Finally, the decorating is starting...

Hello, all. Sorry to have been absent for so long. I've been having some health problems and am trying to get that under control. Just a fair warning for everyone, keep an eye on your blood pressure after you hit your mid-30's-it could seriously save your life, take my word for it.

I have finally gotten around to doing a little something with my dining room, though. I had an old dresser that I picked up at a yard sale several years ago. It was a gross black dresser trimmed in gold, but the lines of it struck my fancy and I bought it for $25. I gave it a good cleaning and a couple coats of white paint and when Otis the jealous dog decided to help me out and break one of the drawers I was painting, I decided I needed an open shelf with wicker baskets. He's such a talented designer, that dog.

I think it turned out pretty good, except that I was so anxious to share the pictures, I didn't put the hardware back on!

I swiped this finial from my sister. It was  this dingy gold sparkly stuff and I got creative and turned it into this...

Not to bad, huh. And best of all-FREE!! See those cool decorative orbs? The red fleur de lis and the embossed leather one I found at the dollar store for, you guessed it, $1 each! The twine ones, I made out of some leftover styrofoam balls from a few christmases ago. The wicker ones came in a clearance package of potpourri, that I bought just so I could dig them out.

The rest of the potpourri in a container I've had forever.I have to give a shout out to my talented sister for making this burlap blind for me. I was a genius and washed the burlap first, so she actually had to make it from the ragged and frayed piece of burlap that came out of the dryer. Note to self-NEVER wash unhemmed burlap! I haven't got the hardware to hang it yet, so I folded it lengthwise and draped it over the dresser. I love it so much, I may keep it here.

I bought this cabinet at Goodwill for $20. I plan to redo it - paint it and add some legs for height and I removed the doors and am going to put more baskets in it (because I went through a whole buying wicker basket phase a few years ago and only have a million around here), I think it will work beautifully in either my laundry room or kitchen (I can't decide which)...

someone thinks it's his new house.

I sense a problem here. I really really do.

Flood recovery is going well. Everyone is pitching in to help reseed the yard, I guess I could wait until Butch is distracted with yard work and sneak and work on my cabinet.

And in closing, here's an awesome poster my eldest made for his school's spirit week. Handrawn, isn't that awesome?!

I hope everyone has a great weekend!

A Few Changes Around the House

Last week, my beautiful yard-seen behind my daughter here- went from this lush green lawn with a few toys scattered around it


to this-a desolate flood ravaged scene of destruction
(the water spurting from the fire hose is from the basement of my house-we're still raking mud out of there)

In better news, I got an idea and ran with it and made some changes before the destruction.

After a couple of weeks with power tools-my dining room went from this



to this


another angle of the beforeI love the change


I did get some outlet covers and put them up last night-and I still need to decorate. I got mini-shades for my chandelier that I need to recover and the fabric for my window treatments. But unfortunately, all of that will have to wait until I get the flood cleaned up.

Taking a Profile Picture

I couldn't imagine being an only girl in a family, probably because I had 3 sisters. Can you imagine never having anyone to whisper with about boys? Or arguing with about clothes? Worse, can you imagine being the only girl with 2 brothers? My daughter can relate to that.

My eldest informed her that she needed a new profile picture, the one she had made her look fat (his words, not mine). So she and I tried to get the perfect picture for her profile.


I loved this picture and I told her I loved this picture. But evidently, you cannot have a profile picture featuring a happy teenage girl smiling the prettiest smile in the world. It just isn't done. Perhaps she should have listened to me. Because...

We were being stalked. Slowly and surely, we were being stalked by the bane of every teenage girl's life-


her little brother.



Who just happens to be my baby, and that makes him somewhat attention deprived, as most youngest children are.

She persevered, barely grimacing at first...


begging me to banish him from the room, perhaps the moon she suggested...


that's not a smile, that's her threatening to break his arm while I snap pictures and she's still posing away...


do supermodels put up with these working conditions? Do they keep smiling through the pain of a shoot when all they want to do is slap someone so hard they scream for their mommy?


Do they gently nudge those sharing the spotlight with them into their proper spots?


Do they yell at their photographer when they get no cooperation?



But look, wonder of wonders, the frustration of being the only girl resulted in the perfect angsty profile picture!!!