Out of Commission

I am out of commission for probably a few days, my laptop contracted a nasty virus and needs to probably be reformatted.  Fun, fun!  Our other computer is located right outside my son's bedroom and since I do almost all of my posting at night, probably not a good idea to keep him awake while I type.  I hope to have this resolved soon because I have some great photos to share and a few projects I've been working on.

Favorite Photo Tuesday #4

Last Friday I went to a really cool place called the George Ranch Historical Park.  I want to go back because having two kids in tow did not allow for me to discover and see everything the park had to offer.  I also found my dream house there.  So, to my hubby, this is the castle that I would like to have since I'm obviously a princess.  I am seriously disappointed that I didn't get to tour the inside of this house.  Next time...next time!

Seriously, is that not the house that you dream of...big tree in the yard, white picket fence?  Ahhh, a girl can dream.  I just didn't think I would find my dream home in Texas...and that it isn't for sale because it's part of a museum that is dedicated to over 100 years of Texas history.

Happy Easter

I want to wish you all a Happy Easter from my family to yours!

I hope that you are able to spend the day surrounded by the company of family and friends.

I'm a Princess!

My son Maben is so sweet, during the creation of this dress, I tried it on and he gasped.  He looked at me and said, "Mommy, you're a princess!"  I melted.  He then asked me where my castle was and I told him our house was our castle...he disagrees.

This is only the second dress I have ever sewn...so be nice.  I took a jersey tank top that was not long enough for my super long torso, cut off part of it and sewed the skirt (which I did all the construction on) to it.  I added a zipper in the back.  I sewed in a piece of elastic around the waist, to reduce the amount of weight on the jersey so it wouldn't stretch out too badly.  I love the fabric and fairly satisfied with the finished product.  What do you think?

The fabric is Kaffe Fassett Lake Blossoms Red.  I purchased mine from fabric.com and have wanted to make a dress or skirt with it ever since I first laid eyes on it.  (Not an affiliate link, just where I bought mine)

Blast From the Past: Looking Beyond

I have been busy working on something that I hope to show you tomorrow, but in the mean time I will show you a blast from my past.  I did this painting back in 2006 while suffering from insomnia caused by steroids given to me when I injured my foot.  I had been watching a documentary about crop circles, which inspired the tattoos.  The woman is a combination of 5 different celebrities.  Don't ask which ones because I really don't remember.  This painting sold at my very first (and only) One Man Show.

I have been asked the meaning behind the painting, "Looking Beyond."  To me, it is about not being alone and looking beyond your current situation and into the future.  The future always brings hope, beauty and endless possibilities.

Favorite Photo Tuesday #3

After all the work was done on the house, our contractor gave us a beautiful bouquet of flowers.  I took a few of the flowers out and snapped some photographs of them laid out on our black marble topped bar.  This one is by far my favorite, it's a spider mum.

I Had a Fabulous Weekend and Announcing a Winner!

My son's school had their Spring Fling Friday night.  Hubby was able to drag himself away from work early enough to join us.  The preschool bench was auctioned off and it went for much higher than I could have imagined.  You can read all about it here.  It made me feel amazing that people appreciated the bench as much as I do.  I would have loved to bring it back home and put it in my yard, but it flew right out of my price range.  Good thing I know how to build one!

There were a lot of fun and games at the Spring Fling and the boys spent a good amount of time in the bounce house.  Colton proved to be quite a bruiser and held his own among the older kids.  He had a blast.

Saturday morning I went to my woodworking club meeting.  It was eventful and it looks like our group is merging with another club!  Who knew there were two clubs in my area.  Awesome!  The leader of our woodworking club also invited us all over to his house and let us pick through his scrap pile of lumber.  Hubby and I brought a bit of it home...oh the ideas going through my head.  I then headed out to 24 hour fitness, we had a brand new one open up and it was their grand opening.  It's a few miles further than the one I normally go to, but half of the cardio equipment has their own personal tv's.  SOLD!  I think I will hit that one up more often.

Sunday hubby actually got to spend the day with us!  That was nice.  We spent part of the day at the mall shopping.  He needed more work clothes and I needed more summer appropriate clothing that fit.  I'M IN A SIZE 6 NOW!!!!!!!!

Today I also decided to paint the mailbox post.  I painted it the same color as the house.  I even used the same paint...even though in the photos it looks much lighter in color than the house.  Now I need to get the paint to do the numbers on the side of the box.  I tried to buy it today, but my ACE Hardware sucks and decided not to carry the spray paint that was on sale.  Booo!  Oh well, it will get done...eventually.

Since you have hung with me this long, I should probably announce the winner of my very first giveaway!

sabrinalauren you are the winner!

Congrats and I will be in contact with you to find out which pen you want me to send you!  

Siding and Windows

It's done...it's finally done!  The construction on my house is done!  It was quiet Friday.  My kids slept in.  I couldn't be happier...but still tired.  It is quite the transformation.  I can almost relax now.

It was so hard to deal with a construction crew here for a few weeks.  I know I bugged the crap out of them, partially because I was here a lot and the other part because between hubby and myself, we have quite a bit of DIY knowledge and would ask questions as to why/how certain things were getting done.  It was also hard to deal with all of this because of everything going on with life!  Anyways, it's done!

I love the new colors.  The house color wasn't bad, but it wasn't great and I HATED the before accent color.  It just reminded me of baby poop.  I am loving the contrast of the new colors.  We used Olympic Toasted Almond and Poppy Pods.

Also, is it just me or does the house look bigger now?  

We also got brand new gutters that wrap around the house and invested in gutter guards.  My hubby HATES cleaning out the gutters and as you can see, we have trees, which means he is up on the roof often to clean them out.   No more of that! 

The windows are the biggest change that I notice.  A lot of our old windows were the slide ones, not lift.  The old windows were plate glass from 1978!  They all now open/close and LOCK!  Important feature!  The old windows had warped to the point where most of them didn't even lock.  Good thing we have dogs that will totally eat someone.  The new windows also let more natural light in and it is so amazing. 

Seriously...look how crystal clear that is.  Even Colton is in awe of it.  The bad part of it all is all the cleaning I have to do.  This is most of the reason why.

The windows in the front of the house were such a tight fit that they had to shave the brick down.  Even though precautions were made, my house is still covered in a layer of dust.  So, most of today was spent vacuuming, dusting, rehanging blinds.  I'm not even close to being done.

The one thing that is very apparent now is that I need to work on my flower beds.  They got TRAMPLED!  Boys just don't care about those types of things.  Their attention to detail is not as good as a woman's.  Point proven below.

The house numbers didn't get painted and the '3' is a little off.  So, here is a list of things I need to fix/do in the front of the house and I can relax.

• Paint the lattice that hides my trashcans to match the house.
• Paint the mailbox post to match the house.
• Paint numbers on the sides of my mailbox.
• Replant my flower bed.
• Fix the house numbers.

Don't forget to enter my first giveaway!  

Bottle Caps as Fine Art...AWESOME!

I saw this while cruising the web and had to do an immediate post.  How AWESOME is Vincent Van Gogh's, "Starry Night" when done in bottle caps?  It came as NO surprise to me when I read that it was done by two college students.  I mean, where else would you find 8,000 bottle caps laying around to create such an awesome work of art?

My hats off to Ross Thomas and Elizabeth Farrell for a job well done.

All photos and info was found here.

I Can See the Finish Line

Now, if we could fast forward and be there that would be awesome!  The home construction, mixed with regular life, kids, plus medical issues and hubby working late hours has resulted in me losing my mind.  I have laughed at a lot of things that ARE NOT funny, like the news that I still have a cyst.  It was in fact on the outside of my uterus, not the inside...the sonogram was very misleading, so yeah, should have been a completely different surgery.  I have also cried a lot more than normal, like when the replacing of a window in my son Maben's room resulted in glass exploding all over his blankets, bed, toys, etc.  What a mess that was to clean up, even after the workers here cleaned it. 

But today...today there was a glimmer of hope that we are almost to the finish line.  I saw the guys start painting the outside of my house.  I still have a couple more days of this, but I can at least see the finish line and know that it is coming sooner rather than later.  I can't wait to show you all the reveal! 

Also, don't forget to check out my very first giveaway!  So far only one person has entered...her odds of winning are looking pretty good. 

Happy 100 and a Giveaway!

This is the 100th post since I started blogging!

I am so excited and can't believe that I have made it this far!  I started this blog to help me keep track, inspire and share with everyone all the creativity that bubbles up and out of my head.  When I first started I didn't know how this would evolve or how far it would take me, but am loving the ride that the blog has taken me on so far.  I also love all the people I have gotten to know and all the awesome bloggers that I have discovered existed out there!

In celebration of my 100th post I am doing a giveaway!  (My very first giveaway!)  You have the opportunity to win one of three pens that I churned out last night for this awesome occasion. 

All three pens are a slimline style pen and the wood is redheart.  I turned each in a different shape and if you win, you can choose which pen you want!

There are a few rules to this giveaway!

1. You must be a public follower of my blog!  Leave me 1 comment letting me know you are a follower.

2. Actually, that is really the only rule, but if you want additional entries into this giveaway, blog about this giveaway!  That will give you an additional 2 entries.  Leave a comment for each entry. 

You have the chance to get up to 3 entries into my very first giveaway!  The giveaway will close at noon, central time on Sunday and I will announce the winner on Monday.

I am sharing this over at Vintage Wanna Bee.

Bluebonnets...Almost a Bust!

Saturday, my hubby, the kids, my MIL and I all hopped into the car and headed out to Brenham and Chappell Hill, TX.  These towns are notorious for their bluebonnets.  Well, the day was a total bust.  We saw next to nothing.  We are in a severe drought right now so there were hardly even any weeds alive, let alone wildflowers.  Disappointing to say the least.

So, I hit up my friends on Facebook and asked if anyone knew of any good places locally.  I should have done this last weekend, but I got a few leads and found some bluebonnets.  Now, they are not impressive at all...actually, this year's bluebonnets are about half the size they normally are.  So, while hubby had to work and MIL flew home, I packed up the kids with a friend of mine and we hit up the bluebonnets yesterday morning.

I didn't manage to get very many good photos this morning.  Neither one of the kids wanted to look at myself or even up from the ground.  Below is my favorite photo of my boys from this morning.

Maben was trying to show Colton how the flowers smell pretty.  Everytime this happened, Colton would sneeze.  It was cute and quite funny, but didn't make for great photos.

I did manage to snap a few really cute photos of my friend's little girl.  Isn't she a cutie?  Anyways, you can see how disappointing the bluebonnets this year were compared to last shown here.

Since I wasn't totally satisfied with the photos from this morning, after dinner last night I packed up the kids and my hubby and we headed back out.

Much better light, happier kids and the help of a hubby made for much better photos.

My hubby does a great job of making a total fool of himself to get our kiddos to laugh and smile.  We also managed to find a great field of evening primrose nearby.  This field was far more impressive than the bluebonnets.

We all had a great evening together and I am so happy to be able to have that family time together.  It was definitely needed, especially with all the craziness that has ensued around here lately.

Here's to hoping that the bluebonnets are magnificent next year.  As for this year, I will take what I can get and make the best of it.  I love you Matt, Maben and Colton.  You boys are my world!

Post Surgery Update and a Few Photos

So, if anyone has been following my blog you might have picked up on the fact that I had surgery on Tuesday.  It was suppose to be for the removal of a pesky cyst from my uterus.  Suppose to be...

Palm tree located in the parking lot of the surgical center.

Anyways, back to that pesky cyst.  It's been confirmed by ultrasound to have been there for a few months and has been causing me issues for much longer than that.

The ugly view from my bed, pre-surgery.  Could those curtains seriously be any more hideous?  Why must all hospitals/surgical centers be a mix of white, gray and slate blue?

Anways, the doctor went into my uterus to remove that pesky cyst to find that it received it's eviction notice already and decided to move out all on it's own.

The post surgery talk I had with my doctor went something like this (to the best of my drugged up knowledge and without all the swearing).

Doctor: So, here are the photos of your uterus...and there was no cyst.
Me: What happened to it?
Doctor: I don't know?
Me: What did we see in the ultrasound?
Doctor: A cyst.
Me: Then where did it go?
Doctor: I don't know?

Seriously, this is how my luck with works when it comes to the medical field.  I cannot consider anything a success until I have completely confused the entire staff and myself. 

Anways...I was discharged and given the instructions to go straight home, rest and try not to eat anything because it will more than likely make me sick.  So what did I do?  I requested that my hubby stop by Freebirds (like Chipotle but way better) so I can get my grub on and eat a burrito.  Thank you manager at Freebirds for giving me a complimentary post-surgery brownie, it was delicious!

BTW, if you enlarge the photo, you will see that granny from Sweet Leaf Tea is even mocking my experience.  The Grannyism on the cap of my drink says "Here Today, Gone Tomorrow."  Real funny granny!  Also, that brownie does say, "Pot Brownies Make Me Happy."  Don't worry, not that type of pot.

I got my grub on, hubby took me home and I have been trying to relax and recover from a surgery that ended up not being necessary (I still feel like I got hit by a mack truck).  My MIL has been here all week helping out with the kids.  It has made it much easier to put my feet up and relax a little, now only if the construction crew on my house would stop banging outside my window EVERY time I lay down for a nap.  I hope to be back to my regular self sometime next week.

Transportation Art

I cleaned out my car the other day and came across a U.S. atlas that was 5 years old.  With all the construction and my lack of road trips has rendered this fairly useless.  I did think of a cool way to use up some of the pages instead of just sending them to the recycle bin.  I decided I wanted to make some art and use the map pages as the background.  I love to travel and hope to pass that love down to my kids.

This is the final group hanging together.  Each map page has a special significance to my husband or myself.  Each mode of transportation...not so much.  I did however try and match up the transportation with a map that might give it some meaning.

Map: Houston
Transportation: Rocket Ship

Houston is where we became a family.  It's where we currently call home and where my boys were born.  Obviously a rocket ship is fitting for Houston.  This city is home to NASA.

Map: Colorado
Transportation: Car

The city in which I was born is visible and I grew up in the Denver metro area.  My husband also spent a few years as a kid in the Denver metro area (back in the days before we knew each other).  The car is intentionally facing East, because we both met each other out East.

Map: Cape Cod
Transportation: Sailboat

Cape Cod is where some of my husband's family lives (I totally love that!).  I love the beach, ocean, fishing, lighthouses, etc and we have been lucky enough to vacation there a few times.  

Map: Western New York
Transportation:  Helicopter

I spent a lot of my time growing up in Western New York.  I just wish that I could have gotten Syracuse to be on the same page.  Syracuse was right in the crease, so there was no great way to save it.  My husband and I met each other while attending Syracuse University.  There is no real significance with the helicopter other than Maben recently got to sit in one.

In order to make the pieces of transportation I pulled out my Cricut (I know, I'm so old school compared to all those with a Silhouette). Some of the pieces were from Cricut cartridges, while some were not.  The helicopter was done with nothing but odd shapes put together.  All in all, I love how this turned out and am thinking of possibly doing a few more framed up to add to this collection.  I can always do a truck, airplane, bicycle/motorcycle, etc.

Showing this off:

Trends

There are several trends that I have noticed that are sweeping blogland.  Some of them I am completely digging and others I would NEVER incorporate into my life.  We all have our own separate tastes, this will give you an insight into some of mine.

Trends that I am totally in love with:

Subway art.  I love that it is customizable or could be completely generic and anyone can do it. 

Photo Credit

The awesome amount of boy fabrics!  I don't have little girls, but I have found that I love to sew.  I am happy that my choices are growing almost exponentially for cute fabrics that I can use for some boy projects.

 Photo Credit

Women DIYers.  In a field that is so dominated by men, it is nice to see some women stepping in and taking charge. You ladies rock!

Trends that I am NOT digging:

A wreath for every occasion.  I hang a wreath for Christmas, I might even make one for spring/summer, but I don't really feel the need to have one for every holiday/event/minor holiday etc.  Call me lazy, but I just don't change out my decorating that often.  I also just don't have the space to store 12 wreaths in my house.  Who knows, I might change my mind about this once the construction on my house is complete.   I couldn't bring myself to post a photo of a few tacky wreaths that I have seen lately because the creators were so proud of them. 


White!  Everything being white.  Yes, I understand the nice clean look white brings, but I do not have the time, nor care to keep it looking THAT white.  I have two boys, two dogs and a husband, I don't like to bleach everything in my home.  When I see a ton of white, it reminds me of hospitals and I spend way too much time in hospitals (had surgery yesterday).  It is not a color that is inviting and I love color.  White is actually the absence of all color.

Photo Credit

Chevron stripes.  I like them, but feel completely overwhelmed with how often I am seeing them.  In my opinion a little goes a long ways and I am seeing it taken just too far.  I have really liked some chevron pillows that I have seen lately, I do not like an entire wall or full sized area rug done with a chevron stripe, it just overloads my senses.

 Photo Credit

What trends are you loving/hating out there in blogland?  I would love to hear from you.