Growing up, our house didn’t have a bar per se, more of a shelf in the entryway closet with booze of unknown antiquity and a handful of bottles of homemade Kahlua (that I occasionally snuck from… shhh! don’t tell mom). As an adult, I’ve grown to appreciate the art of a well-made cocktail — specifically, the Negroni. I’ve taken such a liking to them, I decided to bite the bullet and stock my home bar with the components. Dry Fly Gin, Campari, and sweet vermouth are now proudly on display, along with my assortment of Fee Brothers Bitters and a couple of vintage cocktail shakers. I’m sure I’ll add more to it eventually, but for now, it’s all I need. Those bottles and shakers all arranged make me feel so fancy and grown up. How about you? Is your home bar spartan, like mine, or does it look more like the (impressive) photo above? — Megan B.

photo courtesy of flickr user Rennett Stowe

Okay, it’s official — the winners have been picked! THREE lucky readers have won their choice (limited to stock on hand) of beautiful drawer liners from the impossibly generous Hammocks and High Tea! Cue the drum roll…

Winner #1: Brett, who digs these drawer liners so much they plan to “remove everything from (my) drawers, place it on the bed, line the drawers and keep them open to admire them.” And now that dream can come true!

Winner # 2: Lynne, who plans on spending all Summer in shorts — AND last but not least–

Winner #3: Carolyn, whose collection of skirts and dresses will be resting pretty!

Congrats, guys! You’ll be hearing from us soon. And if you can, please let us all know your choices in the comments. Thanks to all who entered — and to the lovely Becki S. for wrangling up this wonderful giveaway for us. Be on the lookout for more soon!

As soon as it gets close enough to summer that I can find decent sweet corn, I start making this summer salad. While it’s definitely better in July when the corn and tomatoes are local, I can’t bring myself to wait. You can try my adaptation, after the jump, or Rachel Ray’s recipe that uses frozen corn and a different mix of veggies. — Sarah L.
click for the recipe, after the jump!

If it looks like a succulent to you, that’s ’cause it is! Purslane, native to India & the Middle East originally, is an edible succulent that is often viewed as a weed. It can grow in most any soil, will spread like wildfire, and is drought and “black thumb” tolerant. The benefits keep on coming: Purslane, in addition to being delicious (kinda tart and juicy) is naturally high in vitamin C and other minerals along with omega-3 fatty acids.

I’m planting quite a bit this year, so I’ll be doing my usual Summer salad bonanza with a healthy dose of Purslane for sure. It’s popular in Greek cuisine, so pairing it with feta, kalamatas and olive oil is an option — but you can cook it down too, and it will actually thicken soups. Crazy! Have you tried it? Any recipes to share? — Megan B.

Rest easy, everyone. I’ve found the gag gift for your next baby shower. This book, written by Adam Mansbach and illustrated by Ricardo Cortés, has been making the Internet rounds for a few weeks fueled, it seems, by the empathy of thousands of very tired parents. Rounding out 50 days in the top 100 on the Amazon Bestsellers list for books (where it sits in second place, as of press time), this might be a great laugh for a parent you know with a restless baby and intact sense of humor. And it appears other sleepy parents agree. Originally slated to be published this fall, the publication date was moved up to today after PDF versions hit the web, creating a spike in demand. A runaway hit for its independent publisher, Akashic, the first print run of 275,000 copies easily trumps the firm’s standard first run, which averages 4,000 to 6,000; a testament to the the power of tired parents everywhere. Readers, have you read it? $8.18 at Amazon. – Sarah C.

For an interesting look at the book’s success, click here.

If you missed it last week, you’ve still got a chance — a chance to win a set of lightly (or not at all) scented drawer liners from Hammocks & High Tea. We’re giving away a total of THREE sets to you lucky readers, so as it stands, the odds are quite good that you could win a set! The giveaway runs until 5pm PST tomorrow (June 15), so if you’d like to enter, please do so — at the original post. Tell us there what Summery wardrobe essentials you can’t wait to take out of storage, and you’re entered. We’ll be choosing the winners via random number generator and announcing on Thursday. Good luck — and thanks to the generous & fabulous folks at Hammocks & High Tea!

Click here to enter!

Ever since first laying eyes on the Yonanas banana ice cream maker in the June issue of In Style magazine, the simple idea of churning a frozen banana into a quick dish of creamy, soft ice cream has been cropping up everywhere. The recipe is beautifully self-explanatory: Peel a banana. Cut it into sections and freeze. Drop frozen pieces into a food processor, blend and enjoy! A little trick with a big fan base, the recipe met with rave reviews when featured a couple summers ago over at The Kitchn, and has been a trick of the trade for vegan, raw and gluten-free dieters for years. Add a spoonful of peanut butter, honey, cocoa powder or simply enjoy alone for a sweet, healthy and easy summer treat! — Sarah C.

Image: Faith Durand for The Kitchn

I grew up going to the National Lakeshore along Lake Michigan, both on the Indiana side and the Michigan side. If you’ve never been, go. It can get crowded, especially during summer, but the sight of a sand dune as tall as a 20-story building? Unforgettable, especially in the flat Midwest. While the blue water and the powdery sand still hold my interest, it was the architecture that caught my attention the last two trips.

I think both the main gatehouses and the pavilion are WPA projects. (Sadly, I can’t find a list of WPA buildings by state online and did not walk around the buildings to find a telltale plaque, thinking it would be easy to confirm once home. Wrong.) If not WPA, they certainly date to the 30s and are in keeping with other WPA projects in the state. All totaled, more than 120,000 WPA buildings were constructed nationwide. Many are at National and State Parks, on college campuses or at other public places like zoos. Firehouses, courthouses, schools and post offices built under the WPA are also plentiful. While they’re not the riskiest of designs, they have a solidity combined with little design details that I find endlessly appealing. What’s your favorite WPA building? — Sarah L.

Photo of sand dunes from Yelp.com

We can’t help it. We’re still obsessed with those gorgeous drawer liners from Hammocks & High Tea that we showed you back in January. They add such a sophisticated, “pulled together” feeling to our dresser drawers, and make us even more excited to head to our closets every morning. Plus, their subtle scents make us feel a bit like Grace Kelly when we open our delicates drawer (though we’re guessing she didn’t rely as heavily on her trusty collection of Gap boyshorts as we do).

Summer seems to be the season in which we finally unload our closet and actually undergo a clean-out – something about the switch from cardigans to tank tops just brings out the organizer in us. We were thinking: maybe we could help a few of our readers with their summer closet overhauls!

And so, we’ve teamed up with the wonderful people at Hammocks & High Tea to give three Shelterrific readers their favorite set of drawer liners. That’s right: we’re giving you new drawers! (Sorry, couldn’t resist.)

To enter, just leave a comment letting us know what you’re most excited to pull out from the back of your winter closet and wear to death all summer long. We’ll choose a winner on Wednesday, June 15 via random number generator, so please have your entries in by 5 pm Pacific time. US residents only, winners must choose from available stock.

Good luck everyone!

MMM… DONUTS. Fresh cherry cake donuts, to be precise — naturally pink frosted — at Cook and Eat.

We got caught up (forgive the pun) in love with this nauti-cool DIY fishnet curtain we spotted at Remodelista. Stealing it for sure!

You’ve still got time to order a cool gift for Dad — and CasaSugar has a great Etsy gift roundup to help inspire your purchase!

Peel and Stick tiles worth using — spotted at Curbly.

The kaleidoscopically bright floors in Whorange’s monthly pad for June are amazing. Just sayin’.

Badder Homes and Gardens introduces Tick clips, meant to turn any surface into a mod table in the only way they know how: with side-splitting NSFW hilarity.