Wednesday, July 28, 2010

Catching up - as if THAT will ever happen.

But a girl can dream, right?

Right now, i'm sitting in my breakfast nook staring at moving boxes that need unpacking (yes, still...), paint cans and paint drop cloths in.every.room.  My entire kitchen bar (and it's a long one) is covered with a flashlight, a cordless drill, 3 different boxes of drill bits and picture hanging pieces.  What else...oh yes, wall putty, painter's tape, 2 bottles of Method cleaner, a tape measure, one spray paint can and my NOLA saints baseball cap.  Oh, and my new yankee candle. Because dear friends, what says "I have an organized home" if you don't have a new yankee candle sitting in the middle of that mess??!?

I promise that I will post pictures of the progress soon - and we have made some progress this week.  The "walking on the sun"  yellow walls (and avocado and coral walls too) have almost all been painted in icy blues and sandy creams.  My dad is installing an IKEA butcher block countertop over my washer and dryer today, and replacing some wire shelving in the laundry room with remnants from the countertop where we cut it down.  I put the cutest contact paper down in the kitchen drawers too - so you'll get this one stupid picture soon of the inside of my drawers. HA!

We did not have ONE thing broken in the move - i am still  in shock. NOTHING.  That's never happened before.   

Have a great week, i'll be back over the weekend with pics to share - and if it's not too much to ask, pray for my new neighbors - the day we moved in, he moved his mom home from the hospital so that she could receive hospice care and she passed yesterday.  They have been so sweet to us even in the midst of everything going on in their life this week.  If you could keep them in your prayers, i know they would appreciate it.


XOXO
S

Wednesday, July 7, 2010

The Walker Story - for Rose.

A friend from blogs past stopped by and visited and asked for this story, and to be quite honest, I had never even thought about posting it until the beach story a few days back.  So, here it is.

When my boys were 2 and 3 (Walker is the oldest) we lived on Hibiscus Avenue in Winter Park.  It's a quaint, brick street - the houses were a hodge podge of old and new, and it's lined with oaks and a few maples. Our house sat a few houses from the end of the street, and our backyard backed up to the cemetery.  We had a huge (i'm talking HUGE) front porch with a swing that the boys and I would gather on daily. I really really loved the house.  But this isn't about the house - sorry - forgot a bit about that darn swing!


Anyway, my ex's grandfather was in that cemetery - and you could see his grave from our backyard.  Now, for some of you, that may be creepy.  In the south (maybe in the north too - not sure?)  - some of us which have family plots on our homesteads, it's not creepy - it's comforting.  And we bought this house pretty much for the reason that we could walk out of our house and go tend that grave - my ex is very close to his family and his grandfather died a few months before our wedding.  So, to us, it was kind of kismet.

One day, they boys were in the playroom, and Marty was sitting in his desk in his office off of the playroom, and Walker turned to the corner of the office and said "Hi." - to the corner/wall.  We turned and only saw well, the corner and the wall.  He kept staring at the corner and then said "ok, bye." and toddled back into the playroom.  


Marty looked at me, and then asked Walker who he was talking to.  Walker pointed to the corner and said "that man".  Marty said there's no one there.  Walker looked at his daddy, and said "yea, that man. He's waiting on great grandma."


Great grandma was older and in failing health at the time, and later that week fell very ill and unfortunately did pass away within a very short time - i can't remember, maybe a few weeks, a month?


I carry that story with me because i know in my heart that Marty's grand-daddy, waiting on his wife. No doubt in my mind.  Kindred spirits, truly.











Monday, July 5, 2010

The creative juices are flowing.

Hi all - I hope you had a great 4th - we did. We were just house-bound until about 8pm. Rained.all.day. and then cleared up in time for fireworks for a few hours. Then another deluge. swell.

It figures, the one time I actually have a real reason other than vacation to rent at the beach and it's been raining non-stop for a week. sigh.

So, I did what came naturally - grabbed my purse, my umbrella and went shopping!  Thank goodness i waited until a few days before we give up this lease before i caved in or the wallet would seriously be empty.

We hit a junk shop - and got a great wooden gate door that i'm going to transfer into something wonderful SOON.  Hint...it's going to look a lot like what Tara over at Between You and Me did here.....With all of this rain, i was even able to work out the template this afternoon. Productive, i'm tellin' ya.


Then, we hit some shell shops (say that 3x fast) to pick up a few larger shell accessories - i have tons of found smaller shells, but needed a few larger ones for display.  I also got some finger sponges for my large apothecary jar - they're long and a perfect jar filler - I think i'm going to put the jar on my counter in my bath.   It's a dangerous line between kitcshy and coastal and i'm probably going to cross it any minute.  This is somewhat the look...  This came off of RMS - again - lot of rain, LOTS of time girls.




Let's see...what else? Oh! i have some pics of our wall palette - and the choices that we're down to on our floor...  the first is Freshaire's Still Moment.  It's a tad paler than what it shows on my monitor - but just keep in your head the look of washed out sea glass for the whole palette.






This is also Freshaire - this is actaully called Hidden Sea Glass. This computer does not do it justice - it is the palest of pale greens.



And the trim will be a creamy, cottage white.  Eventually, we're going to crack up all that tile and put down stained bamboo floors - and we've narrowed it down to these 2 - but because we have to live with the maple cabinets (until we either paint or replace them) - we're trying to find the one that will work with them and not compete against them.  and gross, i just realized that it is really gross down there.  Yea...ignore that.  I've put the samples against the cabinets (this is the rental house we're in - but our cabinets are the exact same)   --  right now i'm leaning to the redder stain.  Eventually the cabinets will also be a creamy, cottagey white. 




I have some great eye candy for you too...love this room by created by Isabella and Max....


and the flip side ....looks great from any angle doesn't it? I heart this room...



The man really should watch my online activities before I hire her.  Look at that wall color...LOVE IT.  That counter - i want it.  Even the dang column in the middle of the countertop looks dreamy.  She's a talent.