Starburst mirrors. . . again!

People! I was just looking at the One Kings Lane sales going on this week, and of course they have some great starburst mirrors, I think by now this sale has already closed BUT that's okay because I just want to remind you of the starburst mirrors that I told you about last week. BTW- really quick, are we calling these sunburst mirrors or starburst mirrors? Everywhere I look they have a different name for essentially the same mirror... hmmm.

Anyways, back to my breaking news! These mirrors

From High Fashion Homes in Houston (but you can order online and ship anywhere) cost $129 a piece!

Whilst this VERY similar mirror on One Kings Lane:

is on SALE for $349, saying it retails for $850!

People!! I'm not going to tell you they are identical, but for the price- I would GLADLY opt for the HFH mirror- which of course I did and it's supposed to be delivered this week!

WOO to the HOO! Get excited :)

Versatile Blogger Award

I always LOVE getting comments from readers on the blog and I try to always respond fast because it is so fun for me to have people get excited about what we are doing! Last week I got an extra fun comment from Kat at WithyWindle. She has nominated me for the Versatile Blogger Award! This is a first for me so I did a little happy dance! Thank you Kat, you totally made my day, even my week month, who am I kidding!!

The Versatile Blogger Award  is a really neat award and community really that was created by bloggers for bloggers to support bloggers. When you are nominated for the award you get to tell seven (relatively) unknown facts about yourself and then share your favorite blogs for everyone to go checkout! So here goes:

1.      I organize my sharpies in ROY G BIV order (anyone else??? I try to tell P it’s totally normal but he’s not really on board). .. just one sign of many of my hyper organization. I may or may not drive my husband completely mad re-organizing the house all the time or just trying to keep everything in its ‘spot”

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2.      I am taking a photography class to help take better pictures for this here blog and it’s been very fun and informative! Hopefully you will see at least a small increase in the quality of the photographs on the blog as I figure the camera out more!

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3.      I am actually pretty shy in person, at least until I get to know you. I am SO bad at meeting new people and feel super self-conscious about it.

4.      I’m a night owl- I think I get my best work done in the middle of the night! Pretty much every room I’ve painted in the house I started around 9pm and finished late night. I like to clean late at night too!

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5.      I’m VERY reluctantly headed towards a gluten free diet.  . . and I’m not super jazzed about it, BUT my stomach definitely thanks me when I do! Purely Elizabeth makes my FAV gluten free stuff so far

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6.      When I laugh really hard (usually at my sister!) I cry AND my jaw shakes like I’m shivering. It’s completely involuntary, and once it starts I seriously can’t stop! SO embarrassing! My family intentionally tries to make this happen so they can laugh at me J

funny, but not super pretty, especially in pics!

7.      I have always lived in the city, not even the suburbs, the CITY city but I desperately want to move to the country and be out in the middle of nowhere! Is that weird??

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As for other blogs that I read, here are 15 that I read pretty much daily and suggest you do too! They are great!

1.      7th House on the Left

2.      Amanda Carol at Home

3.      Better After

4.      Danielle Oakey Interiors

5.      Pineapples and Pickles

6.      Joy the Baker

7.      It’s Great to be Home

8.      Blue-Eyed Bakers

9.      The Norwood Nest

10.  Rambling Renovators

11.  Pawley’s Island Posh

12.  Pixel Impress 

Check them out, they are all GREAT and put up really interesting/ fun blog posts consistently

Patio layout!

Well last Friday, I showed you all the dining set we picked for the patio, which we opted for after we decided on the layout!

TA DA!!!

Please pardon the really terrible sketch that I did at night (shouldn't be too much of a shocker!) without a ruler or any sort of tools! But just to give you a rough idea! Pictures are forthcoming I PROMISE!

This layout having the three "stations" flowed really well and allowed us to utilize the space best! I never really thought we'd be keeping our old small outdoor dining table and two chairs but it works perfectly as a prep area for the grill and for people guys to hang out by the grill while they are cooking! And having the dining table on the large side of the grill allows us to have more people congregate there and for us to pull up more chairs/ table if we want to feed even more people! Right now there are chairs for 12 people on the patio! Which is a marked improvement from 4!

Oh and over in the corner on the far left side I put a gardening bench on the layout- we don't have that yet but there is a great looking one at World Market I'm thinking about, mainly because it can also serve as a bar/ drink station with a little tub you can fill with ice for drinks etc! Might be a nice out of the way spot to keep drinks outside when we have people over!

Do you like? Or are you sick of the teasing and want to see the pictures??? Soon friend, very soon!

And the winner is . . . .

Smith and Hawken patio furniture!!! I just LOVED the style of the chairs and of course the pretty aqua blue So this is on it's way as we speak I type!

Can't wait to put it together, err have P put it together for me and finally get the patio complete!

Sunburst mirrors

I've been wanting to get a pair of mirrors for my dining room to go on either side of china cabinet for a while. I really like the two  photographs hanging there now (clearly- I took them both!) but I think i need something a little more reflective to catch the light from all the living room windows and bring some of it back to the windowless dining room!
So excited to have found these great sunburst mirrors from a local design mecca, High Fashion Homes

Isn't it great? Two of these beauties are on their way to me now :)

Baked boneless buffalo wings

I thought I'd start your week off with a super easy and fast recipe for baked buffalo wings! P loves wings (not going to lie I like them too- well the boneless kind) but knowing the amount of fat going into the sauce, then the frying etc, makes them kind of hard for me to eat!

I came across this recipe for baked honey Dijon chicken tenders a while ago- we made it and it was delicious! The flavor was great, especially in the breading. It was just SO flavorful. So it got me thinking and I decided to use the same quantities of breadcrumbs and spices but instead of using honey, butter and Dijon mustard, I just used Frank's Red Hot buffalo sauce.

OMG! They are amazing- really and truly- P thinks its the best thing I've EVER cooked! If you like wings I really suggest you try them

Ingredients

1 cup panko breadcrumbs

3/4 tsp salt

1/2 tsp pepper

1/2 tsp garlic powder

1/4 tsp paprika

pinch cayenne pepper (I use red pepper flakes if I don't have any cayenne)

1/2 Cup Frank's Red Hot buffalo sauce

1 lb package chicken tenders- or chicken breasts cut into strips

Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Wrap a sheet pan (that has edges) in foil just to keep your cleanup easy, then put a cooling rack onto the pan and spray the rack with non-stick cooking spray. The rack on top of the pan will give all sides of the chicken a really crispy crust.

In one small dish mix the panko breadcrumbs with all of the spices (through the cayenne), In another dish pour your buffalo sauce. I let the chicken tenders sit in the sauce for a minute or two just to let it sink in there a bit.

Then, a few at a time, transfer to the breadcrumb dish, using your fingers to make sure the crumbs stick well on all sides of the chicken. Lay the chicken onto the rack (sitting on the sheet pan) so they are spaced apart and none are touching each other. If you have any more crumbs I usually sprinkle them over the tops of my "wings". Cook for 20-25 minutes or until cooked through and no pink remains.

If your fingers look like this:

you are doing it right!

When the wings come out of the oven I drizzle them with a little more buffalo wing sauce

Then serve with a side of ranch or blue cheese dressing (and usually some zucchini as well!)

Enjoy!

Wii room

While working on finding items for the living room I came across this great ottoman which was the perfect fit for our "Wii room" or Sam's room! It was the perfect size and on sale so I snatched it up and LOVE the way it looks

Please don't mind the large gap in the skirt of the ottoman. . .casualty of war between Sam and a ball : / Hopefully a new love seat coming soon :)

Love the details, and just the shape!

more patio furniture

Well after redoing our patio, we knew we would finally be able to get some outdoor dining furniture. We picked up a small lounge set last fall right after Labor Day on major sale but that alone is not enough to fill our new patio! So we've started shopping for some dining sets, but I'm just not sure what I want! So clearly I'm not quite ready to buy, but in the meantime, we're browsing around these:

Home Depot

Smith and Hawken for Target

Teak Station through Amazon

We are also thinking about adding a couch to our lounge set (love seat and two chairs around the fire pit)

Possibly something like this:

Patio Furniture Buy

Any thoughts on which style would look best on our patio? ?

While Sam's away

While Sam's away, we .  . . redecorate?
HA! Well I'm sure some of you were wondering about little Sam while we were doing the patio/ walkways project on the house. He wasn't trapped inside the house all day, I promise! In fact he wasn't in the house at all! He is off at "doggie camp" getting some manners and hunting training and he loved it!

The owners were wonderful and we got weekly updates on Sam's progress: who he's been playing with and what's he's learned. And it couldn't have some at a more perfect time! There was no way we could have done the patio and sidewalks with poor Sam trapped inside for a week!

Anyways, we were missing him while he was away so I had to post a few pics!

Getting so much bigger! But still loves to sleep right up next to me

his favorite way to take a ride

When he figured out how to pull every toy out of the toy basket- if only he would put them back!

Can't keep him contained to just the tiled area anymore. . . he used the wall to brace himself and then climbed up slots in the frame of his crate. . . and trying to make an escape to the other side before I caught him!

His cute Christmas sweater and new toys!

riding on P's shoulder!

sleepy head!

This one just makes me laugh- it's hard to tell but he is laying on the center console in P's truck trying to climb between the front and the back. He got tired and had to stop for a rest!

ch ch ch changes

Once again- I've got a few more changes in the living room area. Well living room and dining room! We have finally decided to recover our dining room chairs which I'm so excited about. I knew when I got the table that I wanted to recover the chairs so we've been saving up for this change as well! We were in saving mode all last fall which is why I wasn't really doing much to the house! Now its CHANGING mode :) My favorite!!

So I've picked out this great Robert Allen print for the chairs. Well I should say these great prints. We have 8 dining room chairs and only 6 spots at the table right now since we don't have one of the leaves in the table. So the extra two chairs are flanking the TV right now in the living room and i think I'm going to recover those in a different fabric. They are both end chairs and I think it will be kind of fun to have them mixed!

For the main dining room chairs:

And for the two in the living room:

So it would look something like this:

We may or may not be painting the chair frames a creamy off-white color to match the legs of the table. .  . up for debate at this time

Then to help bring the living room and dining room a little coordination we'd do some living room pillows in these fabrics too

coordinating with the navy and light blue pillows we already have!



Living room updates

Remember that silly little design board I did for my living room the other week? Well after picking out the items on the internet I started doing a little more research and looking at the dimensions and the products in the store. .  .womp womp

Pretty much everything I picked out wasn't really the right size for the spaces they were going in. The mirror top tables were way too small for the large area between the two couches, the rattan ottoman thing was way too short for the space and the coffee table, well it was okay actually. Maybe a little shorter than I wanted but okay. BUT when I started changing up my side tables I needed a different style coffee table!

So here's what I've ended up with:

I love that look and that there is a second shelf down below for more storage

Ballard Designs

One of the mirror topped table for where I had the wicker ottoman- going between the leather chair and the couch (from Crate and Barrel)

And this large tufted ottoman in this pretty indoor/outdoor (for wear) blue trellis pattern. It even lifts up and has storage inside!! From Ballard Designs

I really think the room is going to come together nicely! Now I just need to save up to get rid of our very worn denim couch!

Paint colors

You may have noticed in my little design board for the living room some colors around the edges- these are options of paint colors I'm thinking about. I went and got some samples and much to P's dismay we have samples of paint up all over our house again! Hopefully this time it will inspire us to get to work sooner. . . unlike our bedroom that had paint samples up for months! These are more visible so HINT HINT- time to start painting P!

Here's our options for the living room/ dining room:

Top Left is Benjamin Moore's Pearl River, Top right is Restoration Hardware's Silver Sage at 50% (we had already painted a small swatch of full force Silver Sage and it was too dark/ green but we liked the idea so I started mixing) which is why the bottom choice is RH Silver Sage at an unknown % somewhere around 75% I'm guessing- if that's what we pick I'll have it color matched at BM.

Here's a shot from further away. I promise you that the top two colors are not practically white- just how it's showing up in the pics!

I'm also going to go ahead and paint the hall and probably our master bath (again!)

In the hall I'm down between BM Edgecomb Gray on the left and BM Baby Fawn on the right

And possibly painting our very small master bathroom a dark grey/blue. I would love to do this but was always worried it would look dark/ smaller. But I think the window and all the beadboard will keep it light. . .

BM Smokestack Gray

I think we have a front runner but I'm not positive yet. What are your thoughts?

Living Room design board

Like I said before, we are simultaneously working on a few projects at a time! Sounds time consuming and it is, but it's always fun to be busy with projects that you enjoy! I've been looking for a while to replace our couches in the living room. They are both kind of comfortable but neither are really what we are looking for. They don't match and mainly they always look undone. The minute you sit down on it they are messed up and you have to re-fluff all pillows to look decent again. It's kind of like having an unmade bed, in the living room, all the time! They just look messy and ick. And they are both old couches that we acquired through the years from family so I feel like it's time we get a "grown up" couch that we pick and pay for! YIKES I know- I'm growing up right here in front of you!

Except not really because after looking for weeks on end with no success, it seems the only couches I like are a bit more than I was hoping/ planning/ can spend. So, we will wait a little longer and continue to add to our "couch fund" and in the meantime I am adding smaller pieces to the living room so that when we do finally get the couches the room will be complete! At least for a little while!

Here is my poor attempt at a design board for myself (and P) so we can see how everything really looks together. This is why I need a new computer and Photoshop (this was made in Word, forgive me)!

We'll see how it changes over time as I add the different pieces. Thoughts?

The Shed

Did you see me casually throw in the fact that we built a little shed in my patio update post?? Oh yeah! We did. And it was hardly a "little" shed. Coming in at 5 1/2 feet wide, 7 1/2 feet long and just under 6 1/2 feet tall it's aptly named the Extra Large Extreme Storage Shed!

We got to work on this Sunday afternoon thinking it was going to take us a LONG time and lots of frustration, but it was surprisingly easy. Now when I say easy, please don't read quick. It still took us a good two hours to put everything together but there was never any question about what goes where or what is this part for. Not even any leftover pieces which is always a good sign!

Here she is in all her glory

started out with huge pieces like this:

and about two hours later:

standing on the outside edge of the patio- you can see her haning out back there, but most other places you can't even see it!

And it's amazing how much space we have regained in our garage! We can actually put in some cabinets or something!