Hiatus

To say we’ve been on a hiatus is an understatement. It’s been a crazy couple months. Here’s the quick synopsis of the past two months in our house - Mardi Gras, great news – a new job, bad and scary news, tough decisions, Shelby’s surgery, my Mother-in-law’s surgery, and now more tough decisions. I know most of that was vague but to be honest it would take way too long to fill you in on all the details. Suffice it to say we’ve been on hiatus from blogging and home improvements. But I’m happy to announce we’re getting back in the swing of things!

Now, because we’ve been neglecting our home improvement duties the last few weekends have been more maintenance projects then an actual improvements. We hadn’t really cleaned up all the leaves that fell in our yard during the fall and winter so we decided it was finally time to rake and bag the leaves. It was all fun and games for about 10 minutes then I started to think about how sore I was going to be the next day. Thanks to our local Ace Hardware, the same Ace Hardware I went to 3 times before 3pm on Saturday, we found these awesome leaf scooper things. I’m sure they have a real name but I can’t remember what it is. We also got a bag holder that keeps your trash bag upright while you’re scooping leaves into the bags. These two little helpers definitely cut hours off our yard work. 17 full trash bags later we were done racking leaves.

Unfortunately it didn’t stop there. Our porch had been neglected for a while too, so much so that there was a visible layer of pollen covering the porch.  The grass needed to be cut as well. After two weekends of manual labor we have a new found respect for gardeners!

Laundry Room Ideas

Since we got a new washer and dryer for Christmas, I've been dreaming about a new laundry room. As I was looking for ideas, I stumbled across this website called Houzz. It's amazing! It has tons of pictures, products, and ideabooks!

Here's been some of my inspiration thus far (courtesy of Houzz)...

traditional laundry room design by other metros kitchen and bath Mullet Cabinet

My favorite feature of this room is the bar right above the washer and dryer for hanging. It's genius!

traditional laundry room design by orange county design-build Spinnaker Development

I'm totally in LOVE with this - look at all that storage! Ah, love it! Clearly I'm delusional to think this will be MY laundry room but maybe in a few years when I finally hit that big Powerball payday! Hey, a girl can dream, right?

But honestly, here are some ideas I've stumbled upon so far that I think can be incorporated into our limited space.

traditional living room design by san francisco interior designer Lindy Donnelly

I like the idea of hiding the laundry room behind a bookcase, it's a really cool concept. The only problem I can see is the hassle of moving the bookcase everytime I go to do laundry. I know it may sound silly but I can't help but think this is a great idea in theory and not in reality.

modern laundry room design by san francisco architect Klopf Architecture

I love the the use of space here. And since we have limited space it may be a great option!

contemporary laundry room design by newark interior designer Kingsley Belcher Knauss, ASID

This room is really the most realistic for us. It's a great use of space, still has storage, and even a small counter for folding clothes or a makeshift desk.

contemporary laundry room design by other metros general contractor Weaver Custom Homes

I'm really a fan of the built in look of this washer and dryer, it gives the room a very finished look. The counters and storage also make the room look super functional. If we went with this design we'd have to cut back on the amount of cabinets and storage but I still think we could pull it off.

I never dreamed there could be so many options and ideas! Right now, our laundry area is an extension of our kitchen so I don't want to commit to anything too crazy. Especially if a laundry room remodel  would result in having to do a kitchen makeover at the same time. Oh decisions, decisions!

Let's Get Ready for Some FOOTBALL!

Normally on Friday's I start thinking about a game plan for Saturday and Sunday - what projects do we need to finish? What do we need to start? When I am going to start cleaning the house? You know how this game goes. Well I'm not doing any of that today! 

Today I'm thinking about my football plans, the Saints play Saturday night and then the BCS game is Monday night, it's shaping up to be a great weekend! Even better my cousin is coming to town this weekend to partake in all the festivities. And because my cousin and husband both tend to sleep inn, I'll still be able to squeeze in my Saturday morning coffee/walk date with a friend!

Let's hear it for the weekend! Now I only have to make it through 8 hours of work...

New Year's Resolutions

For the record I usually fail miserably at New Year's Resolutions but I'm hoping this year is different. My theory is that if I publicly declare my resolutions via this blog I will be more likely to stick to them.

So here goes, this year I resolve to:

• Cook more often for my husband
• Take more pictures
• Learn to sew
• Learn to SAFELY use power tools
• Exercise more (this one always makes the list)

Happy New Year!

Our Beautiful Dining Room

Our first anniversary was in October and we were trying to decide on our anniversary present and I know that the traditional first year anniversary gift is paper. Well, instead of paper we bought a dining room table, kind of the same thing, right? Both are from trees, so does that work as a justification? 

Being the bargain hunter I am, I watched the prices fluctuate until they finally reached our price point which luckily was Columbus day weekend and also the weekend of our first anniversary. And a table isn't complete without chargers, napkins, and napkin rings. 

Our beautiful hurricane centerpiece is courtesy of an early Christmas present from my Mom.

We are heading to California tomorrow to spend Christmas with my Mom. I'm also recruiting her to help make drapes for the house. Pictures to come!

Merry Christmas everyone!!

December Madness

One of the reasons I like to finish Christmas shopping early...

And we are smack dab in the middle of it! This picture is actually the simplified calendar. December birthdays are plentiful in our family as is graduations, parties, and family gatherings. And this year is even more interesting as we have added additional work stresses to the mix. Needless to say with all this going on, home projects are on hold!

Although we did use our fireplace for the first time last night. We don't really have any mishaps to report, which is pretty shocking. I figured there would be a problem with the flue or the chimney wouldn't be clear, you know something along those lines. But I am very happy to report we had none of that, just a beautifully warm fire!

Anyway, we are officially one week away from Christmas, 6 days away from heading to California, and 4 days away from a week off of work! Can you tell I'm excited about next week?!

Time to Catch Up

It’s amazing how busy you can get and not even really know it! But we’re back and it is time to catch up! I’m going to try to recap our lives as of late so it may seem a little random but here goes…

We got a new washer and dryer…woot woot! We did tons of price comparison shopping and research. We probably did TOO much research. It seems washers and dryers these days only last 3-5 years, this conclusion prompted us to by an extended warranty. Normally I’m against the extended warranty because I feel like I’m being taken and for the most part I probably am, but I’m just going to look at this one as an insurance policy – it will help me sleep better! Anyway, we decided on the Frigidaire Affinity. I really wanted this crazy Samsung set but I didn’t want to pay double the price so Frigidaire it is. We’ve had it for about 3 weeks and so far I’m really happy with it. It has some nice bells and whistles, wash cycles with options like steam, sanitize, and delicate. The best part – I can finish ALL our laundry in about 3 hours. The old washer and dryer took me one to two days to finish laundry! For Christmas this year I got a washer and Brett got a dryer. Let’s hear it for grown up Christmas presents! Hey at least they are prettier than the last ones...

Thanksgiving was great! We have so much to be thankful for and it was nice to take a day to really remember how blessed we are. My brother and his wife came to town for a week and stayed with us a few nights. We did all the touristy stuff, ate terribly, and even made a trip to Audubon Zoo. We even had perfect Thanksgiving Day weather high 70’s low 80’s, it was absolutely beautiful!

To follow Thanksgiving a friend and I went shopping on Black Friday, I knocked out all my Christmas shopping by noon. It was awesome! Brett even did a little Black Friday shopping of his own via Lowes.com. My mom had given us a gift card a little while ago and Brett figured it was a great time to stock up on tools and so now we are now the proud owners of a new saw, drill, and battery pack for the drill…

To top off our Thanksgiving weekend and get into the Christmas spirit we decorated our Christmas Tree! Isn’t it beautiful?! I obsessed about the color scheme for roughly 20 minutes in Target while Brett patiently strolled up and down the Christmas aisles. I FINALLY decided to go with a red and gold. This year's tree is SO much better than the sad little Charlie Brown tree I picked out last year!

I continued to spread holiday cheer by sending out our Christmas cards (before December 1st).  I LOVE our Christmas card! A good friend of ours was gracious enough to offer to take some family pictures of us and they turned out AMAZING!

Since my shopping is done, presents are wrapped, and Christmas cards have been sent the only thing left to do is to enjoy the rest of the Holiday Season...and blog!