Dreaming Out Loud

~Happy Thanksgiving~

2011-11-24T00:00:00.000-08:00

Happy Thanksgiving Everyone!

We hope everyone has a blessed and joyous Day!

God Bless.

Guess What???....:0)

2011-11-10T14:07:00.000-08:00

Sophie is going to be a big sister,

We are Expecting!

On Sunday I will be 20 weeks..and on the 22nd we find out if our little cutie is a boy or a girl!

I still can't believe I"m pregnant! Everyone is saying it's a boy..so we shall see. I will be happy with either!

God bless :0)

Happy Halloween Everyone!

2011-10-31T22:43:00.000-07:00

We hope everyone had a fabulous Halloween!

Just wanted to share a few pictures of our costumes.

I was Wednesday Addams and Sophie was Pubert Addams :0)

We all thought she looked hilarious! I loved her little mustache, hehe.

Her mustache needed a little touch up and she didn't want to give up the eyeliner after that.

I hope my Mom doesn't kill me for this, but her costume was sooooo funny!

Here she is with Sophie:

omg, that picture cracks me up!

Happy Halloween!

...is it too early to decorate for Christmas now????...

Sophie Turned 1 Year Old!!

2011-09-20T21:44:00.000-07:00

Our little cupcake just turned 1 year old on September 14th, and we celebrated on the 17th .

I thought it'd be fun to show you her monthly pictures, so you can see just how much she has grown!

So..here we go...

There she is!

She is the best, and has been such a blessing. We look forward to seeing more of her personality shine through in the next year. :0)

Here is a picture of her first time at the beach, she couldn't crawl to the water fast enough!

We love you Sophie!!

Happy Birthday sweet girl!!

So Excited!

2011-08-19T22:35:00.000-07:00

I'm SOOOOO excited!

I love him!

We are going to see Josh tomorrow! Wooohoooooo!

*HUGE SMILE*

30

2011-07-13T22:21:00.000-07:00

Last Saturday I turned 30 years old.

I really thought I'd feel grown up by now, especially after having a baby..but nope -I still feel like I'm immature and don't know what I'm doing! I'm thinking that might be a good thing and I'll just always be young..hehe

It was a great day, even though I wasn't too excited about the number at first. We ate under our new gazebo and in the middle of the meal, the Lord showered us with a strong rain that just started from nowhere! It was the best part of the day- totally fun and memorable. :0) We had to make a run for it with our food and chairs in tow.

Here we are all smiles and soaked..

After the rain settled, just because I'm such a grown up - we had a water balloon fight. It started out innocently enough but Sher always gets mischievous!

Here is a photo snapped right as he slammed me with a water balloon smack on the side of my head!! It's embarrassing but hilarious, so I will share the photo...

..and since I shared an embarrassing pic of me, here's one of my Mom and sister Delilah (hehe)

It was a fun and really great day and I was blessed with RAIN, a true blessing here in the desert! I even had 2 cakes - a first for me..my Mom and sister made one and Sher's mom made the other :0)

..and yes, I was able to blow out all the candles..YAYY...hahaha

Thanks to everyone for making my day special. I love you all very much. Now here is a picture of the best gift I have ever received, enjoying her time in the water..she is a total water baby :0)

Thanks for stopping by and remember:

God Bless.

My Mora Trompe Loeil Clock

2011-06-02T15:40:00.000-07:00

When Lindy from Cottage Hill posted about this fabulous idea to make a trompe loeil clock like the one she saw from Pier one, here, I totally fell in love with the idea and had to make one!!

We've been wanting to make a Mora clock for a long time but we just haven't gotten around to it yet..I love all of these styles of Mora clocks.

This project took me a while because Sophie slows down a lot of the projects around here, :0) I 've been working on making our patio a lovely place to be and hang out in and we have always wanted a mora, so I thought it'd be the perfect spot for a fake mora! Using mdf and some trim pieces I made one for our outdoor living room :0) We are really blessed to have a large covered patio -which is a wonderful thing to have in Las Vegas. (pictures of that project coming soon)

The clock is around 6 1/2 ft tall, I drew it on a piece of 3/4" mdf and cut it out with a jigsaw. Sher helped me cut out the circle that the actual clock fits into and he used his router. I bought a cheap clock at big lots and painted it the way I wanted, then added some moulding we had left over to the bottom of the clock and used a round medallion trim piece that I had and cut a piece from to "crown" my mora.

I don't have any "in progress" photos because once I finally have a chance to work on something I always forget the camera! I do have a couple pictures from the time I started to paint the clock though.

Here is the only photo I could find of the naked clock:

I painted it with a blue green oops paint that I had in my paint cupboard, then I added a thick layer of elmers school glue and before the glue dries I put on a thick coat of off white paint I had left over from our laundry room re-do. As the layers dry they crackle and you can see a little of the blue color come through. Once that was dry I sanded a few of the areas and rubbed some mahogany gel stain that we had in the cabinet-I just used whatever I had on hand...

Pop in the clock face and voila! -You've got a mora clock!! :0)

Thanks so much for the inspiration Lindy!!

Sophie's First Easter

2011-04-25T11:35:00.000-07:00

I hope everyone had a fabulous Easter!

Here are some photos of Sophie's first Easter...

She had a fun day at the park..

She had fun on the baby swing for the first time..

It was a great day and a lot of fun..well, at least I think she had fun!,haha

This is what her first Easter basket looked like..

She can't eat the chocolate so I guess we will just have to help her out with that!

These pics are not from Easter but she's just so cute in her new headband that I had to share them..

she has found her toes and is in love with them!..

I had this shirt made up for her when I was pregnant and now she finally fits in it! Sher loves it when he finds something "made in the usa" so I thought this was perfect, it says: "MADE IN USA * with American, Russian,Mexican,Uzbek,Spanish,German and Italian parts."

she's our lovely little mutt..nicely mixed and healthy :0)

"New" Sofa Reveal

2011-04-11T05:00:00.000-07:00

Sorry for the loong wait!

The sofa has been done for a couple weeks but I just haven't had a chance to post anything! To remind you of my sofa and chair, here are the before shots. I bought the set off of craigslist for $108.oo

I really love these..I just didn't love the blue fabric. The blue fabric was thick which made it easier to remove, I just had to yank it off and a lot of the staples came off with it. To remove staples from the wooden frame I use this trusty tool that I found at Lowes.

I removed the staples that were stuck in the fabric and then used the old fabric as templates from which to cut out the new pieces.

Here are some photos of the moment which I look at the piece I'm working on and always think to myself "what in the world were you thinking?!?!," lol.

as you can see my poor bedroom got destroyed in the process..

Now, here is how the sofa and chair look now!

I actually ran out of fabric *gasp* so I had to find a close match in color to make the double welting for both pieces...the fabrics are different but the colors are close so I think it worked out alright.

Here's the sofa...

and the chair...

If you look closely you can see that I used 2 different fabrics, a solid for the front and a dotted fabric for the outsides. I reallly love that little detail..makes them a little more special. I still can't believe I was able to pull off recovering the cushions and double welting!!! woohoo!

I'm a totally crazy girl and bought 2 more chairs to work on..at 25.00 a piece I just couldn't pass it up! In addition to the 2 new chairs I then bought 4 more to redo for my patio..aside from Sophie, my patio project has been keeping me crazy busy! I just really want our patio to be a nice spot to hang out in so I'm working to get it nice and ready in time for all of our lovely weather...if only I could build my own pool too!!!

here are a few pics of Sophie, just because I can't resist!!

btw..the blanket in the second picture with Sophie and on the sofa is one of the projects I have been working on..I just sewed 2 pieces of fabric right sides out together leaving 1.5" all around with some fringe inbetween -like a fabric sandwich, and the pulled out the threads of the 2 fabrics to make my own fringed edges. ..does that make sense? hehe

I'll share my patio projects and progress with you all soon!!

Thanks for stopping by and God bless!!!

1,2,3,4,5.

2011-02-24T12:13:00.000-08:00

My little cupcake is growing so fast!

She just gets more and more beautiful every single day and my heart grows bigger every day!

Thank you dear Lord for blessing us with our little Sophie!

~French Chair Reveal~

2011-02-21T05:45:00.000-08:00

I finally get to share my french chairs with you all!

They were a little challenge that I really enjoyed and I even did a happy dance once they were finished and looking decent!

This is the first time I attempted making double welting, and thanks to Kelly at Much To Do With Nothing's welting tutorial and helpful advice I was able to pull it off!! Thanks so much Kelli!!!

Along with double welting it was also my first time trying to make a box

cushion cover, it didn't come out perfect but I'm very happy with them!

So here we go, here are the "before" shots:

$20.oo a piece!

They weren't in bad shape -but pink just doesn't go with my decor..and I had better plans for them in my mind's eye :0)

Here's a "during" shot ..once they were naked I found marks indicating that they were made in Italy!

Now, you've waited long enough...

(........drumroll........)

Here are the "after" photos:

I left the wood as it was, just oiled it up.

I think it looks really nice now against the cream fabric. The fabric I used is a creamy chenille upholstery fabric and on the back a piece of a toile I've been waiting to use for a few years!

I found some similar chairs online to compare my little cuties to and realized that they are petite chairs..they measure 24.5"W x 24"D x 35"H

Ethan Allen has a beautiful chair starting at $1029.oo

and measures 29'W x 29"D x 39"H

Ballard Designs also has one, $799.oo - $991.oo

measuring: 26.75"W x 24"D x 38.5"H

So I think I did VERY GOOD for $20 + roughly $40 on materials!

(per chair)

During my search for comparable chairs I found something I think I might just have to have..lol

This sweet chair measures : 27.2" H x 18.5" W x 18.9" D

Only problemo is it doesn't have a sweet price.

Oh how I love it though!...I mean, how cute would it be next to the other chairs?!?!..Maybe I'll "get it for Sophie." haha

Well there you have it, my finished french chairs! I think I am addicted to craigslist and chairs now..hehe

Hopefully I'll find some that I can use to make my patio the lovely place I've been dreaming that it can be!!

Until then though reupholstering the french chairs has given me the courage to finally undertake the challenge of this chair:

..and if all goes well with it, I will then have enough courage to tackle his big momma...

They've been with me for 2 years+ but I haven't had the courage to strip them down yet....

*scarey music plays*

WISH ME LUCK!!

:0)

Happy Valentine's Day/ 5 Months!

2011-02-14T17:56:00.000-08:00

Happy Valentine's Day everyone!

I hope everyone is enjoying their day :0)

Here is a Valentine kiss from Sophia

Can't believe she's already 5 months old!!!!

Here are a couple more pics and a sneak peak at the chairs

I've been working on :0)

Trying Cereal

2011-02-10T09:37:00.000-08:00

Again, I'm sorry for the lack of posts..life is just busy!

I'm ALMOST done with my french chairs, woohoo!

They've been a nice challenge for me and I'm so happy with myself because I'm almost done!

It's just taken a while because of being busy with our little cutie.

Sophie tried cereal for the first time this past Saturday so I thought I'd

share some photos from the occasion :0)

We sat her in her purple bumbo and gave it a try...

It started off well enough...and then..

hahaha, ...she likes to eat fast so the spoon is too slow for

her i guess, so she gets MAD!

I'm mean and was laughing while she had that face on, hehe.

I can't believe she will be 5 months on Valentine's Day!!

Thats just crazy fast!!

I will post more pics soon and also reveal the french chairs!

Craigslist Treasures

2011-01-13T16:20:00.000-08:00

I was browsing craigslist last week..didn't think I'd find anything

interesting- but I did!

I found a pair of these french chairs

I contemplated with myself about whether I needed them or not,

Then I googled (talked myself into them) inspiration photos of

similar chairs...such as:

I couldn't stop thinking about them so I decided to just go check them

out and if they were rickety I just wouldn't buy them!

..*plugs in halo*

So I went to "check them out" and walked away with 3 chairs instead of 2, lol.

3 chairs for $60..not bad really :0)

Here's what the third chair looks like:

It has super cute details..for 20 bucks I just couldn't pass it up!!

This one will probably get painted -I'm not sure yet..and a cushion needs

to be made up for the seat.

So anyway...back to the pink chairs...

I was a little nervous about tackling this upholstery job but

decided to just jump right in and figure out the puzzle.

Here's what I have done so far to the poor thing:

(looks bad -but I promise it will get better!)

I've been thinking about putting a piece of toile that I have on the back of the chair

and then finishing the rest of the chair in a creamy chenille.

I propped the toile into the back and can't decide if I like it or not!

any thoughts?

Here's a pic of that...

and here's what the chenille looks like:

(it's on it's way to me-hurry! hurry!)

I could also paint the wood..but I'm using light fabrics so I don't want it to

be too plain..anyone have any thoughts?

Thanks in advance for your thoughts:0) They are very much appreciated!

Sher's Mom's Room Makeover

2011-01-05T14:26:00.000-08:00

I'm posting this a little late but promised I'd share it.

We found out in November that Sher's mom would finally be

able to come to the US..all the paperwork was done..

but her room wasn't! LOL..

It was our "junk room" so miraculously with the help of my super talented sister Delilah

and her crazy storage organization skills I was able

to get the room emptied out,

THANKS DELI!! Could not have don't that without you!!

So after that adventure we were left with the shell of the room we

called the "enchilada room" because of the (ugly)orange color it was painted.

Sher was so anxious to get started that he ripped out the chair rail and

carpet before I could get pics!

(we had like 2.5 weeks to get it all done-including making the flooring!)

***

We then wired for a chandelier, gave the room a fresh coat of paint and decided to do the trim

treatment we used in Sophie's room.

I don't have any pictures of the flooring install because I was entertaining Sophie during all of that!

Here are some photos of her finished room with walnut floors

and some curtains I sewed up. I added some artwork I painted a couple years ago,

some side tables and lamps.

...and voila -done in time!

~ well almost, hehe...

...her mattresses arrived the day after she came in and

I finished the curtains a few days after that..hehe

It was really important to us to have a nice room for her to come to,

so she could feel at home, comfortable and welcome.

I'm so thankful we finished on time!!

(Thanks God!)

We will be building her a bed eventually, it's on "the list," lol.

Next we will be working on a coffee table and dining table, then flooring for the

living room and hall areas....slowly the beautiful wood floors are spreading

throughout the house.

Now that Christmas has passed though I'm constantly dreaming of the patio and backyard

and everything I'd like to do there...*sigh* it's on the list. :0)

Now just because I am so in love with this little one, here are a few pics of

Sophie ( my little baldy), she will already be 4 months old in 9 days! ..Time flies..

I hope everyone is having a beautiful new year!

God bless you all, and thanks for dropping by!

3.5 months old

2010-12-20T16:49:00.000-08:00

So sorry to be MIA!

But here are some quick photos of our little elf :0)

I will post soon, we have family coming in for Christmas and Sher's

mom is now here with us (she came in from Moscow last month).

It's been busy, projects everywhere, we had to redo Sher's mom's room

in 2 weeks! That includes flooring and all! -pics to come soon.

Well, hope everyone has a very Merry and Blessed Christmas!

This is a dress that used to belong to me!

:0)

~HapPy HaLLowEeN~

2010-10-31T19:05:00.000-07:00

Hope everyone has a terrific Halloween!

Hot Air Balloon Lanterns

2010-10-27T15:12:00.000-07:00

I thought having some hanging hot air balloons in Sophie's room would be fun.

Something cute for her to stare at :0)

I found these cute balloons but they were a little pricey and small.

I started to think up how I could make some myself and came

up with the idea to use paper or nylon chinese lanterns.

Then I thought, it'd be cool if they actually lit up too and doubled as night lights!

I ordered a few light kits and some lanterns in different shapes,

I already had some small round lanterns in my closet.

.The green one came colored already, and I remembered to take a pic

right after I had painted on the blue stripes, hehe.

All I did was paint them up with acrylic paints.

Painting on the nylon lanterns was a lot easier than the paper lanterns btw.

I then used dimensional paint to add some fun details,

and a thin sharpie to draw on the "netting".

Finding baskets was hard, lol -I finally found some at Hobby Lobby in San

Antonio while we were on vacation! They were a blonde colored wood so

I just painted them a darker shade.

After the lanterns were nice and dry I just poked some

string through them and tied the baskets on. Hanging them from Sophie's

chandelier made this process a lot easier!

Here it is all tied up :0)

I hot glued on some "sand bags" made

up of scrap fabric and a little poly fil and some little flags.

Those were made quickly and simply with

paper and markers...that's all there was too it!

This was a really fun project. They still don't have the light

kits attached but I hung them up anyway just to enjoy their

cuteness :0). Sophie seems to like them too!

Here they are in their new home..

Now here's some cute pics of Sophie to enjoy :0)

:0)

One Month Old!!

2010-10-14T13:39:00.000-07:00

We can't believe it's been a month already!

Sophie is really a Joy, she doesn't cry much and is

pretty patient with us except when she is hungry, lol!

Here are some pictures to enjoy :0)

Introducing: Sophia Joy!

2010-09-27T15:19:00.000-07:00

Our sweet baby was born on

September 14, 2010

@ 6:52 pm

6 lbs 4 oz. - 19 inches long

This is what she first looked like;

our little chipmunk, lol:

Here's how she's looking now :0)

She gets more and more beautiful every single day!

With Grandpa

Here she is with Daddy..

Just chillin ..I loves those little feet poking out!

We are so blessed and thankful to the Lord for blessing us with our

beautiful daughter.

We are also looking forward to someday having more sleep! haha

~The Cutest Chairs!

2010-09-01T07:23:00.000-07:00

In this post I talked about how in love I am with french

style kids furniture.

A lot of them are really expensive so I found a pair these chairs:

I REALLY wasn't digging the fabric...but the price was alright,

so I bought the pair -and some outdoor fabric:

After reupholstering these bigger chairs, these little baby

chairs were a breeze!

So now here is the finished product!

I'm really LOVING them now!

No hint left of that shiny pink fabric, woohoo!

They go great in Sophie's room and I hope she'll enjoy them

someday as much as I do now!

~Dresser/Changing table~

2010-08-27T09:54:00.000-07:00

Here's a look at the dresser/changing table we

designed and built for our little cutie.

I didn't want to make a changing table. We wanted the piece

of furniture to be able to grow with her, so we built a tray for

the changing pad. Once she is out of diapers -the dresser will still be

a dresser and I will have a nice tray to use around the house!

These are the three dresser designs that I loved:

So, we took what we loved and designed our version:

Here are some pics of the process.

We used heavy duty, soft close drawer slides so that

she won't be able to smash her fingers in the drawers as easily. They can also

support quite a bit of weight -in case we have a monkey on our hands, lol.

Here are the drawer fronts..

At this point I primed, painted and glazed it while the cherry top

was being finished.

Then, voila! (lol) finished dresser!

We also got another thing done and marked off the list.

-Made a frame for the Ballooning over Paris print.

I really love this print, I could just stare at it all day long. It still

isn't hung because not all of the pieces for the room are done, but we

are a lot closer!!

Shower Fun

2010-08-24T14:17:00.000-07:00

We were blessed enough to get to have 2 showers.

One in San Antonio and one in Las Vegas.

Here are some pics of the Vegas shower

Our favors were little take out boxes with a tag that read:

"Thank you for coming to celebrate our little cupcake"

and inside was a mini chocolate cupcake.

Pins,

We played a few games, opened presents and had a good time. :0)

The poopy diaper game looks way grosser in photos

than it actually was, lol.

These are pics from our San Antonio shower:

cake:

diaper cakes

cute mom

This shower was a lot of fun too :0)

A huge thank you to everybody who helped us celebrate our

little Sophie...she'll be here before we know it!!

Tissue Paper Pom Poms

2010-08-18T15:39:00.000-07:00

My mom and sisters are throwing us a baby shower this Saturday,

So I've been having fun making some of these..

Tissue paper pom poms.

I really love them!

They are so cute and fluffy :0)

We used to make tissue paper flowers for fiesta time back home,

so these are a breeze.

You can find instructions here though:

http://www.marthastewart.com/how-to/tissue-paper-pom-poms-how-to?backto=true#slide_0

I can't choose just one color, so all the colors are involved in celebrating Sophie!

We are also doing different sizes. I'm so excited to see these hanging.

I also made a little banner.

well, gotta go play with tissue some more :0)

Hope everyone's having a great day!

Sophie's Cradle

2010-08-16T15:03:00.000-07:00

Finally as promised, are pics of Sophie's new cradle.

Handmade by daddy :0)

It's made of cherry wood and has an amber shellac finish.

We couldn't really find any that we loved, so

we decided to just go ahead and design our own cradle.

I actually drew it out during a little drive up to Mt. Charleston one day,

and we worked out what we liked and didn't like in the design.

Here are some photos of the cradle during the building process.

~lots of slats~

~completed sides~

It's really great, it glides on ball bearings so it's nice and

smooth and will rock for a very long time with just one push!

We both hope Sophie (and future siblings) will enjoy her little cradle.

Rough Draft of Sophie's Crib

2010-08-10T13:11:00.000-07:00

Yes, we are making the crib..nope we haven't done it yet.

Yes, we are a little crazy. ...lol

I drew up a rough draft of what I have in mind for her crib,

then me and Sher will go over it together and he

will design it in google sketch up.

(he's brilliant)

so here's what I have come up with:

We've decided it will be made out of cherry wood (our fave)

with a natural finish -which will allow it to naturally age.

Cherry gets so beautiful -and you don't have to do anything but watch.

We want to make it so that eventually all of our future kiddos

can sleep in this same crib, and keep passing it along.

We shall see how it comes out :0)

French Barometer

2010-08-05T14:17:00.000-07:00

So...I LOVE french baramoters

but I can not afford one right now...

so what's a girl to do?...

get creative, of course!

I found this barometer (in french) on ebay.

I'm not sure if it works, lol, but that's ok.

I hung onto it while I searched for something I liked to put it in,

finally I found this clock -on ebay as well.

It had paint splatted on it and a lot of the gold had

been rubbed off over time, so I added a little more gold

-using this cool stuff:

Next, I popped out the barometer piece from it's wooden frame,

and removed the clock from it's "frame".

...and then married the two together!

Here we are:

My version of a barometer

Hopefully it will hold me over until I can get a real one :0)

I'm happy with how it came out and it only costed around

$25.oo!

Me and baby have made it to 32 weeks today!

I still can't believe it. We are excited and I am also nervous about

the whole delivery part! LOL -I know it will be fine-bc it has to be,

but I am still nervous. :0)

Chair Facelift

2010-07-28T10:43:00.000-07:00

With Sophie's arrival getting closer everyday,

I've been trying to finish up some projects around here.

Remember these chairs I bought last year for $35.oo each?

Well, I FINALLY got around to re-upholstering them!

I actually started taking one of the chairs apart earlier this year,

but took forever to get the fabric off carefully to use the pieces

as patterns for the new fabric.

Taking the fabric off the second one was A LOT easier, haha.

So here we go, the before and after of my $35.oo chairs:

Front Before:

Front After:

Back Before:

Back After:

I am really happy with how they came out :0)

The wood design on the backs really pop now, and the lighter fabric brightens up

my dark living room too!

I recently ordered 2 of these and they should be arriving tomorrow!

The bright pink totally doesn't go with what's going on in Sophie's room

so I will be recovering them in this outdoor fabric.

I can't wait to get these cute little chairs and recover them!

Hopefully since they are small the job will be done quicker!

The bones of the nursery

2010-07-23T09:54:00.000-07:00

Sorry it has taken soo LONG to share these pictures!

This is what the room that would become the nursery looked like before

it got it's face lift.

We inherited these yucky, stained blinds when we bought the house.

I think the previous owner sat and smoked all day long and didn't know how to

open their windows or something!

We are getting rid of all of them, and have applied plenty coats of Kilz paint on our walls, lol.

( the closet wall )

( plain ceiling )

( more ceiling lol )

The first thing I did was paint some clouds for Sophie (and me) on the ceiling!

I used a soft grey-blue for the base so they didn't really stand out against

the blue green color that we had on the wall.

Up next was adding all the wainscoting, window trimming, fresh,

crisp white semi gloss paint, and crown moulding:

Looking brighter already!!

After that -and why things take so long- came the hardwood flooring.

Which we make ourselves. We love it but it adds to the time it takes

in finishing everything. We do save cash though, lol!!

Here we are with freshly painted walls ( "beige glow" from kilz) ,

a new rug from Overstock -which I LOVE-

and beautiful walnut floors.

The clouds really stand out nicely now that the walls are lighter and calmer.

Next we hung a chandelier that I already had,

then I made some curtains. I decided to remove the closet doors and hang curtains in that doorway also.

The closet is going to be housing the computer soon.

To hang the curtains we used my brilliant idea of using metal conduit

instead of over-paying for rods!

excuse the bad pics, we need a new camera.

So there you have it! This is what Sophie's room is looking like now.

We have also finished the cradle, her dresser, the hot air balloon lights, and made a frame for the "ballooning

over Paris" print- so I will share all that with you soon!

A Peak at Sophie!

2010-07-07T10:21:00.000-07:00

We will be naming our new bundle of Joy:

Sophia Joy

We went for an ultrasound yesterday and finally got a peak at her cute face!

We are so excited and can't wait to meet her, (minus the delivery on my part; haha)

Here are some more shots:

Visiting San Antonio was great, we had a lot of fun, visited family,

had a really nice baby shower, ate a lot and then came home

for a real, lounging around vacation for 5 days LOL.

It was lovely spending so much time with Sher.

Sophie's cradle is finally done and I will share it with you soon; her dresser is

a lil more than half way done also :0)

This is a pic of Sher when he was a cute little boy, next to the face shot of Sophie.

So cuute...

This week I'm hoping to finish up her hot air balloon night lights! I'm

looking forward to sharing those- it's been a labor of love.

My birthday is also coming up Friday and I'm getting to go see the

Beatles LOVE show!! I'm so excited, I've been wanting to see it for years!!

Hope everyone had a great 4th of July!!

Home Sweet Home!!

2010-06-22T09:37:00.000-07:00

I get to go back to my hometown for a week!

I can't wait to see my family and the city again.

I'm going to miss my Grandma not being there though.

We are going down to have our last vacation (for who knows how long lol)

and while we are there we will be having a baby shower!

Most of my family is down there, and my Aunt, Uncle and cousin will be coming in

from FL so it should be fun!

Me and baby can't wait for this too:

YUUUUUUUUUUUMMMM...

These type of enchiladas are only served in San Antonio, and my kitchen -

but they are so much better there lol..we don't even have red corn tortillas here!

AND THIS...

~YUUUUUUUUMMMMMM AG~

~AND~

Can you tell we love to eat when we go back home?

Vegas just doesn't have food like San Antonio, yum,yum, yum, lol. ..

I'm so excited, I gotta go clean and do laundry and pack!

See you soon!!

~In Love~

2010-06-14T11:04:00.000-07:00

I'm so crazy about these cute, child sized french chairs!

I've loved these for a while now, but it seems like

the store has stopped selling them!

Some of these are crazy expensive for a mini sized chair...

maybe we can make some ...someday..lol

This is such a cute set!! :0)

These are affordable..

All I know is I definitely have room for cute kid sized furniture!! :0)

A fun Project

2010-06-09T08:53:00.000-07:00

Using this wonderful print as inspiration:

And these lanterns:

I'm working on a fun project that will turn these into hot

air balloons for our baby's room. Three of them -the bigger ones

will have light kits so that they may be used as night lights.

I really hope this works out the way I have it in my mind!

The hardest part will probably be the baskets for each balloon.

I'll show you how they come out! Wish me luck! :0)

Nursery Inspiration

2010-05-17T15:53:00.000-07:00

These are some photos that have been inspiring me

as we put together our nursery, :0):

We are redoing the room I was using as a computer & art room

into the baby's room. So, it's totally getting redone

from floor to ceiling!

Here are some of the things we are thinking about including in the space:

I'm designing a crib inspired by these beds. It will be made of cherry wood

and will probably have a natural finish that will naturally age and darken over time.

This is a quick sketch I made of what I'm going for:

Then we want to make a beautiful little commode for the baby

which we will then make a removable changing table/tray that can

be placed on top of it, and later removed.

It will look like this:

I really LOVE the legs!

I will be moving the computer in to the closet which we are going to build

up by adding bookshelves and shelving so that I can store all of my craft supplies, etc.

Since we are doing that baby needs a little closet space so

we will be making something that looks similar to this piece, except it will be bigger

and have drawers on the sides instead of the doors in the picture.

Perhaps in this color?:

Next, we need somewhere comfy to sit:

~ or ~

Lighting would be nice! For some reason it's hard to find a home here

that's wired for a central lighting fixture (so dumb).

So Sher already wired us up and we are thinking of using this chandelier:

This will be the wall color:

Along with lots of white on the wainscoting and trimwork.

The draperies have already been sewed out of this fabric:

This will be the rug that sits on top of the hardwood floors:

I really love these colors!

We've also chosen the bedding already which will be from the

cottontail friends collection:

Phew!, Well that's what we got going on so far!!

I can't wait to see the room put all together...I still have to come up

with art and a few other things.

I'm in love with this print though:

If we go ahead with this print I'm thinking of making a few hanging night lights

that will look like hot air balloons..I'm so excited, lol.

I also want to make a handmade from Mommy pillow out

of this fabric that will spell out the baby's name.

....if you look closely you'll see there are hidden animals in the letters.

It's so pretty!!

We are so excited and happy about our sweet blessing and working on the room

is a labor of love.

We'll share our progress with you soon!

~AND~

Our last ultrasound revealed that our baby will be a little girl!!!

It's so exciting!! We were happy to have either a boy or girl!

With all of our hearts, we thank you sweet Lord!

We're Expecting!!

2010-05-12T12:24:00.000-07:00

It's been a long time coming...

We are so happy to say that we are expecting our first beautiful child

at the end of September!

I am 20 weeks come tomorrow, and I still can't even believe it!

Here's a picture of our little cutie:

During this ultrasound the baby was waving it's arm up and down,

sorta like doing the "stayin alive" dance like John Travolta, haha!

So the drawing in the last post is of a crib we are designing and building soon.

So far we have been redoing the nursery from ceiling to floor.

It has brand new paint, mouldings, and wiring.

I'll post our plans for the room soon and also share the furniture ideas.

We've got a lot to do!!!

~Our Laundry Room~

2010-04-27T10:22:00.000-07:00

Once again, here is the first drawing I did of the room:

Sadly, something happened to our computer so I lost the before pictures!!

I'll have to describe what the room was like; it had ugly, torn up linoleum flooring,

ugly dingy "white" walls, old machines, a very loud lighting fixture like you'd find in an office or

something and across the main wall above the machines was

one long (useless) metal shelf that looked like this one:

To begin, we removed the shelf, replaced the fan with a recessed light fixture and fan in one, and

added another recessed light. We also had to move around the plumbing to accommodate the new sink, move the light switch to the outside of the door and add a couple new outlets.

Thank God Sher is handy in all those areas and I have a nice Uncle in TX

who is a plumber, so we can call him up with any questions!

After all of that was done we started building the cabinetry.

They were built so quickly I didn't even have a chance to snap pics!

Here are a couple of the upper cabs:

the lower cab:

We put in some awesome drawer glides that won't bang shut no matter how hard

you try to bang them closed..~I LOVE THEMMM...

The part that took longer was us deciding on which inner profile to use on the doors.

I knew I wanted little arches for sure..we just had to find the right bit set in

order to get the profile we wanted.

Here they are:

While we were making those the flooring was curing..so up next was pulling out the

ugly linoleum flooring:

Then I painted the walls and we put up the bead board.

Next we hung the upper cabinets...

This part went a lot faster than I thought it would!

Adding crown moulding and a chair rail came next:

I had to show how good Sher cut the trim pieces!..

I was so impressed :0)

We then installed the lower cabinet:

..and finally it was time to lay the flooring..it was exciting to

see the results of all our hard work actually FINALLY coming together!

I really love how the flooring came out. It takes such a long time, but it's

very rewarding in the end.

Painting the cabinets took forever..we put 2 thinned out coats of primer with sanding

in between, and then 2 thinned out coats of paint with fine sanding

in between them as well. Then a little glaze over that...

We are very happy with the results, they are nice and smooth to the touch.

Next we added the hardware... and brought in my new machines! Then the granite guys come out, and after that we installed the sink! YAY!! A beautiful working sink in the laundry!!

The laundry room is right next to the workshop so having a great sink in there is a must

for us! It makes it so much easier to just run in there when

we need to clean up some yucky mess instead of running all the way across the house to

the kitchen!

Finally...

Here are the final pictures.

It's hard to get a good shot because it's one of those rooms you walk through...

There are a couple things still left to do. I have to make a laundry sign just like the

one in the drawing, and we are thinking of possibly putting up a faux wall to hide the sides

of the machines.

~BUT~

For now that will have to wait, because we are already working on our next room,

which will include a piece of furniture that looks something like this:

Any idea what that might be???

Making Our Own Wood Flooring..

2010-04-20T13:07:00.000-07:00

YES...you read right...

YES...we are crazy!....haha

It all started when we went shopping around for walnut hardwood flooring.

The ones we liked were super expensive AND you don't

even get a nice layer of the actual hardwood!

So after debating with ourselves about whether or not we should tackle such a

thing, we decided that doing it for ourselves and our home would be worth it.

~and~

If we ever truly get sick of making it we can go ahead and buy some.

We've decided to take it slowly -room by room-

First room on the list was the laundry room.

We thought this would be a great starting place because it's small and

we could dabble in a few things like cabinetry, flooring, plumbing etc..

so as to better prepare ourselves for when we decide to take on the kitchen.

I always draw out what I'm thinking for a room or a piece of furniture

so that Sher can get a better understanding of what's going on in my head.

Then, we will talk it out, tweak it and he will design a technical version in

Google Sketchup and then we start building (in real life- lol) from there.

Building in sketchup is pretty cool because you can make all of your mistakes there,

and all the real measurements are there in the design so the cutting list is easy to print out.

So..here is the drawing I made of what I was looking to do with the Laundry Room:

It's not perfect at all..I forgot to draw in the crown moulding and kick space

under the cabinets etc. ...oops..hehe

BUT, it gives Sher an idea of what I'm talking about!

I'll post more pics of the Laundry Room in the next post,

and now I'll show you the process of us two crazy people

making our own hardwood flooring.

First we started by picking a 1 3/4" thick x 10" wide x 8 feet long walnut board at the lumber yard.

Then we cut it down to roughly 30" pieces,then using the bandsaw we resawed the board into

thin pieces:

I don't have a pic of the sawing at the bandsaw because we are both involved during

that process so there are no free hands for picture taking.

Sher then cuts down some baltic birch plywood sheets to fit the strips of walnut.

Baltic birch plywood is AWESOME..comes from Russia -it's super

straight and has a lot of nice uniform plys..it's not all junky and full of holes or spaces like

the plywood they sell and lowes or home depot.

We then glue the walnut veneers to the baltic birch, and clamp them up to dry.

Here they are out of the clamps.

After they are nice and dry we run them through the planer to

make them all uniformly thick and to take away the re-saw markings.

(We so need a new planer -this little guy can't handle all the flooring anymore LOL)

After planing all of the boards, it's time to make the tongue and grooves at the table saw.

This is how the floor will snap together.

This takes a while because you have to make all the grooves on 2 sides of the planks,

and then switch blades and make all the tongues on the other 2 sides.

My job here is to check the flushness of the boards and to stack them up as

Sher saws them..so I'm able to take pics hehe.

Once all of that is finally done, they get a sanding and then we lay

them all out to receive their 3 coats of poly.

Here are just a few of the boards waiting to get all pretty in oil based polyurethane.

The wood just wakes up and gets so beautiful when you apply the finish,

we decided to just clear coat and no stain.

So that's it!..Sounds simple enough but it sure does take a long time to get through all the steps.

Soon we'll show you what the finished floor and laundry room came out like!

Cascarones

2010-04-01T09:59:00.000-07:00

My hometown is the Lovely San Antonio.

I REALLY miss San Antonio with all my heart!

Easter is one of those times of the year when I can do something traditional from back

home and fill connected to it again. :0)

I remember very fondly when I was a kid how my Grandma Severa

would always be saving up her egg shells.

Then close to Easter (and Fiesta time) she'd bring out a HUGE bowl that she had

which was used to mix masa for tamales during Christmas time, and fill it to the top with confetti!

We'd cover the dining table with newspaper and bring out the cups with colored dye, colored pencils,

crayons and markers and have a blast coloring our eggs any way we pleased.

Every time I make cascarones(confetti eggs), I always find myself reminiscing about my Grandma :0)

SO! Cascarones are washed out egg shells that you decorate as you please, stuff with confetti, cover with tissue paper and then on Easter or during Fiesta (a celebration week in San Antonio) you

run around like crazies chasing your friends and family and crush them (in your hand first) on their heads!

Here's how we make them:

I didn't get pics of the naked eggs, but all you do is crack an egg more to one side than in the middle.

Wash it out right away and rub the inside with your fingers to make sure it's cleaned out well.

Then just set it with the hole faced down to dry out.

Next you decorate them in which ever manner you choose.

This year we didn't use any dye because we only made a few.

I still find myself coloring them with some of the designs my Grandma always loved.

After they are all decorated you fill them up with confetti.

Next you cut circles out of tissue paper that are big enough to cover up the holes.

~and~

Make a glue out of a couple tablespoons of flour and a little water.

Using your finger, you dip into the glue and rub it along the edge of the hole in the shell.

Then grab a piece of tissue and smooth it on .

Like this:

After that just set them back in an egg crate and let them dry!

Now your ready for a fiesta!!!

We usually have them around and then someone will sneak a couple and ambush

another with cascarones ~lol~ which then sparks an all out

Confetti egg battle.

They are always lots of fun.

We used to make tons of these...

They look so pretty and colorful.

Then afterwards you look pretty and colorful too!!!

*Make sure to crack the egg in your hand first and not on someones head! ~ that hurts!!*

I hope everyone has a wonderful and Blessed Easter!!

Sorry for the lack of posts lately but we've been buried in the laundry room redo.

We even handmade our own wood floors!! Yes, you read right lol.

More info and pics to come soon! :0)

Our Front Door

2010-02-20T16:57:00.000-08:00

After the holidays our front entry became naked and boring once again..

I finally got around to sprucing it up a little...

I hung the wreath I just posted about, added a mat, and then flanked the door

with some plants that not even I can kill! LOL

Just a few little changes to help welcome spring in :0)

It's made it a lot more welcoming to come home to also!

Our next project is the laundry room..we are in the process of building the cabinetry now,

so soon I will get to share that with you.

Hope everyone is having a wonderful weekend!

Spring Wreath

2010-02-16T11:03:00.000-08:00

I've had this photo of a wreath I loved in my files for a long time.

I finally got around to making my own version!

This was my inspiration photo.

I can't remember where I saw it, I save so many pics in my files

that I just can't remember!

It's so perfect for springtime and it's been feeling a lot like spring around here!

So, to get started I made some little eggs out of my favorite clay:

I let them air dry and then painted them with acrylic paints.

I bought a floral stem and nest at the craft store and just added some feathers to the nest.

Glued my nest in place, stuck the flowers all around and; Voila!

Here's my version of the wreath:

I really like the way it came out, and the little eggs are my favorite part!

:0)

2010-02-09T09:08:00.000-08:00

I can't wait to see this movie again..

The book is a thousand times better, but I still loved it.

~PLUS~

Eric Bana is in it! What's not to love? hehe

I think he made a perfect Henry.

It's such a sad story, but beautiful at the same time.

Another Option...

2010-01-20T09:57:00.000-08:00

I found another gazebo..

I like the legs. I like the top.

It's roomy: 11' diameter x 11.4' tall.

Winner?

I ACTUALLY found the inspiration gazebo,

BUT it is in Iowa! ~and no shipping is offered. ..ah well..

I think so far, this one is in the lead. :0)

Sher's Newest Addition

2010-01-16T18:19:00.000-08:00

Sher has been wanting a better dust collection system for a while now.

He recently acquired a new, more powerful table saw

at a stellar price ($200 instead of $1400).

Since getting that saw, his old small dust collector just couldn't keep up.

So...along came the big monster.

This thing is HUGE.

It's over 9 ft. tall and HEAVY!

Here is how it arrived, nicely packaged in boxes..

little did I know of the crazy days ahead LOL

Then we unpacked it and started assembling it. ...

Our first thought was to use a winch to lift the motor part up and then attach it to the

legs..

Haha, yeah right...the monster was too tall for our ceilings.

That thing was SSSSOOO heavy!!

Did I say that already?

LOL, there were also a lot of nuts and bolts to line up, while trying to

support the weight.

Anyway, plan #1 didn't work so we had to think up plan #2.

Sher had to cut out a hole in the ceiling so it could stand.

He cut the opening and then drywalled it so the noise could

be muffled a bit.

Then we laid the big monster down:

Then attached the top motor (heaviest) part to it (so much easier).

Sher then had the brilliant idea of using the winch to hoist the big monster

up onto it's feet. ...voila:

There he is in his new home...taking better care of our lungs and

keeping the shop much much cleaner!

It really is a powerful and wonderful tool to have in the shop.

Sher also added ducting to all the tools for the dust collection. It was

quite the job and took forever hehe..

Looks good though, he's extremely happy about it, so I'm happy too.

I'm so glad that this is completed! woohoo!

He's working on a clamp rack now - I'm listening to the saws going as I type :0)

Thennn! We will be back to building stuff again!

The laundry room is going to be our next big project. We decided on tackling it

and hopefully learning a lot, so then we can apply what we've learned to

our kitchen redo.

We are looking forward to the adventure.

Wish us luck! :0)

Such a Sweetie

2010-01-14T10:50:00.000-08:00

Sher came home with a nice big surprise for me yesterday!

He brought home 3 dozen roses, each a different color,

"because they were all beautiful."

:0)

I'm so blessed to have such a sweet, cute, and thoughtful husband!

Thanks honey!!!

I Love You So Much!

***kiss***

Any Thoughts?

2010-01-13T12:46:00.000-08:00

This photo is my inspiration:

Me and Sher would love to have a spot out in the yard like this!

So...these are our 2 options:

This gazebo is an octagon with 43 sq. ft. of inner space,

according to the description.

The second choice is 8'square:

I love the shape the look of the octagon, but can't decide whether it is too busy or not, and

also whether it is spacious enough.

As for the second choice it would have more room because of the open legs.

It has a cute top, but I don't like the legs.

Decision, decisions...

Any Thoughts?

More Inspiration...

2010-01-09T13:50:00.000-08:00

We've been having some lovely weather here lately.

Since the holidays are over I am stuck on dreaming of spring time,

and what to do with our long boring patio!!

Here are some inspirational photos that are helping us

come up with what we'd like to get done out there:

First, we need a little space for garden tool storage.

Since Sher doesn't share his garage with me lol, I've gotta

have him build something to house the tools!

Perhaps something like this could work:

Then we need some furniture.

A place to hang out ,eat , and lounge around:

We are planning on building an outdoor table and then perhaps tiling

the top. If we do decide to tile -I am thinking of hand painting the tiles

in some sort of design. ...It's still in the works..

Just like indoors, we need chairs outdoors too! lol

And of course, the something to lounge on:

It'd also be nice to see each other at night, right? :0)

I'm in LOVE with this chandelier.

It's from Pottery Barn and of course not available anymore.

No problemo though! I've kinda got something up my sleeve.

Putting up some lanterns is also in the plan:

This gorgeous birdhouse from Velvet and Linen really inspires me!

I'd LOVE to have something like this out there.

I also want to maybe doctor up these birdcages:

To look closer like these birdcages:

or these:

Then hang them on the wall or from the ceiling.

I haven't made my mind up yet...

Then using this as inspiration I'm trying to come up with something to

make that would be a good pediment.

Then we gotta build some of these,

....And one of these..(Sher got the hammock for Christmas minus the stand, lol).

To have something like this in the yard would be so awesome...

and so very magical at night..

..and then last but not least,

Toby the turtle!

...Why not, right?!

:0)

Whew, there's tons on the list! Hopefully we can get some of the major things done

in time for spring. It's supposed to get cooler here soon -which is just

gonna make me dream harder!

Have a great weekend!

Love, Love, Love....

2010-01-05T19:55:00.000-08:00

So Beautiful...

I can't express just how much I LOVE those birdcages!

~And these pillows!

Sher just may have to sleep with some birdies for a while...

heehee

I Love it!..I love birds...another obsession of mine.

This fabric is gorgeous, doesn't it make you smile?

Makes me wish spring time was closer..

although Vegas weather isn't too far from it at the moment,

at least in the daytime.

The embroidery on these is so lovely..My grandma embroidered ALL

the time, so I have a soft spot for it :0)

I've been day dreaming and planning how I want to start making our patio

a lovelier place to be.

These cute birdcages are total inspiration...

..As is this beautiful sculpture...

I can't go out and buy all of these things, so it's time to get creative...

Gotta put that thinking cap on lol.

It truly inspires me, and what I'd like to do with the patio..

and...I may throw some birds into the bedroom too..:0)

My Resolution

2009-12-30T12:11:00.000-08:00

My resolution for 2010 is to paint more!

This past year I only did 2 paintings!..I can't even believe it.

I did a few other projects in which I painted but still, 2?...no good. lol

We had to move twice this year so my painting just kinda took a back seat.

The 2 paintings I did do in 2009 though are my favorites so far.

This one I did back in February:

It's very large!

(30" x 50")

The largest I have ever done, and I really love it.

Sher still needs to frame it up for me, but it will take a lot of wood

so we just haven't got around to it yet.

I know once it's framed it will make such a difference and

look so lovely :0) -I can't wait.

This is my latest painting:

(20" x 40" without the frame)

I didn't even plan on painting the day I made this!

...but, voila! -it was born.

I reallly like it. We have a thing for trees, so it fits right in!

I saw a painting like it and it inspired me to try painting one similar

because it reminded me so much of our trip to Muir woods last year.

It now lives above our mantel in the living room,

and the first painting lives in our master bedroom.

I hope everyone has a really blessed 2010, that all your dreams come true,

and that many blessings come your way!

Merry Christmas!!!

2009-12-24T06:00:00.000-08:00

MeRrY ChRisTmaS!!!!

It's finally here!

That's both exciting and sad because I don't like it when Christmas ends!

We've passed out goodies to co workers and neighbors

And now on Christmas Eve, we are off to my Mom's

house to make homemade tamales together!

YuM!

We might make some of these for dessert...

Empanadas just like Grandma used to make, filled

with pumpkin or camote (sweet potato)

Even Yummier!

I hope everyone has a wonderful Christmas full of love and happiness!

~Merry Christmas everyone!~

And may we remember the reason for the season.

God Bless.

~My Favorite~

2009-12-22T15:51:00.000-08:00

When it's time to pull out the Christmas decorations,

this is always my favorite set to run in to.

It is a nativity set I painted a few years ago.

After each piece was completed I wrote on the bottom what date it was

and the order in which I finished them.

I'm so glad I did this too!

I really admire these hand carved and hand painted Russian

nativity sets, but they can be a little pricey.

When I made this set we were just setting out and didn't have a lot of extra cash

to spend on decorations so I decided to try making my own version.

This is the original nativity set that inspired me to make mine.

It's so gorgeous.

For mine, I just found a pine board scrap that my dad had in the garage, and

traced out the drawings I had made on paper.

Sher then cut it out for me and I painted it!

I did a lot of the detail painting such as the dots using toothpicks.

Here are close ups, and what they look like on the back:

Maybe someday I'll actually get the real set, but for now- I LOVE MINE!

I hope everyone has a really blessed and Merry Christmas!

Our home, Ready for Christmas!

2009-12-18T10:43:00.000-08:00

~Dessert Anyone?~

I have a little obsession with sweets.

The ceramic kind mostly..the biggest plus of this obsession

is that they have no impact on my waistline!

Here are a few photos of our home...

Most of my decorations are sweet related!

Here's the dining room:

Would you fancy anything from the dessert bar?

I actually made the little cakes you see on the top and bottom plates.

The tarts I bought.

I also made the topiary, 2 of them... each gumdrop is handmade!!

I also made the little gingerbread house you see in this picture.

I've always wanted to make one but can't stand that all the work will just be eaten away!

So..I made an everlasting gingerbread house out of mdf!

This is the new chandelier that we installed in the dining room,

covered in candies!

View from the kitchen:

In the kitchen I have a little tree standing in the corner.

I LOVE decorating this tree each year, all the ornaments bring

back so many memories..I made all the ornaments on the tree except for the little fruit tarts.

~I know, I'm crazy~

:0)

I just adore the little cupcakes, cakes, ribbon candies and cookies so much!!

(you can enlarge the pictures by clicking on them)

~The Main Tree~

We always get a real tree for our main living room...

That smell is like no other!

We have this strange half wall on one side of the living room

(which drives me nuts), so we placed out tree in front of it with the village sitting behind it in

our "hall" way.

We love mixing colored and white lights.

Who says you have to choose anyway, right?

So across from the village is our bookshelf,

which I display one of my nativity sets in.

We have a few little hangings on the doors around our home,

these were made out of cardboard.

Our entry:

Even our bedroom gets a little change,

Green toile instead of blue. I'd like to eventually add some more red into the mix

during Christmas time. Perhaps candy cane striped sheets or something.

Maybe next year..

Well, there it is..our humble home.

I love Christmas decorations because they hide all the things

we still need to change! Taking the decorations down is sooo sad...

so I am trying to enjoy every second of it!

I hope everyone has a very Merry Christmas!

God bless.

$35.oo Chairs!

2009-12-14T12:54:00.000-08:00

New -to me! lol

I found these chairs on craigslist for $35.oo each.

The green fabric is alright and I think I can live with it for a little while,

or until I decide what to re-do them in.

They are over sized, pretty comfy and

I love the design they have on their backs.

For now they are living on one side of the living room, in

a little reading area :0)

Sorry for the bad pictures, we need a new camera!!!

12 Days of Christmas Quilt and Tree

2009-12-11T11:12:00.000-08:00

I'm not sure what I was thinking when I decided to make this last year lol!

It's a throw sized quilt and sewn very wonky!

I added "me" into it by painting the panels.

I just used some scrap canvas I had, drew out the scenes

and then painted it with fabric paint.

Here's my very crooked quilt!

haha

Here's a close up of the painted panels:

I love the "3 french hens" panel..I just had to add a piece of furniture

into that one since that's what we enjoy building!

Out of these the #6 is my fave because of the cute baby chick :0)

Gotta love #8's apron :0)

I had a lot of fun making #11 and #12

Even though it's all crooked I loved seeing the painted panels

when I brought it out this year.

Here's the tree we started in the master bedroom:

It has pears, birds, and little drums.

I'm working on more ornaments but might not finish them in time for this year.

-So there will be some to look forward to next year!

I'll share our real tree soon and my favorite Christmas theme:

SWEETS!

Have a wonderful weekend!

Sher's 12 Days Of Christmas Book

2009-12-10T11:17:00.000-08:00

Me and Sher lived in Malaysia for 5 months in 2004.

While there, I had a Looot of time, so I came up with the idea of making

him a little book for Christmas.

We didn't have much money,

so I just had my markers and colored pencils to play with.

I found a 3 ring binder/photo album at our neighborhood grocery store

and a drawing pad.

I actually did this right under his nose! At the time he didn't really know about the

12 days of Christmas or how Christmas obsessed I was haha.

-So it was easy to do..when he wasn't looking I finished it with the

"For Sher" page. Then I packed it up to bring home

with us on Thanksgiving, and presented it to him on Christmas.

We bring it out every year and smile at every page.

Every time I look through it I can remember the specific days and what

was going on in Malaysia as I worked on it.

Here's how it came out:

I painted the outside of the album as soon as I got back home,

then hid it away until Christmas.

Partridge in a Pear Tree.

2 Turtle Doves.

3 French Hens

(I love this one)

4 Calling Birds

(They are all speaking in Russian, his native language)

5 Golden Rings

6 Geese-a- Laying

(This one has a door you can open up)

7 Swans-a-Swimming

(notice the one in the left bottom corner lol)

8 Maids -a-Milking

This one has a door you can open up also:

9 Ladies Dancing

10 Lords-a-Leaping

11 Pipers Piping

12 Drummer's Drumming

Needless to say, this book created a theme for us. So every

year I try to add something to the theme and we have our master bedroom

decorated with 12 days of Christmas.

I have a quilt I made last year to share with you and

I'll also post pics of the tree we have in there tomorrow.

God bless. :0)

Easy Christmas pillows

2009-12-04T13:08:00.000-08:00

By the way ~ The Cranberries were AWESOME!!!

Now, onto the pillows lol

I don't have a tutorial but you should get the idea...

I love these so much that I look for more every year!

You can go to big lots or ebay or anywhere really and find

tapestry like placemats or actual pieces of tapestry (ebay).

they usually cost anywhere from $1.50 -$2.00 a piece.

The tapestry pieces go for a little more but are usually bigger in size.

Then you just cut 2 overlapping pieces of scrap fabric that fit the placemat

and sew wrong sides together all around to create a sham.

Here's what the back looks like:

This was a piece of fabric from a flat sheet so it already had a nice edge on it.

You can add any kind of trim you love and I even like adding a little bling with glitter glue.

Sparkly things are awesome during the holidays :0)

I have a few for Halloween and Thanksgiving and

an ever growing collection for Christmas, so it's pretty easy to just change up the shams!

They really make me smile and

I love spreading them all around the house.

These are two I made from tapestry pieces I bought on ebay.

Hope you like the idea!

I'm not a fabulous sewer but these are nice, easy and much much

cheaper than buying ready made pillows!

I'm SoOoooo Excited!!

2009-12-03T16:18:00.000-08:00

I can NOT believe it!!

I am going to see the Cranberries tonight!!

*does the happy dance*

It's an early Christmas present!

They have been one of my faves since I was 14!!

I got to see them and meet them around eleven years ago...

They were so awesome live!

*does the happy dance AGAIN*

I had no idea I'd be going until a few minutes ago!!!

I can't wait!! Ahhh!!!

I'm soooo excited now that I have go run

around the house like a crazy woman!

~Haha~

New Bedside Tables!

2009-11-24T09:37:00.000-08:00

We finally finished our bedside tables!

The tables we had before were too small and just didn't go with the room.

These were our old tables:

These are the inspiration photos for the tables we wanted to make.

We took what we liked best from each table and then designed our own.

Here are our new tables in the making:

dry fitting..

Getting glued up

Then we added a little detail that goes all around the top part of the table.

And now here is one of the twins sitting pretty and

unfinished just after it got fitted with it's drawer.

Voila!

Here's the new table in it's new home!

We decided to stain the mahogany dark and then applied a few layers of amber shellac

to make it sing. Sorry for the bad pic but the table is dark so it was hard to make it show

up better in the pictures.

I love the shape of the legs, I think they are so beautiful!! They are different from any other legs

we've made in the past, so we are enjoying the look of them.

Sher did a terrific job making them! (as usual) :0) They really compliment our bed and

fill up the space. Our old tables looked sad and small next to our big bed - and it

was difficult reaching out to anything that we put on them (like eyeglasses)!

Well, hope you like them.

We LOVE them!!!

:0)

Our New Mantle!

2009-11-20T10:37:00.000-08:00

We finally have a mantle!

Here is a bad, sad picture of what was:

This is what the house came with.

It's not very exciting lol

AND

There was no place to display anything or hang up stockings!

~No place for stockings is just not gonna fly in my home~

*haha*

So my lovely and talented husband

built a mantle for us :0)

He was kind enough to put up with my craziness. He followed my vision

and thankfully is great in math, (I wanted it at an un-standard angle)
and was able to figure out some crazy angles.

Here's our new mantle:

I painted the ugly gold that was on the doors black so it'd just blend in.

The molding we chose has oak leaves and tiny acorns on the bottom

and egg and dart on the top.
~and was on sale for $20~

WE LOVE IT!

With the nice topper and a coat of fresh paint it is

such a huge improvement on what was there before!

AND

now Santa can find our stockings!! hehe

I'm looking forward to dressing it up more, especially for the holidays

but I have a billion other small projects I'm trying to get done before Thanksgiving!

Have a great weekend!

ConGratuLatIoNs!!!

2009-11-14T16:18:00.000-08:00

Yesterday my dear husband became an America Citizen!

I can't believe we finally made it to this milestone in our lives,

and I'm so happy and excited in our future.

Congratulations Honey!!

I'm so proud of you and so happy for you!!

He's already been totally American LOL

but now it's official :0)

He was blessed enough to actually win the green card lottery a few years back

(I didn't even know there was such a thing before that)

And now the journey is finally complete with his citizenship!

Now he can vote and have his voice heard..and he might even have to do jury duty

...haha, no escaping now!

An old Painting..

2009-11-12T10:07:00.000-08:00

Well....

I finally have my dining room looking a little cute -at least as cute as it has been since moving in!

I also have a new painting I made that I want to share

- BUT -

The batteries in my camera have died and I can't find the charger!!

I "put it up somewhere safe-a place I knew (at the moment) I'd be sure to find it"

But, as usual, when I do that -I'm never able to find those "safe"things!! haha

So in the meantime, let me share with you an old cartoonish painting I did of myself and Sher...

I always smile or laugh when I see it..

I tried to capture the funny face he gets when he's near a tasty dessert! haha

Wish me luck on finding that charger!