Backyard Botanicals

I wanna do this blog thing. Really. I swear I mean it.
But then I read ALLLL the other amazing blogs written by such talented women, and I get discouraged by what I have to share. I start to question whether or not people out there in the universe reading all of those wonderful blogs would find anything of interest here...at my little space in the blogosphere.
And then I buck up, tell myself that this is something I want to do for me, and I pop back here.
It's become a cycle. I repeatedly wrestle with my own insecurities and doubts.
That has to stop.
So here I am.
Again.

We've been on vacation and while getaways are appreciated, I always love returning to my happy place. Today I snipped a few flowers and some greenery from our backyard to spruce up the abode and settle back in.

The greenery went on my desk in a plastic wine glass I specifically picked up from Target  to use as a vase. The clay paper weight was made by our son in kindergarten and was displayed at his school's annual art show last year. It's important to me to integrate things lovingly made by our kiddos throughout our home. The metal L was a TJMaxx or Marshals find many years ago. This trio is atop some of our Sinatra coffee table book collection.

The flowers went into one of my beloved large blue mason jars that once belonged to my grandparents. The iron piggy bank was an antique find while on an shopping outing with a dear friend a long time ago. (Funny side note--I bought it before we moved into our current home, and I noticed when I unpacked it that the name of our new town is on the piggy. Happy signs!) The tin cup is an antique measuring cup that once belonged to my great grandparents.

(This photo is also a good example of something I wrestle with when it comes to this blog. We plan to update the kitchen backsplash and counters...eventually. It's on our list. I dream of replacing the square tumbled tile with white subway tiles with gray grout and the tan laminate with the ever coveted granite or perhaps something a little different, like concrete. And while I dream, I tend to shy away from sharing the current state of things.)

Small vignettes make me smile. Such a quick, easy way to pump new decor and, hence, new life into a room. And fresh flowers can add that little something to make a spot feel brighter. This is the first time I've snipped botanicals from my own yard. I have no idea why I haven't done it before, but you can bet I'll be doing it again.