Happy Easter!

I hope everyone is having a blessed Easter and enjoying the festivities while remembering Christ died for our sins today! The littles woke up with squeals of delight this morning finding that the Easter bunny had made his way by!

We do have really cute baskets but they are locked in the attic, unreachable at the moment, so I improvised with $1 pails from my Mom. The ears are also from my Mom, every Easter I take a photo of the kids with them on. The candies consisted of organic gummies and organic suckers found at Home Goods. I also found there a juggling set for Jake and a handmade harmonica for Charlotte. The bubbles were originally from Aldi. Funny enough the chalk is from drive through happy meals from somewhere lol We spent the morning reading the bible. In the afternoon we headed to friends for a lovely dinner. The food was absolutely divine!

Guest/Craft/Office Desk

I love this desk we found at a garage sale last summer. Technically my husband gets all the credit because he is the one who actually stopped. I passed by it while rushing home with two hyper kids in tow and was calling him when mid buzz he called with the news of his new found desk. $100 later and some back pain we had moved the solid wood desk into the smallest bedroom out of our 5 and it was over powering.

The plan was for Honey to use the room as his office but a hop skip and jump later he received an amazing job offer and no longer worked at home. We couldn't decide what to do with the desk so we moved it into the empty room that it is currently in and made the smallest room a guest room. Some furniture moving later the trundle was moved into the empty room and was shaping up to be a new room all together.

I LOVE this desk. Honey still uses it some but I'm the one who crafts, writes short stories/poems and handles all paperwork coming in and out of the house. My seahorse candle stick was a gift from Honey this past year for my 24th birthday.

The other candlesticks are from my sister-in-law, Jenna, they were originally chrome in two different tones. Spray painted to match I love them. I love the bottle ship lamp (still need to grab a shade for that), it was a white elephant gift Justin got at Thanksgiving 2012.

The top shelf has a driftwood crafted box Justin gave me. A fake plant from my Mum. A photo from our 1yr anniversary where we had our big wedding.

I just love how this room has come together and on a great budget thanks to some many hand me downs and repurposing things. It's quickly turning into one of the most often used spaces in the house. Tomorrow I'll show the secret nook in the room. :)

Honey's birthday

Honey turned a sweet 26 today! I just love birthdays and even more when they involve my honey. He had asked for a low key birthday and that is what he got. Just the kids, me and a whole lot of love.




Now that the littles are growing up it is so fun to sing Happy Birthday and take part in little common activities. I splurged and got him a small Cheesecake Factory cake.



It was so good that we both had an extra piece!



His birthday gifts were a little random. He had asked for new socks so new socks he got and a thankful for Dad book from the littles. I found a cast iron bulldog opener at the Pottery Barn Outlet here and a much needed facial hair trimmer. My sister sent cigars and his parents sent a lil check that he will be putting towards saddle bags for his motorcycle.



Happy birthday to my love!

Trundle bed for the Guest Room

I've been working on our guest room/office this past week and found bedding at a garage sale. It's a soft, satin coverlet with matching shams for only $10 at the sale. The extra pillows were gifted to us from my husband's sister Jenna. We got daybed with trundle originally from Pottery barn this summer for $100 and just got a great deal on Serta pillowtop mattresses. I'll be doing finishing touches later this week. I'm still on the hunt for art above the bed. I'm thinking something swamp:

or a Audubon bird print:

:)

Happy Valentine's Day in Bacon

I've been trying to get better on actually doing things that I Pinterest, when I came across man Valentine's I was hooked. After alot of browsing I decided to try my hand at a Bacon Bouquet. I got two bunches of roses from Walmart for. 97 each last payday and this payday I got a $2.59 pack of bacon. The plan was to do as many tutorials say about drilling holes in muffin pans so the grease drips in a pan below. Well at 5 am I had no interest in drilling holes into my fought hard to get muffin pans. I looked around at what else to do and found our old pizza pan full of all those little vent holes.... duh why not just use that. Sure it made me feel a little less DIY but how often would I used drilled out muffin pans (wasteful!) So I just wrapped the bacon placed it on the pizza pan and a casserole dish underneath. No grease in my oven and they all stayed up fine. Take a look at these beauties :) They were well received by my honey after realized I did NOT go and buy myself flowers like he thought I had lol For the kids I made simple goody bags of frosted animals and learning books. I'm not big on them being sugared up. Happy Valentine's Day y'all!

Spray Paint the Ugly Away

Do you ever find things you love but hate the color of? Or they simply don't match your other decor. I'm a person who hates multiple finishes. I am more than okay with two but that is my Max for a house. A house starts to look junky with multiple metal finishes.

I made a trade two years ago for two over the door signs. This one is able to hold a wreath. I'm sure back in the day it looked great. I had stuffed it in our attic and forgotten about it until we moved to TN. I was really hoping to make it work in our new home. I used rustoleum's bronze spray paint. I didn't prime it just a good scrub down and two light coats. Much better don't you think?

I am in love! I think it looks so much classier. The white gave it a cottage feel and the faded gross later just made it look like a trip to the trash can was needed. This is much more my cup of tea.

My wreath was a 2.99 Goodwill find when we lived in NC. I paired it with a Pier 1 bird from my Mum. What things have y'all brought back to life with spray paint?

Inspiration

I'm definetley a type A personality this can lead to procrastination when things are not turning out perfect. We moved into our home in March, threw some cheap $100 for the lot furniture in the living room and called it good. After trying for months to make a really workable layout so I could progress from onward I figured it out. Our main goals were to have as much seating as possible while still keeping as open as a floor plan as possible. I hate closed off sectionals. *****Please squint hard and visualize with me.

This long wall will house a extra long sofa with a chaise on one end. Squint hard! I pushed the coffee table to act has a chaise. I'll be looking for a piece shorter by about a foot to eighteen inches.

I being a weirdo measured the deep that the current sofa bulges from the door frame into the kitchen. Here's to hoping for a slender, comfy, extra long, cushy dream of a sofa comes my way.

You've probably noticed the little cutie in my pictures. I feel so grateful to watch this little 7wk old. She is such a sweet baby and so cute!

Squinting again we can see a leather recliner. I'm not sure if the sofa will be leather but the recliner will be for sure. The back wall will have a huge console similar to this.

I found it on Joss and Main marked down to a crying $1700. It's by Hooker furniture and gorgeous. It checks off every category: sexy legs that do not obstruct the huge floor vent, lots of storage, a whopper of a size (105inches!), and stunning. Sadly not in my budget but I'm on the hunt down here and will DIY something if I need to.

The art work above the back wall console will be a DIY. I was looking at the new Ballards Design magazine that came in and fell in love with these maps. They make the over all scheme a bit more manly. The honey approves. At $289 a piece though these will definitely be a DIY project. I love the warm hues they give. Well that's it for now. I just had to log the inspiration before I lose it. :) One Last shot from entryway so you can see how open it will be. LOVE IT!

Great Nightmare

Does anyone else have awkward walls or at least one? Our house has several uneven walls or awkward little nooks. Made the house look gorgeous on the empty walk through when we bought but the design a nightmare.

This wall for instance is 16ft tall and 12ft wide give or take a few inches with a vent that starts about a foot in on the bottom and is 18 inches long. SWEET! Lol

The french doors open to the patio, the small opening next to them is a micro hallway into the master. Other end the wall is a taller opening that leads to two random rooms and extra bathroom. Exactly opposite of the hallway to the two rooms is the stairs to the second level.

I'm really at a loss on design. I favor open floor plans and having a sectional in this tall and long room would close off several openings. I've tried having the furniture at different angles or facing opposite each other and it annoys me. I can't handle the furniture covering part of the stair rails. Call me weird, I don't mind but it is a huge pet peeve of mine. Having the sofa all the on this large back wall would make it way to far for us to enjoy our subtitle movies not to mention the remote is to far away from the t.v. then. Standing and walking halfway to the t.v. to use the remote the horror! ;) Did I mention that we have a corner fireplace?

Oh yea we do with a wide off center opening to the kitchen.

I truly love this space but I need to kick up the functional aspect of it. I am saving up babysitting money for a dark brown leather set and I'm not attached to anything in the room. Honey does want the t.v. to stay over the mantle just mounted a tad higher. I'd love to have a blown up picture of each of the kids in the frames on either side of the french doors. So what do y'all think of this nightmare of a room. Thoughts? Ideas?

Monogramming and Sales

Garnet Hill has been having an awesome after Christmas sale! I found a backpack and lunch box for a fraction of what they originally cost. Backpack $44.95 down to $14.00 and matching lunch box for $8, markdown from $18.00

Being a girl who loves monogramming I sprung for the added touch. I was going to put Jacob on the backpack but when I asked Jake if wanted Jacob or Jake, he asked for Jake because he didn't want to be in trouble at school. Ha! We only call him Jacob when he is in trouble or when we have to be stern. Honey and me thought his reasoning was hilarious so Jake it is for school.

I also love that his backpack has clips on the front so it will not only cover his name but help keep the lunchbox hopefully from not getting lost. Wrapped the pair up and now we just wait til August so Jake can unwrap his first school backpack :)

Front Room Seating

We've been looking at some eye candy for the front room.

We are both over this East lake style furniture. This one has been recovered in gingham. It's our favorite.

We like this set also. Very similar, about $100 less on craigslist. Neutral fabric. Still not sure about the front room idea. Justin pointed out we can easily fit a upright piano in the Great room or guest room so we shall see where we end up :)

Front Porch Living

Moving into our new house this past March, I had no idea how much we use our front porch!

Nearly every Saturday and various times throughout the week we have neighbors come over for porch time. We talk neighborhood gossip, what is going on in our lives and just enjoy the company. Porch sitting is actually how we have met several of our neighbors. They would see us sitting out there enjoying a drink and stop by to chat. What's crazy was many of our neighbors have lived here 5+ yrs and never spoken until we introduced them to each other. Our new neighborhood has turned into a small community for us and I just love that. It feels like we are meant to be here. Right now we have two black rocking chairs I found at Walmart clearance for $25 a piece. The table between them actually goes with the two green chairs we have pushed together for a make shift bench. I can't tell y'all how much I love the Lounge pillows on the chairs. I found the this past summer at Hobby Lobby. We get complimented on them often. I like that the chunky lettering can be made out from the street. I see those pillows being on matching chaise loungers once we get the back porch sorted out.

We plan to hunt down the perfect porch swing this summer to replace our chair/bench. As well as a outdoor rug to serve as a large welcome mat.

One of my favorite things though is to use the pitcher that belonged to my husband's grandma. It looks so elegant when it is filled up with sweet tea on a hot day.

Flu Times

We've been bitten by the flu bug here in Memphis. I've been taken back by it, I haven't had the flu since I was in high school. The kids have been troopers about it. Laying in the big bed watching Netflix with us.

How cute is this lil sleeping angel? She and I have logged some major Sesame Street time this past week.

Even Holly has been taking advantage of laying around and being her normal lazy self. Jake has been a huge helper with the laundry. He loves getting to stuff the clothes in and push the buttons. We have new front loaders so both kids have a blast just watching the laundry swish around. Back to resting y'all!