It's July

Our days lately have all begun with a visit to the chicken coop.  I'm behind on sharing some of the now hundreds of yard chicken photos that I've captured since we welcomed our little brood of four a week and a half ago.  

So far, July is slow going for the boys and me- or at least this first week feels that way.  The husband is crazy busy planning The Fayetteville Roots festival which will be at new venue this year:  the town center, and has been hard at work on the buildout of a new restaurant.  Wood Stone Pizza +Bar is set to open in a few short weeks, followed by the festival.  So we are taking it easy, pacing ourselves, and decided to keep our Fourth of July less bomb-tastic, if you will.   

A very low-key independence day:  piddling around the garden, pulling weeds, snacking on the first ripe tomatoes, watering, chicken cuddles and hammock hanging, practice sparklers, a visit to Jerrmy at the workplace, pulling weeds out of the restaurant gardens, back home for more chicken cuddles, ice cream before dinner, delicious brats and onions, a few sparklers for the little ones, big brother very cautious not wanting little brother to get burned, no one was burned, kids early to bed and quality time- just us two lighting sparklers, laughing, taking way too many sparkler photos and sipping gin cocktails til the first boy wondered starry eyed out of bed- our que to wrap it up.   

This glorious bit, is a collage of two iPhone photos made into a collage with an app by big blue chip and filtered with a vsco cam app pre set, B4 BW MOODY (a favorite bw preset)

Cheers to you in the new week!

That Time We Visited Moss Mountain

Perhaps you've heard of P. Allen Smith?  And maybe you've also heard of Moss Mountain, Allen's Garden Home Retreat.  Well, let me tell you- the man and his garden retreat home are just as lovely as you'd imagine.   

A few weeks ago, my husband and his restaurant partner were asked to speak to a group of bloggers at Moss Mountain, telling their restaurant's story following a lunch where the launch of a mass produced version of their Black Bean Burger (that won the the US Foods World Food Championship back in November) was served.  That's all kind of a lot to include in just one sentence.  Brass tacks- we took a two-family road trip, finding ourselves at P. Allen's for a better part of last Monday, and it was lovely.  The husbands did a great job of not only telling our restaurant's story, but really conveying the love that goes into it all.  (And that's the truth.)  I was a proud wife. 

There were some really nice blogger-folks to meet, as well as a friend from Instagram (Sundry Mumsy- check her out.)  From what I gathered, there are periodic events such as this at Moss Mountain where bloggers are treated to a day of learning, togetherness, and food.  Like a day camp.  I made sure to casually plug my humble work here (and on Instagram) to one or two folks, and it was fun when a couple of the gals actually were familiar with my Ozark Mama Deer contributions to the internet.  Anyway, the day was not about me, but I did snap several snaps and I thought I'd bring them back here and give y'all a little taste of P Allen's Place and if you are in the area- do visit.  It's a nice place to visit.  Beautiful land, lovely gardens, heritage chickens, horses, green, green and more green.  Oh.  And the house.  It's pretty fab. (And if you are a blogger- I'd find a way to get in on one of these events- seems like a valuable and fun way to spend a day.  Plus:  Because, Food.  The food situation was looking pretty choice.  Let's just say- there was an ice-cream truck)

***

Our big day down south ended in a half-way-to-home over-night stop in Ozark, Arkansas, where we were treated to a lovely evening at the historic family home of our dear friends.  Lovely views, the golden glow of a summer's-here sunset, bbq ribs, squirt guns, a rabid skunk scare (yep.  that happened), evening swinging, lightening bugs, sweaty kids, bare feet, bubble baths and sneaking away after the bedtime to sip drinks and chat til midnight-- a whole lot of little things that made for a big time.  

Big Time.

xo