Christmas Time is Here..

"Happiness and Cheer!"

As I mentioned in my last post, over the Thanksgiving weekend my mom and I decorated my house for Christmas.  We had some help from our company in town who helped decorate the tree with my husband (thanks SIL!).  Here's a picture of our mantel, our stockings hung with care!

Here is the fire place, I love those red trees and had to fit a picture with them in the blog somewhere!

A close-up of the ledge between the den and dining room.

The dining room (as noted in my earlier post about the dining room, the red color is smooth, for some reason depending on how the lighting is at the time the photos show it as splotchy).

The table at the front entry way.

The stairs you see from the entry way.

And of course, the true meaning of Christmas....

"Oh, that we could only see such spirit through the year!!"

Wishing you and yours a very Merry Christmas!!

Thankful

My Thanksgiving preparations began with the purchase of my first Turkey ever (OK, first raw turkey ever).  I was so excited buying it in the store and wanted to take a picture in it's new home to commemorate the occasion.

But in all seriousness I took lots of pictures to post here from the first Thanksgiving that we hosted.  We had family and friends visiting throughout the weekend but for the actual holiday my parents, SIL, and very special   family from CLT were in attendance for the Thanksgiving meal.  My mom and I started getting things ready in the morning and cooked the turkey all day.  

Yummmm, that Turkey is all ready to pop in the oven and get a tan! :) 

But before it was time to eat, even before all the guests arrived, we first had to set up the tables and decorate.  My mom is a florist and she made two beautiful arrangements using some of the pumpkins we had on the front stoop.  Below is the larger arrangement of the two, the second you might catch a glimpse of in pictures of the food table.

There were 7 of us total so we had to set up two tables to fit everyone.  The table we currently have in the living room is the kitchen table from our condo (now our dining room table).  We moved our current kitchen table from the kitchen to the foyer so everyone could still talk from table to table.

Here is the dining room table....

I made place cards for everyone out of magnolia leaves.  I used a gold paint pen to write the names on one of the leaves and tied two leaves together (one green side up, one brown side up) with gold ribbon.

This is the kitchen table set up in the foyer...

Cooking for the Thanksgiving meal was not as difficult as I had built it up to be in my mind.  Once I had everything figured out and a schedule in the back of  my mind, things just fell into place.  I made the side dishes and my mom handled the stuffing and gravy (phew, those were the two things I was worried about making myself!!).  It was nice to have an extra set of hands in the kitchen and someone with years of experience with actual Thanksgiving meal cooking.  

Here's our turkey just out of the oven.  Gobble Gobble Yummmm!  That turkey was able to feed many different visitors all weekend and we still had plenty left over to make Turkey hash to freeze for both our house and my parent's.

After the turkey came out of the oven, we heated and finished cooking the sides.  Doesn't all that food look yummy?  I forgot to take a picture before we called everyone in to start filling their plates so instead you get an action shot!

Here's a view of the desserts.  My mom made her famous pumpkin roll and I made the pumpkin pie.  I had left over pie dough so I added a leaf for extra decoration.  We also had freshly made whipped cream on hand.

This Thanksgiving I am thankful for so many things.  I will not list them all here, but I thank God for each and every one of them!! :)  

Rub-a-dub-dub

To tide everyone over until Thanksgiving posts I wanted to do a quick post about the tube area in our master bathroom.  The area was just aching to be decorated and luckily David and I were able to complete the task (almost) with items we already had.  The pictures on the wall and embrodered towels were wedding gifts.  The glass canister I bought at Home Goods and filled with a vase filler I found at Target on clearance (another steal!!).  The candle and stand were throw away items I rescued from friends and family and the towels were a gift from my mom (Thanks mom!!) for my old condo guest bathroom.  All in all I think it came together well and it is nice to walk into the bathroom area and see such a finished space.  Enjoy!!

Paint the Town Red

Sorry for the long delay between posts.  I really do want to update this blog more often as I get frustrated when the blogs I love to read  go weeks without updates!!  Things have been busy around here getting ready for Thanksgiving, celebrating milestone birthdays with family, and helping to pack up a house.  A little over two weeks ago (ok, maybe more like three weeks ago but that would require me to admit to myself how long I waited to write this post), we hired a painter to come in and paint our dining room for us.  We choose red and as many of you probably know, that is a difficult color to paint.  It always seems to require way too many coats and no matter what the store says, even if you buy the paint with the primer, you should consider priming the wall first (we did not and I wonder if that would have helped at all).

Back to painting…we had our painter/handyman tackle the dining room for us.  Since red is so unforgiving I wanted someone who knew what they were doing as opposed to myself :).  We have used Tom for painting projects at the new house (painted the entire open, high ceiling main living area for us) and handyman projects at the condo (replaced all the doors, renovated the ½ bath, etc.).  He always does a great job and is very trustworthy and friendly.  He did a great job with the dining room, painting the red and all the trim work.  He really goes above and beyond with his attention to detail.

Well, needless to say, this red dining room took 5 coats!  Looks great though, doesn’t it!!

Please forgive the weird lighting.  I opened the windows and surprisingly it was a little too much light for these photos.  The red color is smooth but some of the photos make it look blotchy, which is not the case.

Just in time for our first Thanksgiving hosting!!

While Tom was painting the dining room, I decided to take the day off from work and paint our bedroom. 

Forgive the weird angles.  I was trying to hide the fact that the bed was not made and I was too lazy to make it for these pictures.  I was in the middle of a sewing extravaganza day and didn't want to break my concentration for long.  More on that to come later!

We painted the bedroom the same color as a hallway I painted in September.  I finished it one Friday night while the hubby was out of town.  When I get a project on my mind, I can't stop until it's done.

I have to admit, I have an ulterior motive for posting this hallway picture.  I really wanted to show off our new runner.  I purchased it recently at Target on clearance for a real steal.  I LOVE that store!! (and who doesn't love a great deal).  

That is it for now folks!  I have another post in mind so I plan to update you before Thanksgiving.  Love to all.

Blinded by the Light

...or should I say blinded by the out-dated-ness of the light fixture?!  Yes, I think I did just make up a new word for Webster's Dictionary to try and define.  When I pulled into the garage for the first time in our new house there was one project-to-be glaring right at me!!

Let me just add in an up-close and personal shot.....

Ummmm, I think those things have seen better days.  I have to admit, from the beginning of our house hunt I was always looking for little projects (nothing too big or expensive, just little things I could spruce up and put my own spin on).  I've been reading my favorite blog Young House Love for awhile now.  They are always working on great projects, some of them tasks I can handle, some of them tasks I can admire from afar.  Well....one of my favorites is their obsession with Rust-Oleum's Metallic Oil Rubbed Bronze.  It's amazing how a few coats of spray paint will make anything look new.  And the new spray paint on the market is way above the caliber of previous ones.  It's spray paint with primer, indoor/outdoor use, and the spray mechanism on it ensures you don't end up with finger tips covered in the stuff.

So the first step was to take down the fixtures (make sure the power is turned off or you may get a  more than unpleasant shock when disconnecting the wires).  Who knew those fixtures had so many pieces.  I thought I would have to cover the glass with paper and painter's tape but the glass panels just slid right out.

Once we had everything disconnected and taken apart we laid all the pieces out on newspaper and cardboard.  We gave everything a nice even coat and then checked on them a few minutes later to make sure all surfaces were covered.  

I can't begin to tell you how much fun it is to use spray paint.  That defiantly helps move the project along.  We let all the items sit in the sun for a few hours.  Periodically we would run out and admire our spray painting abilities (I'm sure the neighbors thought we were a little nuts).  The directions on the can indicated the paint would be dry to the touch within 30 minutes, to handle in a hour, and fully dry within 24 hours.  After maybe 4 or 5 hours we were anxious to put everything back together and see how it all turned out.

Voila......

And to get an idea of the whole picture......

We sprayed our metal house numbers too during this project and hung them back early on for instant gratification.

I think it is safe to say we both felt pretty proud of ourselves and now can't stop looking around the house for other items to spray.  We still have a pretty good amount left in the can so this project didn't even cost the full price tag of one can. 

On another note.....I recently got directions from someone who spray painted the brass colored framing around their shower with Rust-Oleum's Universal Hammered spray paint....maybe that will be another project in this house soon.

Happy painting.....and on that note I'll be posting soon about the painting that has been going on inside our house.

As Ye Sew, So Shall Ye Rip

I don't know if you can tell from the quirky title but I have begun sewing.  The "Rip" part is for all the times I had to rip out my stitches and redo a seam ;)  My mom has been sewing for as long as I can remember, I am sure long before I came along.  I had learned the sewing basics years ago and recently decided to pick up the craft again.  I am not advanced enough to begin sewing clothes but I have managed a few simple items.  I've been working on a HUGE T-shirt quilt for my husband with all his shirts from high school and college.  Right now I'm waiting for my mom to help me pick out the backing for the quilt.  In the meantime I have moved on to bags.

I have been using a Martha Stewart pattern I found on her website and the more bags I sew, the more I add my own touches.  I've even started adding lining with fabric of different patterns. 

Notice the red and black ribbon that I used as trim?!  I was very proud of myself!

 I plan on giving these out as gifts this Christmas as well as some cute zipper bags I have been working on.  I don't want to show too many images just in case some of the few lucky recipients are reading this blog.  We'll see if I can make as many as I need by the time gift giving comes around!

Happy crafting!!

Fall is Here At Last

Living in the South it always seems as if fall comes later and later each year.  This year we have been pleasantly surprised to have plenty of cool days and crisp fall nights in September and October.  We recently went to the mountains of NC with our friends for our annual fall trip.  The leaves were beautiful and the weather was great.  We have made it a tradition to stop at the same pumpkin stand each year when we visit.  This year my husband and I will be hosting our first ever Thanksgiving.  We decided to splurge on our pumpkin purchases and maybe went a little over board.

We decorated the front stoop with these new pumpkins, a few bales of hay, and some mums (both new plants and old plants from last year).  I was quite proud of myself to even put some decorative material to cover the base of one of the planters.

Aren't all those pumpkins too cute.  How could we possibly pass them by?!  The great thing about the stand we stop at is they have such a great variety of pumpkins and gourds.  We picked a variety of smaller items to decorate our mantel.  We've got a few Halloween items on the mantel too but those will come down for November.  I'll have to find some additional items to use as a filler.

I couldn't resist snapping a quick picture of these two tin pumpkins.  My mom and I found them at HomeGoods at the beginning of the season along with a few of the Halloween decorations on the mantel and the ceramic pumpkin on the front stoop.

I hope everyone is blessed with a wonderful fall this year!!

New Beginings

My husband and I recently purchased our current house.  Over the past few months, we have been busy with many tasks.  In that time we have managed to have the main living area painted (by a professional, I do not have the skills or the tools to paint a wall that high), purchase a kitchen table, hang a few pictures, and paint a hallway. 

We painted the main area with Behr's Sandstone Cove.  Once the walls were painted we could start hanging some pictures on the walls.  My husband has a hobby of photography which makes for some great images to hang.

I find myself struggling with a desire to just pick things and fill up spaces (as many who know me will tell you, I am an inpatient, sometimes impulsive person – I like to have a task and “get her done” as they say).  I do not want to fill my home with stuff, I want to decorate, pick a theme, display items that are meaningful to me.  I have a few ideas and a laundry list in my head of tasks I want to accomplish but along with a  new home comes a new mortgage and I have to remind myself that I need to space out projects and do what we can afford (Did you know a gallon of Behr Ultra Paint is 30 dollars?!  Not that I think it is too much but if you have to buy multiple gallons it starts to add up).

I want this blog to be a way to share projects I am working on and things going on in my life.  There is no set theme, just discussing tasks around the house and activities that make our house a home.  Here are some more pictures just to show you around a little bit of the house.

That red splotch on the wall is a paint sample.  We're having the dining room painted soon to be ready for Thanksgiving. 

The bedroom walls will be getting a fresh coat of paint soon too.