A Nugget and a Doodle

Since I finished the kids halloween costumes in October, I've been slaving away in my little workshop like a totally spastic elf getting all my new decorations ready for our first year in the new house!  Get comfy, because this is a LOOOOOOONG post, which is reflective of the number of hours that went into all this stuff! When we decided to move across country, I sold or gave away probably 75% of our Christmas decorations.  I'm really glad I did because most of them were a total reflection of my twenties style.  Everything was shiny, and sparkly, and bold.  In my thirties I'm really into more of a lived-in, loved and worn style as it feels more comfy and cozy to me.  In this new house, that shiny sparkly stuff just doesn't work, and I decided I needed to supplement with a lot of new decor for Christmas.  New doesn't mean it has to come from a store though! I started with making all new tree ornaments, nearly 100 of them.  When my nana died, the who...

I posted an early phase 1 photo on facebook a couple weeks ago without telling anyone what it was or what it would become.  I didn't get any guesses, and if I did, I'm confident they'd have been wrong.  :) Here's a reminder of those 2 photos I posted. Pretty underwhelming looking start, right?  I've never posted in-progress photos before finishing it so this was a little scary!  No idea what it is right?  Well, if the title of this post didn't tip you off friends, then you need to spend one Christmas season in Boston, or make more Italian American friends! This painters tape and papertowel monstrosity was to become my long awaited Dominick the Donkey!  Please please please tell me you know the song.  In Boston, they played it at 5pm every day from Thanksgiving until Christmas!  The nostalgia from being a kid, from living back in New England, and the memories it raises of my fur-sister Maggie are just so warm an...

Many of you know that I really dedicated myself to losing weight starting in January 2013.  Even through the stress and chaos of relocating across country, I stuck with it and lost about 75 pounds.  I never got to my final goal of 100 pounds, and then the holidays hit, and bad habits snuck back into our routine, and then we had our second move in a year and bad habits became the complete norm.  In fact, most of this year has been a yo yo, on again, off again.  I'd do well leading up to a trip for work, and then I'd succumb during the trip and then it would take a week or two to get back to eating better again resulting in a couple more pounds gained back each time I'd slip.  My method of weight loss was just documenting everything I ate and counting calories to burn more than I take in.  And that works.  The science made sense to me.  There are two big "buuuuuuut's" coming. 1) My objective was simple.  Eat fewer calories than I burn.  ...

Many of you have seen or heard about bits and pieces relating to our work outside, but this phase is finally done and it's time to share!  Disclaimer:  I retain the right to start another phase tomorrow if I choose.  :) Where to begin?  Well, we bought the vacant lot next to us a couple months ago.  We did this to a) block a local builder from building a spec house there and b) to extend our landscaping so that our house doesn't look so smooshed into the end of the cul de sac.  If I could turn back time, we'd buy both lots at the same time and center the houses on them.  Ahh, hindsight.  When we bought the lot, the neighbors on the other side were devastated because they thought that builder [who happens to have just built one of the less attractive homes in the hood got the lot, and they had inquired about purchasing a couple times over the past few years but the developer wouldn't budge on the price.  So, they somewhat hopelessly asked wi...

This post is long overdue.  This handsome little man is 4 weeks old today, and the goal was to blog about his nursery before he was born.  He did arrive almost 2 weeks early, so I guess I'll let mama off the hook for the delayed photos!  :) This is Cole.  As you can see, sometimes he's really happy, and sometimes he's really sad.  But he's always super cute and so is his nursery!!

Chances are if you're reading this, you know I've been redesigning the office only months after moving into our new house, at which time the office was completely decorated in a jewel toned peacock-inspired scheme.  Lots of people have told me I'm crazy to re-do it, either because they can't imagine dedicating this much time to a single room, or because they're politely trying to imply they loved it as is.  :)  Maybe some of you did truly love it, who knows?!  But after literally like a day, I didn't love it, and in fact, I hated it.  In a vacuum it was kind of cool, but it was very visible from the main living area, which is a far cry from mod, wacky peacock colors.  It was the odd man out and needed reconciliation with the rest of the house.   Just in case you haven't seen it a million times already, here is what the office looked like before:    It felt really dark in here too, which was depressing.  We work from ...

I absolutely adore this fabric.  I'm pretty sure it's my all time favorite fabric ever woven on this planet.  Too much buildup?  :) It's lovely on the doodle!  Special thanks to grandma for crafting this beautiful dress!  Can you believe how big she's gotten since I first started blogging? But it's also the perfect new cover for the office lamp shades!  I bought 2 sweet little mercury glass lamps at TJ Maxx.  They were the perfect size, and came with the shade!  $20 a piece... booyah! The shade was just a little serious for the room and I was looking for ways to incorporate more pattern and texture and the lamp shade was the perfect opportunity.  I haven't covered a lampshade before, but there are oodles of online tutorials with all different methods. This lampshade was particularly easy v. other tutorials I've seen because it's the same diameter on the top and the bo...

I have to tell you... I wrote my first blog this weekend to share the massive makeover the gold beast armoire got.  It was my first post in a while, and I use page views to gauge interest.  The number of readers has always amazed me but that particular post only got about 25% of the usual viewers.  Where have you all gone?  *taps mic... this thing on?? So I'm giving it another shot with this post, though it's not office-makeover-related, there is a peek at an office project. The nugget started pre-K a few weeks ago, and he's taken an interest in hanging his artistic masterpieces on the wall.  He came home one day, looked up at an entirely bare navy blue wall in his bedroom, and said "Mama, I'd like to put pretty art on the wall."  It was like a choir of angels singing heavenly music for my little man to be speaking my language suddenly.  :) When I was planning his room I'd fully intended to create some giant art for the big empty wall, but everyt...

Sorry I haven't posted in a while.  We've been keeping very busy, mostly outdoors, and mostly with the purchase of the vacant lot next to us!  I'll be sure to post pictures of those projects once they're complete.  Early in July, I warned you that the peacock office was going to be no more.  And it is no more, though I'm sorry it's taken me so long to share all the progress.  On the other hand, it's been nice to work without racing against an imaginary timer this time around!  I'm almost ready to share the whole office makeover with you, but there are a few final touches I'm waiting on. In the meantime, I thought you might like to see the major transformation the gold mafia boss armoire has undergone.  It was a painful process, actually, because if you remember, I had a heavy coat of metallic wax to give the gold finish the patina I wanted.  Note to self:  If there's any chance at all I'll ever refinish a piece in the future, don't use ...

Yup, she beat me to the first do-over which was just a little over a month after we moved in!  I may have gently nudged her into the makeover, but only because some unfortunate hurried decor decisions really prevented the room from living up to its potential.  Also, as bright as most of the rooms are in their house, this particular room doesn't get great light because it sits in the shade of a giant oak tree.  Relating to the light, everything in the room was seeming to take on a sickly green tone, maybe from the leaves of the oak tree and definitely from the window treatments!  Here's the before: That's the only photo we have of it because before it simply wasn't worth the space on the camera's SD card.  :) So this room functions as an office space primarily, but the bulk of the space is used by a nice plush bed just begging for guests to come and visit.  The walls are a light tan/khaki - same as the rest of the house....