Spring Around Here

 Spring hasn't really hit around here. It comes for a day or so with it sunshine and warm 60 degree weather and then boom, we get a high of 36 and rain for a whole week. A whole week! And it's end of May/beginning of June. Blah. I'm hoping that the month of June will bring us the warmth that we are craving. I think about 68-72 would be nice. Take into consideration that we don't have air conditioning and I can live with that. Everything is nicer when it's not constantly raining.

We made caprese  salads for the first time at home and it was so easy. I don't know why we've never done it before. Tomatoes, mozzarella, basil, balsamic vinegar and a little salt and pepper. Boom, amazing.

On those rare nice days we take Ariana for walks and let her ride her new bike. We've only been able to take it out about 4 or 5 times in the month that we've owned it. We like the paved walking trail by our village since it's close, but we've also let her ride it around the housing area on base. We can't ride it on our street very easily because we live on such a hill, but she and Richard took a walk/ride down to the local bakery in our village the other day so it can be done.

And with Spring comes the best pets ever. Snails! Ariana love love loves finding snails and I'm right there with her, I think they are pretty darn cute too. We've had snails as pets before and they are so simple. Just make sure you give them some things to munch on (weeds, sticks, cucumber, broccoli) and keep their area damp and they are happy. Unlike our last pet snails that had a ton of snail babies, this time we found a little garden snail and Ariana named her "Sweetie Princess". We only kept her for a few days and then set her free back in our garden by the lilies I'm waiting to see bloom.

Our garden is blooming pretty nicely, even though some of the flowers have been overwatered by the rain and the fact that they don't have enough drain holes on the bottom of the pots. I always kill ranunculus and it's a pity because I think they are such pretty flowers. Our apple trees were even finally blooming not that long ago.

Growing and Gardening

It seems that I have fall babies and when this happens I hit my second trimester around spring time. I get the incredible urge to garden. I usually always have some pretty flowers planted outside in the spring/summer but something about pregnancy makes me want to go over the top. So 2 weeks ago or so we bought up a whole bunch of pretty colorful flowers and redid are backyard pot garden.

Ariana had so much fun digging in the dirt with her hands and finding earthworms. She cooed at them and gave them names and put them in our pots after we planted all our flowers.

And of course since it was a nice day out (rare in Germany these days) we took a few outside shots of the 19 week baby belly!

Garden: Before & After, ranunculus and other beauties!

My garden/patio was in much need of a mini makeover! Check out this before and after picture of our covered patio area. Eww, that brown bench is just horrible. 

I was going to throw it out, but decided it wouldn't hurt to have some extra space to sit outside. So, I spruced it up. Choosing paint was fun since the base has NO selection and German paint, well it's not the same, and plus we can't read the can!

A lot of sanding, priming and painting later, I had this! Beautiful isn't she!? I'm proud. Not only because I love the bright summery color, but this was my first project of repainting furniture. Nothing spectacular, but to me it made a huge difference. And of course, flowers never hurt!

Ariana and I (and Rich) have been doing some gardening the past week or so. Her are some peeks of the flowers we have planted.

Ariana picked these yellow ones by herself. She insisted on getting some yellow flowers! 

And, you may have seen the flower below on my Scavanger Hunt the other day, but I loved it so much I decided to share it again! I love that you can actually SEE the pollen specks on the petals.

And this baby is my favorite flower in my garden. It's a ranunculus. It's my new favorite flower. I finally figured out what kind of flower it was this year. I scooped up the last 2 that the base had for sale the other week. Love it!

Plant a garden was one of my April Goals! Check!!

xo's 

Cat

Fireflies and Flowers

Ariana and I stayed up late the other night to catch fireflies. I sometimes called them lightning bugs which she picked up calling them "light bug" or "firefy". It was cute, she really enjoyed it. 

I tried to get some pictures but it's hard taking night pictures...and fireflies are elusive! I did get this shot of on in the jar and one outside the jar lighting up at the same time.

Silly bugs! It was so much fun though, our yard is full of them!

I also found myself staring into the centers of my petunias while gardening the other day. I found these photos fascinating. These were not edited in any way at all. These are raw photos, no cropping, color changing etc. Most of my photography is that way. I don't like to mess with the original image that I see in my viewfinder. Sometimes I'll adjust the lighting or crop it a little but most of the time it's pure photography, untouched.

Leaf.

And yes, I love macro photography. 

Love, love, love!!!

xo's 

Cat

♥♥♥

Pretty

I'm so excited that Spring really is here! I'm ready for my garden to be full of color! I love planting flowers and  making my flower beds pretty each Spring/Summer. When we first moved into this house I decided that I wanted Hydrangeas around my front steps. I bought 2 bushes. I love them! I love gardening!

I love it when they are this color!

*source*

This week Ariana and I went out for the first time this season and watered them. It was an especially hot day and she loved playing in the water. She was such a great helper. She loved using her watering can that Grammy sent her. 

I can't wait to get more flowers for our flower bed. Right now all we have or the hydrangea bushes and they haven't bloomed yet. They have lots of little baby blooms on them though! I'm going to wait until we get back from out trip to buy any more flowers to plant.

They looked pretty pitiful in the heat, but they look much better now! I can't wait for them to bloom! :) They make me happy! 

I love their soft romantic color. It's kind of like a periwinkle. Our wedding invitations were a shimmery  periwinkle blue color. The actual name of the color of the invitations was actually "hydrangea". 

Here is some pretty periwinkle inspiration!

*source*

I hope everyone has a lovely weekend! 

We'll be going to a 3rd birthday party tomorrow. YAY!! :)

xo's

Cat 

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