Random thoughts: Reading nook?,Christmas and SI Joint Fun on New Years Eve!

Sorry for the crooked photo, I was in a hurry while Matt was disassembling. You are probably wondering what this photo is all about. And what could those crazy Bedsauls be doing when their Kitchen reno isn't done? Well, let me explain, Matt was lucky enough to get a flat screen LCD tv from his parents for a combination birthday, Christmas, Fathers Day and any other misc. Hallmark holiday you can think of. We've had our TV in this trusty built in wall unit for YEARS. Our Family room is parallel to our garage and one day, years back, we had the idea of breaking through the wall a bit into the garage to give us a RECESSED area for the TV and book shelves. It's been a really GREAT addition and opened up our room so much. When they were building it, shelving with doors was put on the garage side as well for additional storage. This photo was taken right before Matt slid those bookshelves out. He's re-using the doors that went on the bottom for the new cabinet he's building under the flat screen that is now on a different wall. When the shelves are out, the area measures about 6 ft by 3 feet. The family is split 50/50 as to weather we should make it a built in reading nook with a generous bench and shelves or whether it should be
a little step into shelved area with a desk like in one of these photos in the collage. I'll let you know what happens as we move along! ;-)

Sorry I don't have credits for these different photos, I have been copying and pasting for a few days, not really thinking about it. So If I used your photo or you know who's photo someone is, let me know and I'd be happy to link it!

We had a very nice Christmas a few days ago and I hope you all did as well! Here's a photo of the puffy eyed kids with their stockings.

I wanted to share a WONDERFUL source for delightful custom jewelry. Together with Matt's brother's family, we ordered this great necklace for my mother in law with all of the grand children's names on it. It is so lovely in person and took my breath away when I first opened it! It's from http://www.lisaleonardonline.com/ 
I've been sorta absent from my bloggy home here. I had those Bi-lateral Sacroiliac joint injections the week before Christmas. Good times, good times. I haven't been getting as many ZINGERS in my hips that I was getting before when I turned a certain way. So I'll take that as a PLUS! ;-) Tomorrow, New Years Eve, I'm having my first SI joint RFA (radio frequency ablation). It's like that thing I had on those little joints where Dr. Doctor goes in an numbs the joints and juices them up with some steroid and then puts another needle in and uses some high radio frequency and burns the nerves in hopes that the damaged nerves can't send the pain signal to the brain. Sounds like another good plan! The difference with this is that the SI joint goes pretty far down into your pelvis so they have to go DEEPER.  It's not going to feel much different then what he did 2 weeks ago. I'm up for anything at this point...BRING IT ON! ;-) Anyway, I'll be gone again from here for several days...wish me luck!

Merry Christmas and a year in review!

This is our version of the Christmas letter you sometimes get that tells you all the WONDERFUL things that that WONDERFUL family has done over the year...you know, straight A's, honor roll, helping little old women across the street, etc and so on and so forth.  BUT it was really fun to do and we are thankful for the year we have had, the good and the bad!

Make a Smilebox slideshow

Show and Tell Time!

I'm participating in Cindy's SHOW AND TELL PARTY, go check everyone out! I'm sharing this sweet Cop Top milk bottle. The other two bottles are from dairy's in Maryland but I'm not sure where the Cop Top one is from. If you are not familiar with milk bottles, they made some bottles with a large bulb on the top to hold the cream. On the Cop Top, the bottle is embossed with a police man and a suggestion of a hat, the bottle would say "cop the cream", mine says it faintly but you have to hold it on an angle to read it. I've seen a couple of these go on ebay for 95 dollars although mine has a happy little home here in my NEW open shelving in my kitchen that you'll see when I do my kitchen reveal party when it's all done. Which. It's. Not. But soon! LOL As a hint, my cabinets went from natural oak to black with a slight distressing of robin egg blue showing through (or Robyn Egg Blue!). The bottles and the old measuring cups are from the antique store I showed you last week in my Show and Tell. I HEART them!

I know everyone and her sister is making FORK EASELS but I still had to show you mine! My husband actually made it for me 'cause he loves me like that and stuff! I Heart HIM! LOL I'm going to give each of my friends that come over Christmas eve (If you are coming over, forget you read that!) tied with a pretty bow. They are perfect to hold a recipe card or a photo!

Wanted to throw in some Christmas ornaments just because, well. It's almost Christmas~!

Oh Christmas Tree and SI joint injections

On the fourth day of Christmas my Dr. will give to me, 2 Bilateral Sacroiliac joint injections and a partridge in a pear tree.

If you don't care to hear about my BACK YET AGAIN, you can skip this post. Really it won't hurt my feelings. I'm writing it for me anyway ;-)

I went to my spinal pain management doctor today and Matt tagged along for good measure. If you remember (not that you probably care too! HA!) I had a rhizotomy on both sides of my lumbar spine at three levels a couple weeks ago. As I had mentioned then, I read some pretty horrific tales on the Internet of the utter torture that rhizotomies were supposed to be.(A rhizotomy is when they go in under an xray and insert a needle into the tiny little branch nerves that are around the joints in your spine, they then numb them and use some kind of special radio that probably doesn't play Colbie Caillet and burn the nerves. Hopefully these dead nerves won't be able to send a pain signal to your brain) After the 2 procedures, I explained that all of those posts I read had obviously been written by men. No offense to any potential male readers I may have, which is doubtful. Not that I'd rather have a rhizotomy than sit at Starbucks over a white chocolate peppermint mocha with one of my girlfriends but really it's not to much of a biggie. It's one of those procedures that you can't really hurt to try on the off chance that it works. Unfortunately, mine didn't. I had relief for about 10-11 days after one of them but that was it. That relief was actually from the anti-inflammatory that went in with the injection. BUT, I did get more done in those 10 days then I have in a long time! ;-) I could actually hear my dining room floor sigh and say AHHHH while I was wiping it. A couple of 13 years olds with a swiffer just doesn't always cut it, you know?

The Bilateral SI joint injections I'm having next week are one more effort to try to alleviate some of the pain. The SI joints are the joints that connect your pelvis to your spinal column. We are going to go in there with some nice long needles and juice them up with anti inflammatory and some yummy numbing stuff. I will be tickled PINK if it gives me 10-11 days of some relief to get me through Christmas. THAT would be awesome! Yesterday, he basically said this was about as good as it's going to get. He said some things may give me some relief but I'm not going to be pain free. Apparently, I'm a complex case (I KNEW I was a space case and a basket case but now I'm a complex case too!) It was actually such a relief to hear it. Sounds weird and pity partyish but at least now I don't have all kinds of false hope and I can deal with this now, and move on. I just will have to keep the routine I have going. Believe me, I'm thankful it's just THIS. It's not going to kill me, It could be SO much worse. He also put it into perspective when he explained that at least my fusion STOPPED further neurological damage. I can walk and talk and all that fun stuff. You might remember this first post from forever ago when I didn't know what was going on in my spine and I suddenly was walking like Quisimoto and hobbled across a major road at 2:30 in the morning to rescue a sweet white pup from certain doom not knowing one wrong twist and my walking days could have been over. Hey, I never liked sports anyway, so better me than Ray Lewis!

Dollar Store Design for Christmas

First I want to say thank you for all of the lovely people that have visited from My Romantic Home's Show and Tell! THANKS!

As much as we'd all like to deny it, the economy is not in great shape. I'm hearing from everyone that times are TIGHT and we all are pulling our belts a bit tighter! Getting new Christmas decor drops to the bottom of the list when 3 of your kids want IPOD TOUCHES! I'm not saying Ol' Saint Nick is going to comply but you know what I mean.

Fortunately/Unfortunately we have a new Dollar Store next to our grocery. It's a little too easy to pop in there now and then for a big movie box of SUGAR BABIES (my current candy obsession). Yesterday, I stopped in to see what Christmas decorations I could get that would be inexpensive and update our Holiday decor. I think I SCORED!

Let me back up a moment and say that the first idea with the Ball jars isn't mine. I saw it on another blog and I've lost the link...sorry and if you know who's it is, let me know so I can give them credit. Anyway, THAT imaginative blogger had a NEW ball jar and put EPSON SALT in it with a little tea light for some ICY CHEER! I LOVED it! Considering I have this old milk carrier filled with OLD BLUE Ball Jars and my family room (You can sorta see the color above the board and batten molding is a GORGEOUS soft Robin Egg blue (if i do say so myself) in one of the photos, they fit perfectly with my color scheme. I poured epson salt from the dollar store into the jars, popped in some tea lights from Ikea (you know the pack where you get like 50 for 2 dollars and they have a lovely vanilla scent) topped it off with some FREE branches of Holly and lime green cypress (I think that's what it is) and a bit of bow from a roll of ribbon from the dollar store. This bit of ribbon was left over from the lenght I used on my re-styled wreath. QUICK. EASY. CHEAP!

This petite ladies antique shoe form is from Bob's, Ye Ol' Curiosity Shop (you know the one, in the show and tell post below). I'm currently have a girl crush on her. I snipped some greens from the front walk, put on a little ribbon from the dollar store and 2 dollar store bells that came in a mega box from the DOLLAR STORE. They were left over again from my re-styled wreath! I think she's so PRETTY NOW and festive and almost FREE!

This wreath is an extra from what we put in the windows every year. Look how utterly SAD it looks all squished and lonely there on MY NEW(OLD reclaimed wood) ISLAND TOP (more of that to come in a future post...it's still not all done, so you'll have to come back for my kitchen reveal party).  She's had a 11 month long sojourn in the basement and she needs a little spa treatment.   I fluffed her up and added some FREE branches of Holly and lime green Cypress clippings. tied on big gold bells from my mega dollar store box. I clipped off red berries from my BUNCH of $1 red berries from you know where and wired them on. Slapped on a fresh bow from the ribbon roll from the same ol' cheap place where everything is a DOLLAR. VOILA! She's ready for the front door that I'm going to stick to our leaded glass door with one of those 3M removable hooks (again I saw that on someone's blog and I don't know where...sorry). We haven't had a wreath on the door since we put in the new leaded glass one SEVERAL YEARS ago!

Last but not least, we used to have a 80's style oak rail covering part of the step down into our family room. Years back (maybe in '01) I told Matt how much I hated it. I don't have a photo to show you. I went to work that night and came home, and as I pulled into the garage, there was the railing up against the wall. In place of it was this pretty pretty white column. Instint UPDATE. Matt wraps a lighted garland around it every Christmas. Here's where the handy dandy DOLLAR STORE comes into play. While there, I picked up a couple packs of little white birds and a couple packs of glitter covered snow flakes and we put them on the garland covered column. It's so icy and festive!

That's my Dollar Store Decor for the Holidays! ;-)

BEFORE HER MAKE-OVER

AFTER HER MAKE-OVER

SHOW AND TELL FRIDAY....FINALLY!!! Photos of Ye Old Curiosity Shop!

****If you like what you see here, then click on the older posts at the bottom of this one...THERE are SEVERAL OTHER POSTS IN A ROW THE TONS OF PHOTOS of the INSIDE!
EDIT: If you are visiting from THE LETTERED COTTAGE, please know that there are actually 3 posts of photo goodness so at the bottom of this post, click "older post".  Believe me you won't be sorry.  This place is FABULOUS!!!

CLICK any photo to make it LARGER! ;-) 
When I went by today (I HAD to get out of the house and get my Commander serviced and this place is on the way) I finally took photos of the antique store I'm always talking about. I told Bob I'd be posting these photos and he said to make sure I tell you all that "It's a REAL antique store with tiny little mouse footprints in the dust". That cracks me up! Anyway I know you'll have to really scour these photos to see even a small fraction of what Bob has. CLICK on the photo to make it larger. Bob does ship and you can call him to get a quote on something. He's always been very fairly priced for me. He's ADMITEDLY a WEE bit crotchedy and gruff but he has a good heart! Plus he knows his STUFF. I always get a history lesson everytime I go. His phone number is 410-734-6228 and please tell him Robyn sent you!  I AM SO VERY excited to share this with you for SHOW AND TELL over at My Romantic Home!  I know it's a couple hours early but I couldn't wait to share all this ABSOLUTE GOODNESS!  So please check all this stuff out, feel free to call Bob (I swear I get nothing from this, I just hate to see small places like this struggling when he has soooo much to offer!) and then go back to  My Romantic Home and CHECK OUT everyone's show and tell goodies! Here's the link : Cindy's Show and Tell at My Romantic Home!

I'm ALWAYS restraining myself in this place because you could spend SO much time here looking and never see a fraction.   I always see something new!  I have even scoured these photos too!   PLUS he has a basement full of goodies, so I'll ask him if he has a particular something and he often has it in the secret hideyhole basement!   I've been saving my "lunch money" for a SWEET COP TOP pint milk bottle.  When I got it out to the car I realized it's PINK!   I haven't seen ANY Cop Tops (supposed to hold the cream in the milk) that are PINK.   OHHH I LOVE THAT!
If you look carefully, in the first photo, there are two VERY nice condition wood and glass wash boards that would be delightful in a laundry room with a fun paint color showing through!

MORE EYE CANDY!

LOOK a brown canning jar! And those tiny little creamers behind it!  SWEET! This window is where I find goodies all the time!  I found my saphire blue fire king side spout measuring cup there.  That salt and pepper shaker there has a girlfriend match just out of the photo and they are the most lovely blue hue!That bottle on the far right would be PERFECT with a pour spout for olive oil or dish detergent....it would be so pretty sitting in your window sill with the morning sun glowing through!I see something in this photo I have to call Bob about today...I think it's a metal pedestal!  YAY!Look for the book with the odd spelling title!These airplanes would be SWEET hanging in the corner of a little boys room!COFFEE TINS!!!!antique chocolate mold in the shape of a pistol!BOB has THE BEST BALL JARS...yesterday I got one that's full of bubbles and has a strait neck and isn't even numbered!  GREAT PRICES TOO!