Prescott Park

Jim and I spent a couple of nights recently in our favorite New England town of Portsmouth, NH.

Prescott Park is this beautifully kept array of plant and flowers. I have posted photos on my blog of this park before so it may look familiar to some of you.

We always visit it when there.

There are 3 fountains within for the added tranquility of falling water.

We also strolled down here with our morning coffee and witnessed out they keep the gardens so lush!

Our summer has been completely rough with heat and dryness!

With all that water and sunshine there was sure to be manmade rainbows!

I hope you have enjoyed this sweet garden tour. Wishing you a wonderful week ahead! ~Val

This Week's Blog Post

Pyrite Bracelet

When I was a little girl I had a mineral collection. One of my favorite pieces was a chunk of pyrite. I love its brassy grey color!

The barrel shaped pyrite beads are accented with black onyx.  A perfect bracelet for fall and winter! Available at Miss Val’s Creations.

Portsmouth, NH Part III

Part III is very floral! There were more amazing flowers in Portsmouth this time than any other time we have visited here! So of course I had to take many, many photos!

There is a huge garden area near the water with a brilliant selection of flowers. So many different types and colors!

Each flower is labeled so if you want to take notes for your own garden you know what to ask for at the garden center!

There are beautiful flowers throughout the city too. This sweet hibiscus was in a doorstep pot. I have never seen one that was multi colored before!

This pretty pink one was in a beautifully landscaped bank parking lot.

This black plant is real! It is in the window of a wine bar titled The Black Trumpet. The plant choice must have something to do with their theme. You can see fresh baked bread cooling in the window. Oh how I wish I could eat regular bread again! Jim and I have not been inside this place yet…maybe next year!

At Prescott Park there is a pretty fenced in garden area with brick walkways and benches. 

There are many magnificent window and door photos on Pinterest so I started a new board this week. I added this photo since it has charm. I love the window barely showing behind the sunflowers and ivy.

Ending the post with a little street art! This one seems appropriate with all the shark sightings, close calls and one shark attack we had off the coast of Massachusetts this summer!

The guy who got attacked is fine. He had the bright idea of swimming out really far (with his son) to a sand bar knowing of all the shark sightings. Maybe he wanted 10 minutes of fame which he got! People are nuts.

I hope you enjoyed all these floral delights! Thank you for stopping by and have a great week ahead! ~Val

This Week's Blog Post

Star Glass Pendants
This week has been crazy with sales of lanyards and eyeglass chains so I have been beading like a madwoman!  I am guessing it has something to do with teachers going back to work and wanting to update their accessories!

At my last appointment, my hairstylist was wearing a glass star pendant with the 3D like insides and she has been looking for another one. So I said, let me see what I can come up with! I got these 4 pretties which I will bring to the next appointment s see if she likes them.

Someday I hope to take a class to learn this technique.  I love how the inner design looks like it is ready to burst out of the piece!

Portsmouth, NH Part II

Back with more Portsmouth! I love the architecture of so many buildings in this city. This house is one of my favorites! Full of beautiful details!

This awning is so cool. A heavy iron chain seems like it is holding it up!

This home has so much charm with its fuchsia door and blue trim.

Many homes have little nooks like this with all sorts of plantings.

Lion doorknockers!

I am not sure why I like this photo so much. I was attempting to photograph the plant which looked like tiny green pumpkins. That did not work, but I love the old home in the background and the white picket fence!

There are many antique homes here.

This Georgian mansion is the Moffat-Ladd House. William Whipple, one of the signers of the United States Declaration of Independence, lived here during the Revolution! These pretty gardens are on the opposite side of the street and is really sweet to walk through.

Many of the brick homes have ivy growing up the outer walls which I love!

 

Jim and I saw this boat being built last year over at Strawberry Banke so it was cool to see it in action! It is a gundalow named Piscataqua. This is the type of boat that was used for 400 years in Portsmouth for transporting goods in and out of the city. Now tourists can take a ride on it!

We also saw many happy loons hanging around!

I guess I am doing a part III next week!!!! Too many pictures that I adore and want to display on my blog!  Thank you for stopping by! I hope you enjoyed this tour of a charming New England town.

This Week's Blog Post

Buri Root Necklace
I actually made something for myself! These black beads are carved from the buri nut which is native to the Philippines.

Between them I used dark grey hemalyke beads. This is going to be a great staple piece in my wardrobe so I look forward to wearing it many, many times!

Portsmouth

Jim and I stayed a couple of nights in our favorite local spot, Portsmouth, New Hampshire. It was our second annual weekend trip there!

This New England gem has great eateries, scenery on the Atlantic Ocean, gardens, theater, art, historical buildings and so much more! Many of the eateries are in old structures that have been renovated. This year was tricky since I realized I can not eat gluten and of course I am a vegetarian. Luckily Portsmouth is well aware of the gluten free population!

This self portrait was taken at the Common Man which is a restaurant with multiple locations in New Hampshire. If you ever visit NH, it is definitely worth looking up the closest location! Its menu includes homecooked style comfort food like mac and cheese and pot roast. For me they have a quinoa and roasted veggie dish which is delicious!

We wanted to check out this newer restaurant called Mombo. It is a more upscale dining but we just went in for a glass of wine and cheese plate.

It is located at Strawberry Banke which was a thriving area dating back to the 1600s. Here homes have been preserved and guests can tour the area with live actors reenacting life in the old days!

The restaurant décor is beautiful with that old American feel.

We also visited Agave Mexican Bistro which has 1 location in Massachusetts and 1 location in New Hampshire.

Both locations have elegant dining and bar areas but reasonably priced.

Annabelle’s Ice Cream was another great stop we made in the middle of a hot day for some homemade frozen yogurt.

It has a feel like it has been around for many, many decades but actually opened in 1982!

We saw some cool sculptures. These metal pieces are by artist Rick Burns who received honorable mention by the NH Art Association. This is Emaciated Farmer.

This is 21^st Century Sisyphus.

This cool rock has random animals carved all around it that appear to be behind windows.

These beautiful hands were in the yard of a temple.

Here I am with a lion. This was outside of an old building that has been converted into upscale condos.

We passed this sweet polka dotted feather on the sidewalk.

Many benches in the park have chess boards on them! There is probably some historical reference to this since one of the buildings downtown has the old ink reading “chess club” on it.

I have been seeing flower walls lately on Pinterest so it was really cool to see this one in person. This gardener used bags to house each plant.

I took a ridiculous amount of pictures so next week I will follow up with some great old architecture and stunning flowers!

Thank you for stopping by! If you ever have the opportunity to visit Portstmouth, NH someday you will not be disappointed!!! Have a wonderful week.  ~Val