Clean and Purge

It must be this beautiful spring-like weather that made me get the itch for some 'spring cleaning'. Or maybe it was the fact that my closet is busting at the seams and I am only wearing half of the clothes in there. Either way, today was the long over due day that I decided to attack my closet. Looking back I usually do this twice a year but obviously need to keep on top of it a little more. As soon as I buy something new and hang it in the closet I should be getting rid of something else. Sometimes easier said than done :)

In the end I hit every article of clothing. Pajamas, socks, underwear, shorts, capris, pants, shirts, tanks, you name it. I ended up with 4 garbage bags full and freed up over 60 hangers in my closet. Now THAT feels good!

Asparagus

I have a friend that recently said that Pinterest is making her a better cook :) I cannot say that I am necessarily a better cook but it is absolutely opening my eyes to new things that I would not have tried before. Tonight it was asparagus.....

So simple. Drizzle some olive oil, sprinkle some parmasen cheese, pop it in the oven and voila!

Turning Green

We are slowly seeing the Valentine's red disappear and infusing our house with a touch of green....

Four Months

Four months have passed since little Miss Mya has left this earth to join the angels and look after her mom, dad and big brother. I was surprised by the sweetest gift that still brings tears to my eyes. Mya's parents had these mementos made and we were honored to have received one. Krystal and Tyler, you continue to amaze me with your generosity, love, strength and courage. You carry yourselves with such grace and poise in a time in your lives when it would be perfectly acceptable for things to be so different.

It is just gorgeous and leaves me speechless. She now adorns our photo gallery wall with all the rest of our family and loved ones.

Photo Canvasses

I was beyond excited when I received my photo canvasses that I had ordered to finish off our master bedroom. They are perfect and exactly what I envisioned! I chose to use Costco for these canvasses due to the issue of quality. There are lots of places out there to order from (and some less expensive) but I just trust their quality overall. The site also allowed me to move the images around on the canvas where some of the others restricted that.

Thanks to my amazingly talented friend Starr Mercer, of Starlite Studio Photography for taking our family photos this past fall and providing me with these awesome images to adorn my walls!!

Happy Valentine`s Day!

The boys love days when they get mail and today they got a little gift in their card from Grandma and Grandpa Irwin who have jsut recently returned from their winter Mexican holiday.

So cute. The boys love them!

I have a dream

I know I have mentioned this before, but I soooo badly want a mantle that I can change out seasonal decor on. I found something that would work a while ago on the Pottery Barn website but with the $400 price tag plus shipping I have been hesitant. With my addiction to Pinterest I keep scouring the site for ideas and have finally come across a tutorial to possibly attempt to make this little dream of mine a reality. Stay tuned! DIY is not something that I tackle generally but I am quite cofident that I can pull it off......we will see!

Here is a quick peek at what my I see in my dreams :)

Vegetable Soup

I felt a little like venturing outside of my comfort zone today and decided to try making some homemade vegetable soup. It actually turned out good enough that I am going to have to make a freeze some more very soon!

An Afternoon Outing

It is very rare, in these winter months, for us not to be on the road to a hockey game somewhere. Lying in bed on a Saturday morning daydreaming of what was or could be on the agenda led me to text a girlfriend to make a quick road trip to this quaint little decorating store.

Shannon, the store owner and operator, has such a well trained eye for all things great. She runs a fabulous business and will bend over backwards for any request. We have bought a few pieces of furniture and decor items from her in the past but I am sad to say that on this day I left empty handed :(

If you are looking for anything design wise be sure to check her out at Front Porch Interiors!

Ouch!

Hudson came home from school today with a bit of a goose egg. It is hard to tell in this photo but it was actually quite raised and getting bluer, blacker by the hour.

Boys will be boys!

Gifts frm the G-rents

The boys got these personalized bracelets in the mail from Grandma and Grandpa Irwin, who just returned from the Mexican vacation.

"Love Day" Classmate Gifts

I was able to finish off the boys Valentine's Day gifts for their classmates today. This was really a simple project once I got the label all designed and set up.

I initially found a similar project to this on Pinterest. Thank you Pinterest for all you do! ;)

I designed the labels on my Silhouette because then I could use the grid and make them the right size. Once printed I used my 2" scallop circle punch to cut them out. The shovels were a 7" shovel. I ordered 50 of them from an online party store for 0.49 cents each. I then used a clear cellophane bag measuring at 6" tall. put 2 small punches in the tops of the tags and ran a piece of ribbon through it an tied it off. The M&Ms were probably the most expensive part of this whole project.

Some were just from Hudson, some jsut from Graidan and some from both boys to give to mutual friends and neighborhood buddies.

Happy Love Day Everyone!

Wall Art

Now that the room is coming together I need to do something about the one completely blank wall that we have going on here. I do not often find myself actually watching daytime television but tday when the Nate Berkus Show was on I found myself sitting down with my cup of tea taking some of the show in. And I am so glad I did. Today he featured another fellow blogger that does alot of fabulous stuff around her home. Destiny from A Place For Us Blog was on a segment of the show to demonstrate 3 of her favorite projects of 2011 and one of those projects was her Brown Paper Flowers and I though they were right up my alley. You can view her detailed tutorial here. Tonight I decided to try one and like how it turned out enough that I then thought I could incorporate it into our master retreat. I decided to try spray painting it in the same yellow color as our hamper and then mounting it on a blank white 12x12 canvas.

This is how it turned out:

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This canvas is again a 12x12 sprayed in the same yellow. I then made a template of this design on my SILHOUETTE and cut it out on white vinyl. I found that the vinyl wasn't sticking to the paint very well so once I carefully got it all laid out I then put a thin coat of Mod Podge on it and let it sit for the night to dry.

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And here they are hung up on the wall in a little grouping with a frame I had done up a couple f weeks ago when I was out picking up oaint chips to decide what color to go with on the walls. I chose all the ones I liked and brought them home to the room so I could test the color in the real light. Didn't see any reason for them to go to waste ;)

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Not so bad for cosing me nothing!

Clothes Hamper gets a facelift ;)

I am at it again. I cannot leave things alone..... today I decided to spray paint our clothes hamper to fit in with its new surroundings. I figured, if it didn't turn out then I could go hunting for a new option and if it did wrk all it cost me was a can of spray paint.

I am not sure yet if I love it yet or not. Ryan hates it! I think it looks too bright. The can sure looked alot more "mustard-like" compared to what it turned out like. We will live with it for a week or so and then I will decide what to do about it.

What do you think?

Master Bedroom Re-vamp

I get bored easily. I have to often be doing something. Keeping my hands busy. Ryan hates watching movies with me because now rather than giving th movie my full atention I am either blogging, editing pictures, crafting, or something else. My logic is that if I am going to be sitting down without kids distracting me then I am going to be getting something productive done while watching the movie....multi-tasking :)

Sometimes my boredom just needs me to make a change. Whether it is buying new clothes, getting my hair cutécolored, or rearranging furnture. Well, our master bedroom is an odd shape to move things around too many different ways and our King bed doesn`t make things any easier. It has been 5 years since we built this house (I cannot believe it!) and our master has been moved around a couple of times but this time I was ready for something bigger. Something more dramatic. And something dramatic is what I got! I started out with some paint, a new ceiling fixture, new lamps, decor and art work. I am still waiting for a couple of things (nightstands and photo canvasses) to arrive but wasn`t wanting to put this reveal off any longer. I am so loving it that you cannot get me to leave my room! After the kids go to bed at night Ryan goes down to the basement and I go up to our room. Probably not the best thing for a marriage but for us it works :)

BEFORE

AFTER

My Inspiration :)

I purchased 3 Matt & Nat bags in the last couple of months and this one is one of my faves. More than andything I just love the color

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This is the same dresser in the same place. All we did was take the mirror off and get a new TV to mount on the wall instead.

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Armoire is also unmoved. We still had the doors in the storage room and put them back on. Now that the big clunker of a TV was out of it Ryan now has more room for his clothes (since he has no room in the closet) and we can have a more finished look on the cabinet.

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I wouldn`t have believed that a light fisture could change a room so much but this one really does make the room, I think. I really like how it works in there and it jus thas such presence ;) I initially thought I wanted some type of chandelier and then I decided on this.I purchased it from here.

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A couple of decor elements from one of my favorite stores - Hobby Lobby....that of course is second to TARGET!

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Then for my absolute FAVORITE part of the room. I have always had a soft spot for white linens and bedding and had always talked myself out of getting them but this is what I wanted. After searching and searching I ordered our bedding from here.

As you can see the wall on the left of the photo is angled and so our current nightstands do not fit the width of this wall, hense why we have not moved things around that much. For now I have decided on a set of white nightstands from IKEA that I am hoping will replace these ones temporarily (at least until I change the room around again). They are currently white and my plan is (mush to Ryan's disagreement) paint them mustard yellow as well. I will have to see once I get them and decide what to do.

Also the headboard is a bit of a bone of contention for me. I want so badly to change out the fabric in the center to match the current room but I want to do so without compromising the current fabric and headboard. This is where I am hoping Karen can help me. If anyone has any ideas please feel free to let me know what you think!

I have also ordered 3-16x20 photo canvasses of my boys to put above the headboard to finish off this wall. I will update the blog once they arrive and get hung up ;)

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Pillows. Pillows. Pillows. I LOVE Pillows. Another reason I was able to talk myself into the white bedding was that it could last a little longer. We never sleep with our comforter on our bed (we each cocoon into our separate blankets) so it gets folded up on the floor each night. I thought that if the white was standing up ok then changin gour room out in the near future would just require a few new pillows to infuse some different colors into the room. The pillows were from (Back Left) TARGET; (Back Right) and Etsy find; (Front Left) came with the bedding; (Front Right) another TARGET specialty. Did I mention how much I truly enjoy that store? :)

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So do love the texture of all of these pillows!

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Well, that is my progress thus far. Thanks fo stopping by!