hooray for new landscaping!

When you own a home, it seems like the projects are never ending.  For the most part it is fun to fix things up and make it exactly how you want it, but the down side is that everything seems to to require a good amount of $$$.  We have been in our home for three years now and each year we pick a couple big projects that we will do.  Last year we put in wood floors, new grass and added a concrete slab.  

This year we decided it was time to fix up our landscaping.  We had let it get pretty bad...please don't judge. ha!  Since neither Jason nor I really had the time to tackle this job, we hired a good friend to do it for us.  We are super pleased with the end result.  And I am so in love with having trees now, I never realized before how incomplete our home was without trees.

Next year everything will be more grown in and look even more fabulous.  

Thanks Shawn for helping us out!!

------

more work in the backyard

While us ladies were out having a good time, Jason and his dad and brother (and jack too) were back at the house finishing up a project in our backyard.  We decided a few months ago that we wanted to extend the concrete slab to give us a little more space to work with.  

It was so great to have my father in law here to help out Jason, his expertise always comes in handy around our home.  The guys did a great job and I think Jack had a great time supervising the whole day.

Now we just need to decide exactly what we want to do with this extra space.  I am thinking we should get a couple chairs and a fire pit.  I can imagine having friends over on a cool evening and roasting marshmallows and telling stories. mmmm..smores.  

What do you think would be a good use of this new space?

our backyard is transformed

 A little over a month ago this is what our backyard looked like.  Dirt and weeds.  We dreaded it anytime it rained because Jack's paws would get sooo muddy.  So one of the top items on our to do list this spring was grass.

Hubby did all the prep work.  He was super excited to use this machine thingy a.k.a. a dingo. (i love the name. hehe)  "Hey honey, are you done playing with your dingo?!" hahaha

 Hubby recruited a group of his friends to help him lay the sod and voila!  I am ecstatic with how it turned out.  The guys did such a fantabulous job.  Jack loves to run around and play fetch.  And I love the fact that I can go out in our backyard with bare feet.  I can't wait for the kiddos to get here so we can run through the sprinklers :)

I got these awesome lanterns for our now awesome backyard.  They are LED and they are powered by a little solar panel.  Basically they are amazeballs.  And they come from IKEA (of course)!

Oh and Jack says "hi!"

bye bye carpet

A little while ago I mentioned that we had some unexpected projects pop up.

Well here is the major one.  Over the winter, one of our pipes froze and decided to leak and then eventually burst.  As a result, our guest bathroom and bedroom flooded.

Although we knew we eventually wanted to get rid of all the carpet in the house, it was not on the agenda for the near future.  But this incident kinda bumped it up a few spots on our to do list.  After doing a lot of pricing and research, we decided to go ahead and tear up the carpet in all three bedrooms and put down laminate hard wood floors.

Even though this was a very unexpected expense; in the end, I am glad we did this project.  I am soooooooo happy to be rid of all the yucky carpet.  Jason and our friend Travis did all the work and it turned out amazing!

I'm so thankful I have a handy hubby with lots of handy friends! ha!

i fancied up a couple of vases

As I continue to decorate and re-decorate my home, I am doing my best to be thrifty and save money whenever I can.

For my breakfast area re-do, I knew I wanted to as some splashes of white on the bakers rack. Instead of buying brand new pieces, I used a couple things I already had. I also used left over primer and spray paint from this project.

The vase on the right was already displayed on the bakers rack and the vase on the left is actually a wine bottle that I saved because I liked the design.

Here is the result! The vase on the far right came from Homegoods ($19.99).

Total for this project: $19.99 +tax

Pretty thrifty, huh?!

house project: after (finally)

You may remember a while ago when I mentioned here and here that I was planning to redecorate my kitchen/breakfast area. As I read it again, I laugh at how I gave myself two weeks to complete the project. As it is over 3 months later and truthfully, I still have a bit more work to do.

BEFORE:

AFTER:

I got the curtains from Ikea, basically my favorite home store.

The left and middle vases are DIY projects that I will show you soon. The vase on the right is from Homegoods.

I just love this saying on the sign (from Hobbly Lobby). And here are my most often used cookbooks. I recently acquired several vintage cookbooks that I can't wait to break into.

Here is a photo from our wedding with my bridesmaids. I LOVE these girls. I plan to do a little DIY-ing to the cake stand soon.

At the bottom right is Jack's eating area. I still have a little work to do. But I thought it was about time that I did the big reveal!

So what do you think?!

It turned out even better than I imagined. The blue color just brightens up our home even more. Incase you didn't already know, I am a HUGE fan of color in our home. My dining room is orange!

i did a d.i.y.

I've actually had this project done for a little while now, but I am just now getting around to posting it.

I follow a few design blogs and I am always quite inspired by all the DIY projects. Instead of just buying expensive pieces to decorate our home, I really wanted to start finding cheap pieces and fancy-ing them up. So here is my very first DIY!

For this project I followed the instructions found here.

I started with two frames I found at a discount warehouse store.

First I did one coat of primer, followed by two coats of spray paint. I let the frames dry completely in between each coat.

After the last coat was dry, I glazed the frames to add a special touch.

And ta-da! I ended up with two fantastic frames for my prints.

I found these awesome prints here.

What do you think??

I had such a fun time doing this project and it really made me feel good about my creative abilities and I appreciate these frames more than plain old store bought ones. I have never really thought of myself as an artsy person, but completing this project has really inspired me to do more DIY projects. I already have my next three planned!

why haven't i diy (done it yet)

photo via

I would really like to do this with my jewelry. I have seen it done a few different times and love it every time I see it. I think it may be my turn to try it.

face lift

I have partnered with Shay at dumplin design studio to customize my blog. She will officially start working on my blog on Monday, so this week I have been trying to think about exactly how I want my blog to look. My main concern was my header, because that is usually the first thing people see and first impressions can be pretty important. Although I don't want to give away too much, I thought I would share one of my photos that did not quite make the cut. Each item in the photo has a special meaning to me.

While thinking about the outer look of my blog, I couldn't help but start thinking about the content as well. To say it simply, my blog is about my life. It includes the people that I love, fashion, interior design and really whatever else I feel like writing about. I don't claim to be an expert in any of these areas, but I just enjoy writing about things that make me happy.

I can't wait until my blog makeover is complete, so stay tuned :)

sneak peak

Hello friends! I just thought I would give you a little sneak peak of my breakfast area redecoration. I know I said (here) that I wanted to get it done in two weeks, but I think it is gonna be just a bit longer. The good news is that we are making progress. lol Stay tuned for the complete project.

help! paint opinions, please.

Okay, I have narrowed my paint choices down to four colors and I need your help. Yes, there are only three on the wall, but that is because Ace Hardware did not have a sample jar of color number 4. However, number 4 is just one shade darker than number 1, so I hope you get a feel for what the color might look like. I also included some photos of the rug since it was mentioned that I should use the rug as a guide. I have a color that I am leaning towards, but I don't want to influence any opinions so I will not say. But I would greatly appreciate any and all of your comments and suggestions :)

------------------------------------------------