Awards & Outside Eating...

I have received a couple awards from my blog friends. Yeah! I know I shouldn't get all gushy about receiving awards but I truly like receiving them. Who doesn't?

Cindy at Love from MN has given me The Smile Award. Thank you Cindy!!

Characteristics for the Smile Award:
1. Must display a cheerful attitude. (not necessarily at all times--we are all human).
2. Must love one another.
3. Must make mistakes.
4. Must learn from others.
5. Must be a positive contributor to blog world.
6. Must love life.
7. Must love kids.


And Diane at A pictures worth 1,000 words has given me the Kreative Blogger award. Thank you Diane!!

With this award I'm supposed to list 6 things that make me happy.

1) Eating dinner at a restaurant
2) Eating lunch with friends (okay it looks like a trend here but I really don't like eating all that much)
3) Playing with my dogs. This is such a stress reliever!
4) Building legos with my middle child.
5) Watching my youngest do just about anything
6) Decorating
7) Getting along with my daughter
8) Spending alone time with my husband

Thank you ladies! There are so many wonderful blogs out there that it's almost too hard to choose a couple to give awards. So I would like to pass on these awards to each and every blog on my list.
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I'm so darn excited to show you my newest purchase. I've been drooling over this outdoor table for weeks and it finally went on sale.





A few days later it went down another $100. So I grabbed my receipt and took it to customer service. They thankfully refunded it.

So now that I have an outdoor table, we can eat meals on the porch, drink coffee, enjoy the weather. Okay, so I realize it's August and 115 degrees out. But I'm thinking of the 7 months of great weather we'll eventually have.

Speaking of outdoor areas. Some friends of ours recently purchase a home in Palm Springs. I couldn't get over how beautiful the back porch was. What do you think?

They had a sitting area...


A dining area...(inspiration for my table)

An area with a fireplace...
The outdoor kitchen...
And a fountain with flowers...I could spend hours outside (during the cooler months) and lounge by the fire, roast marshmallows, gaze into the sunset. I can hardly wait until it's cooler out.

I wanted to thank everyone that left birthday wishes on my blog over the weekend. And also thank my husband who hacked into my blog to let my blog friends know it was my birthday. You are so awesome hunny! The birthday message line was perfect for bloggers. When someone left a message it would email me and I could play the message right from my computer. It was fun to hear the voices of blog friends.