Pickford's Sundries Lives On.......

My friend Paddy and I went this afternoon to have lunch at the remodeled Pickford's Sundries that is now the Cafe & Bakery on Hillsborough Avenue. Having lived here in Tampa for many years, I have always thought this was a really cute little pink building that somebody should make into something. Well finally, it has been restored and it's the cutest little cafe & bakery now.
I had a delicious Roast Beef sandwich and a Cherry Coke. Paddy said her BLT was great, too. The sandwiches were so filling that we didn't have room for any of the yummy lookng dessert but we will make another trip there just to have dessert. Their breakfast menu looked awesome, too. The blog title above will link you to their website. They're open Tuesday-Saturday.


After lunch we ventured down to the new IKEA store that opened last week in Ybor City. It's my first trip to an IKEA store. Pretty cool stuff. I'd love a red kitchen like the one pictured above. I'd love a craft room designed with all of their cool storage units. It's a huge place and we did plenty of walking. The temperature was a little warm for our taste but it's a cool place.

Key West April 2009 Smilebox Scrapbook

Please join us all at Happy to Design to see our Sunday Favorites. We share our favorite post from the past.

I am a Winner!!!!

Yes....I'm a winner of a $100 Publix supermarket gift card. Cool! I participated in the POST Return to School Sweepstakes and I'm a winner of a gift card it seems. It came in the mail this afternoon. Awesome! That's the 3rd thing I have won this year so far. :-)

April Adventures with the BF....

The BF came home last Friday and we took a roundabout trip to Key West. First we zipped over to Orlando with the thought of checking out Epcot but it was late in the afternoon before we got there and $75 a pop for tickets is just more than we want to spend. We did pay $12 to park and then took the monorail ride around for a few minutes.

We left there and started the long drive down the costly Florida Turnpike to Miami. We spent the night in a lovely room at the Ramada Inn in Florida City. It's right at the beginning of US 1 that takes you down the Keys.
We headed out early Saturday Morning for the 3 hour drive to Key West where we had a reservation at the lovely Ambrosia Bed & Breakfast (title above links to their website). A wonderful and relaxing place. Ben could not have been nicer. We stayed in the Havana Cabana room. It has a very large jacuzzi bathtub that was just wonderful after our long drive and long day of walking Duval Street.

I'm working on a smilebox slide show with all of our pictures and I'll hopefully have that up soon.
It was such a special trip with my sweet & wonderful BF....Love you Bee ;-)

Tampa Downtown Market

My neighbor Paddy and I ventured to downtown Tampa to check out the Tampa Downtown Farmer's Market. It was a beautiful day, we found an excellent parking spot close by, and we had a really nice time checking out the vendors.
We could not find the actual "Dancing Goat" but the Dancing Goat lady was there selling her handmade soaps. Paddy bought some delicious Focaccia bread and shared half of the loaf with me. I had some this afternoon with some olive oil, salt & pepper. It was very good. I bought some smokey Paprika that I hope to use soon from a women selling spices . I always see Rachel Ray cooking with it on her show. I, also, picked up some fresh green beans and a couple of limes from the produce vendor.
After the market we went over to Channelside for a bite of lunch since Paddy had never been to Channelside. I gave her the short tour and she very kindly treated me to lunch at Thai Thani. It was very good and had just the right amount of spice for my tast buds.

After lunch we did a quick driving tour around Ybor City, then a drive down Central Avenue so that I could show her the beautiful old Hillsborough High School, and then it was back home.
If you have the chance go downtown to check out the Market before they close in May. They're opening from 10:00 am to 2:00 pm each Friday. Click on the Market photo above to link to their website.
Friday evening I went over to Clearwater to join my friends Kathy& Larry. We went to Safety Harbor to participate in the Third Friday Festival.
http://www.cityofsafetyharbor.com/index.asp?nid=317
More beautiful Florida Spring weather. It was a fun evening spending time with old friends, enjoying Lobster Bisque from a vendor, seeing how much attention little Marcel, their dog, got and enjoying some nice wine back at their lovely home. I slept very well last night.:-)