Progress and a Peytonism

Matt used his handy saws-all and got rid of the middle strip in this large cabinet where we keep our plates and glasses and other often used stuff. These two cabinets are just going to be open shelving. Again this blue (Okeechobee Haze) is the primer and then we'll be painting them black and distressing them so the blue peek a boo's here and there :-) !

Here's my hard working man putting these cool corbels up to support the shelves because they no longer have the middle support plus don't they look so much cooler? The corbels and the shelves are also going to get primed too. But I thought you might want an update. All of our plates and glasses are all over the counters right now so don't mind the mess.

Here's the island the he did over the weekend. We originally had doors on both sides (which could have been convienent) but since we have stools there we never really used the second set. I'm LOVING how my honey has transformed the island! It's going to look chunkier and just so much more fun!
Now I'm debating if we should do it black like the rest of the cabinets or white (and distressed with the blue showing here and there). Regardless it's going to have a different top then the other counters. Our reclaimed boards are currently being kiln dried and the owner of the company is going to drop them off next Monday on his way to Manhattan to work on a restaurant. Matt's going to make them into the island top. They're old hard white pine. I CAN'T wait to see the boards!

PEYTONISM!

Last week, Peyton and I had a couple errands to run and we needed to get some supplies for the kids bath now that the floor is done. I needed a new shower curtain and all those kind of accotrements! So we popped by Pier One, where Peyton promptly fell in love with a double pappasan chair. She kept saying she could sleep in it, it was so comfortable, she loved it, it was so pretty...yada yadda yadda. I assured her that she would NOT be getting it as a bed. Finally she picked out a $1.99 loofa soap holder thingy that will match her new bath. As we get up to the register she says to me, "Actually, can I just get that bed instead!?" Like that was an even swap! Goofy girl!

CHHHHANGES and it's my birthday and I can be happy if I want to!

Matt took off some of the cabinet doors in preperation for the primer. I'm really tired of our current cabinet color. I really like natural wood finishes but we've had these natural oak long enough. It's starting to look so orangey to me...and I love orange but not like this. Our first house had natural pecan cabinets and they were so lovely, I still miss them! Anyway, as I said in a previous post, we are going to prime them in a medium robin egg blue then paint them in an eggshell black. Then we'll distress them some so you can see the robin egg blue through in the distressed spots. I say we when I mainly mean Matt, but you get the picture! LOL I think we are going to leave the doors off of the cabinet where our plates and glasses are and trim out the edges and just have them as open shelving. My sister gave me those AWESOME numbered coffee mugs that I'm totally and completely in love with for my birthday. The island and the desk area are going to be primed in the blue and painted white and have the same distressing technique. We found a really cool company with re-claimed wood for our island top and desk top. That'll be so exciting! They are in West Virginia but he's doing an entire bar in Manhattan so is going to deliver it for free because he'll basically be driving right by! Cool ;-)

At this age, my birthdays aren't so exciting anymore, LOL. But yesterday we went antiqueing in Havre de Grace, MD. That's one of my favorite things to do. I got a couple of those white bowls there and I went back to my friend Bob's place and bought a measuring cup I've been eyeing. It's just a clear measuring cup by Fire King with a hint of blue to it. It's at the bottom of the first picture hidden partially by the cabinet divider. I don't know why that measuring cup has been calling my name!

I'm guessing that my 39th year can only be better than my 38th year so I'm looking forward to it. I'm thinking happy thoughts!

I LOVE this and a yummy recipe!

HEY all FLEA MARKET-TEERS!!! WELCOME!!!  One of my favorite finds is this old chippy milk crate.  It's holds mason jars now, sometimes put flowers in them, sometimes I put my silver ware and napkins for a party....they are just too much fun!



This is the kids bathroom tile before Matt grouted it today. We used black grout and it looks awesome, very graphic. PLUS it's ALREADY BLACK! Just kidding! The kids bathroom before had white grout, like the rest of our bathrooms so it required MEGA-STORE proportions of bleach cleaner to keep it semi clean looking. I forgot a before photo but let's just say it was the cookie cutter house white bathroom tile. I really don't mind it but this is definately more fun!

I've been saving box-tops all summer. You may remember my semi-obsession with them last school year. I'm like one of those coupon people that buy stuff JUST because they have the coupon for it. Well not quite that bad but almost. If you look closely in that middle ball jar, you'll see my stack of box tops. I've had this milk crate for about a year and a half and I'm still in love with it. And YES, I did get it from my friend Bob at the YE OL'CURIOSITY SHOPPE. Okay the box tops leads me to the cake in a curcuitous way. You see I was reading the box top website and checking out the recipes and I came across this KEY LIME COCONUT CAKE. I ended up making it fat free except for the coconut and it sure didn't taste fat free! I'm going to link you to the recipe but I want you to know I substituted fat free cool whip and fat free sweetened condensed milk. I also brushed all the layers with a bit of just lime juice before I frosted them with the yummy, delicious and ohhhh so sinful tasting frosting! http://www.boxtops4education.com/Recipes/RecipeDetail.aspx?CatId=335&rid=7919

pony party

 
 
 
 
Peyton went to a VERY cool B-day yesterday for her friend Jordyn. It was a pony party at an equestrian center. She had so much fun! Here are a couple pics I snapped.

I've been dieting a bit, just basically trying to eat more healthy, tons of pro-biotics and anti-oxidants. I feel like with my spinal degeneration stuff happening, I should at least get the rest of me healthy! Plus loosing a few lbs can only help my back of course! Anyway, today on FB I came across this website that I figure I'll try to look at everytime I want to eat. Believe me, I think it will be an automatic appetite control! Check it out...if you dare! www.thisiswhyyourefat.com

Matt's grouting the kids bathroom right now. I'll post pics of that later. We are going to go very classic black and white and then pop it with a color (Callie is thinking CHARTRUESE - [okay I know I didn't spell that right], which is cool with me!) Then I'm going to put 3 black and white photos of the dogs on the walls and use a cool etsy store I found that does VERY matte wall decals so they really look like paint. I think I'm going to do the quote that's something like, "Lord, help me be the person my dog thinks I am". Just a bit of morning inspiration for the kids everyday! LOL

We also took the plunge and bought the paint for the kitchen cabinets yesterday. It's a soft black by Behr called, Beluga. Which kinda makes me laugh because Beluga's are not black, unless they are talking about the Beluga caviar which has never and will never pass this chick's lips!

Project Updates ;-)

Hey I changed my blog layout! I hope you like it! It's from Smitten Designs, I LOVE it! I still need to work on getting the title photo moved a tad to the right but I don't know if I'll ever get it right! LOL



These photos were taken in my backyard. I LOVE that orange butterfly. We always get the yellow swallow tails and then the pretty black ones with the bright blue spots and tons of smaller brown ones with white spots. But I've never seen one like this guy there. We have a huge butterfly bush that just attracks them in droves, of course. The other day, my father was sitting on our patio and he asked Matt if he noticed all of the butterflies on the bush. And my husband told him that it's always covered in them. My father then said, "They should call that a BUTTERFLY BUSH". Matt then said that "they do". LOL My father didn't say anything about that! ;-)

Matt and my Dad started re-tiling the kids bathroom...I'll post a photo of that. It's small octagonal white tiles with black diamonds. My Dad said it used to be called "barber shop tile". I'm totally lovin' it!

We had our primer printed for the kitchen cabinets. It's called Okeechobee blue, it's like a Robin Egg blue. We are going to paint them black and distress them here and there so the blue peeks through. I CAN'T wait! So excited! I'll be posting before, during and after photos when we (Matt) start.

Yesterday I stopped by my favorite antique store. It's a tiny tiny little shop (It's called the "Ye Ol' Curiosity Shoppe"). The owner is a sweet Vietnam Veteran that you either like or you don't. He's more than a bit eccentric and I think he might be a hoarder. Well, I'm sure he's a hoarder. You can't really walk into the store. You just kinda walk in and look as far as your eyes can see because you can't walk more than 4 feet from the front door. But you just ask him for certain things and he has a huge mental inventory. Yesterday I scored a YELLOW wooden Coca Cola crate that Cole has been looking for forever. (Yes, my kids like to go antiqueing too...it's a bit weird probably but I always like to go with my parents too!) So I made Cole's day!

You HAVE to check out this link...I never get political but it's too cute not to share! It stars a dog! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XivhwO_zWWg

Meet Smitty and a story about Cosmo and a duct tape couch.

Here's little pudgy Smitty. He's just so squishable and almost kissable but not quite! My sister Brandy and I and our Dad took the kids to Ye Old Swimming Hole...LOL It's a place called Jerusalem Mill (remember I went their with Steph awhile back). They had so much fun as usual and I just got to chill out and enjoy the kids. Grace named him Smitty immediately. Pretty funny name.
Tuesday (the J-Mill day) was the one year anniversary of my first surgery. Wow, what a year! I've had better years but I've had worse years too. It's all good! Although I really have to think hard about which years were the more difficult years, lol~!

I wanted to share a site with you if you don't already know about it that just makes me laugh... http://awkwardfamilyphotos.com/

So sweet Mr. Cosmo has been so good lately. So like total idiots, we thought he'd be fine with not crating him when we weren't home. Levi of course was a no go. Not an option. Probably never will be an option. Cosmo proved to us that he was WORTHY of not being crated when we left. For almost two weeks he had free reign with Macy and acted like a complete angel. Granted during the week I'm home almost ALL the time, you know I HAVE to hold down the couch. Anyway. He never once showed any little inkling of getting into anything. Obviously he was just waiting till our comfort zone got big and cozy. Then. It. Happened. The kids and I went swimming over Tina's Tiki Bar Pool and Resort. (It's actually my friend Tina's pool but doesn't that sound oh so much more glamorous?) Her pool is heated and is salt water so it's SO good for my back to just hang from a noodle. We were gone about 3 hours and we left kongs filled with cheese and dog biscuits for our fur babies to keep them happy and occupied.
Cosmo found another FUN way to occupy his time. He pulled off all three cushions of our leather couch and tore into the fabric on the bottom side of them( THANK GOD). He then meticulously ripped chunk upon chunk and bit upon bit of foam from them and coated the new family room carpet with a fun and cushy layer of foam. He had his very own foam pit! FUN! The kids and I had to squeeze as much foam back into the cushions and then form bases of the cushions with duct tape. It looks fabulous. I may go into the upholstery business because I obviously have talent in making a couch cushion from duct tape. Guess where Cosmo goes now when we are not home?

Keep Calm and Carry On

My blog title is what's currently on my chalkboard. It's from a British sign that was prevelant during one of the world wars but I think it's relevant anytime! Dang, I wish my kids would keep CALM. LOL This sweet and lovely water lily was smiling up at me from our pond on Saturday. I think it might be the most lovely one we've ever had!

I posted a photo of my husband's other woman last year. He was holding her like a baby on the couch watching tv. Now she is totally making the moves on my man. This is what I have to compete with. She's lovely, has gorgeous eyes like dark dove chocolate. Her hair glistens with russet highlights. Her body is sleek and toned and while athletic, she still has the grace of a princess and the regal bearing of one as well. She allows us to live in her dog house. How can I ever compare?

Stephanie is going to kill me for posting this photo. Especially since I haven't photo shopped it at all, although I'm the one needing the photo shop here. I'm getting a little Mt. Kilamanjaro over there by one of my eyebrows and look at those wrinkles! It's one of those extreme closeups where you hold the camera out...so yeah at least I think we look better in person! Several weeks ago, we took the kids swimming in a stream and
Steph and I just hung out. She is just the most wonderful friend that anyone could ask for and I can get teary-eyed thinking of the zillions of ways I'm thankful for her. She just had a B-day and we haven't celebrated yet, so I wanted to say happy Birthday Stephanie...I haven't forgotten!