Field of flowers

I found this post from a few years ago and thought it was so appropriate for right now..Maybe some of you have not seen it before..and since we are in the midst of zinnia season, I hope you enjoy my words and pictures this morning...

Every once in a while a dream becomes a reality..I mean the vision kind...something that you have seen in your heart and dreamed about one day seeing in real time...Yesterday, that very thing happened to me....we were in the mountains around Clayton GA and rode up to an overlook at the Dillard House..and lo and behold right there...there it was!!! something I have seen in my mind a million times...row after row of blooming ZINNIAS..

I could not wait to get out with my camera and get in the middle of them..here are a few pictures..experiencing them was so much better but I hope you can get a glimpse of this summertime flower......one day, in my own yard, I will plant row after row of zinnias.

I just love it when something happens like this.totally unexpected..a little life gift...just riding along a mountain road and WHAM!! just like that..a suddenly...I am right upon something that I have only dreamed about...that is what life is like...make good choices and don't ever stop....PERSEVERE and just when you least expect it..there is total and complete BREAKTHROUGH! what I saw in my heart broke through and I saw with my eyes..I was not looking for it but when I saw it, I KNEW this is IT!!!!! what I had only dreamed about...

What are your dreams??? they don't have to be spectacular..they can be as simple as a field of zinnias...or they can be as big as a children's hospital..the point is...KEEP ON KEEPING ON...when you least expect it, it happens..it might just be right around the next curve in the road...or right up that little hill...

Dreams are good things..they give us hope...don't let anyone steal your dreams...even if they seem unrealistic..that's okay..they are DREAMS!!

thank you dear friends for reading along this morning and visiting the field of zinnias..they were absolutely BEAUTIFUL!! suddenly a dream fulfilled...
Love, Mona

Stone Walls and boundaries....

One of the things that caught my eye right away when we saw our house for the first time were the stone walls that are in our backyard..  Actually, I think I kinda said this is the house I want as soon as I saw them......You know, there are things in a landscape that only time can put there....No new construction can even duplicate something that has been there for decades...My one request to our realtor was that our house be 'a homeplace'.....I knew what I was looking for and that helped in eliminating house after house..  I could almost tell the minute we drove up in front of a house that it wasn't what I was looking for....we looked at a lot of houses....a LOT....much to our most patient realtors chagrin......but he stuck with us and we stayed true to our word...we WOULD buy through him..no matter what.....and we did...

Sometimes , I need a reminder of why I am doing something....of what I was drawn to in the beginning..what makes me keep going and remembering the little things that caused me to make a choice....and all of this helps me to persevere..even when life seems hard and mundane and complacency creeps in...

 I really do have a vision and it needs polishing up a bit....Seeing these great walls with different eyes yesterday reminded me.......Even when it seemed impossible...I mean really, really impossible....not even a chance....God came through for me....He gave to me my hearts desire....a HOMEPLACE.....complete with these little stone walls and a mature landscape..

.daffodils, camellias, oak trees, magnolias, hollies, tulip poplar, even a beloved deodar cedar...azaleas, peonies, many, many sasanquas, hyacinths, crocus, liriope, ajuga, iron cross, English dogwood(mock Orange), spirea, forsythia, mahonia, daylilies, snowbells, dogwoods, crepe myrtles and the list goes on and on...It is a delightful garden and a wonderful place to live...my dream did come true..and it all started with a stone wall.....

What is your hearts desire?  have you let it go or are you still hoping..even hoping against hope for it to come to pass?? 

I hung on...just barely....and it did come to pass...I now live on an old homeplace and it is our home.......

Hold on to your dreams....never, never, never give up......not ever.....

Father's Day Dream

We moved into our house on Father's Day weekend ......... 

9 years ago......

I wanted it to be a memorable date

It was a dream come true, as I have written about many times before...but, you know what????   it still IS a dream come true....something I prayed for and waited for....for a   v.e.r.y  l.o.n.g      time.........I envisioned a yard and a garden I could plant and landscape the way I wanted it to look......and a house I could coordinate with the colors I chose to live with.......yes...a lot of people take it for granted that they have a house of their own.....

I did not get my own house until I was 50 years old.......between signing the contract on this house and our moving in date, I lost my Mama....but the overall memory of that year is that God does indeed answer prayer..I have chosen to focus on LIFE..sometimes it takes a lot of patience to stay focused on the important things and W.A.I.T....for the other things....if you delight yourself in the Lord, HE WILL give you the desires of your heart.....in HIS timing....

I am everyday grateful.....overflowing thankful.......

and on this Father's Day weekend 9 years ago, my Father gave to me.......ONE FULFILLED DESIRE......a homeplace...a place to call my own....a home where me and Bryan could build our new life together without memories of past failed marriages haunting the rooms...

so yes, dreams do come true.....

Happy Father's Day to the ONE that makes my life worth living......My Father God.........
thank You for all You have done for me.....and for how You love me the way You do....
and for giving to me my husband...my children...and my grandchildren...and my sweet friends.....

You have been good to me...

Some of the evidence of the fruitfulness of this homeplace called Winterpast.....

I am glad you stopped by today.....thank you....

During this Father's Day weekend,

 it is a good time to take time to thank our Heavenly Father for all that He is.....

I hope to see you again soon.....

Mona

Sowing Seeds

This weekend, I got a new greenhouse....I have wanted one for a very long time and my sweet husband saw this small greenhouse the other day while buying dog food at our local Tractor Supply.....

After he put it together yesterday, I cried....I was overwhelmed at how perfect it is...and that he would do this for me.........

Standing inside..even with nothing in it yet...my heart beats faster......I do love to sow seeds and to grow things...

The first things I put in it were 3 metal flats for seedlings that belonged to my Mama..and I have carried them around and used them forever..she had them in her greenhouse when she lived in Dawson...a long time ago..

It won't be long before I will be showing you what is growing in this sweet little house that is all mine.......

Eight shelves to fill with seeds...Oh, My!!!!

I am in process of deciding what to grow...Can you believe I will have to narrow my choices?   I have a lot of dreams in my heart and sometimes it is a challenge to pick the ones I want to work on at the moment....

Once again, I encourage you....NEVER give up on your dreams...they will come to pass if you don't quit!  

Put God first in your life and He will direct your steps.....

Remember to plant good seeds in your life because they WILL come up..even the bad ones...so think about what you sow....Do unto others as you would have them do unto you....

Thank you for stopping by today...  Happy sowing.....and be selective in the kinds of seeds you sow......

                                                        I hope to see you again soon..

                                                                         Mona

A DREAM realized...

                  After I took this picture a few days ago, I was reminded  of a dream I had years ago......

For any of you that have been reading my blog for a while, you know how much my home and gardens mean to me....this is another one of those stories about Winterpast...my dream come true....

I dreamed that me and Bryan were hacking our way through a very thick jungle..we were so tired BUT we kept going, we didn't stop...it was slow going at times and there were a lot of tangled vines and thick underbrush...together we leaned into it and whacked away with machettes...All of a sudden, we were on the edge of a clearing and we could see a house....In the dream, I just knew it was our house..we had made it through the thick of things and come to a clearing....HOME!

this picture represents that dream really well..I don't try to stage my photography, it just happens as I take pictures of things I like.....I added some effects to make it look a little aged and liked the way it turned out..... then, I remembered my dream...a long ago dream...now a reality...

It means a lot when we see a dream that is in our heart become a reality in our life....for as long as I can remember, I have liked to play house...even using cuttings from the landscaping to make little gardens in the sand.(Mama said anything I put in the ground would root)  to me it was play and dreaming...about a garden I would one day have of my very own.. and a house I could furnish to suit my taste......my very own house...


It would be a long, long time before that dream would come true...and there were many years that I didn't much hold onto that dream anymore...
When I got divorced I thought that dream was probably pretty much DEAD!..I lived in a rental house and had a broken down car and an empty nest too....and no job..and on and on and on....it was looking mighty bleak for me.....
and then.....

a little spark of hope started to burn....and then I met Bryan......
and the rest is history...well, so far..history..there is still a lot of history to make...

I am so very thankful for our homeplace...it is a reminder to me...don't stop dreaming..no matter what!!  dreams do come true...some of them take a little longer than others....

One week after we signed the contract on this house, my Mama left this earth as a result of an awful car accident..and my Grandmother was in the stages of dementia..so neither of these all important women in my life ever got to share in my realized dream....even in the midst of that saddness.. a desire realized gives hope..

I have no idea why the two things will forever be intwined...My mama's death and buying my dream house...all in the same week....
Probably the only real regret I have in my life, that she never got to come here...she saw pictures and loved it but...

Oh, well...I hadn't planned on going there....
There is a heritage that goes on, daylilies grow on this land...a family tradition.and gardening is in my blood....and so is the making of this house all it can be......

The house in this picture belonged to my great Grandparents....and the angle in this picture reminded of the picture I had taken of my very own house.....looking at a family home through the trees....I see a family legacy here....it might be a stretch for you to see it but I most definitely see it...and live it.....

I am thankful for all of the homemakers in my family line.....I embrace what you left for me....

thank you for reading this little scattering of my thoughts this morning.....

I appreciate you and hope to see you again soon....
I'll be out in the garden enjoying this warm weather...

It can happen to YOU

During this week between Christmas and the New Year, there  is usually a lot of soul searching and rethinking and planning in very small doses...  :-)    Some people make resolutions, some people take inventory, some people think about what they want to do in the coming year.....but nevertheless, ALL of us will enter a brand new year in just a few days...

As we take stock of our lives.....  or not....  I encourage you (myself included)  to dream...dream BIG!!  try the impossible...let go of the fear of risk taking...begin to say to self...why NOT me????   life is not just for others...it is for ME!!  choose life...to embrace it and live it...  Let's see just what we can allow ourselves to do in this coming year...make it better than the last one.. go forward.......

these 2 little songs say a lot.....IT absolutely CAN happen to you.......

When you wish upon a star

Makes no difference who you are

Anything your heart desires

Will come to you

If your heart is in your dream

No request is too extreme

When you wish upon a star

As dreamers do

Fate is kind

She brings to those to love

The sweet fulfillment of

Their secret longing

Like a bolt out of the blue

Fate steps in and sees you through

When you wish upon a star

Your dreams come true

 Fairy tales can come true, it can happen to you
If you’re young at heart
For it’s hard, you will find, to be narrow of
mind
If you’re young at heart

You can go to extremes with impossible schemes
You can laugh when your dreams fall apart at the
seams
And life gets more exciting with each passing
day
And love is either in your heart or on it’s way

Don’t you know that it’s worth every treasure on
earth
To be young at heart
For as rich as you are it’s much better by far
To be young at heart

And if you should survive to 105
Look at all you’ll derive out of being alive
Then here is the best part
You have a head start
If you are among the very young at heart

And if you should survive to 105
Look at all you’ll derive out of being alive
Then here is the best part
You have a head start
If you are among the very young at heart

thank you for stopping by this morning....let's live this life to the fullest.....

at the end, I don't want to leave anything undone 

Life right now..

This sign just about sums up my life right now...if I am not physically out in the garden, I am there in my head...planning and thinking and dreaming......

the last movie we watched was even a documentary named DIRT..and I thoroughly enjoyed it...

so I thought I would just drop you a note and let you know where I am and where I will be for the next few months..hopefully I will be better able to balance my life when the rush of warm weather gets familiar again......

So thank you for dropping in on me and I will be sharing my garden with you very soon.....I am thinking I NEED to go by the nursery today and buy something..anything......

A DAY TO CELEBRATE

First, you make a roux...a yummy base for gumbo that is made from one part oil and two parts flour....then you stir and watch for a long time...maybe 30 minutes..and this is the base for a wonderful meal to celebrate a milestone in my life..

Then add some flowers, yes,of course...ALWAYS, ALWAYS FLOWERS!!!! even if it is freezing and the wind is blowing fiercely outside..you still go out and pick flowers. :-)

Then come and sit with us as I tell you what today is all about...and have a bowl of gumbo with wonderful sourdough bread from Earthfare..it'll warm your heart...Cajun food always reminds me of celebrations....it is our HAPPY food....

One year ago today, I started a journey..one word at a time.  I started my blog...WHOO HOOO!  it is my anniversary...I am so excited that I am here...Thinking back across this past year, there have been so many things I have learned and pushed myself to do...I have thought of all those quotations about a journey starts with one step, etc....

But the one that speaks the loudest is don't despise small beginnings.....and indeed it was a small beginning.  I have received so many kind words of encouragement from you and I appreciate every one..they have fed my spirit...and yes, there have been the absolutely horrendous few that almost bowled me over..but they did not...

this has been one of the most rewarding years of my life....I have learned to write.  a secret dream I have had for as long as I can remember....I just never did much with it.until last March..then I dared to write that first word...the key was to begin.........things never happen if we never begin...so there I sat one year ago today.....right smack dab at the beginning......and lo and behold, here I am......hundreds of posts later.....I can hardly believe it....  I really did something to start fulfilling my dream....I have loved writing this and taking pictures to share....there are so many more stories to tell and so many more blogland things to learn......

But, for today  ...........

HAPPY ANNIVERSARY TO ME!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I really took the first step to begin fulfilling a dream of mine and here I am , already a year into it....


I took a risk..I started a journey without knowing where it would lead and where I would end up...I still do not know that....but it is ok with me..I am learning to enjoy the journey...it is the journey that is important....one step at a time....one day at a time...that is all we have...

So, I encourage you to make the most of the time you have..what is your dream and what can you do TODAY to start you on that journey?

I will leave you with this question because it is the one that got me going.        


IF NOT TODAY, THEN WHEN????????




put that foot out there and begin that journey..it doesn't matter if it is messy or you don't know all about how to do it perfectly....just START...life is lived one step at a time..I am living proof of that...I dared to start a blog without knowing how to do it....and I have done it for a whole year now and I know a lot more than I did when I started it..
Enjoy the journey....and the learning of something new....

here is my first post.....


"This is my first attempt at blogging. Since I love homemaking and I have been doing it for more than 35 years, I want to share my experiences with women(and men)that are aspiring to make their home all that it can possibly be. I am a wife, mother, grandmother, gardener, seamstress, cook,thrift store shopper.. I love all that is involved in making a home a good place to be ..and a place that the family wants to be. a safe haven...Maybe there will be some of you that are interested in joining me on this journey as I learn how to blog.. :-) we will see..I know it is something that I will enjoy even if it only for me and my family...."


and that is how I started this journey...leave me a comment...I love to read them...and as always, I appreciate your reading along....for many, many blogs to come...and for celebrating this milestone with me...

Knowing myself...

The older I get, the easier it is to know when something is out of sync in my life...maybe that is one of the beauties of aging gracefully..my home reflects my personality..shiny glass objects, dust, and all of the collections....as hard as I try to be just a simple woman, I CANNOT!!!!..I have too many interests to be that way....I like the idea of living simply, but it just never quite works for me......

Here is my kitchen window taken on just a random day so this is how it looks 360 days out of the year...and then I try to clean and straighten it..it lasts for about 4-5 days at the most.  LOL
then it automatically goes back to this...

,

On any given day I will most likely spend time on the computer, garden a little, sew a little, read a little, play with the dogs a little, read as much as I can get in, write some, cook, shop, PRAY!, then, as little housework as I can get by with, and rearrange some of my collections and that is honestly a typical day for me..so maybe SIMPLE is only a concept that I am fooling myself into believing is attainable for me...maybe I don't really even like simple....I don't think I do...I had rather have multi layered things....I like line upon line....complex, many, many different all at once...THERE!   maybe there is hope for me after all..I have admitted to being a complex woman...LOL
So today, here are a few of the layers of things in my home that make me smile...I hope they make you smile too..one time a friend told me that crows are drawn to shiny things so I am revealing the 'crow' side of me today.  I LOVE shiny things.....and especially shiny, happy people....

And I really appreciate you my readers..thank you for reading along...tomorrow is a BIG day here so come back and see what it is.. 

Do I really have a dream??

Since this is MLK week, I have been thinking about his speech..I Have A Dream......I envy him..he had purpose and he had direction  and he knew where he was going.... one that he was willing to die for....he changed history...almost anybody that hears the phrase  'I Have A Dream' knows that Martin Luther King said it....

but in my life I have been pondering..do I REALLY have a dream?  NO, I don't think so....not one that is worth dying for....
When we bought this house almost 8 years ago, I think I had a dream...to make it into a place filled with hospitality... where people gathered and shared life...a garden for people to spend time in ...a place of refuge from the busy, chaotic world.......a home shared with the world...in a park like setting...where all are welcome...

We have had starts and spurts but nothing like I had dreamed of...we even had a wedding and a wedding party in the backyard...we  had a kinship group that met here for a few years....we have had many family gatherings, even some with extended family coming from afar.....but it is not enough...I am not satisfied...
I Have A Dream....well, there it is..LOL  I DO have one......and now you know about it...

We all need a dream....I am getting mine out and dusting it off and using it again......we have been hit hard from all directions....we even have a home office at this time...that didn't fit into my plan....it has changed our home dynamics to have a fax machine and a business phone in the house..and for Bryan to always be around here working..but this is where we are right now..  building a company from the ground up....

BUT......I still have a dream...and I am not going to let it completely die...I will let it grow and change and bloom right here where it is planted......in WINTERPAST...my dream come true..well, the first part anyway..at least I know the setting for the dream....LOL   and the partner I have... and at least a few of the players....
y'all are great to stick with me as I figure this life out.....
Do you have a dream?  and can you articulate what it is?  give it some time and think about it...life is worth living a dream.....
NEVER stop dreaming......

Winterville Wonderland

Winterpast..home

I never thought I would see  a white Christmas unless I traveled further north..I just had to share these pictures because we did indeed have a snow on Christmas...as I write this, it is still snowing after starting on Christmas night..
what a wonderful gift to us all......

May this be the year that our dreams become reality...
we have all sung the song  'I'm Dreaming of a White Christmas'


as of this year, it is not a just a dream..it really happened.....

ENJOY!!

deodar cedar

welcome

the road home