Kitchen Fireplace Mantel

The week went by so fast. Time flies when you are having fun and being with my grandsons, a newborn and a toddler, really makes it fun and therefore, fast. I only have 1 more week here and then I surely will miss these 2 precious boys. Now, while the 2 boys are napping, it's time to do a post. I would like to join

Blue Monday, which is hosted by Sally of http://smilingsally.blogspot.com/

Tablescape Tuesday, hosted by Marty of http://astrollthrulife.blogspot.com/

Three or More Tuesday, hosted by Tam of http://thegypsyscorner.com/

For more wonderful entries, make sure you visit these gracious hosts.

We are very fortunate to have 3 fireplaces in our home. I have shown 2 of them in the past and now I would like to show you the 3rd one. Of course, I am one who likes changes so the mantel does not always look like this, but it's been this way since I took down the Christmas accessories. I am sure it will change again as soon as I get back home.

This fireplace is in the dining portion of our kitchen. We have placed a TV above it because hubby's favorite shows just happen to go on during dinner time and I do not like to take the food to the family room game table all the time.

Can you tell that I like candles? Shown in the pic below are 10 candles and their holders. Can you spot all of them? Do you think that is a good enough contribution for 3 or more? And you will notice that most of them are blue so they also count for Blue Monday. You will also see a framed blue tile of "Our Lady of Fatima" on the right short hall wall, which is leading to the family room. I bought the tile ( a total of 6 put together) when we visited Fatima in Portugal and had it framed when we got home. I think I might have shown it in one of the past Blue Mondays.

We won the fleur de lis pottery that is hanging in the middle of the mantel, from the Chamber of Commerce party silent auction. One more thing we won there that is not shown on any of these pictures, is a huge (about 2 ft high) candle holder, which looks very similar to the Corinthian column holders on the left side of the mantel. We only placed a bid once but all these items were included.

On the left side of the mantel are candles on Corinthian column holders that I just mentioned earlier, a planter with faux plant, a bird given to me by Laurie, the Bargainhunter, and a small Polish pottery cottage tea light candle holder.

In the center is a box that I placed on an iron tray. This wooden box serves as a double purpose: to conceal the TV electrical cord and to hold a set of flatware.

On the right side of the mantel are another Polish pottery tealight candle holder, a hand made heavy pottery bowl that we also won at the chamber of commerce silent auction and a pair of brass candlestick holders I bought at a flea market for $2.

On the floor next to the mantel is a flatware cabinet. I was able to fit 5 sets of flatware there, including one set with a settings for 12 on the top compartment. On top of it are another pair of candles on iron holders, a teapot I bought from one of our London trips, a miniature tea set and another faux plant. I see a tin bird peeking out under the cabinet.

You can see a little bit of the small table on the left side of the mantel here. The table is actually one of a nesting table of 3. On it are a hurricane candle lamp, the TV cable box, a pedestal peacock cake plate with an orchid and rooster sitting on top of it. I have another tin bird under it and a tole container I used for storing firewood.

I guess that is it. Hope you enjoyed your visit cause I certainly enjoyed having you. Thanks to Sally, Marty and Tam for hosting these 3 fun events.

Grandsons and Awards!

After church today, my daughter and son in law took me out to lunch. They said it is a thanks for agreeing to stay 2 more months. Heh! heh! Actually I am going home this coming Saturday.

And since I am going home soon, I wanted to post my grandsons again. This way I can always go to my blog and see their pictures. I sure am going to miss them after I leave.

B's smile is always so cute. And hasn't the baby grown since he was born 2 weeks and 4 days ago? They sure grow fast.

I took B to the library for storytime while his mom was still recuperating
from childbirth pains. He really had a lot of fun and I was enjoying just watching him. He was very attentive and of course, he had to be right in front of the reader.

Mom and baby.

Big brother and baby

I wanna tickle those cute feet!

Now, it's award time. This
Kreativ Award is long overdue. Debby of Just Breathe presented it to me last January. I am sorry I just got to post it, Debby. I might be late but I never forget and I want to thank you again for thinking of me when you passed it along. You should all visit Debby at http://skyesofblue.blogspot.com/. She is one of the sweetest bloggers that I have ever met and seeing her cute dog, Skye alone will make it worth stopping by there.

To blog is to create so I believe everybody out in Blogland is creative so please grab this award if you read this and you blog.

Today I got this Beautiful Blogger award from 2 beautiful ladies, Debbie of http://debbie-debbiedoos.blogspot.com/ and Kim of http://sawwysouthernstyle,blogspot.com/. You really ought to visit these 2 ladies' blogs and like me, I know you will drool over their beautiful homes. Kim and Debbie, better cover the areas that you don't want to get wet, lol! And thank you so much for these awards. I appreciate you thinking of me.

With this award, I am supposed to list 7 things that you do not know about me yet. Hmmmmm, you might know everything about me already by now cause sometimes, I talk too much. But let me try.

1. I am retired but I used to work as a Clinical Laboratory Scientist, also known as a Medical Technologist, for so many years

2. I married my boss, (both second marriage for us) and he tells everyone that I am his boss now, lol

3. Unlike baking, I don't enjoy cooking that much but I cook everyday. But I actually enjoy cooking when I have company coming.

4. I was born and grew up in the Philippines and immigrated to the US when I was 21.

5. I got my Bachelors degree from the oldest Catholic university in the Philippines when I was 19 years old.

6. I enjoy decorating so much that our house decor and furniture arrangement (except for the ones too heavy for me to push) never stay the same

7. I cut my own hair, not too often cause I keep it long most of the time.

Last but not the least is "I love Your Blog Award" I received from Maria of http://personalizedsketchesandsentiments,blogspot.com

I encourage you to visit Maria, meet her lovely family and see her beautiful sketches. I have never met anyone more talented. She takes special orders too and she custom makes them to your liking.
The rule here is to pass it to 7 bloggers whose blogs I love. I have a difficult time choosing only 7 because I love all the blogs I visit so I want to pass this along to everyone I follow. Please come and grab it!


I hope you are all enjoying your weekend.

Pink Quilt, Summer Purse and Ybor City in Tampa

It's Pink and Sightseeing Saturday again so don't forget to visit Beverly at http://howsweetthesound.typepad.com/my_weblog/. You will be amazed a all the pretty pinks circulating around Blogland today.

Last weekend, I took a break from babysitting our newborn grandson and his brother.

John flew to Tampa for a meeting so I drove to the Bay area to pick him up from the airport and spend the weekend with him.

On my way back to Fort Myers, I passed by a Marshall's and a Ross and naturally, I had to check them out. I never come out empty handed when I visit those stores and I am sharing 2 items for my Pink Sat. contribution.

I bought the printed quilted throw from Ross, only $12.99 and I really love the colors. I thought I would use it for a tablecloth on our game table to create a springy tablescape when I get back home. It is also reversible. Pink, yellow and blue flowers and green leaves on a white background on one side and green and white stripes on the other.

The canvas Tommy Hil. purse came from Marshall's for $19.99. It's mostly green and orange but it has a pink interior and on the plaid pockets. I think it is perfect for summer and spring but I couldn't even wait for those seasons to come so I am using it now. After all, weather here in FL right now feels more like summer. We already have the air conditioner on.

Now, back on my Tampa trip. The meeting was in Ybor City so after picking up John from the airport, we went there and checked in the hotel. The location is very convenient because it is only a block away from shopping and restaurants and very close to 7th Ave., which is recognized as one of the "10 Greatest Streets in America". I love the old paved roads.

After checking in, we walked to find a place to eat. We ate at Iguana Grill and Bar. I had a grilled blackened mahi with mango salsa and fried plantains and John had a Caesar salad with blackened mahi. We enjoyed the food so much that I forgot to take pictures.

While John was at the meeting, I drove north of Tampa to my other daughter's house to pick up AJ. She was ready to spend the weekend with us too.


We went back to the hotel to pick up John after his meeting and then we went to the Tampa Bay Performing Arts Center to watch Wicked. AJ loves this Broadway and everytime she hears it is playing, she calls us and asks if we could see it, again and again. We have seen it twice in Tampa and twice in NY. John bought her the book. It has really nice pictures of the cast and the script and she was following the script while it was being acted. And for $50 to be donated for a good cause, you can have a poster autographed by the entire cast. Of course, AJ had to have that too. She was so excited to have pictures taken with the Munchkin and other casts. She wanted a pic with Elphaba and Galinda too but we could not find them

John's daughters and the 3 grandkids also came to see us. We all walked around Ybor City downtown while John was in a meeting again the next day.

Ybor City is a charming old historic town in Tampa founded in the 1880's by cigar manufacturers. It used to be occupied by multi ethnic groups mostly Spaniards, Italian and Cubans, who rolled millions of cigars annually. After World War 2, they started abandoning the area and it got neglected for decades. It was finally redeveloped into a popular night club and entertainment district.

We went to the marketplace and they were having a craft show. We also visited the Ybor City Studio. The kids had a great time playing and walking around and listening to music.

Here's another of my pink contribution. Zoe is wearing pink! Isn't she a cutie?

Ybor City is so alive at night so if you are looking for a fun night life, it is the place to go. I did not take pictures but all the night clubs had long waiting lines outside as we passed them.

After the meeting, we took the kids to the Florida Aquarium. I will show you pictures of that next Sightseeing Saturday cause this post is getting too long. Thanks a lot for coming along.

And thanks to Beverly for hosting another fun Pink Saturday!

I hope you all have a nice weekend!

Playing on My Daughter's Dining Table

I am still with my daughter, SIL and babies and did not really want to miss a Tablescape Thursday entry. So, what's a tablescapaholic got to do? I dug out a few items I bought from shopping before my daughter went into labor, bought a set of placemats and napkins and just rummaged through Tina's cabinets to find dishes and flatware that I could use and this is what I came out with.


Just a simple tablescape for 4. She had no napkin rings so I just folded the napkins.

While in the process of putting stuff together, my older grandson asked, "What you doing, lala?" My daughter joked that it's what she has been wondering all along too. LOL!

Then, my son in law came home from work and asked why we have a bird on the table. Tina answered that it's mom's tablescaping thingy.

All these commotions made me feel like I was a freak. Am I? LOL!
Of course, when I see everybody else's tablescapes, I will feel normal again. So, let's all feel normal, go to Susan's blog at http://betweennapsontheporch.blogspot.com and have fun looking at each others table creations.at

Thanks for your visit. I truly enjoyed it. And thanks to Susan for allowing us to play with dishes every Thursday.

Bookcase in the Hall

I would like to announce that Marty of http://astrollthrulife.blogspot.com/ has taken over hosting Tabletop Tuesday. Please join Marty and help make the event a success. I am joining her first week's hosting takeover. To see many inspiring tabletop vignettes, go see Marty and her participants. I am also excited to join Miss Mustard Seed at http://missmustardseed.blogspot.com/ for Furniture Feature Friday for the first time. I think it will be a meme I would love to join regualrly since I have a lot of favorite furniture. Don't forget to visit her blog and see lots of beautiful furniture.

For a starter, I would like to share this bookshelf. DH and I spotted it while browsing through an antique shop downtown. The shop was being moved to another location so they had a lot of their items marked down considerably. We saw this big book cabinet and fell in love with it, especially the ladder. Dh always wanted a bookcase to keep his books together and I wanted one to hold a lot of my knick knacks. We tried to think of a place where we could put it because we really did not have any more space for any more furniture. Then I thought about this hallway. It is wider than usual hallways, in fact, I used to have a settee there. We took the measurement of the bookcase and went home to measure the hall wall to see if it would fit. And wouldn't you know it? It would fit perfectly! It was meant to be! So, we bought it and there it is now. I store the ladder on the side when it is not in use just so it wouldn't be in the way. After all, this is a hallway, even though hardly anybody ever goes to the back rooms, except when we have guests.

I think it is perfect there because the home office entrance is located on the opposite wall.

There you see the ladder in place when we use it. The cabinet at the end of the hall is a gun cabinet but we are not gun collectors so I took the gun shelves out and had some glass shelves installed to display my doll collection. Maybe I will showcase that some other time.

I kept the gun shelves in case I want to convert it back when my wilder side takes over, lol.

The wood is mahogany and it is solid, very heavy. The ladder hooks into a bar and you can slide it left to right or vice versa. We like the dentil crown moulding.

There is a l ittle clearance on the very top where I keep large bowls and cake and serving trays that I rarely use.

The cabinets at the bottom is where I store my table linens such as table cloths, runners, napkins and placemats.

It has a pull out shelf on each side to use as tables or desks.

Do you see my blue and white Russian Tsar and queen vodka decanters below? I moved them from the bar. I think they are safer here. I shop a lot from these vignettes to use for tablescaping.

I sure filled it up pretty quickly. Sometimes I wonder where could I have kept all these stuff before having this piece of furniture. Pretty soon, we will have to move the books out of there. Actually, I already moved out a few but I had to keep some so I can keep calling it a bookcase. LOL!

I

Thank you for coming by. I hope you enjoyed what I showed you today. Thanks to our gracious hostesses for hosting these 2 fun events.

Water and Palms

It's a new week and I would like to participate in 2 events, Blue and Mosaic Monday. Blue Monday is hosted by Sally at http://smilingsally.blogspot.com and Mosaic Monday is hosted by Mary at http://dearlittleredhouse.blogspot.com. Make sure you visit them to see lots of blue beauties and creative mosaics.
Well, I am still in Florida but I took a weekend break from babysitting my 2 precious grand babies to join hubby in Tampa for the weekend. He had a medical seminar to attend. I drove and picked up my granddaughter so she can spend sometime with us too at Ybor City. We also watched the broadway, Wicked. AJ and I have seen it for the 4th time. Do you think we really like it? LOL! I will show you more pictures for Sightseeing Sat.

For now, I just want to share with you the blue waters of Florida, although the first mosaic looks more like gray water, the sky is definitely blue. These pics were taken on the Cape Coral bridge which connects Fort Myers to Cape Coral.

The presence of palm trees and water is so typical of Florida.

Although this is the new Sunshine Skyway bridge, it still freaks me out but I drove pass it just to take pictures to share with you. It is a beautiful bridge but the original bridge has been a site for many tragic accidents.

In Jan, 1980, USCGC Blackthorn and a tanker, Capricorn collided resulting in the drowning deaths of 23 crew trapped on board and belowdecks. And then again in May, 1980, the southbound span of the original bridge was destoyed when the freighter MV Summit Venture collided with a pier support column during a storm. 1200 feet of the bridge plummeted into the Tampa Bay. Six automobiles and a Greyhound bus happened to be driving by, not knowing the bridge has been split and they fell 150 ft. below killing 35 people. This bridge is very tall and it is really hard to see what you are approaching. There was 1 survivor, Wesley McIntire. His pickup truck landed on the Venture but he died in 1989. He was haunted by the fact that he was the only one who survived.

The Courtney Campbell Causeway on SR 60 is a different story. I love driving by there, very picturesque with water on both sides. It has 2 beaches along the way. It stretches 9.9 miles connecting eastern Clearwater to Tampa's Rocky Point Island and subsequently to the western portion of mainland Tampa.

I hope you enjoyed a little tour of some FL waterways and bridges. These are just a few of the many bridges in Florida. Thank you very much for your visit and many thanks to our hosts!