All that's left of the Christmas tree

The Wisteria Outlet is the absolute JAM!

I should mention that this is the most I have ever blogged! I think it's directly related to the fact that my class is over and my clients are few and far between right now!

Back to it, shall we?

My mother was headed to the Wisteria Outlet and asked if I had any requests. Yes. Two of these, please:

No Go.


A few minutes later she texted me this:

I had been eyeballing these Medallion Iron Arm Chair for a long, long time. Then they disappeared. This is typical for me. I watch and watch things, and then they disappear.
I think that is the Libra part of me.


Well, low and behold four of these fabulous chairs popped up! Regularly priced $299. At the outlet $179...After a little haggling...$74!!! SEVENTY FOUR DOLLARS, people! Granted there is a little rust on the back, but I can fix that!

I get ridiculously giddy over good deals! This is no exception!

These are going to look great around the (round) table that I have yet to find! :)

A new house

In my dreams, of course.

Santa did not deliver my extra bathroom/closet/office space. Bad Santa. I'm moving on to bigger and better things dreams.

I know that it will be extremely hard to leave the house we are in now. We have put a lot of sweat into this little place and I think it looks pretty good.

But, if we were to ever build, these are some styles I'm liking right now. Today. Highly likely things will change in 6 months.

Southern Living's Sandy Hook Cottage

I really like the floor plan. Love the porches. The only thing that is missing is a bedroom downstairs. We are dreaming, right?

If you notice the two front rooms separated by the vestibule. I picture it looking something like this:

And in the back, the kitchen and family room...

We can't forget about the back porch! 

This is one of my favorites from all of my pinterest boards...

One single snap shot from christmas

Christmas has come and gone. What a busy 48 hours! Holy cow. I only got one picture. The cookbook was actually intended for Jason's sister, but he got it instead. SOL, Erin. We've got your veggie book. :)

My goal is to have all the Christmas stuff in the attic by January 3rd, just before my next class starts. 

dish towel sweat shop

I have been really burning up my sewing machine. 

What you see here, multiple it by a million.

Just about everyone I know will be receiving monogrammed dish towels.

SURPRISE!

Don't be fooled. I did NOT make the actual towels. 

Those are from the TJ Maxx holy land.

I have had the sewing/monogramming machine for nearly a year and 

have used it more in the past 10 days than I have all year long. 

Lots of learning this week. :)

Myrtus Communis: Week 1

This week we had our front beds reworked overhauled gutted. We had everything ripped out. I wanted to replace the shrubs with a plant my mom has. She actually gave me the same plant a few years ago and to her surprise, I was able to keep it alive until this summer. Sadly, I forgot to move it out of the blazing heat/sun while we were gone to the beach. So now its dead. Boo.

She bought them (we think) in Brenham, Independence, or Roundtop, but we can't find them here. It didn't help that we didn't know what they were.

I took a bunch from her plant to Akin's, and within a few minutes the girls were making bets as to what it was. Before long they concluded that it was in fact MYRTLE! And they didn't have any.

They dipped the stems in some hormones? and sent two home with me. I am to keep them moist (her word not mine), and hope they start to grow.

Here we are at week 1:

Shop with Docs

We got word Friday afternoon that volunteers were needed as personal shoppers for the following morning.  A group of doctors donated money to the Lighthouse kids (50 children to be exact), and we were to help them shop. 

It was real sweet, the kids had no idea they were going to target, and had no idea they were going to be given $350 each to spend. 

shreveporttimes

There were some guidelines: $125 was to be spent on clothes and necessities, $125 on toys and $70 on a gift(s) for people in their family. 

I was excited to be a part of this! Sometimes I get a little teary about things like this--I'm a cryer. I just knew I was going to boo-hoo the whole time, which I did NOT.  Probably because the kid I was paired with continued to tell me how "bored" he was, and how he "wanted to go HOME!" I tried every angle to get him involved and make the day special, but he just wasn't having it. He was just a little turd. Such a bummer.

Jason on the other hand, had the cutest, roundest, funniest, most appreciative little boy EVER. They had so much fun together. 

Meet Darrel:

shreveporttimes

This kid was loads of fun. He told Jason he wanted to go to the clothes department first. HA. Not Jason's favorite department. Luckily, my mother showed up and helped fit both of our little boys with new threads. :) She was great! She just showed up out of no where and we were so thankful for her help!

Staying within the budget was up to us. They gave us a little notepad and pen and we just had to wing it. I ended up forking over an extra 40 bones for my kiddo, but Jason did really well. He came in under budget. Check out his note taking skills:

Towards the end, we were in the men's underwear department looking for my kids dad a gift (slippers, scarf--not underwear), when Jason's kid pops up out of the clothing rack waiving around some men's Superman bikini underwear, yelling "oooo oooo my daddy say he neeeed these! he want 'em reaaal baaad!" I'm talking blue underwear, with red trim, and the superman emblem on the crotch. The real deal, y'all! At one point he was holding a pink wallet for his 'mommaaa' under his arm and waving the superman underwear around. Funniest sight ever.  Unfortunately, Jason didn't feel they had room in their budget for them. 

Cut to the check out line. Who comes up $15 under budget? DARREL. And what does Darrel want to do with that extra $15? HE WANTS TO BUY HIS DADDY SOME SUPERMAN UNDERWEAR! The funniest thing ever! Greatest kid ever. 

It was a real fun morning. I think I got teary once. Okay twice. Once at the beginning when they got there and were told--they were so excited. The second was at the end. There was this sweet kid who had one bag and one box--as opposed to the other kids around him who had multiple bags and bikes and scooters and other ridiculous loot.  

He was soooo proud of his box. 

He picked out a Christmas tree. I'm telling you I nearly lost it. Ohmygosh. I mean really. Of all the other junk he could have gotten--he gets a freaking Christmas tree! So sweet. So sad. So happy. So proud.  I don't know. I just lost it. I think about how freaking excited I get around Thanksgiving, knowing I'm getting a tree...I have never ever, ever known a Christmas without a Christmas tree. 

Such an awesome way to celebrate the holiday season! 

Eff tha Po-lease.

I'm gangsta. No, not really.

Okay, so I  have relatively strong opinions about some of the shreveport coppers. I think they are idiots. No need to rush into defensive mode. I said some.
I have been taking 'data' on interesting/questionable things I see cops do when I'm out and about.
Today was a little different.

There is an intersection in Shreveport that is in serious need of a camera. People are shameless about running this light. Maybe they think they can beat the orange, but fail. Big time. So I was headed North on Line when I spotted a five-oh blow through the light. I was hot. (I think the douche who cut me off moments before triggered my *rage.) I was so hot that I followed the cop. I decided that I would say something to him if we got stopped next to each other at the next light. RED. So I roll down my window and he does the same.

Me: I am not trying to be accusatory BUUUT...I have seen some serious accidents at the intersection of Line and Pierremont due to people running the stop light. And I actually just saw you run it.

Ahole police: Ma'am, I DID NOT RUN THAT LIGHT.

ME: Okay, maybe you didn't notice ;) but I saw ya, and it happens. It would be awesome if we got some cameras, or police presence. Its so dan---

Ahole cop: MA'AM. I. DID. NOT. RUN. THE LIGHT.

ME: Okay, all I wanted to--

Ahole cop: I'M GONNA TELL YOU AGAIN. I DID NOT RUN THE LIGHT. THE TIMING MUST BE OFF (bullshit), BECAUSE I WOULD NEVER RUN A LIGHT.

It's not a case of bad timing. I have been watching that light forever. And even if it was, the city would be stupid to have not noticed or fixed it.

Anyways, our light turned green and I managed to get in a 'its dangerous--don't run it.' And turned on the first street I could. My inspection sticker is way out of date and I'm pretty sure I didn't have my seat belt on.

I can GUARANTEE that had there been a camera on that light, it would have proven he ran it. I have seen a gazillion regular ole folks and shreveport's finest police officers run that light. Hey, I'm guilty too. At one point in time, I thought it was a good idea to do sixty mph between fern and fairfield just to avoid red lights. Not any more. :)

Fiery decor

I lit a few candles on the mantle  tonight. I was very careful to move the garland and the lighted berry garland away from each candle. Apparently not too careful.

Jason was in the kitchen and I was straightening up, I walked into the dining room and could see HUGE flames exploding on the mantle in the living room. Okay, maybe not HUGE, but six inches high. Enough for me to scream a good ole HOLY shit! 

The crazy thing is that the lighted berry garland still lights up! I loved those berry's--they came from the late great Smith and Hawken. Irreplaceable. Ah well, at least our house didn't burn down! 

'Tis the Season...

Oh, it is my favorite time of year! I love gearing up for Christmas. However, its been a little spotty this year. The class I am taking is pretty demanding so I have been pulling out and putting up Christmas decor during breaks from work and homework. Needless to say, it looks like a tornado is hovering over our living room.

Jason and I got our tree the day after Thanksgiving, like we do every year. With his eyes glued to the game on TV, he contributed by hanging holding the lights.

Ollie, my helper. 

Ellie 

We started hanging the lights outside. Not quite finished. 

Three months later...

In October, J and I cruised down to Austin... Of course, I wanted to stop in Brenham.  So we made a quick stop there. We were there for only an hour and I managed to run in all the stores that were open and run out to Mr. Glenwood's.

Klump Farm

Off to Austin...

When planning this trip, I couldn't find any decent prices on hotel rooms--of course, the austin film festival and the world book festival were both happening that weekend, so that meant that all rooms were like 350 bones a night.  I'm not down with that, at all.  So I snagged a VRBO. This place was perfect for us. It was a block off South Congress, right in the middle of it all, really.  Sometimes VRBO can be hit or miss, this time it was definitely a hit. 

We were there for only 3 days, and all we did was walk, eat, nap and shop (I managed to sneak away from jason twice to hit the outlets in San Marcos).  One morning we took a glass blowing class. Very cool experience.

"Center it." "KEEP IT CENTERED!" 

She must've said this to us a hundred times. 

Jason kept repeating "Ceeennnter it" the rest of the day. ha!

Swinging--while keeping it center? 

*move your curser over the photo*

blowing. :) 

The goods: two ornaments, two paper weights, and two glasses. The teacher made the two on the right.

Around the house...

Our neighbor has a rent house that is IDENTICAL to our house. It is so weird. Its the same--down to the left over wood used as shelving in the hallway closet. Anyway, she was nice enough to give us the screen door that hadn't been used in years and years. I'm so excited about this thing--when it cools off, we will be leaving the door WIDE OPEN!

We couldn't wait to start working on it. In the heat of the day we began sanding and taking the screen apart. 

Looks like we have grass!

I'll post some after shots ASAP!

Its kind of been a big week on the home front. Screen door and brick steps! My mom's guy came and bricked over our concrete stoop. We are pleased with the results! (hopefully he'll be back in the fall to do my beds!)

before:

after:

It really looks like fall in that photo--and my door looks turquoise!

strong like bull

We have an escape artist. Her name is Eleanor.  We have known from the beginning that Ellie can't be held back. She is a wild child.

She was jumping the fence, so we got a new fence.  She was pretty good for awhile, until she wasn't.  So we figured out where she was getting out and devised a plan to fix it. Our plan included 8 cinder blocks, 12 bricks, sand and lattice.

We really thought we had come up with something that she wouldn't get through--we were so wrong.

Okay so it's a little ghetto--but notice the cinder blocks. 

No bueno.

DIY--replacing the potty

Let me start off by saying, I hate our bathroom. HATE IT!  It is so small, there is no quarter round so the tile doesn't meet the wall properly, the tile around the tub is shotty--and the BATHTUB! oh gosh, it is nasty and old and just gross. (hopefully the next bathroom project we do will involve busting out the bathtub!)

I realized the toilet was leaking when i was cleaning, so we decided to go ahead and replace it.

I thought I'd do a step-by-step post, but there really isn't much to replacing it--so i won't. You take the old one off, clean, put the new one on and thats it!

These pictures are so embarrassing, but here they are:

How gross is that?! 

BAM! 

A little cleaner, and i can now sleep better knowing the wall is painted behind the toilet!

Okay, so there really isn't away to photograph a newly installed toilet to make it look like a fabulous new toilet--but it is fabulous and totally makes a difference in the bathroom! 

Front Door...

Here it is. Black door. Black shutters.
This is from last summer. The porch is no longer sagging.  :)

Here it is stripped.

The color on the door is a sample of Catalina Blue by Benjamin Moore. Initially, I was pretty happy with it, but not so much now.    

I have a feeling the door is going to look like this for awhile.  :(

Bicycle Race

I have danced around getting a bicycle for a long time. When I lived in Holland that was my only form of transportation (that or hoofing it) and i became quite fond of riding...not to be confused with 'riding' like lance armstrong 'riding'--more like cruising.
So after winning a $100 credit to River City Cycle, we decided to go ahead and BUY A BIKE! whoop whoop! Totally pumped about this purchase!  Jason actually sold his road bike the following week and purchased a boy version similar to mine.
I really wanted a 'cute' bike, but ended up with a more practical bike (that i can soup up at a later date and will eventually learn to love).
Since the weather has been perfect lately we have taken advantage and hit the streets on the bikes.

 Eleanor has even gotten in on some bike action. Jason would pedal as fast as he could (UP hill) while Ellie would pull him. PULL him. She is such a machine. 

leaning tower of chocolate

My grandmother and I made the ugliest, but possibly the most delicious cake in all of Louisiana...

Looking to the Pioneer Lady for some help!

Making sure everything tastes just right. 

You can tell that it's a little lopsided, but in all actuality it was REALLY lopsided. 

front door inspiration...

I have an overwhelming desire to paint my front door turquoise. This just might happen this week.