How many words for a thousand pictures?

Ahh, this post is going to be chock-full of pictures of things that make me happy! Mostly creative endeavors on my part, and forgive the lighting and such on some of these. I'm still a bit behind the times and using our phone camera! This is the walnut-basil pesto I made. I liked our other batch so much (not to mention gave away the rest of it's rather large volume), I tried one of the variations in my cookbook!

Ok, for some reason, Blogger isn't letting me rearrange these pictures, so they're not going to make any layout/chronological sense (sorry!). This is my sweet (and 6 months old-wow) Bunkin and his BFF Phineas. Every time I nurse, Phinny comes out of the woodwork to RUN to Bunkin and lie on him. SO cute!
Last weekend I went to my friend Amy's house where a few ladies from our Bible study got together for hang out time and to meet Brownie's new little one, Helen. I saw a scrumptious-looking strawberry cake in the latest Paula Deen magazine, and begged Hunny to let me bake it for Bear's 2nd birthday party coming up, to which he promptly said "No, it's PINK!" So, just having to bake it, I brought it to our get together. Mind you, I'm an excellent baker, but my results usually taste waaaay better than they look.

The funny thing, though, is that after I'd baked the cake and was waiting on it to cool, I was tending to Bunkin and the house in general, and I realized that I hadn't heard anything from Bear in a while. You know what that means, right? Quiet kid = something is up! Sure enough, I walk into the kitchen to find one very proud little kid standing on the shelf in the bottom cabinets and reaching to the counter where this was the end result:

He isn't called Cookie Monster in our house for nothing. :) And, as you can see from the iced picture, someone just got a dollop more of frosting, and no one was the wiser (til I blabbed, of course!).

I'm finally seeing tomatoes!! WOOHOO! My hand is for perspective; the fruit isn't very big yet (these are my "sandwich-sized" plants), but they are there! I cannot wait to eat that first ripe yummy tomato! The supermarkets are still stocking "safe" and uncontaminated tomatoes, but to be on the safe side, we haven't bought any, so it will be a real treat!

This post is supposed to be about things that make me happy, and let me tell you, bright orange flowers like these truly make me happy. I'm not sure what they are, because I did not plant them, but they are hardy and very low-maintenance!

Another flower that made me happy as long as they lasted, which in Memphis heat was a pitiable week, were the gardenias right in front of my porch. Oh, the smell! It was heaven for that week.

I'm not sure why I'm adding Pele to the mix, but isn't she cute?

And last, but not least, was my first attempt at homemade Rosemary Focaccia. Hunny was slightly dubious (I think he said something to the effect of not liking rosemary), but the results were so yummy, we ate two huge slices before I was able to take a picture! This bread was surprisingly simple, and felt kinda healthy as I used my own ground whole wheat. I felt like a domestic diva making this bread: picking my own herbs, grinding my own wheat, kneading the bread instead of letting the dough hook take care of it... not that I'm bragging or anything!!

Well, I know this is the most picture-heavy post, ever, on my blog, but I hope they made you happy, too!!