bluehouse Weblog

….but I say it’s our new berry flavored syrups. Newcomers blackberry and blueberry join our tens of other great flavors to add a taste-of-summer-but-better to all kinds of drinks. A blueberry latte? Is that too crazy? Or is it just crazy enough to work? You won’t know until you try it.
In other delicious beverage news, you, dear reader, have a chance to be part of bluehouse history. All you have to do is come up with a great name for a frozen drink, preferably one that doesn’t play fast and loose with copyrighted terms.
I want to call our frozen, blended coffee beverages “fraptacular chills.” Obviously, I must be stopped.
Bonus: name the drink and get a free one. Vote in person, or leave a reply in the comments.

People, Latte Time included, have mentioned pie in this space before, but doesn’t pie’s place in the world deserve some more analysis? Yes.
I have set aside a piece of Spinach and Goat Cheese pie, made by the artisans at Dangerously Delicious for my lunch, and now I am going around the store with a little cartoon thought bubble with a picture of a pie inside it floating lightly above my head. To be fair, this is often the case, but the quality of the pie in question makes my lunch break seem that much further away.

You all thought I melted away into a puddle didn’t you? Confess! It was touch and go for a while, I will admit. Earth Day saw me and two of my intrepid coworkers struggling to set up our tent in the pouring rain at Baltimore Green Week’s EcoFestival, an event for which bluehouse was the headline sponsor. Thousands of people were expected to join us for a day of fun eco-friendly activities; in the end, we did have a bonding experience with several dozen hardy souls who understood that if Mother Nature wanted to celebrate her day with a drought-breaking shower, who were we to complain?

I just wanted to tell you that we got some super-cool stuff in since I last wrote.

Prominent among this is office furniture from 20 Gauge, offering reconditioned steel tanker desks, school lockers, and shelving in some awesome colors. The ones in our showroom and warehouse are either sky blue and chartreuse, but they can be custom ordered in any color you can imagine.

We’ve also got the best picture frames in! They are made from wood recycled from boats and feature cool striped patterns in the original paint colors.

And then there are the quilts made from recycled sports-number tee-shirts. These are twin-sized throw blankets, perfect for your little soccer star’s bed, or for the comfy chair in front of the television.

Or how about looking through our new selection of green-lifestyle oriented books?

And there’s always the new range of LED light bulbs that last 60,000 hours each and can save you 80% or more on your electric bills. (With these, we also ordered in a few LED flashlights and even a really great crank-powered radio/flashlight combination that might be good if this year’s hurricane season gets out of control.)

Last but not least, if you’re bargain hunting this month, come on down and see our big glass- and tableware sale. Get 30% off of recycled-bottle glasses and goblets, antique seltzer bottles and apothecary jars, bamboo cereal and salad bowls, some really beautiful handmade planters, and of course, our old friends the Vybica mouth-blown glass bottles and vases.
Come early to beat the crowds!

It’s getting hot outside already. Luckily, bluehouse now carries both iced coffee and iced tea. Our iceable teas come amusingly named, perhaps so amusingly that it is best not to repeat what their twisted makers would have us call them, but I am calling myself Latte Time, so have very little room to talk about who may or may not be twee.
Today’s tea, for example, is a nice fruity blend called Berried Treasures. It’s nice with a little sugar or alone, and it’s a lovely red color. Isn’t that nice?