Tuesday, February 26, 2013

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Our doggies were sent to boarding yesterday, and house keys given to a friend.

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I was up at 3 am to water my orchids and finished packing my bags. The bedroom felt weird without my doggies sleeping on the window seats. I missed them already! At 5 am we left home for a trip.

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The destination? Hawaii.

My husband and I are staying at a house on the ocean front for a few days. The beach is gorgeous and we've got a generous front patio to look at the ocean.

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For no particular reason, I have always loved a walk on the beach in the evening. With it being so close by, I will be able to do it every night.

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Tonight I'm going to fall asleep to the sound of the ocean wave.

Monday, February 25, 2013

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Fairy gardening is very addictive, it's kind of like yoga, or camping, if you do it long enough, that kind of end up being the only thing you will ever want to do. Being in the out doors, breath fresh air, just live life and not having to wonder about a new plasma screen tv or a new car. I'm not sure if it's healthy to be so "zen," you can really end up going into the extreme and fall off a cliff.
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I admit, I have my honey boo boo moments sometimes. Today I'm treating my doggies to some fast food chicken nuggets. Mama had one piece herself. This stuff taste like rubber and felt like it could clog all your arteries in one go, but what the heck:)



A few days ago we had an episode of my doggies escaping from the backyard.  Between the gardeners and the plumbers that came rushing to my house at once, somebody somehow left one backyard door wide open. I let my doggies to the backyard to play after everybody had left, and three minutes later I started wondering why everyone was so quiet.  When I finally realized that one of the backyard door was open, I ran out bare foot to find my dogs. Luckily they didn't wonder far, a pair of black dogs were found sniffling our next door neighbor's tree, and Kelly was just sun bathing on my back porch. 

Today I finally got my acts together and made name tags for them.  I bought matching colored harness and they looked cute wearing them. The whole deal was pretty fun!

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 I think I might have a case of the "spring fever." I can't stop messing around in my fairy gardens lately.



Saturday, February 23, 2013


They paved paradise and put up a parking lot
With a pink hotel, a boutique and a swinging hot spot

Don't it always seem to go
That you don't know what you've got til it's gone
They paved paradise and put up a parking lot

They took all the trees and put 'em in a tree museum
And they charged all the people a dollar and a half just to see 'em

Don't it always seem to go
That you don't know what you've got til it's gone
They paved paradise and put up a parking lot




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Fie Fie gave me this really happy face yesterday. I let him out to the backyard first thing in the morning, when he'd done his morning exploring he hopped back into the house and looked up at me with so much pride and happiness. Yeah, I just had to write it down. That was a face I could never forget. I just love that boy!

Thursday, February 21, 2013


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Just a few pictures of my fairy gardens in daylight:)

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I had my gardener planted my Camellia Japonica in the front yard. When our walnut tree fell down a little over a year ago, it knocked down several small bushy trees. I had this bald spot that exposed the neighbor's driveway for a while, but I think now the Camellia tree will fill in the space nicely!

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Last year around January I planted these small bushes in the corner of my front yard along with two pink carnations. 

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Look how much the bushes have grown only after a year! The french lavender bush smells so good and it constantly has bees swarming around it. 

Wednesday, February 20, 2013

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I love to add miniature LED lights to fairy gardens, except the last one I got has bright harsh white lights. I used a few different color nail polish to paint a light coat over the lights, and viola!

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The picture doesn't do the lights justice. It's actually very colorful, kind of like the multicolored Christmas lights, except in miniature size!

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The theme is suppose to be a tree man reading a fairy tale to a little girl. It was in a different fairy garden, but a while ago when our chimney had smouldering fire, the fireman accidentally knocked over this tree man and broke off one of his little branches. The fairy garden has since died, and I wanted to moved the little girl to a different fairy garden and put the tree man in the garage, but he seemed very sad without the little girl listening to his stories! So I decided to glue his branch back on and put him in another place. Now he's back into the fairy world, I think he should be happy again.

Monday, February 18, 2013

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My cleaning lady always said she loved my fairy gardens each week she came to clean my house, so today I made her one. I've been really enjoying the days when she comes by, while she's cleaning she tells me about her family stories in Mexico, the kind of food she cooks, her dog, and even really scary ghost stories sometimes!

Sunday, February 17, 2013

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Today was the last semi warm day before the weather turns cold again for at least another week.  I spent the gorgeous day doing laundry and putting things back in the pantry, no time for gardening this weekend, but I will get some quality gardening time soon:)


Saturday, February 16, 2013


 The termite people finally removed the circus tent this morning and we got our house back! I immediately gave all my plants a good watering and moved the fairy gardens back in place. After two days of living in a dungeon hotel, it was nice to finally be able to breath the fresh air again and be surrounded by trees and flowers.  A lot of things that I got so used to seeing everyday, my fairy gardens, lavender bushes, trees, humming birds, and the fresh smell of rosemary, now I feel so lucky to be able to live among them again!
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My doggies seemed very tired! I gave them a bath and fed them some food, since then they've been sleeping and sleeping and sleeping...
I have to say, we are pretty lucky to have a sizable back yard for our doggies to sun bath and run around. I never had a dog back in my studio apartment days, but I can imagine how that could be pretty hard for dogs!

Friday, February 15, 2013


A few days ago I received an email notifying that a business associate of mine had suddenly deceased. It was quite a shock, even though I didn't know him for long,  he always seemed like a nice fellow.  It seemed all so unreal as I've still got unanswered work email from him sitting in my inbox. It's not the first time lately that I heard of young people's sudden and very unexpected passing. Sometimes you just don't know when illness strikes that disrupts all orders of life. It's a reminder that you just have to take it easy on the stresses that life throws at you now and then, and not forgetting to take good care of yourself!

A Valentine and a make shift home...

 

When the radio station announced the traffic yesterday, they said that you were going to be late for your date, and they were right. Traffic was congested pretty much at every single major street and freeway.  Besides the crazy morning dropping off my boy doggies at boarding and getting the house ready for tenting, I spent most of my yesterday trying to recover from an excruciating back pain.  Anyhow, when my hubby showed up with flowers after being stuck in traffic for two hours, it was very nice to go out for a glass of wine and some yummy dinner to take me away from the grumpiness of the day.


I quite liked the restaurant we were at yesterday. Everything reflected the owner's good taste. It's got a decent wine selection, menu was carefully planned out, the music was beautiful and leaves room for conversation, there was even a love poem printed on the menu!
So this was our fourth Valentine's Day spent together. It sounded like such a long time yet it all went by in a flash! I'm lucky to have a husband who always tries to make Valentine's Day a memorable one!

Thursday, February 14, 2013

For Valentine's Day, my husband and I are staying at a hotel...


but not for the reason you think!

This is the only week we could squeeze in a termite fumigation for our house, which is long over due.  Last night my husband and I worked hard to clear things out of the house, food, medicine, cosmetics, dog food, plants,  whatever we could think of. Thank goodness for a big garage! Up next is our clogged sewage pipe, and then the chimney...yay...can't wait... There are times when I felt like asking my hubby, "are you sure there isn't a landlord's phone number somewhere we could just dial?"

Tuesday, February 12, 2013



There was a dog competition show on tv tonight.  I watched some of it with my neighbor while sipping wine. The thing is, I don't believe in judging dogs based on their breed or appearance, but my doggies obviously enjoyed the show very much! Fie Fie was pretty much glued to the tv the whole time, I wondered if he ever dreamed of a more exciting life?


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The camellia trees in my backyard have been blooming for quite some time, only today I decided to clip some flowers and decorate my room with them.



  

Saturday, February 9, 2013


Ever since my hubby and I moved in together ( we did not live in "sin" for very long as we got engaged and married pretty much in a snap, lol) and I brought my dogs along with me, my husband has been a saint training them. He has a talent understanding animals. Even though he claimed that he's not a dog person, he somehow understands their emotions and trains dogs way better than I do. I could never get Kelly and Bobby house broken, but my husband trained all of our dogs and the result was pretty impressive.  From what I can see, it takes consistency. He usually takes them out first thing in the morning and right before going to sleep. Walking them during the day also is a major part of it. The only down side now? Kelly has gotten so lazy, that if she needed to go potty, she won't go unless somebody carries her to her spot! So here they are on their nightly ritual, the white horse and the white princess, going to potty:)

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February is a relatively stressful month for us with so many things going on at once. We are in the process of talking to the city, the insurance company, and all sorts of contractors to deal with our damaged fire place. It is very sad knowing that such a beautiful and old fireplace eventually will have to go. I can't even imagine how I will deal with it when my house becomes gutted, I guess it's one of those things you will learn to deal with as you go.  We are doing our best to preserve, if nothing else, at least the same outer appearance. It's one of those things that's discouraging, but at the same time the challenge made us wanting more to restore everything back to its original state. 


Thursday, February 7, 2013


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A couple of weeks ago, my Hokkaido elm tree leaves suddenly turned yellow and fell out. I thought the tree died until I made it into my local nursery and asked about it. Turned out, this little tree just loses leaves during the winter time.

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On close inspection, there are tiny little leaves sprouting out. Can't wait for warmer days!
 
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New Year Preparation

I always like to do a bit of preparation at the end of each year to welcome the new year, although this year things were very challenging, I...