Fall-ified

I don't really consider myself to be a seasonal decorator.  I mean, I decorate for Christmas of course, but that's pretty much a given.  The only other time I really decorate for a season or holiday is if/when we're having a party of some sort.  That said, yesterday I brought home some pumpkins and added a touch of fall to our house. My mom helped host a couples' shower Saturday night and she was in charge of the table decorations.  Somehow that meant that I was also responsible for the table decorations.  Huh.  We procrastinated until the very last minute but finally settled on a pumpkin theme late Friday night.  That's how I ended up with decorations for our house - they're leftovers from the party.

Here's our newly fall-ified (fallized? falled?) dining table.

This is pretty much exactly how we decorated the tables for the party, minus a few votive candles.  The tables were outside and we had three of them to do (plus a food table inside) so we needed something that wouldn't get too expensive.  We bought our pumpkins from Home Depot for about $4 each.  The mini gourds came for the grocery store.  They were 3 for $1.

Like my dining table, each table at the party had three main pumpkins - one white one, one large orange one, and one funny shaped orange one that we laid on its side.  I didn't get a picture from that angle but this one kinda looks like two pumpkins stacked on top of each other with just one stem.  For the white pumpkins, I pulled out my Silhouette machine and and cut out a fancy G (the initial of the soon-to-be-married couple) out of black vinyl and just stuck them on.  While I had my machine out, I went ahead and cut out an E for me and an S for my mom so we could use them at our houses afterwards.

The big orange pumpkins all got carved.  My mom left me to do this part by myself and I thought my arm was going to fall off!  I had six pumpkins to empty and as I got my work area set up, I realized I've never really emptied a pumpkin by myself.  I had no idea what I was doing, but I guess I figured it out ok.  Getting all the guts out is hard work!  Then, once they were all finally empty (and I had broken a good sweat), I grabbed the drill and got to carving polka-dotting.  The drill bit went through the pumpkin really easily, so it wasn't hard to do at all.  My problem was that I was using a re-chargeable drill that had a heavy battery on it, and it seriously got heavy after a while!

It looks ok during the day, but it really looks cute at night when its lit up.  I tried to take a picture of it, but I couldn't really capture its cuteness.

I know my burlap needs a little fluffing.  It's not arranged very well yet, but I didn't feel like fixing it for the pictures.  I'm lazy like that.

I put another polka-dotted pumpkin on our kitchen table.  Much plainer, but it works I guess.

I did crank out one tiny craft project too.  After cutting out all the monograms for the pumpkins, I had a small strip of vinyl scrap leftover that I didn't want to just throw away.  So I cut out "give thanks."  I grabbed a scrap piece of wood and painted it brown then yellow and sanded it down.  The letters were easy to stick on and I just added a piece of wire we already had to hang my new little sign.  I didn't have the raffia bow on it at first, but I think it gives it a little something extra.  Total cost?  Zilch.

My new little sign is hanging on the china cabinet for now, but that could change.

The last fall decoration that I put out is my set of wooden pumpkins that I made last year.  I still love them.

I also have a bowl of candy corn sitting out on the coffee table but I didn't think I should take a picture of that.  I'd hate for someone to come over and expect to see it because it won't be around much longer...

Bam or Slam?

So, here's the thing: we've lived in our current house for a good while now - Doc for 4 years and me for a little over 2.  For the most part, I can say that our house is fully decorated.  But there's this one wall, this one stinkin' wall, that has been driving me crazy!  It's got a big blank area that's been screaming for something, but I just haven't been able to decide what it needs. Here's the wall I'm talking about.  It may not look like much to you, but to me, this is the wall I stare at every time I walk from the kitchen into the dining room or living room or towards the stairs and it just glares back at me with all its boringness.

Here, let me zoom out a little so you can get a better feel for the space.  But trust me, the blank space is going to jump out at you too.

See what I mean? You can't miss it.

Obviously I've known for a while that I needed to hang something there, but what?  The picture above was taken while I was standing right behind our love seat, in the middle of our dining and living rooms.  From this spot, if you look to the left, there's this big picture...

...and to the right, there's this big one.

Back over my left shoulder is another large painting by the dining table.

Don't worry, those three big wall hangings are balanced out by this gallery wall of craziness, on the opposite side of the room.

So that's why I've been so confused.  I've already got three big pieces, but I've also already got a wall full of small stuff.

One day it hit me; I knew exactly what should go there: a grouping of four square-ish paintings.  I could hang them in a grid pattern and they would work together like one big piece of art, but still be four individual pieces.  Genius!

But then, as I stood back and tried to envision four pieces hanging in a grid on that blank! space!, something else popped out at me...

Grrrr...it's already a wall-o-grids.  Back to the drawing board.

On a semi-related but kinda different note, when I acquire something new that I like but don't know what to do with, I put it on my dining table.  This is the bad side of having your house almost completely decorated - there's nowhere to put new things.  But I can't bare to just put them away, so I stick them on the dining table so that I see them every time I walk by until I'm so annoyed with them being there that I'm forced to find a place to hang/display them.

This really doesn't sound like that big a deal, but it can get pretty bad.  There have been times where I've had so much stuff piled on the table that I've had to leave the cleaning ladies a note to skip over it.  Such was the case last week when they came and I still had the canvas I painted, the name sign I made, and a gift from my mom all sitting on the table.

I think we all know where this is going, right?  Big, boring, blank wall + table full of cute stuff that needs a home = me trying to figure out a way to make it all work.  I laid the three items I already had out on the floor, but knew I still needed something else to put with them to come up with any kind of arrangement.

Gotta love Hobby Lobby and their 50% off sales.  I snagged three of these door knobs on the cheap.

And now, without further adieu, here's what I came up with.  (Forgot to scramble the letters in my last name so I had to spray paint over them.)

Sigh...I just don't know about it.  Two very different styles of painted canvases hanging in the same grouping - surely that's breaking some kind of design rules, right?  And I have our full last name hanging right above our first initial - is that weird?

I need your opinions.  I'm taking a page (post?) out of The Mustard Ceiling's book (blog?) and putting this up for BAM or SLAM votes.  BAM means you like it, SLAM means you don't.  Tell me the truth, I can take it.

(My mom suggested adding another long something across the bottom to finish it off.  I'm open for other suggestions too.)

Yard Crashers

Do you guys ever watch Yard Crashers on the DIY Network?  You know, it's the show where some innocent man heads to the home improvement store for a couple of boards to fix a fence in his backyard, runs into the host of the show, Ahmed Hassan, who asks him what he's up to for the day, and the innocent man ends up bringing home a TV crew and a slew of yard men who turn his simple fence project into a backyard oasis, complete with fountain and flat-screen TV. Have you seen it?  We don't actually get the DIY Network at our house but my parents do so I've caught the show several times at their house.  I love it!  Now I find myself looking around for Ahmed anytime I'm at the local orange or blue store.  We have a strict rule at our house: if a random stranger approaches you at the home improvement store and asks what you're up to, say yes and bring 'em home!

And guess what??

Yard Crashers totally happened at our house yesterday!

It was exactly like on the DIY Network, only Ahmed didn't ever approach us at a store.  In fact, he never made it to our house.  The camera crew and the yard men didn't either, now that I think about it.  And it seems we're still waiting on the fountain and flat-screen TV.

Okay, okay.  So maybe it was just me and Doc doing some yard work by ourselves.  Where's the fun in that?

But now that I've got you so curious (you are curious, right?) I suppose I can show you how we crashed our own yard.

See these trees here?

They're in our side courtyard and, once upon a time, they were really pretty.  The previous owners of our house hired professional landscapers to work their magic.  The pros are the ones that brought in the five tree/shrubs above to soften the big wall of our neighbor's house and to give us a nice green view from our kitchen windows.  I must say that I've really enjoyed having them there.  We've been in other courtyards on the street that don't have lush green plants against their neighbor's big blank wall and it doesn't feel nearly as warm and inviting.

But here's the problem: these two on the far left decided they didn't want to live anymore.

They gave up on life sometime this past winter but we thought we'd give them til spring to see if maybe they wanted to give it another go and green back up.  They were still goners, though.

Obviously we knew they had to go.  But then what do we do?  We'd have three adult-sized tree/shrubs on the right, and a big hole on the left.  Sure, we could plant new ones, but they were going to look like dwarfs next to the others.

We racked our brains on how we were going to fix this problem and decided yesterday, Good Friday, was the big day.  My very own yard crasher got his tools ready.

And out came the dead plants!  (Which I apparently didn't take a picture of.  Use your imagination - three big trees and a big hole.)

Here's how we decided to fix the lopsided problem.  We dug out the middle of the three good trees - the second one from the right - and re-planted it on the far left.

So now, when we get ready to plant two new trees that will inevitably be smaller, we'll have a nice tall-short-tall-short-tall pattern going on.  Genius, right?

Let's just hope that uprooted and then re-planted tree makes it.  Right now it's getting its lean on, so some stakes and rope are in order.

As for what I was doing while my husband was digging big holes in the flower bed, I finally got around to planting some ferns and creeping jenny in all of our pots.

Sure, they may look puny now, but I'm counting on them doubling in size over the summer.  Fingers crossed.

And that was the extent of our yard crashing.  Turns out we didn't even need Ahmed, but that doesn't mean I'm going to stop looking for him at the home improvement stores.  Maybe some day...

Our Weekend and Lolli Update

The kids finally got to meet Lollipop this weekend, and I think they love her!

Anna especially didn't want to put her down.  She kept holding her up like Mufassa does Simba in the Lion King.

Our two cute girls!

Anna, Lolli, and I cheered on the boys while they played a game of Knock-Out.

Friday night we were invited to a cookout at our friends' house.  They bribed us with food but I'm pretty sure they just wanted to meet Lolli.  (In fact, Mary Elizabeth admitted it here.)  We were ok with that, though, because we really like food.

We also really like their little girl.

Wesley was nice enough to let Wyatt borrow her tree swing.  I tried my best to give him a good push.

After dinner we played Pictureka while Lolli got acquainted with their dog, Ollie.  It was such a fun night!

Friday night was all play so Saturday morning we had to get to work.  Well, I'll admit I slept in a little bit, but Doc got right to work out in the yard.  Wyatt was his helper until I brought Lolli out to play and he decided to take her for a ride.

The kids played with her so much during the morning that she was exhausted by lunch time.  She fell asleep in Anna's arms so Anna set her down on her blanket that was sitting on top of the kitchen counter.  We all sat down at the table for lunch and she never budged, so she ended up being our centerpiece for the meal.  Poor thing was tired!

We spent the bulk of the afternoon at my parents' house.  I arrived first and got questioned by the little people about "Where the puppy dog is?"  Jett had to call Uncle Doc and sweet-talk him into bringing her over. 

Lolli had her first trip down the slide.  I'm not sure that she liked it.

Bren likes to hold "wolly."

While the kids were busy playing with the dog, I put together the hammock that we bought my parents for Christmas.  Everyone took turns pretending to nap on it and testing the weight limit.

And somehow, Lolli ended up getting it all to herself.

We stayed over at their house late enough to enjoy an impromptu cookout.  Nothing like burgers and dogs two nights in a row!  After church Sunday morning I got to work in the shop.  With the help of both Mom and Dad, I completed my first headboard.  It's for another room re-do I'm working on - hopefully more pictures soon! 

Update on life with Lolli:  Things are going really well.  She stays in her kennel during the day and does not mess it up at all.  She still cries when she's put in it but calms down eventually.  She's great about using the bathroom upstairs and only has accidents when we go too long without taking her out.  She's learned to go up and down the stairs by herself - a new talent that we're not proud of (an unsupervised puppy running around upstairs on my carpet is the last thing I want).  Her favorite things to chew on are our toes, and it's not uncommon for me to step into my slippers only to find them full of slobber.  One day last week she jumped into the shower with me.  It was an unexpected surprise for both of us.

Sunday night was a bit traumatic for her - it was time to get her first bath.  Even though she got wet in the shower earlier in the week, she hadn't been shampooed yet and it was definitely time. 

She didn't know what was coming - she was more interested in the cup I got out to rinse her with.

But as soon as I held her over the water, she threw those paws up and did not want to go in.

"Dad, stop taking pictures and get me the heck out of here."

I've never bathed a dog with so much fur.  I made sure I didn't miss any spots - even around her little mouth.

And then, y'all, the craziest thing happened.  The softest, fluffiest, cutest little white puppy that you've ever seen turned into...

...well, this:

Does anybody else think she looks like Splinter from Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles?  No? Just me?

Doc kept showing me "before" pictures so I'd remember what she looked like, and I kept reassuring her that she'd fluff back up.  I wasn't sure she would but my fingers were crossed.

And that's how our weekend ended - with a soppin' wet dog that wasn't too happy with us.  At least she smells better.

On the Wall

I've been meaning to show you guys a couple of things I got for Christmas.  I just recently got around to hang them up on the walls and I love the way they look, so why not share?? First, on the fridge, is this calendar that Santa brought.

Sure, it doesn't look like much in that picture, but let me tell you - this is better than just a regular ol' calendar.  For starters, it's a 17 month calendar so you don't have to throw it away after just a year.  It comes with a magnetic strip and a hook for easy hangup wherever you want to put it.  It has a large grid so you have plenty of room to write in things and a little pocket at the bottom where you can stick notes or a pen or whatever.  And - my favorite part - it comes with 196 stickers.  Who doesn't love stickers??  It's called a Plan-It Calendar and there's a version designed specifically for moms, so if you like to stay organized, you should check it out!

New to my dining room is this church painting done by my sister-in-law, Beth.

I picked out the picture below and asked if I could commission her to paint something similar to it for me.

Didn't she do an awesome job?!  Of course I love the version that she painted much better (it looks so much neater!), and I LOVE the way it looks hanging in my dining room.  I have several blue pieces of pottery in our hutch and the colors in the painting seem to just tie everything together.  Thanks, Beth!

And last but not least, is a picture frame collage I received from my mom.  You may remember it from my Christmas Wish List.  This took me the longest to get hung because I needed Doc's help with the anchors, and because I had to pick out and order pictures.

It's hanging in the hallway that leads to our half bath downstairs, and I love the way it looks there.  I debated between full color pictures versus black and white, and so far I'm pleased with my black and white decision.

Sorry it took me so long to share these!  I'll be back soon with another wall that I need your help with...