Sunday, March 28, 2010

I may have found something!

I know that I just posted....but I found an idea that struck me the moment I saw it. I have attached a few pics below. (a close-up and of the finished piece on the bloggers dining room wall). I found it on Lemon Tree Creations and it was done by Patrice who is one of the three main bloggers. She posts on Thursdays to the blog. Her ideas are amazing and brilliant! This one is for sure in the running for our living room. I like the idea that you can personalize it with books that have meaning to yourself and your family. Since my son Jude and I go to the library often, I think its a great fit for us! I think that since our walls are off-white, the colors of the book covers I choose will really pop. I was thinking blues and green. I can see it now!


Looking for inspiration....

Our living room has taken a drastic change. Our walls once included three walls in a color called Adobe Straw (which was in the beige family) and another one that was chocolate brown. They are now ALL an off white color. There were multiple reasons for the switch. First, I just needed a change. Second, with Spring near, I needed something brighter. And third, we are considering putting our house on the market and thought that it should be more neutral and more of a blank slate for potential buyers. Now that we have the walls painted, I am looking for new DIY wall art that is more artistic and colorful than what I had before, but not something that is too drastic.

My husband and I still have not decided what direction we want to go in as far as our house goes at the moment, so the off white walls are staying for now. Our options are to stay in the house we currently reside, move to another home or to build. The factor that keeps us in our house now is our yard. It is what we fell in love with when we bought it! We have nearly three acres of land that has a creek running through the back. We also have a shed and a rustic fence enclosing our two wonderful dogs in the back yard so we don't have to wory about them when we are at work during the day or are away on weekends. Also, there are over 30 trees in the front yard alone. We own a a wooded acre lot to the side of us as well. The mature trees, the seculsion from neighbors, the quiet and the lushness make us hesitant to leave.
The reason for wanted to move was simply because we wanted more space. Our current home is 3 bedrooms/2.5 bath. Plenty of space for our family of three, but we hope to someday be a family of four or five with a room for guests. Also, we have no "formal" dining space which is a problem only because I love to host gatherings.
We have looked into buying a new house but are finding it difficult. So with exploring our options, we either find a house we love on a lot that is absolutely terrible (in a subdivision on less than an acre---yuck) or a yard we love with a terrible house! We love the idea of building, but again, we are having a hard time finding a lot we love. We are looking to stay in the area or closer in the direction of my husbands job, which is only eight miles away. The problem lies in the fact that we are surrounded by farm land. Therefore, all of the lots are surrounded by corn fields and are bare with no trees! That is not an option with us. Unless we find a lot we love - I think we will stay in our current house and make a five year plan to put an addition on that includes a formal dining room, a guest bedroom and a family room. We will see what happens.

But in the meantime, I am looking for a DIY wall art project to fill our big wall above the couch. It has to be large in scale since the ceiling are vaulted in the living/kitchen area. I will post pics below of the space prior to the off-white paint and hopefully will find something that will work! Any suggestions are strongly welcomed!

Here is the living room. The walls are off-white, rug (and cat) removed and curtains are now blue.
Here is our irreplaceable yard I mentioned.
So lush and not a neighbor in sight!
Here is our view when we have dinner nearly every night in Spring and Summer.
Just posting these pics makes me not want to leave all over again.
We may just have to develop our five year plan after all.

Thursday, March 25, 2010

Yes, I am crazy.

Today is my little angel's First Birthday. I cannot believe that a year has already passed since the first time we met face to face. He has truly been the biggest blessing in my life. He has really shown me what true love is. I have cherished every second of the past year that we have shared. There is no kind of love that is at all comparable to how a mother loves her child.

Speaking of his birthday, his 1st Birthday party was a success. Although I spent countless months planning for the best Mickey Mouse party ever, I did not finish all the things that I wanted to. I still think that the party was great! We had just about sixty or so guests which included 14 little ones. The item that did not get finished that I was most disappointed about was his Birthday banner that I was sewing. It's pretty labor intensive for my first sewing project ever. I am doing it double sided with an iron on in betweeen each side to make the fabric a little stiffer. Then, I was sewing the letters of the banner onto a ribbon for hanging purposes. Needless to say, its unfinished.


I have a tendency to take on much more than can physically and mentally be accomplished in a set amount of time. I handmade all of his invitations which involved getting a template, tracing it onto felt, cutting the felt and sewing them together. Then I had to hand sew two buttons onto each invite. Then, I made a booklet with all the party details contained inside. So that involed formatting, cutting and tying ribbon around it to attach. I will post pictures of the invite later along with a few of the pictures we got back from the photographer, Lisa already. (I asked her to email me a few so I can get working on the "thank you's".


In addition to the invites, I made Oreo Truffles and Oreo Truffles on sticks, chocolate covered pretzels with sprinkles wrapped in invidual bags for the kids gift bags. I also made custom labels for Notebooks with each childs name on it which were called Mouskenotebooks to play on the Mickey Mouse Clubhouse theme and labels for the bubbles and tags for the gift bags. There were also labels for the food in the shape of Mickey Mouse heads.


I had a sense of relief that the party was almost here and over the day before the party. That did not stop my brain from instantly thinking--"OMG-what am I going to do for next year?" Yes, that is how my mind works. I am most satisfied when I am planning something. I love planing parties with a theme. My idea's for Jude's 2nd Birthday are....drumroll please....Barnyard Animals or Transportation.
For the barnyard theme I could make invitations with a different animals face for each one. (a pig, cow, horse, chicken). For the favors I could make a trough or wheelbarrows with goodies in them. Also, on the food table I could have little nests on them with Peeps in them since Jude's birthday isn't far before Easter. For the tansportation theme, I was thinking I could do planes, trains and automobiles for the invites or an airline ticket type paper invite. For the favors I could do mini suitcases with luggage tags and box lunch type meals. How fun would either of those be? I am already feeling the pressure. Therefore, I am indeed a crazy person!


Birthday boy, Jude Maximus.



Opening gifts with mommy.

Some buffet details.


Mickey Mouse invites.


Bubbles with custom labels.


Mousekenotebooks for the gift bags.

Monday, March 22, 2010

Another item added to my never ending list....

I am starting a blog. Isn't that obvious? The reason for this is so that I can keep others updated on whats going on in our world who are too far away to really "stay connected" and also, I think it will serve as an "online journal" of a sort to keep my thoughts organized and milestones our family reaches in order and documented. I have a journal that I started for my son, Jude quite some time ago but never seem to make it a habit of writing in it consistently. Therefore, this is what I have resorted to. Also, if I decide that something significant is posted on here....I can take the easy route and print it and paste it into his journal. Smart thinking, huh?


Well I hope you enjoy it. You will find that much of my time is consumed by tending to my wonderful, almost one year old Jude, whose birthday is in three short days and keeping up with my husbands busy schedule as a teacher, Head Football Coach and Assistant Wrestling Coach. I also work as a Biller at a Chiropractic office at the moment and is in the process of trying to figure out the steps I need to take to pursue the career that I want. In addition, I love to plan events. I just had Jude's First Birthday party yesterday afternoon and it was great! Picture's to be posted as soon as I get them back from the photographer!