My good fortune at my GOODWILL

My cup run'ith over this week with doctors appointments to be ready for next weeks vacation with my surgeon.  (Otherwise known as my surgery).  Today, I thought my appointment was at 9:00 am and when I got there the secretary looked a bit incredulous.  She said, "You are VERY early, are you going to wait? "  Come to find out my appointment wasn't until 10:45.  I did NOT have time to go home and come back so I went to the local Goodwill.


THERE, I found this SUPER sweet needlepoint doggie on a leash. (click on the photo to make it larger!)  That inspired me to make a little doggie wall collage.  You KNOW I love dogs (and birds) so then I was on a quest to find another doggie print.  I KNEW I needed 3.  Then I came across this SWEET little boy with the pup.  I got these little black frames to frame a doggie print I got from BOB at the YE OLE CURIOSITY SHOP.  I haven't decided on which one yet.  Let's see, the needlepoint was 4, the oval doggie print was 2 dollars and the little frames were 2 for 5.  I also picked up this SWEET milk glass bowl for 3...it's so purty !  Lastly they had chairs on sale and eventually I want to get all mismatched chairs for my kitchen table and unify themwith the same color...my wooden chair was 2.00!  I SCORED BIG TIME! 


I took off the back of the needlepoint to paint the frame, more on that in another post!  It's drying in the basement and I hope it has a cool finish I can share, If NOT I'll still share it so you don't make the same mistake! LOL

I'm beginning to think Rustoleum should sponser a spray-paintaholics.

 Remember the itsy bitsy bathroom reno I showed you HERE a couple days ago. If you don't remember than you MAY have bigger problems than I do. Just kidding, but seriously, if you haven't seen it, it is cute. I think! Even if I can never find my keys. Or if I currently want to spray paint everything that's not moving. I'm sure I have tons of issues!

SO SORRY FOR THE POOR QUALITY PHOTOS, MY POWDER ROOM IS TINY AND DOESNT' HAVE ANY NATURAL LIGHT.

I've had that mirror since before we got married. When I was in college (don't get all excited, it was for just a short while, then I married and started popping out babies...two at a time!) I did some interior design work at a furniture store my mother's friend owned. I fell in LOVE with this mirror at the time. I was about 18 so um it's a bit over 20 years old. SHEEESH. I'm old. Anyway, I loved the bow. A. Lot. It was an expensive "furniture store" mirror from Carolina Mirror company and I might add, this little sucker weighs a TON and has pretty beveled edges around the mirrored portion. Even with my discount, I think I paid 90.00 for it (I know it was a little less than a $100). I think that's expensive, even now! ;-) For 20 years it adorned 2 different powder rooms in the two homes we've owned, showing off it's slightly aged, gold toned finish.

Enter 2010 and me with my current obsession with Rustoleum Hammered Spray Paint. After I RENEWED the bathroom light fixture and the toilet paper holder and the towel holder, the mirror looked a bit sad. She wanted a little face lift. (Don't we all after about 20 years past our glorious youth!) I had handsome Mr. Whimages take her down, I unscrewed her with the drill gun (girls, if you can't use the drill gun, get a lesson. NOW!) Painted her pretty little face, screwed her back together and VOILA' she's bright and shiny and looks totally different, sorta like Heidi Montag, you know her own mother may not recognize her! Since I did the oil rubbed bronze on the other fixtures, she needed some Heirloom White to give her some contrast and make her stand out amongst her rich friends. What do you think? The powder room is almost done it's little update! You are probably wondering what's this mess down here in this last photo, right? WELL, that's where we originally had our built in entertainment center, the TV was there and book cases on either side. We "built" it out into our garage about 7 years ago or so to give us some extra space. Since the new flat screen came and Mr. Whimages built the TV cabinet out of the wood he took out of the built in, we've been trying to decide WHAT to do with the area...stay tuned it's finally progressing! Notice "FLAT KITTY" in this last photo, she's the little stuffed toy that looks like she was run over by the garbage truck. She is actually the love of our little lady boxer, Macy's life! She's checking out the progress of the new built in.

Check out everyones goodies here:  remodelaholics friday!beyond the picket fence ,  http://theinspiredroom.net/? ,  my cottage charm

Master Bedroom Sneaky Peeky

Remember my LUCK in receiving the Annettte Tatum duvet cover from the MARVELOUS MARIA at DREAMY WHITES ?  Well, we've purchased the feather filled down comforter (to put IN the DUVET) from HEAVEN (my new name for Ikea) as well as their 400 thread count SATEEN sheets.  These sheets are TO. DIE. FOR.  I want to shout my love for these sheets from the rooftops.  But I'd probably fall. And break my back.  Or poke out an eye.  I'm graceful like that.  Mr. Handsome Whimages and I went to our other little slice of Heaven, otherwise known as Home Depot last night.  He got some boards to work on the built in I mentioned earlier and I picked up paint samples.  Here's a little display of some colors I'm playing with.  We had Behr's French Silver left over from the island so some of that is slapped on the wall.  As much as I LOVE it on the island, in our not well natural lit bedroom, I fear it's a tad too dark.  I might have them half it or third it with white, or choose another paint.  Tonight, when I wake up at 3:00 am. I JUST might make a cool POLYVORE of all the cool stuff that we'd LIKE to do and get for the bedroom. 

Our Island with   Behr's French Silver, looks so much lighter in the kitchen which is full of sun!

Oooooppps, I NOW KNOW I should never accidentally show up in a photo in horizontal stripes.  But they are a really comfy lounge set from Target with matching lightweight Capri sweat pant thingys.  That makes it all better.  Pretend I'm thinner, 'kay?  Don't mind Macy back there on the bed either.

I want to add that if I could go to ANY vintage/antique/junque show this year it would totally be this one THE FARM CHICK SHOW and if you want to check out a chance for a $50 ANTHRO card, go here to TWIG...you won't be sorry!

RENT-ing a room, an ETSY update plus a dance recital (I'm taking my life into my own hands here, people. Posting this slide show!)

Five hundred twenty-five thousand six hundred minutes
Moments so dear.
Five hundred twenty-five thousand
Six hundred minutes
How do you measure, measure a year?
In daylights, in sunsets, in midnights
In cups of coffee
In inches, in miles, in laughter, in strife.
In five hundred twenty-five thousand
Six hundred minutes
How do you measure
A year in the life?
How about love?
How about love?
How about love?
Measure in love!

I had a surprising call yesterday, my surgery has been moved up a week. It's exactly 364 days since the last fusion surgery! Talk about your De ja' vu! I can't help but think of the RENT lyrics! Next week, I'll be renting a room at a local hospital!

I think I have lyrics on my mind since our girls had their dance recital this weekend. An entire "season" of prep work for one day. The girls always say it's the most stressful day of the year, although I tend to think of it as a bit longer because of dress rehearsal which I find more chaotic. Anyway enjoy their little slide show. They did such a fabulous job and I'm so proud of them. Callie was actually in 3 dances in 2 shows but the one dance was IMPROV and it was difficult to photograph because it was to the TV music for the Twilight Zone, making it a very DARK number. Enjoy it while it's up here because if my older daughter Callie sees it: a. she will smother me with a pillow in my sleep. b. also take it down from the blog.  DISCLAIMER:  NO my daughters do NOT wear this makeup any other time.  This is stage makeup and it is only for recitals.  Yes, my almost 14 year old DOES wear mascara, and lipgloss and occassionally eye liner.  I wanted to clairify before I got hate mail. Now back to your regularly scheduled blogging. ;-)
These lovely flowers were pulled from the girls bouquets...shhhh. I did a little funkified processing on the photos to give them a bit of a vintage vibe...what do you think? OHHHH and BTW, about the ETSY shop. Due to the impending surgery and the recovery time, 8-12 weeks, I have put the shop on hold. I'm sorry! If anyone was REALLY looking forward to ordering something, email me and I'll try to have one of my besties get it out to you! Regardless, now you'll have something exciting to look forward to when I come back, other than my witty banter!

Matt started work on the built in. We've finally figured out (well, we think!) how we are going to get a desk in there AND a small sitting area with a wall sconce. I'll keep you posted! Later today, I'm going to show you a little sneak of some of the things we've pulled together for the "Annette Tatum" master bedroom we are doing.

While I'm gone next week, I'll have some of my wonderful "in person" friends and "bloggy" friends filling in for me. If the last surgeries fill-in's were any indication, you are going to want to check back next week. Plus the guest BLOGGERS I have lined up are going to be GREAT! I'd say I can't wait, but I'm going to miss it anyway! I'll have to read it all when I get home and I'm semi-lucid. You might want to check out these links to see what they did to me last year!
Brandy
Callie
Tina
Stephanie

Some of the guest bloggers will include Maria from Dreamy Whites and Melissa from My Cottage Charm .  I don't have all the other details on the others yet, but I will soon!

Later in the week, I'm going to leave you with some of my favorite links and blogs. I'm sure you are like me, and have nothing better to do than lose a couple hours here on the 'net!

Make a slideshow

This is our built in.  This is my husbands butt in our built in.

Itsy Bitsy Refresh In The Powder Room

With 19 kids, our little powder room gets a lot of use. Yes, it feels like I'm a Duggar most of the time, especially on the weekends! I've even had one of Callie's friends list herself as one of my children on facebook! LOL (Bethany you KNOW who you are) About the bathroom, it's a sweet little room with WHITE TILE FLOOR AND WHITE GROUT. In theory, that's wonderful, bright and pretty. In reality, it needs to be bleached DAILY! Anyway, this little room needed a little update. BUDGET UPDATE was totally the name of the game, isn't it always I guess?! I REALLY want new lights, a new towel rack a new tp holder and a new mirror. That's NOT happening...so this is what I did...

Wooden shoe forms and it's Peytonism time again!

FIRST let me add that I haven't had pretty feet probably EVER but at least since high school! ;-) 

I've been getting as much done around the house as I can lately so that I can go on my little 4 day vacation ( shhh it's with a surgeon, you know the one I told your about a couple days ago...). I'm getting all kinds of odds and ends together but most of them are not fun.

We have a garden pond that has MANY fish, 2 of which are ENORMOUS MUTANT KOI. Not really sure if they are mutants but they are BIG and they eat A LOT. Sorta like my 3 kids. I had to get SUMMER fish food (Yes, Julie, they have different diets for different things!) and the pond store is across the county but near a SUPER cool antique store. So I asked my friend Julie if she wanted to go, and off we went 'cause these moms could both use a little FUN and a bit of thrifty retail therapy never hurts!. Unfortunately, I could have just cried. The store was EMPTY. This is a HUGE old manufacturing or storage building and it was EMPTY but had a huge GRAND OPENING SOON sign. Thank goodness or my fish may never eat again. Julie remembered another store she "thought" she had seen sort of nearby. WE didn't want to ONLY get fish food when we had visions of the every elusive "FIND". Well, we FOUND some goodies for sure...the store was
mostly overpriced but somethings were a VERY good deal. There was a LOVELY fluted edge enormous milk glass tall footed cakestand that Julie had to pry my un manicured fingers from that was only 20 or so. And Julie was VERY tempted to get  a set of ULTRA cool opaque turquoise footed sherbet cups but they were big bucks. The sweet owner directed us to the SHED where she said the things were a bit dusty and you had to DIG. We both said "WE LOVE TO DIG!" In the shed I found the last shoe form I NEEDED. I really have to usually have 3 of something on display. This one is for a women's heel and that point on the front could kill an intruder if necessary! It's a size 6 AA, I don't think I was EVER that size! LOL DANG those shoes could NOT have been comfy!

PEYTONISM TIME! Loyal Whimages followers will know I post silly/ funny/ um...ditsy things my youngest says. Her sister Callie in a moment of weakness got her these cool silicon bands that a lot of kids are wearing as bracelets but they spell her name.

Peytonism 1.
We've had a photo of the twins at about 3 months on our dresser forever. Yesterday, I was dusting it (you KNOW if I was dusting I MUST be getting ready for something!). Peyton asked who they were. At first, I thought she was kidding. She. Wasn't. Believe me this child really is smart. She's just a complete AIRHEAD. I mean she's 7 and the thought NEVER crossed her mind that the sweet photo of a little girl baby and a chubby boy baby could possibly be her older TWIN sister and brother?

Peytonism 2.
She was playing with some baby stuff and asked if she could look through some of her baby things. She came across some sweet little baby shoes that on one bottom said Peyton and the other bottom has her birth date. She admired them and asked where they came from. I explained that when I was a little girl I had the same bus driver from elementary school through high school. I told Peyton that she was always very SWEET to me and I really liked her. Then I explained that when she found out I had Peyton, she mailed me those sweet baby shoes! Peyton just looked at me wide eyed for a moment and then said, "You had me when you were in HIGH SCHOOL?"

As a side note, if you enlarge the bracelet photo and you see the little doggie hair on the e I think...it's probably from this handsome devil, Cosmo!  That's Ms. Peyton up there getting ready for one of her dress rehearsals for this years recital.  For some reason, Cosmo insisted on hanging out under the tutu, I think he liked how it felt.  Or how he looked in it.  Maybe he's very confident in his masculinity!  Either way he's tutu cute! Yes I had to say it!

THANK YOU ANNETTE TATUM!!

warning: post may be long winded! These photos aren't the best because my light in the foyer right now is not that great.

Yesterday I received a most wonderful package in the mail. The 3 kids had just walked in the door from school. Cole carried the package and nonchalantly sat it on the island. I didn't really notice it at first but when I realized what it HAD to contain I shushed them all into silence. If you have a kid or so and they are in school, then you know that this is almost an impossible task.  When kids get home from school there is some weird wiring in their brain that is attached directly to their mouth and stomach and it short circuits. They are LOUD and they want FOOD. NOW. It's like they walked forty days and forty nights without speaking or eating.

I just wanted a moment of silence so I could enjoy the grandeur in that cardboard box. The kids thought I had lost it. My mind, that is. Again. I pulled the wonderful fabric goodness from it's cardboard cage and we all ohhhd and ahhhd a bit! Me, especially! I even had to call my neighbor/friend and tell her! Annette was so sweet to include 2 LOVELY coordinating pillow cases to go with the duvet. It's even more lovely than I could have hoped and the fabric is such a wonderful silky cotton. I'm in LOVE with the colors! We have a cherry bedroom set with a 4 poster bed that was mine before we married. I think it's going to be GORGEOUS on the bed. I took the photos on my husband's grandmother's tunnel tufted upholstered chair that has cherry arms and legs to see what it would look like. It's so perfect that I think this chair is going to have to be moved from it's home in the foyer to our bedroom! The colors are PERFECT! I just have to decide if we (actually Matt) will paint the room a soft dove grey or a soft butter yellow.   If you haven't seen Annette's catalogs of visual design yumminess , you MUST check it out!

ANNETTE TATUM Home Collection and Maria from DREAMY WHITES, you have made me so happy and I certainly appreciate your generosity! Both girls were sweet enough to post on THEIR blogs about it!

Here's the lengthy part...the room probably won't get done for a bit so I won't be able to show it off for a while. If you read Maria's post or the sweet note attached that Annette was kind enough to write, you may have a hint. It was decided last week that I will have another surgery on my lumbar spine in early/mid May. This is a crazy time of year anyway with the girls dress rehearsals for dance and their picture days and more dress rehearsals(photos will be coming soon!) at the theater and then the actual recital. Plus I have many things to do to get ready for the surgery, doctors appointments etc. I think because we only have a few weeks to get ready, the room won't be the first thing on the list. Last year, (almost exactly 1 year ago and 1 week) I had a similar surgery. My husband put a twin bed up in our family room because I had to limit the stairs. Obviously, I'll be spending a lot of time initially there.

If you are wondering what I'm having done, read on... (I'm kind of sorta writing this just for me! LOL)

Without giving you all the background (it's all here in the blog somewhere starting July 08), I had a lumbar fusion last year on L3-4 with a faux disc and pedical instrumentation. My disc at L3-4 had a previous surgery called a discectomy because a chunk of it had ruptured, broke away and migrated down my spinal canal. It continued to plague me and re-herniated so 8 months later we did the fusion and put in the fake disc. My MRI's at that time showed that the disc below was also diseased (I had a test on 3 discs called a discogram and I failed at L4-5 not at L3-4. I don't think there was enough disc there to cause pain). Because my neurosurgeon was conservative (which is NOT a bad thing) we only fused L3-4. Unfortunately, that added stress to the already diseased disc and area below and it now is possibly ruptured as well. During this surgery, all of the titanium instrumentation will come out and they will take out the bad disc at L4-5, replace it with a faux disc, mix up some ground up bone that they sand off and mix it with a hormone containing polymer and add BRIGHT SHINY NEW titanium rods and pedicals to the whole thing. New Robot Robyn! ;-)

Expect several guest posts from my friends during that time plus I'm going to ask some great fellow bloggers to post as well! Should be a good time for all~!

Skeleton Key Kitchen Project

 I want to thank all my new friends thanks to the Marvelous Maria at DREAMY WHITES! I love NEW people and can't wait to check out everyone's blogs.

Yesterday I showed you a little hint of a project I was going to do for the kitchen. I know there are TONS of knock-offs  of the Restoration Hardware's Skeleton Key  frame that cost $199.00.  Since we've done our budget kitchen reno, I wanted to figure out something I could put under the cabinet in the only available under cabinet wall space I have. I saw the knock offs and knew that would be perfect! Here's my version!  While running errands on Thursday with my delightful friend Stephanie, we got a bit of bleached burlap then ran to my favorite junk/antique store (link below) to get a few skeleton keys he had waiting for me. They were 2 dollars a piece!  I SWEAR that man has almost anything I ask for when I call!  LOVE THAT!

Let me explain why I do NOT have a lot of tutorial photos (this is an easy project so you really don't need them anyway!). My father stopped by just as I was starting this project. All of whatever skills I have with tools and wood and rigging a project, I got from my Dad. He had a router in my hand when I was 13! Now he acts like I can't do anything because of my back issues. Plus he likes a project just as much as I do!

Originally this frame was a BRILLIANT LIME GREEN, if you look really closely, you can see a smidgen of it on the back. My father grabbed the frame and spray painted it before I had a chance to give you a photo. The frame came from my friends supply warehouse for her occasionl sale and tent sale so it would have been painted Heirloom White anyway. It came with this piece of blue mat board taped to the inside of it. As I was taking the tape off so I could wrap it in the burlap, my father FREAKED out and insisted that I NOT wrap it in burlap and use it as is. It is pretty cool looking as it is. I used gorilla glue on the skeleton keys (from my friend Bob's antique store). Do NOT use Gorilla glue because it dries white and it expands...first mistake. I put the mat board back into the frame and glue it in on the back with the gorilla glue, the expanding was actually a plus for that! Lastly, I clipped two grey chiffon flowers to each other (they are from Joanns) and then glued that to the bottom corner of the mat board. VIOLA'. ALL DONE! Sorry for the poor photo, it was night time and I used the dreaded flash for the photo...it really doesn't have a yellow cast.

No I have a 3rd of a yard of burlap I need to find a project for! Any ideas? Let me know what you think of this bargain version of the project ;-)

LINKING this to the fun finds at  THE DIY SHOW OFF! SOUTHERN HOSPITALITY  , beyond the picket fence , The Shabby Chic Cottage and over at Kimba's DIY DAY Go check out everyone's goodness!

Dreamy Whites

If you are visiting from Dreamy Whites, WELCOME TO WHIMAGES!  It's so nice to have you!  I hope you become a follower so that I can get to know YOU!
Over the past week, I've gotten to know  a bit about Maria from the delightful blog DREAMY WHITES. Her blog is as beautiful as her heart! When Maria said she wanted to mention my blog, I was just tickled. Between the unbelievable fortune I had to win the Annette Tatum Home Collection duvet and now this...I feel like I'm dreaming! Of course in WHITE! I'll give you the 60 second Robyn run down...

I know everyone says they are married to their best friend. Yes, I'm going to say that too. My husband Matt and I have been friends since we were kids, I met him when I was 10! We'll be married 17 years in April and have 3 children. Girl/Boy twins that will be 14 in May. Their names are Callie and Cole. They are 7 minutes apart and NO, they are not identical. Probably sounds crazy when you think about it, but girl/boy twins can NEVER be identical.  That is the most commonly asked question. We even had an orthopaedic surgeon ask us that last week. I guess he sat next to a pretty, smart girl in genetics! We also have a  little diva who just turned 8 named Peyton. She says the funniest things (I know all parents think that!) and some day when you need a laugh, search Peytonisms in the blog search engine. BELIEVE me, it's worth it!  Our home is also shared with two furry clowns, Macy and Cosmo.  They are Boxers and Boxer rescue (all rescue, really) is something I hold dear to my heart.  We've had all rescued Boxers since I was 18.  We have 3 feathered friends and a pond full of Koi and goldfish as well.  My house is loud, chaotic and often filled with several extra kids and I wouldn't have it any other way!

I LOVE all kinds of things. I'm just going to give you some bullets! ;-)
* Photography- I love taking pictures of children, anything with fur, fins or feathers and still lifes too!
* Crafting- I enjoy all kinds of paper crafts, making mini-books (a little scrap book that usually tells a story of one event or item).
* Reading- Give me a book over the TV any day!
* Antiquing- I get goosebumps over the stores that have so much stuff you can never see it all in one visit!
* Baking and Cooking- I love to find new recipes and share them with my friends, often here on my blog.
* Blogging- I love to blog hop and see the goodies that everyone has to share. I really enjoy looking at the blogs listed on OTHER blogs
* Thrifty Decorating- My husband and I like to figure out how we can decorate on a budget. We LIVE at Home Depot. TRULY!
I'm guessing that's the ROBYN RUN DOWN.  Over the next week or so, I'm flinging open the doors to my Etsy shop over at http://www.whimages.etsy.com/ where I'll have various photos and the occassional vintage goody that I've come across!  I'll be back in a bit to share some of my favorite posts that you might find interesting.

OHHHH, I should tell you that that little photo up there is actually a clue to my next project for my kitchen! I hope to get it done tomorrow so come back and check!

Some of my favorite past posts:

The ALMOST reveal party of our BLACK PAINTED KITCHEN
Peyton's Party Favors
A life changing day
I'm sorry, what did you say?
Nana's Butter Cookies (HEY, EDDIE ROSS POSTED in the COMMENTS)
Photos of the BEST ANTIQUE/JUNK store EVER!
A frugal find and the dog thought the Vet was a tree!?
Looking on the bright side
These are the kind of friends I have...
Robyn the Robot
One of the things that could only happen to ME!

Ode to Blue

"COLORS ARE THE SMILES OF NATURE" ~ Leigh Hunt, British poet 

First and foremost, let me apologize for the smudges on the mirror and the dust on the buffet. I love you, my dear dear readers but since you are my FRIENDS I figured you wouldn't mind a bit of dust and smudge. What's a bit of dust and smudge among friends? My sister in law has this great saying that goes something like this, "If you are coming to visit US, stop by ANYTIME, if you are coming to visit my HOUSE, please call first!". I LOVE that saying...although her house is perfect all the time. Michele, you know I'm talking about you. ;-)

Our dining room has been this lovely delft blue above the chair rail for several years. EVENTUALLY, my handy dandy handsome husband is going to put raised panels below the chair rail but we have projects in rooms we LIVE in that we would like to finish first...plus we like to eat now and then. As you might know, I have a mini obsession with a local junk/antique shop nearby. I've showcased it a million times and I'm sure a few of you think I'm getting a kickback from the owner or something. I. Am. Not. I. Swear. ;-) It's just a fun store if you enjoy the "DIG" to get to the "FIND!". This mirror above the buffet has been looking a bit lonely lately. Every time I go to Bob's (the aforementioned junk/antique shop), I admire his GINORMOUS collections of plates. I did a mini little plate display in my foyer of brown transfer ware (some of those are from TJ Maxx...shhhh don't tell the antique aficionados!). While doing that, I fell in LOVE with divided restaurant ware plates. I think it's so cool that old cafeteria style restaurants would use such lovely plates! Plus those suckers are HEAVY! As a former server, I think there is something about them that just warms my eating out lovin' little heart! Bob mentioned to me that he has some Blue Willow "grill" plates. That's what he calls these restaurant ware plates. I don't know if that's the real name or not. That got me thinking....they might be very pretty in a display around that lonely mirror in the dinning room. The other cool thing is that they are NOT expensive!

All that talk about the restaurant ware and I'm NOT showing them to you! That's because I don't have them yet, they are on hold.  Instead I purchased these other two plates to start the collection. (BTW, that GORGEOUS Ironstone pitcher is ALSO from Bob's and the sweet little pitchers were my husband's nana's. LOVE them all! When I get the other plates, which are only like 6 dollars a piece or something, I'll have Matt hang them in some hopefully fabulous fashion around the mirror. So what do you think?  OHHH and if you want some of these cool plates, he has PLENTY and he ships too!  His number is in the 3rd link down in green.
If you want to see some of the oooodles of posts about the junk/antique shop (It's called the Ye Ol' Curiosity Shop), here are some links:
Hob-Nail milk glass
Beautiful blue Mason jars, milk carrier and shoe forms
LOTS of PHOTO GOODNESS you won't believe. This store is FULL! Check out older posts below this one too!

THANKFUL and LUCKY ME!...oh and an ETSY update ;-)

Gratitude is the fairest blossom which springs from the soul. ~Henry Ward Beecher

I want to again express my appreciation to Maria of the delightful blog Dreamy Whites , she has GORGEOUS decorating ideas, photos that will make you gasp and obviously the sweetest family to boot!  (Pun intended 'cause she lives on a RANCH!)  She not only shares wonderful bits about her life but has the best give aways as well!  As I can attest.
 I'm just dying to show you my Annette Tatum Duvet cover!
Speaking of Annette Tatum, she is not only an EXTREMELY talented designer of all kinds of goodies but she obviously has a VERY GENEROUS heart, that I'm so thankful for!  Please check out her site that is chock-full of photo goodness and ideas for LIVING!  She has an AWESOME book with a design philosophy that your own personal fashion decisions should influence your decorating style. The book, The Well-Dressed Home has over 200 beautifully styled photographs of interiors that will reflect your own personal fashion style!  THANK you Annette from the bottom of my heart!  The give away I won is from Annette's Home Collection.  LUCKY ME!
Today was Easter and we had a relaxed day full of candy, family, love and friends.  I wanted to share this photo of Cole opening his basket and how interested the dogs were in the hoopla!  It's obvious out of the three kids, who probably shares the most with his furry siblings!  Macy and Cosmo were VERY interested in what was in his basket!   In addition to the typical Milk Chocolate and sparkly sugar coated peeps, the Easter bunny left the girls some very fun GIRLY GIRL gifts. 

These Tokyomilk lip balms are packaged so lovely. Both of them smell lovely but the cupcake one is sweet cream and has such a wonderful but subtle scent/flavor of frosting. They also each found these sweet flat pocket mirrors in the baskets. I thought they were both too pretty not to show!

Hey remember the disaster that was Peyton's birthday cake? I had followed the directions that came with the pan from Williams Sonoma exactly.  I'm not patting myself on the back or anything, but just like anyone else, I CAN follow a recipe.  You might remember, the cake would NOT come out of the pan.  WELL, we tried two BOXED brownie mixes in the pans.  THEY popped out of the pans practically on their own!  I filled them with mint chocolate chip icecream, froze the entire cake.  Let me just say one word.  Yum.  Okay, two words...Easy. Yum.  ;-)   We took Macy and Cosmo to Grandmom and Pop Pops for an egg hunt.  They look like they really couldn't figure out why they couldn't join in the fun!

ABOUT ETSY:

I hope to have the store up and running by the end of this week, beginning of next.  The address is www.whimages.etsy.com if you want to put it into your favorites now.  LOL Just kidding...well kind of, I'd LOVE THAT IF YOU DID! ;-)

Foggy Amish Morning, DREAMY WHITES and Annette Tatum!

Even though we live in Maryland we are about 35 minutes from the Amish Country (Lancaster County) Pennsylvania. There is a nice buffet at a golf resort in Willow Street Pennsylvania (of John and Kate plus 8 fame). A couple times a year we make the LOVELY drive and have a very filling breakfast, drive around a bit admiring the countryside and make our way home. We never fail to see several Amish buggies but today we were lucky enough to see several Amish farmers working their horse teams in the dampness of the early fog. It looks like such a dreamy, slow paced life although I'm sure it's far from like that. Our oldest daughter Callie, said she'd like to spend a week with an Amish family. Matt and I hesitated and then looked at each other and totally just had a fit of hysterical laughing. Matt said she'd be there about 15 minutes and then ask for her Itouch back! I wonder how Uggs look with those long black skirts? I wonder if they'd let her straighten her hair with the iron they heat in the fire? The entire idea of any of us let along one of our techno savy progeny spending time in that life style just seems so preposterous!
There is this GORGEOUS blog that I follow called DREAMY WHITES written by the lovely and talented, Maria. Her photos are gorgeous and I've only recently started following it but I'm totally addicted. She was fortunate enough to be offered a queen size duvet from the UBER-FABULOUS ANNETTE TATUM and her awesome  Home Collection to use in a give-away. I dreamily flipped through the online catalog for of goodness and ohhh and ahhhed over the beautiful fabric combinations before I put my name on the list for the give away. I never win anything so I sort of put it in the back of my mind. WELL, this morning while I was gently nudging Peyton awake with my toe (she had a sleepover in the family room and no, I did NOT feel like bending over and singing her the goodmorning song I usually sing. It's really corny and I know that she'd be MORTIFIED in front of her friend) I quickly checked my mail. LOW AND BEHOLD, GUESS WHO WON THAT GORGEOUS DUVET? Little Ol' ME! I'm beyond excited and couldn't stop talking about it all during breakfast! THANK YOU so very much Maria and Annnette!   I'm going to choose Brocade Pearl!   SQUEEEEEL!

I hope you all have a wonderful and blessed Easter!