breakfast room drapes

We are getting breakfast room drapes folks!!! Get excited. I've been looking for a while and after searching for just the right thing-I realized I was going to have to order the fabric and have drapes made. So I took the plunge- I ordered my fabric (through http://www.fabric.com/) and it should be on it's way shortly! YAY!

If you haven't already noticed, our whole house is pretty much blues, tans and browns of some shade with some other accent colors thrown in different rooms. I was looking for a lighter blue/ aqua color for these drapes since this whole area is painted a light sandy color. This is what I decided on:

 Premier Prints fabric- Osborn print in robin

I WAS planning on having these made seeing as i don't know how to sew ( I KNOW- really want to learn though, maybe sometime this year) but then I saw this great tutorial on Young House Love about making your own curtain panels with self adhesive hem tape! So I have already picked up my Heat 'n Bond ultra hold tape from Hobby Lobby and the fabric has come in:

Isn't the color pretty??

And look how nicely it goes with the fabric I picked out to be the seat cushion for my breakfast room table bench:

 I am hoping to start working on the curtains this weekend! I will let you know how it goes and if I am capable enough to iron on my hem tape STRAIGHT!!!

paint chips

Our room is blue. Baby blue. . . baby boy electric blue! I LOVE blue- it's my favorite color by far and I actually want a blue room. Well a blue- grey room. What I have come to find is that if i like the blue on the paint swatch its probably going to look something like a baby boy's room. So now I look for paint chips that are grey but have a blue-ish tone. So I went in search of what I thought was a good blue-grey and came back with a sample of this:

Woodlawn Silver Brook from Valspar

I really had high hopes for this one- and even though it has a bit of a green tinge in the picture, it really doesn't in real life. So I slapped a bit up on the wall to see what it was like, SURE this would be the one. I don't have a good picture of it up on the wall but let's just say this- it was much darker than I was expecting. I really tried to like it- I did, but it just wasn't working for my vision of the bedroom

So I started reading up on blogs about people's favorite paint colors and just looked at colors people had used and I came across Misty by Sherwin Williams (its 2nd from the top):

So I decided to try some of that, and then just for some variety I went ahead and got a sample of another color too. Also SW but I can't remember the name. It was too purpley anyways so it was out. But anyways, here is what I haven ended up with:

The whole bottom area is the Valspar color. The top right is Misty and the top left is the mysterious SW color. Also you can see the original color blue in the foreground on the very left side of the picture. Its hard to tell from this angle but it really is too blue.

So now our room has now been sitting like this for over a month. It is hardly noticable though because of it's location behind the bathroom door and on the side of my closet (that's why the pictures are so bad- hard to get good lighting there!)

Anyways- I am 99% sure the bedroom is going to become SW Misty and the bathroom might end up being Valspar's Woodlawn Silver- the lower color- it is darker than I wanted for the bedroom but I think it would be nice in the bath with the beadboard and the big window. (It too has the same baby boy blue paint) and I like the idea of the bathroom being a shade darker than the bedroom!

I'll let you know when I finally get off my rumpus and try to paint this enormous space. It's really not THAT big (14 X 15) but its bigger than any of the other room's we've painted ourselves AND we have a hallway you walk though inside the bedroom door before you get to the main part. It creates this very long wall that I am NOT looking forward to tackling, yet. One of these days, I'll do it though- and you'll be the first to know!

Going to the chapel!

My sister is getting married. TOMORROW!!!

I'm so stinking excited I could cry, and laugh, and smile, then probably cry again! I have been working with her new sisters in law to put a slide show together for tonight and it's been so fun reminiscing.

Without spoiling it for anyone coming to the party- who is actually reading this today (Anyone, anyone??)

 I have to post some wonderful pictures of my sister, in honor of her big day!

weeks old with my dad and brother!

Christmas day- trying on her ballet costume

happy as could be

with my dad

after singing and dancing to Barry Manilow for my parents wedding anniversary (yes- we actually did that!)

Always making me laugh- ALWAYS

because her laughter is contagious and you can't help but laugh with along with her

and with her Fiance and my soon to be brother in law

I'm so happy for you both and I can't wait to have you in the family.

 I am so lucky to have such an amazing sister. I'm so glad we got past stealing each other's cassette tapes and clothes and became the best of friends. We don't get to pick our sisters but God sure picked the perfect one for me!

I love you Carolina!!!

Curb Appeal

This is what our house looked like on the day we bought it:

cute right? We thought so- love the cedar shake shingles and the ivy of course! And the cute black shutters. We were smitten.

We moved in and started working on the inside of the house and all of the sudden started realizing that we needed to do some work on the outside as well. I felt like the bushes were TOO tall EVERYWHERE and the ivy was overgrown. Want to hear a dirty secret? At one point I was ready to just completely get rid of the ivy! I even asked around about how to do it! But then we (meaning P talked me off a ledge) decided to trim the ivy and do some weed pulling and bush trimming! This was back in September and man- it was a LONG day. I pulled the ivy off of all the window casings and made sure that it was an inch above the foundation and an inch below the roof line/ shingle line so it was trim and tidy looking. SO CUTE! That is when I decided I LOVED the ivy. Really.

pardon the dullness- this was taken in winter

Then we, err, P went to work on the bushes- and trimmed the tops off of the bushes in front of the living room window. So much better- we can actually see the window which is a plus and they are a little more structured looking. (Don't mind the trampled monkey grass- that's from the window install) I realize they look a little funny since they have no leaves on top at this moment, but anyhoo. Good stuff- we tried to tackle the bushes in front of the porch and guest room window but they were just too big.

This is when we realized that the roots are seriously growing out at like a 45 degree angle to get out from under the roof line and they are just massive.

Isn't that crazy looking! That's what you see when you walk out the front door (pardon the nightime shot)

It was on this day that I decided we would be redoing our front yard landscaping!! YAY
Now fast forward 5 months and a BUNCH of work and $$ spent on the inside of the house and I am READY more than ever to have those enormous bushes gone! And what a better time right?

So I drew myself up a little landscaping plan- I might have gone overboard with the color pencils...

 It’s almost to scale too! (My sidewalk got a little out of control in the width towards the driveway- pretty sure we don’t need a 6 foot wide path but whatever) You get the point. So after a bunch of online research I found a landscaping service I really liked. Garden Guy for local Houstonians. Had him over and he’s worked up a plan for us!

SUPER DUPER excited- now I just have to save some more money- more than expected because we decided to pull the trigger on the lighting situation (see Monday's post )

But anyways- come mid-April I hope to introduce you to our new and improved front yard!