Five on Friday – Favorites

My apologies for the silence over here on the blog yesterday… B and I were in Atlanta yesterday and I honestly just couldn’t muster the energy for my originally scheduled beach trip post by the time we got home. 

I haven’t done a faves post in several Fridays, so here we go!

O N E – A VERY Old But New-to-me Plant

I am a self-proclaimed “black thumb” and I’ve mentioned that no less than twenty times here on the blog.  I can’t keep plants/flowers/shrubs/trees/sometimes grass alive to save my life, so every single one of the plants in our house is fake.  Only in the last couple of years have I finally been able to keep our outdoor ferns alive for the five-ish months of summery weather, and even that has been no easy task.  (Not to mention by the end of summer they are turning brown and crunchy.)  I have constant envy over those of you who have all of your perfectly green and abundant gardens and I think it would be the coolest thing ever to grow my own veggies one day.  First, though, I have to master keeping the easy stuff alive.

I was discussing this with my grandmother one Sunday evening a few weeks ago and she started telling me about her plant that is in their front sitting room.  My grandmother and grandfather have lived in the same house since before my mother was born, so that is the only house that I have ever known them to have.  As long as I can remember, the table in their front sitting room has always been full of greenery.  I never really thought that much about it, but I have always assumed there were multiple plants throughout the years. 

Well, my grandmother gave me the history that evening, and I was completely blown away.  It turns out that all this time, there has only been one single plant on that table.  It is now over FIFTY years old, and it belonged to my great grandmother.  She was gifted the plant from my grandfather’s work after a hospital stay back in the 60’s and my grandmother has cared for it ever since.  It is now humongous and taking over the whole table, and she has given clippings to lots of people including my mom, my aunts, and I think even a couple of my cousins. 

She asked me if I wanted a clipping, and I wasn’t about to turn that down!  She brought it to me this past Sunday and I am so excited and honored to have such a neat living piece of history in our house, but I’m also really nervous that I’m going to kill it.  I told her how nervous I was about caring for it, but she replied with a cool, “Well, if you kill this one, I’ll just clip another one for you.”  Haha. 

She told me that all I have to do is water it once a week and make sure it gets a little bit of sunlight each day.  Sounds easy enough, right?  We’ll see.    

T W O – Painting and Hiding Rocks

Have you guys seen the new trend of painting rocks and then hiding them around your city for other people to find?  Once you find some you can either keep them or you can hide them again for someone else to find.  We have a city Facebook page devoted just to this and it’s made me so happy to see all of the posts of kids with the rocks they’ve painted or found.  We haven’t painted or found any yet, but I’m beyond excited to do this with our kiddos soon!  You could totally make someone’s day by doing this… you just never know!

T H R E E – Girls Night

I had a much needed girls’ night this past Tuesday to celebrate my BFF for her birthday.  Five of my girlfriends including Adrienne (you might read her blog… hi Adrienne!) all went to our favorite Mexican place in town for margaritas and tacos.  We stayed later than usual this time and it was so nice to just chat and eat and drink without getting interrupted every 30 seconds by, “Mommy, look at this!”  Haha.

On another note, the birthday girl (Shelly) and I met in 1993 when she moved into my neighborhood and we’ve been inseparable ever since.  Of course now that we’re married and have babies we don’t get to see each other near enough, but we try to see each other as much as we possibly can.  This birthday marks the 24th of Shelly’s birthday’s that we’ve celebrated together and that still blows my mind every time I think about it.  How awesome is that?  She is someone who I know will always be in my life.  

F O U R – Shutter Fixed on the Back Door

A few weeks ago one of my favorites was that we had a new shutter on our back glass door so my paranoid anxiety-filled self could feel 100% safe at night and NOT like somebody was always watching us. 

Well, the company we hired had to have our shutter custom-built so it took two months to get it, only to find that they had built it backward.  Instead of opening the same way the door opens, it opened the opposite way, completely blocking the door knob and the door opening.  #Stupid

Anyhoo, after several more weeks of waiting, the new shutter was finally installed yesterday so now it can be opened the way it was intended to be opened and we will NOT have to close it before opening the door each time for the approximately 1,900 times a day that Maui asks to go out.  #Winning

F I V E – ATL Trip

As I mentioned at the beginning of this post, B and I went to ATL on Wednesday and the primary reason was for me to finally see a specialist about my back problems that I’ve had for the last six years.  The appointment went well, and I have started some new treatments, so I’m keeping my fingers crossed and praying every day that this will finally be the end of my problems.  I apologize for being vague, and I promise to eventually tell you about my journey from start to finish (and I’ll go ahead and warn you – you better SETTLE IN because it will be LONG… just ask the nurse I talked to yesterday!), but I want to see how this new experimental treatment goes before putting it out there for the whole world to see.  I’m trying not to get too excited about it, but I am cautiously optimistic. 

Anyhoo, the fact that my six years of research AND never giving up on finding a cure might – just might – pay off is definitely my VERY FAVORITE from this week. 

Not to mention we got to eat lunch at Tin Lizzy’s – our verrrry favorite ATL restaurant – aaaand we brought home two cases of wine from Trader Joe’s. 

#EnoughSaid

Happy weekend, y’all!

And P.S. Moana is now on Netflix

#YoureWelcome

*Linking up with A Liz Adventures and Carolina Charm for Five on Friday, A Little Bit of Everything for Friday Favorites,  September Farm and The Farmer's Wife for Oh Hey, Friday, Meet @ the Barre for Friday Favorites, and Cup of Tea for High Five for Friday.