to show off her gap to anyone.  It lends a whole new personality to her when she smiles.