The Sound of Music

Good morning, heavenly friends!

I made a date with Murphy this morning.

Murphy's Oil Soap, that is.

 I love cleaning with that stuff.  Don't you? The smell is almost intoxicating to me. I have used it for years. The house always smells so warm, comforting and inviting afterward. Especially in the winter when the windows are always closed and the scent lingers for almost a week at a time. There's just something about that smell. Heavenly. I've always wondered why they've never made a scented candle from it....

(Yeah, yeah, yeah.  Call me crazy. Now you know that I don't have both oars in the water....)

But, as I was cleaning and mopping away - moving things out of the way to get waaay back in those nooks and crannies, 

I kept noticing the things in the house that I find myself swooning over - again and again. Things that I've placed around the house that mean a lot to hubby and me, that carry a boatload of memories.  Things that I'm so happy I discovered, uncovered, dug out, bargained over, bartered with....

...or stole.

(just kidding! don't get your knickers in a knot.)

But here they are --- a few of my favorite things at Heaven's Walk... 

(I do believe I hear Julie Andrews singing in the background.  lol!)

My vintage rockers on the deck...

....all my fav colors in one pillow next to my pale sea green linen pillow shams  
(not to mention the perfect pattern combo)...

...Yankee Candle in "Sun and Sand"... (seriously, it does smell like sun and sand!)

...a picture painted by my father years ago and I've treasured ever since...

...Ile De Tahiti coconut-vanilla lotion...

...a piece of driftwood twisted in all the right places picked up on an island in Florida...

...a small wire basket filled with shells next to an antique aqua Ball jar...

...our bed - simply dressed for summer...

...drifting off to sleep with an ocean-scented candle bowl filled with shells on the nightstand...

...new summer pillow shams on the bed...(just plain yummy)

...a seashell doorstop...

...starfish on the pie safe hung with a piece of twine...
(thank you, Sarah at abeachcottage, for that charming idea!) 

...and JOY...

I'd love to hear what some of your favorite things are! 

"...I suddenly remember my favorite things....and then I don't feel soooo bad!"  lol!

Peace and joy to you at your little slice of heaven,

~ laurie

A Light at Heaven's Walk

Good day, my friends!

I am so looking forward to spending summer evenings out on our deck with friends. 

Love, laughter, and tall tales live there.  Oh, yes....

  

Evenings that are too warm to sit by the campfire so we all end up relaxing on the deck amidst the pillows and candles. Our homemade wine (that we've aptly christened "Fat Cat-Happy Dog" after our heartbeats at our feet) runs freely and conversation flows.  The flickering ocean scented candle mingles with the heady aroma of the peonies...

It's all about creating an atmosphere that is so warm and welcoming that they have a hard time leaving, ya know?

A place where as they step on to the deck, they enter into another room of Heaven's Walk. A room where the ceiling is the dusky evening sky sprinkled with diamonds around a bright full moon. The walls surrounding them are a small green arching iron arbor dripping with a lavender clematis, a frothy row of burgandy roses and peonies bursting with their sweet scent, pots of beach grass swaying at their feet, and vintage shutters propped up against the siding - complete with a sign pointing the way to the beach - and the seashell wind chime tinkles in the breeze.

(Sigh!)

Every spring I anxiously await for the day when it's warm enough to gather all the furniture, cushions, pillows, shells, and lanterns to create this embracing place of fellowship.

And one of the best things about this room is the lanterns filled with white Christmas lights.  It's a very simple way of filling an outdoor room with soft light that reflects so beautifully in everyone's eyes and bathes the whole area in warmth.

There's just something very special about it.

I nabbed a couple of lanterns years ago at Pier I and they've been hanging in my gardens throughout the years spreading light over the heads of many flowerbeds during the evening hours. They've been welding together time and time again by my hubby. They've been the attempted home of many garden wasps (oh, no you don't!), but they have withstood the demands of time and are a mainstay and anchor in my garden.

I do believe that no garden is complete without some sparkly lights....

 

 Want to know how to create this yourself?  

It's so easy...

Buy some white Christmas lights when you first see them out on the store shelves in the fall.  Buy a lot of them.  You're going to need them throughout the year (yes, I have mine plugged in all year 'round because they're just as beautiful in the snow).  Sometimes the white ones are difficult to find off-season, so you can use the green-corded type - but I so love the extra brightness the white corded ones give. 

Simply stretch them out to get those funny kinks smoothed a little, gather them up in a bunch, place them in the lantern, and plug them into an automatic timer. You can choose the amount of time you want them on. Place them on a table or hang them on a hook and you have easily and cheaply created a romantic, welcoming atmosphere on your deck or your porch!  

 

As I look out on the deck at night at the new white addition to my lantern collection, it puts out enough light so that it almost seems like there's a living room light on out there - and it reflects in the aqua vase that always seems to be half filled with rain water, 

making it just glow. 

So pretty!

So, the deck is ready for company this weekend. 

Fun, fellowship, love, and laughter.

And little white Christmas lights, of course.

 The lights are always on for you at Heaven's Walk...

 {{Warm hugs}}

~ laurie

Day Trip for Heaven's Walk

Good morning, sweet friends!

Heaven's Walk took a day trip during the weekend.  After church on Sunday morning, we packed a cooler, stuffed beach towels in our beach bag...

...and off we went.

Our local lake is large and beautiful, boasting 99 miles of shoreline
and up to 60 feet deep in some places. The water is always so clear and beautiful.

Homes dotting the shore are an interesting mix of three story mansions
landscaped to the hilt...

to large, historical homes
(this one being one of my favs because it sits right at water's edge and is painted a beautiful, faded sea green)...

to small, quaint, cozy cottages tucked in the trees
(like this one we've always had our eye on for our future beach cottage).

We actually tiptoed around this little treasure one day last summer, knowing that no one lived there.  We sighed and moaned as we peered in the old windows, picturing ourselves tearing down this wall, expanding that room, creating a open-air porch, sanding the original wood flooring, adding beachy white cabinets in kitchen surrounding a marble top island.... (sigh!)

We met the elderly owner one afternoon that same summer. He was a sweet old man spending his years happily in Arizona.  He actually invited us in and took us through the main floor of the house.  Ooohhh!  We loved it!  We could imagine ourselves living in that quaint little beach cottage...so we gave him our name and phone number and left with our fingers crossed. He said that he would "add our name to the list".

Ummmm.....THAT didn't sound very promising.  But we can still hope....

But back to our lake trip....
Quirky boathouses set proudly out in front of these lake cottages - each one built with it's own personality matching the house it guards.

This home sets majestically on the original stonework foundation. Just beautiful!

And then there's Al Capone's house (remember the mobster from years ago?) with the 'Crow's Nest' overlooking it's property.  Al's bodyguards used to live in the Crow's Nest to keep an eye out for trespassers. Lots of stories full of mystery and intrigue surround this historical home.

 And no one can pass by Bay Pointe Inn that nestles regally on the south shore of the lake, without a long gaze.  It's relatively new, the old, original inn being torn down which broke the heart of many local people.  It was just another slice of history to unfortunately disappear from this lake...

But everyone you know can be found at South Shore stores, where you can dock your boat to grab pizza, lattes, ice cream, or various sundries.

We beached the boat for a while at a small, quiet beach so that hubby could do a little fly fishing which he loves to do - and I love watching him.  There's something so elegant and calming about fly fishing...

After catching and releasing a few fish, we continued to motor by another favorite cottage of ours. It is a new home, but built with the wonderful old architectural details that many new homes now lack.

Beautiful farmhouse style home in a beautiful setting... 

Graceful sailboats silently floated by...

....followed by even more graceful swans....

We finally turned our sunburned faces toward home.

Always great to spend a day on the water in the warm sunshine spiffing up your tan and getting your vitamin D therapy...

but always soooo good to be back home again...

Here's to a day of vitamin D therapy for you!

{{ Hugs }} to you!

~ laurie

A Bend in the Road

What a beautiful morning!

Welcome to Heaven's Walk today!

I decided this morning that a bend in the road can be a really good thing.

 I laced on my fav workout shoes after hopping out of bed to take advantage of this warm, sunshiny morning and grabbed my camera on the way out the door.  I wanted to share a little more of my world with you.

The dogwoods were in full bloom. Beautiful, little puffs of pure,clean, white in the dark green woods. (I tried planting some in our yard last year. Pretty pink Katsuras. But the oh-so-hungry deer ate them right down to the ground. I replaced them with crabapples planted much closer to the house. We'll see how that goes.)

Heading down the first hill brings me to where I hear all the grand old bullfrogs calling to each other (and where I always, for some odd reason, have to sidestep a racoon roadkill...yeah, that's pleasant...and no, I won't share pics with you regarding that issue.)

Heading up the other side of the hill, a pair of Canadian geese were honking and looking for the perfect spot to nest their eggs, leaving a small, steady wake behind them as they made their way across the pond.

I pass by wide open fields surrounded by old, broken fences and forgotten grapevines...

...newly planted wheat fields and far off lakes...

...and big, statuesque trees hugging green meadows.

Beautiful rolling farmland...

...that seemed to go on forever.

When I see 'the glen', as I call it, I know I'm close to my most favorite view along the way.

I can see the lake through the trees and huff and puff my way up the big hill to the top.  My calf muscles burning as they carry me up to where the wind catches my breath and my whips my hair...

where tidy little lakeside cottages are tucked in among the trees.

And there.....Shimmer Lake greets me.  

Beautiful, isn't it?  That's not the true name of this lake, but when I saw it for the first time, I knew it deserved a much more appropriate name. I always love how the morning sun shimmers and sparkles in the breeze. The deep blue sky reflecting in it's depth. Mesmerizing. I'm in love with it. Total eye candy for this country gal pining to see water outside her windows once again. It's a peaceful, quiet lake. I never see anyone out on it. Someday, I'd love to build a quaint little summer cottage on it's shore...

...nestled along the trees somewhere with a grand view of the peaceful, sparkling bay.

I know I've lingered long enough when drivers passing by crane their necks to stare at the crazy woman with the wild hair standing in the field, staring off in the distance. "Crazy as a jaybird!" I'm sure they're thinking.

So I turn to head back home - but grab one more photo of my little lake, promising to return tomorrow morning to gaze and dream some more...

So at the bend in my road, there is my lake.

Shimmer Lake.  

A little piece of heaven that holds a special place in my heart.

I pray that there is a Shimmer Lake in the bend in your road today....

~ laurie