From May 25-26…….
After the raccoon incident(s) we were definitely ready for a much more normal holiday weekend. Sunday afternoon we headed to Home Depot to get some flowers for the yard and a few more plants for the garden. We couldn’t resist these patriotic flags to help spruce up the front. Lilli loves all things “America” and waved it out her window the whole way home. Abbi was just happy not to lose an eye. 
I replaced all my pansies with summer flowers and Lilli wanted my old pansies. She took them all and decorated her little playhouse with them. I thought it was so cute. And so old lady-ish. 
They were even hanging out of the mailbox… 
We got our clay pots spray painted for summer. We love to get clay pots and spray paint them fun and bright colors for that summer’s color “scheme”. This year we got some bright pink, purple, lime green and silver. They look so pretty on the deck. A few days later Lilli and I cleaned the deck and got everything looking so nice and relaxing. The cats love stretching out on the deck, so at least someone gets to enjoy it. And maybe one day when Abbi isn’t such a wild toddler we can, too. 
We’ve spent a lot of time freshening up the landscaping out front this summer. The previous owners had put down no grass barriers, so it was such a mess last year. We put in the knockout roses last year and love them, so we’ve been working on scraping out all this old mulch, killing the grass, putting down fabric and tons and tons of new mulch. I think Brent ended up north of 60 bags of mulch so far out front. It looks soooo much better than this “before”. 
The best way for us to both get some time to work on it is for Abbi to be trapped in the car with Lilli, cruising the yard. 
And when the battery runs out we had some fun under the tree doing some “sensory” type things with ice and scoops and spoons. Somehow it managed to keep both of them occupied for upwards of thirty minutes… 
She’s so proud she can finally reach the lowest branches. Poor branches. 
Of course we made our annual Memorial Day ribs. Low and slow in the oven for several hours and then finished off on the grill. They were awesome, as always!! 
And Abbi definitely enjoyed some of the corn on the cob from her grandparents (out of the freezer from last summer). It would have been a perfect Memorial Day weekend, minus the raccoon-having-babies-in-our-wall incident. Here’s to rodents staying in the great outdoors! 
