The Great Outdoors

As we continue to make progress on the inside of the house, it's getting rather gorgeous outside so we've been taking some action around outdoor furniture. I have fantasies of nursing the baby on a big chaise lounge in this half of the front yard

which as you can see is screaming to be occupied with something. We found a double-lounger/big chaise at West Elm and took advantage of their summer sale plus a coupon we had that I think is going to work. There's room for all 3 of us on it and I'm into the orange cushion. We seem to always gravitate to color around here (I told you the accent wall in the baby room is turquoise, right?).

The pending question is what to put in the other half of the yard

I'd take any of these:

here--this is in Bali, no less. Of course.

the always-brilliant

Martha comes through

via here

House Beautiful this is so beautiful--it's not a front yard but I am inspired

you again

The reality is we're probably going to end up with some colorful plastic chairs and a bistro table for now. The budget dictates something along those lines. But seeing the yellow chairs above gives me some hope it can be cheerful and classy at the same time. I've been looking on Craigs List but this is probably not the time people are selling their amazing outdoor furnishings. I will look again in October......

Meanwhile, this little one is hanging around the front door and I, gulp, bought some cat food after giving it milk for about a week. Another creature that I'm not sure is a boy or a girl. We're to the petting stage now, which means I should get some gloves and borrow a cat carrier and take it to the vet for shots. If I'm in fact going down this road. Which is looks like I might be. Maternal instincts are powerful things.

But give and you are given to! I had no idea I had an artichoke plant in the yard til a week ago when these appeared! Dinner tonight.