mantle-tastic!

My mantle

Do you like it?

Pretend that our pictures are above the kids in oval frames.... thats the plan!

I love the way it turned out. I'll love it even more when it's done.

note- the paper matches the hutch.

Turns out that oval frames are a little harder to come by than I planned.

The kids love it because they didn't want goofy school pictures displayed so this was a great compromise. I love to have pictures of the kids everywhere but I do not like the norm, you know- 8X10 school pics hanging in oak frames here there and everywhere... lining your halls, haunting your staircase.... hither and yon....

you know what I mean!

I love silhouettes- I LOVE THEM!

AND

they are easy to make!

I'll make one for you if you want me too- just ask!

*now you see it, now you don't*

Thanks to Mr. B. we have an.....

Unsuspecting accent table? Maybe...

OR

a spot for a little hidden TV so when I need a minute or 60 to make dinner I can set up a movie for Kid4?....

GENIUS!

That Mr. B- if I can dream it, he can do it! I wanted a hidden TV in that little antique victrola phonograph and he made it happen. Isn't it the most beautiful thing ever??!! I love it!

decorating from dawn till dusk and loving every minute of it!

All weekend we have been decorating, painting, sawing, sanding and WORKING hard so that the main floor in the house, the place where we all spend most of our time can be “done”. (is it ever really “done”) Mr.B the kids and I have worked ourselves to the bone each one with their own project hoping to all come together in the end and have it finished and I am thrilled with the end result!

One of my favorite blogs is where I get a lot of my ideas and decorating help. I use the Nesters blog like a decorating thesaurus! If I like something one way I look through her blog to see if she has better ideas and trust me- SHE DOES! The Nester is a very talented decorator and all around good blogger.

When we moved into this house I worried about the TALL walls, I wondered if I would find the right things at the right price and thanks to the Nesters door on the wall idea I certainly did. I used her idea for hanging a door and just love the way it turned out. My door still needs a little something, but I’ll find the perfect little something and add it when I run across it.

My decorating philosophy is if I love it, I can make it work. I love old doors and windows, they have such charm. I love to repurpose an old something or other into something or other of mine to love and enjoy! I love to make the things I have work for me in any house. It can be a real challenge to decorate on a limited budget but it can be done.

I really hoped to find an old door lying around somewhere but it just wasn’t happening for me so I bought a new one for 19.00 from Lowes. I am in love with Robin’s egg blue; I painted Kid4’s kitchen robin’s egg blue last year and have never tired of the striking color. We had these old frames that I had collected from tag sales here and there and repurposed them for this project. The whole project cost me less than 30 dollars- it was a bargain and we’re thrilled with the result.

What do you think?

Tomorrow I am going to show you my hidden TV- I know your on the edge of your seat!

**I want to say a thank you to the Nester for being so gracious about me sharing her ideas. Thank you Nester, you inspire me to decorate with your fantastic creative ideas. Keep up the good work!**

haircuts, memories and old horror!

Three of the kids got haircuts Friday and oh my do they look cute!

Kid1 just NEEDED a haircut and this was the first time he got a style instead of just a boy cut… it was so exciting for him. I won’t lie it made me a little sad to see his feet reach the ground in that barber chair. I remember a time when they were little and their feet hung so far above the floor as they peered at themselves in the mirror wondering what the stranger with scissors would do. As little kids they must have wondered why THEY couldn’t cut their hair but a complete stranger could and WHY is it now okay to talk to a stranger with scissors?

Kid2 wanted a shorter haircut and although I was a little nervous, she has a good sense of style and takes good care of her hair, plus she looks cute in any style. As she sat there I couldn’t help but to remember back to the day that she wanted her hair cut too, just like her brothers went every so often she also wanted a turn. I took them all to a local barber. Kid1 got a bowl cut, so did Kid3 and when it became Kid2’s turn she hopped up in that big ol’ barber chair with her long blonde hair so proud to get her hair cut too- JUST like her brothers. I said to the barber to just give her a little trim because she wanted to be JUST like the boys and have her hair cut too. I turned to tend to Kid3, he was very small and when I turned back the barber was giving her a bowl cut too “Just like the boys”. It was then I realized he didn’t speak good English and all he heard was “just like the boys”….. this is what I tell myself anyway. I don’t know what he was thinking. As her little long blonde hair fell to the floor and she watched in horror I realized that very quickly I was going to have to lose the shocked face and try to make the best of this disaster, after all it’s just hair RIGHT?!

When she was finished I swooped her out of the chair, spun her around and told her that I LOVED her “ice skater” haircut! I told her how much fun we would have that evening going out shopping for new barrettes and headbands; I smiled a very painful smile and pretended to love it. She was not sure she believed me. Even the boys were in shock… they were confused why I was thrilled with such a horrible mistake. I was trying to act as cool as a cucumber and realized I had better call her Daddy before he walked in the door because his face would be covered in obvious horror- sometimes Daddy’s don’t fake ‘thrilled’ as well as Mommies!

So we spent the next few months ooo-ing and awww-ing over her ice skater haircut and trying to support her and not make her feel bad, heading off strangers asking about my “boys” and friends pointing out the obvious. It was a rough few months and she still remembers it. Friday as she sat so still and her feet reached the floor, she looked so grown up telling Holly what kind of style she wanted I thought back to that day - it seemed like forever ago and it was.

When Kid4 got up into that chair with her little feet dangling over the hairy floor I found myself a little nervous, my mouth a little dry and my words fewer as I asked for a “bob”. Kid4 was dreaming of shorter hair and I was sad. As her beautiful brown curly hair fell to the floor on Friday I held her hand and wondered how quickly her life will pass before me and how soon will it be before her feet touched the floor.

Time flies, hair grows but the love and memories of a mother remain true and vivid throughout the years.

My nest is best… (or good enough for me!)

Today we got super busy repurposing our hutch and buffet. I have wanted to get rid of it lately because I’m not in love with it anymore but I just can’t part with it. We bought this piece of furniture when we were very young and it was one of the first things we bought together and I’m nostalgic! I’ve wanted to paint it, sell it, throw it out the window- but there it sat day after day begging me to do SOMETHING!

We did it and I love it. I love repurposing old furniture, old frames, old windows, doors- ANYTHING!

I’m posting the before and after and also the dining room wall. The wall is NOT orange but it looks like in this picture. I’ll try more pictures tomorrow and see if I can get a true color picture.

Mr. B. worked so hard today, he painted while I sanded. I could have never done this without him he carries, paints, unhinges, de-glasses and puts it all back together for me- Thanks Mr. B you’re one in a million!

**OKay seriously I just realized that the "BEFORE" word on my picture didn't show up right... aarrgghh! I'm not going back to fix it because I know you know it says "BEFORE"**

just me

Here's a little pic of me when I was 4 or 5. I was a Daddy's girl!

A Monday miracle

A miracle happened to me tonight. I know it may sound crazy to some of you but this is what happened.

My oldest son, Kid1 wanted to go out with some friends tonight and I usually say yes to Kid1 because he has never done anything to make me not trust him (that I know of anyway). He and his friends hang out doing 16 year old boy things, building cars out of power wheels and racing them I know it seems stupid- but I really don’t mind it’s not a bad thing.

So tonight he wanted to meet his friends at 8:30 and he would be home by ten but I was feeling very uneasy about the whole thing. I just had one of those bad mother feelings. I hated to say no because it was a silly thing to say no to and we were almost where he was going to meet his friends. I asked God in my head to please give us a way out of this. I asked him to please just cancel the whole thing. I wasn’t really sure what to ask for but I just asked for what I knew. Two seconds after my prayer Kid1’s friend called and said they decided not to go out tonight and that he was so sorry.

Kid1 felt so bad because we had driven ten minutes from home and all I could do was smile HUGE, give a little laugh out loud and tell him it was no problem. I kept smiling and he asked me why I was smiling and I told him about my prayer. He smiled because he believes in miracles too!

God DOES answer prayers- he does, even simple ones. Just try it, just ask him!

Thank you God for this miracle and all the others you have granted me!

**this is Kid1 holding Kid4 4 years ago**

Okay so my friend Christy nominated me for this blog award. Thank you Christy I have never been nominated for anything in my entire life. I had to do some research about how to write a proper award acceptance speech, this being my VERY first award and all!

Without further adieu:

Here are the rules-


Say one nice thing about the man in your life.
I have said before in previous posts how I adore Mr. B. But I am happy to reiterate.
Mr. B. You are too good to me. You are the hardest working man I have ever met, I sometimes sit here and ask myself how in the world I am lucky enough to have met a boy who grew into such a magnificent man? You are impressive daily and I am honored that you are mine.


Second- list at least 6 ways you measure success in your life.
1. Having a happy marriage
2. Having faithful, loyal and happy kids
3. Having real and admirable friends
4. Being happy and feeling settled within myself.
5. Being happy with what I have.
6. Having my family be proud of who I am
7. Making sure that the people around me know how I feel about them.


Third- assign 5 other blogs this award.
This one is a little harder than I care to admit because I’m what I like to call a 'page linker'- which means I go to Christy’s blog and then head to Mary Catherine’s blog and then promptly head to the Cowan’s blog, and also McCall's blog. These girls don’t know I read their blogs but I do every single day! So to assign to 5 other people is a bit of a challenge. Here are the 5 personal blogs I read most.


1. Stephanie’s blog (my friend from high school)
2. K.K.s creation (she has the most inspiring things on her blog and she is such a pure hearted person)
3. Razor Family farms (Lacey is such a fun girl with a ton of great ideas!)
4. The Miller family (I have been begging her to update her blog, maybe this will motivate her)
5. Cuddles on the couch (I read her blog a couple of times a week to see the new baby and to read her homeschooling ideas, she has a really sweet heart)

If you were tagged congrats on your award- good luck with your speech and I can’t wait to see who YOU tag!