It's June 1st and the New Summer Issue of Mercantile Gatherings is out!

I am happy to announce that this is the second issue of Mercantile Gatherings that includes two articles written by yours truly....Me! I feel lucky that I have been asked to be a featured writer for this wonderful magazine where I will be writing on antiques and early primitives along with writing a second article titled 'Did You Know...' that will feature information on our early American ancestors. Here is the front of the Summer Issue so run out and buy one at your local primitive shop or better yet!

Subscribe and you can get your magazines delivered directly to your door! PLease check out the magazine here: https://www.mercantilegatherings.com/ and make sure to set aside some time to sit down with a cup of coffee, tea, or a nice cool drink at this time of year to read the articles and, of course, look at all the pictures! I was sitting on my front porch this morning breathing in all the early summer smells and listening to the birds sing and the baby birds yelling to be fed and felt very content. I have been working on my gardens for the last month, trying to rein in my shrub borders and some of my trees that have become so overgrown this spring with all the rain we have had in the couple of months. We added a new walkway in the front garden, a new arbor (made of metal this time) and added to my beds of spring ephemerals. We have also decided .... I think .....to add a cage bar to our great room and maybe rechristen it as our tavern room. Watch this space for updates on this project. That is all for now but I have to tell you about our bunnies that call my gardens home. They raise their babies here (and I have an Irish Setter/Lab mix!), hop through the gardens playing and running around, and have learned to run behind the short black metal garden fences that I have up to protect my more delicate plants from my 7 year old male Irish Setter/Lab mix when he is in a crazy spring mood. They will sit in among the perennials and watch him as he barks at them and hysterically runs around trying to get to them but they know they are safe and just to make it even more perfect.... in this picture I took this morning, you can see one of our many bunnies that call our gardens their home just lying out in the grass and taking it easy. Isn't that the life?