letter: dear dad

dear dad:

it is your 31st father's day.  that is quite an accomplishment and you should be proud of yourself.  you were so young when mom told you she was pregnant.  i'm so grateful that your agreement was to have her stay home to raise us kids.  that must have put an incredible amount of stress on you.  sole support of a family isn't small potatoes and you took it head on.  i love hearing about how you guys would budget out the month by putting money in envelopes.  it has taught me the value of a dollar and living wintin your means.  that is an invaluable lesson.  raising us was your number one priority and i know you sacrificed.  thank you.

some of my favorite memories are summer nights.  every night we would drag every toy out of the garage and every night after we went inside you would put everything away.  you must have been exhausted after working all day and yet i never heard you complain.  you ran me up and down the cul de sac a million times trying to get me to ride a two wheeler.  i was a slow learner and you were very patient (and you were again when you taught me how to drive).  you and mom would pitch the softball to all the neighborhood kids and our yard was always the place to be.  you'd get so mad when we'd run around with no shoes on and then track dirt and sand from the sandbox in the house.  i remember a few times a summer you would take us to the local pool at night.  that was always so fun.  then when i was in college we would take nightly walks together.  we had some good talks and found that glass table in those people's garbage.  it still looks good in the family room.

i love that halloween is your favorite holiday and you're crazy enough to like black jelly beans.  i remember trick or treating after school but the real fun came after we ate frozen pizza and headed back out with you in the dark.  i always give kids who are out with their dads after dark extra candy on halloween because i know how much fun they're having.  don't worry, i plan on making my kids dump their nerds and pixie sticks into margerine containers so that they don't get any on the floor.  i still freak out if i hear a nerd hit the tile.  where did it go?!

thank you for coming to all my extracirricular activities.  i remember that you were supposed to take a customer to the skybox on the night of my last track meet.  you told your boss you couldn't go because being there for me was more important.  family is always first.  period.

you helped move me four times in four years in college and i remember when you moved me into my law school apartment you told me it was the last time you would move my couch.  i stayed in that apartment all three years.  i know when i've pushed the limit.  thank you for my college education.  my brain is full because of you.

it was such an honor for me to have you walk me down the aisle at my wedding.  people say you marry your father and i'm so lucky to have you as my example of what a man should be.  i saw the way you looked at mom with total love and devotion and knew that i would never settle for anything less.  i saw that same look in king louie's eyes and i'm the happiest girl in the world. 

thank you for being supportive when i went into treatment.  you did everything anyone asked of you and you were just there.  being there for king louie and for me is part of the reason that i've been in recovery for over two years.  whether is was physically or emotionally being there or helping when my insurance ran out you were committed to my recovery.  i swear i'll pay you back someday and i know that you don't really care if i ever do.  being healthy and happy is repayment enough. 

it is so fun working with you.  you're the best boss i've ever had.  while i don't run into work in the morning because i'm so excited to be there, i always get a kick out of stopping by your office and chatting about the last night's events.  kinda weird that you give me reviews and raises, huh?  i loved at the company Christmas party when mom told someone that i was such a daddy's girl.  it made my day.  everyone tells me that i look just like mom but once in awhile i have someone tell me that i look like you.  that makes me happy.

thank you for being a terrific role model.  you taught me to stay calm and basically not to be a pain in the caboose.  work hard and let my actions do the talking.  it is so much more effective.  you've gained the respect of king louie and i know he looks up to you too.  that means the world to me.  thanks for being the person to call when the garage door wouldn't go down, when there was randomly water in the basement and for all the other hopeless situations we get ourselves into.  it is so wonderful to know that i have the option to:

via laura major via twitter via source

happy father's day!  go hug your dad, your husband or any other amazing man in your life and thank him for making you the wonderful person you are today.

~poptartyogini~

flashback: the 1960's

as i mentioned here my family had a garage sale over the weekend.  my grandpa passed away last summer and my grandma died back in the 90's.  during the winter my family met in his condo and all of us grandkids got to take what we wanted.  we started with my oldest cousin and worked our way down to the youngest.  i was going to do a post about all the different things i took but when i went to take a picture of my cuckoo clock i couldn't find it.  now you're probably wondering what kind of person has a cuckoo clock and are even more confused by the fact that someone could lose one and i have to admit that i don't blame you.  while i work on the caper of the missing cuckoo clock (doesn't that kind of sound like nancy drew?), you all check out some items from long ago that i think are kind of groovy.  i use the term groovy because the items are from the 1960's.  while i've never seen an episode of mad men, i feel like you would find these things there.

booze:

after all the divvying up, king louie and i were snooping around the kitchen.  we opened a lower cabinet and there were all these vintage liquor bottles.  two of them were still sealed.  one had a seal that said 1961 and the other said 1974.  it kind of makes me want to ask my grandpa why there were never opened.  were they for a special occasion (we wondered if the 1961 bottle was a house warming from when they moved out of the city and into the suburbs but it wasn't)?  heaven knows that people drank back then and my grandparents weren't tea tottlers.  i guess some of their parties were kind of wild, but 1960's wild, not puking on the front lawn wild.  regardless, king louie and i have a bar in our basement (hilarious because i am a tea tottler) and would like to find a way to display the bottles.

smoking:

this ashtray wasn't taken on the aforementioned (king louie hates that word) day.  it was my grandma's and my sister and i each got one.  way back when my grandma would host the ladies for cards.  i guess it was fashionable to give each gal her own ashtray instead of using one communal.  this cracks me up because my grandma didn't smoke.  she and my great aunt (her sister) would keep a pack of cigarettes in the freezer (i have no idea if this keeps them fresh though i'm thinking i might know where my love for freezing stuff comes from) and share one on cards day.  kind of different from now when i would scratch someone's eyes out if they even considered lighting a cigarette in my house.

photography:

i couldn't figure out how to get the camera out of the case

i saved this one for last because i thought that as bloggers who take pictures of every miniscule detail of life you would appreciate how far cameras have come.  they couldn't imagine a phone that didn't have a rotary dial let alone a phone that could leave the house let alone a phone that could leave the house that could take pictures.  how about that for a run on sentence?!  i thought this camera looked so cool and we have it displayed in our family room.  i wonder if it still works and i wonder why my grandpa still had it.  regardless, i'm glad he kept it.

i hope you enjoyed our little walk down memory lane.

what items do you have that take you to another era?

~poptartyogini~

pinteresting: just because

when it comes to

 

 i always have a plan.  i have to have a theme because i have to have something to control.  it is weird because i'm not super organized in real life but when it comes to oh, how pinteresting wednesday i needs things all neat and tidy.  this week i'm going outside the box and choosing five pins just because i like them.  no rhyme, no reason, just because.

just because bookworms are sexy:

thea neubauer via pinterest via
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 just because this may be the key to my heart:

lisa de palo via pinterest via
source

just because time flies:

via lisa de palo via twitter via source

just because rainbows can also be delicious:

laura major via pinterest via source

just because love cures all:

tasha norris via pinterest via source

have a wonderful wednesday.  just because.

~poptartyogini~

garage sale: thief!

over the weekend my extended family held a garage sale.  my grandpa passed away last july and we cleaned out his condo for the sale.  a few other relatives added their own items to sell.  my sister (sissy) took a half day on friday to help and was so inspired that she went home and went through her clothes to find things to sell on saturday.  king louie and i are not exactly morning people so we arrived to help with the take down on saturday afternoon.  everything was still set up when we got there and i took a look around.  imagine my surprise when i saw this dress for sale:

that dress is mine!  that little stinker was trying to make a profit off my clothes.  i don't even know how she managed to get her grubby little paws on it.  i bought that dress back in the summer of 2001.  i saw it express and thought it was so cute but too expensive.  later on it was on sale and i snatched it up in an instant.  i wore it on my 21st birthday.  i tried it on on saturday and it still fit.  then the goober told me that it was on sale for $5 but she would give me the special price of $3.  needless to say, that did not happen.  instead, i took it home and wore it to a bridal shower on sunday.  king louie calls it my forever 21 dress.  i'm just glad it is home and in my closet where it belongs.

friday: letters

once again i'm linking up with ashley for friday's letters:



friday's letters

dear railroad:

a freight train has come through a few days this week at four right as i'm leaving work.  this is not convenient.  please stop.

dear boston celtics:

way to eff it up last night.

dear lebron:

you will never be michael.

dear nba:

i'm pretty sure you're fixed.  it just seemes too convenient that there will be a game 7 over the weekend.

dear self:

when did you become a dude?

dear king louie's softball game:

i really should be in bed at 9:30 tonight.  please be quick and preferably give us a win.

dear last night's yoga class:

awesome.

dear weekend:

i won't have a lot of time to chill out.  please remind me to have fun at this weekend's events and not be bitter that i'm not on the couch with king louie depleting our dvr.

have a good one!!

~poptart yogini~

summer: flower power

growing up my mom always planted flowers.  let's not confuse things.  my mom plants flowers.  she does not garden.  as a result, i plant flowers.  i do not garden.  i remember planting with her.  we'd have icy diet cokes and would listen to the cubs on the radio.  they were more than likely losing.  once i bought my own house i knew i would also plant flowers.  i was a little concerned when i realized there wasn't any place to plant flowers in the ground.  honestly, my house has been standing since 1951 and there isn't a patch of dirt anywhere.  my first year i attempted to plant in the mulch.  every year after i stuck to pots.

here's how i plant flowers.

step one:

assemble your pots.  i keep mine on the side of the house during the winter.  note: store clay pots in the garage.  they will crack if kept out in the elements.  there's a scientific reason why.  i am not a scientist.  ever year king louie's grandma gives us $30 for our anniversary.  every year i buy hanging baskets and save the basket to plant my own flowers in the next year.  i also recommend asking friends and family if they have extra pots.  i've inherited quite a few. 

all lined up like little soldiers

here are some extra items and my clay pots.  i have a spade, a tiny rake (i'm sure this has a technical term), miracle grow, a pair of good gardening gloves (they're atlas brand.  thank you AM) and extra soil.  it seems a bit ridiculous to buy dirt but i guess i buy water too.  please stop me if you ever see me in line at the store buying bottled air.

from here i break up the dirt i had left over from previous years with the tiny rake.  i have to find out what those are really called.  it is just embarrassing.

then you choose a flower and pop it out of the container.  squeeze the bottom so you don't accidentally rip the flower out of the dirt.  then pull off the bottom part of the dirt like so:

it exposes the roots to the new soil.  then dig a hole, add miracle grow and plant.

here's the flower box all prettied up with petunias

 

then repeat, repeat, repeat.  i had my AM buy me seven flats of flowers.  i must have been out of my ever loving mind.  after two straight hours of planting on saturday i was out of pots and out of patience.  it kind of bothers me that i don't have the time to actually take my time and enjoy the process but this coming weekend is booked.  it was last weekend or never.  i sent a frantic text to AM who graciously brought over her leftover pots on sunday and after church i went back at it.  this time king louie was around to help (he was mowing the lawn on saturday) and once i convinced him to stop being a perfectionist things went pretty smoothly.  well, except for when i bend my fingernail backwards while digging a whole.  my reaction was to put my finger in my mouth.  all that got me was a hurt finger and a mouth full of dirt.  kinda gritty.

here's how it all turned out and where they will spend the summer:

 

back steps

patio

patio

front lawn

impatiens around the tree in the parkway

another tip for bigger projects like this tree is to find a friend.  king louie dug the holes and i followed planting the flowers.  we flew once we started this system.

front lawn

and now the fun part begins: watering them.  there's nothing better than working at a heating and air conditioning company on a 100 degree day in the summer and coming home to almost dead flowers because it is scorching.  you break a sweat dragging the hose all around the house where it undoubtedly kinks on you at least once and you trip over it.

honestly though, it is worth it.  the tree is on the parkway and some neighbors drove by as i was planting.  they said that they always notice our flowers.  i really appreciated it.  i love the pop of color too.

how about you?  do you plant flowers?  or do you garden?  or do you buy your pots already made up?  fruits and veggies?  or is it just a pain in the neck?

pinteresting: gardens of eden

over the weekend i planted seven flats of flowers in two days.  more on that tomorrow.  however, i've been in a gardening state of mind recently.  i've even watered my plants two days in a row after work.  this is unheard of.  i plugged 'garden' into pinterest and i found lauren at garden accoutrements.  all pins were found via pinterest via lauren.  this tickles me because linking back to pins is a time consuming endeavor.  so, please join me as i hook up with michelle for:

 

source

source

from tumblr but i can't find the original source

source

source

source

source

don't those images make you want to run to the nearest nursery and get cracking on your summer garden?  stunning.  i learned that i really like purple as i look back at my pins.  my flowers look nothing like this.  i didn't want to instill false hope regarding my post for tomorrow.  just remember when you look at my flowers:

source

happy planting!!

~poptart yogini~