Our Dining Room Remodel

One more project down! 

Its been a long time since I have posted. I have been doing small projects here and there but the largest project has been laying new floors throughout the house. I hate having a bunch of different flooring in a house, I prefer to have one seamless look. We decided on a laminate from Lumber Liquidators. We bought it on President's Day weekend for $1.79 a square foot! We got enough to do the entire house except for the bathrooms. We will be using a porcelain tile with the wood look to try to get it to match as much as possible. I thought my first post would be of the office aka my photography studio but I have not finished it yet. I wasn't really planning on doing anything to the dining room but once we laid the floor I was definitely ready to get rid of the green, the same green that came with the house. Yes it has taken me two years to get it painted. The first picture is of the dining room  before we moved in. I didn't really do anything to it but move my furniture in and put some stuff on the walls. Those pictures are not that exciting so I thought Id share the blank slate. 

As you can see the room is brighter, warmer and has a lot more personality. 

I had paint left over from painting the living room so I did not have to run out and buy any paint. Actually the only thing I had to buy was the curtains and curtain rods. I got the curtains at TJ MAXX for $16.99 for 2 panels. The wooden headers were actually shelves that I had over my kitchen sink for plants that I removed because the cats kept getting on them and knocking over my plants. So I repurposed them. 

 The corner cabinet was given to me and up until now lived in my foyer. As I was redoing everything I knew that the dining room would make a much better home for it. 

 The lighting fixture was purchased at a local pallet liquidation place. I got it for a whopping $38! 

I love how it turned out. I love the combination of the neutral colors with the wood grains. Right now this is my favorite room in the house and I think I just want to sit in here awhile. 

The Egg Haus

One of the first things we decided we wanted when we bought this house with all of this land was that we wanted chickens. So here we are a year and a half later and finally built our coop. I did not take pictures of the progress and honestly this was not one of my cheap projects. We are NOT builders so I went off of the simple design of the coop that my Mom and Dad built when I was a kid. We decided to keep things even more simple and do an 8x8 pen design and a 4x8 hen house design. There was minimal cutting. We did use posts sunk into the ground because living in the middle of fields we get some crazy wind out here and we didn't want it going anywhere, Now we just need the chickens!

My View from here!

Andrew and I sit on the front porch or in the kitchen often admiring our sunsets. They are so beautiful. They don't get old and are never the same. Sometimes they are screaming at me to grab my camera and make them a permanent memory as they are constantly changing. 

 As beautiful as the sunsets are the lightning storms as just as impressive. Andrew called me out one night to check it out. I had never tried photographing the lightning and this image is far from perfect... the camera was resting on the ground being propped by its own strap and I had to ever so carefully push the button. Even though its not perfect.. its cool!

Craft Day! Halloween

So we started early on Halloween Crafting! (Ive also already decorated my mantel, it is just waiting on the pumpkins then it will be photo ready!) This craft cost each of us a whole $13 and we now have a unique and awesome piece of Halloween art! 

Materials:

16x20 canvas (we got a 5 pack from Michaelss for $19.99)

A lazer cut frame ( $6.99 also from Michael's) 

Craft Paint ( from Michael's can not remember the sale price)

Painter's Tape ( I had this on hand already)

A printed graphic (found on www.thegraphicsfairy.com) 

We set to work painting!

First we painted the stripes on the canvas. We used the painters tape to make them. We also taped off where the graphic would go because we did not want to see the stripes behind the graphic. Trish trimmed her skull out and made it a little different but she still taped off where the skull would go. After painting the canvas we painted the frames while the canvas dried. 

 Then we debated on if we were going to glue the graphic on as is or vintage it up a bit. We decided on vintage except for Trish she left hers as is. So we tea stained the paper. Then Ashley decided she wanted her edges burned... I burned her entire picture up. I couldn't get the printer to work again so she had to go with a moth like mine because I had an extra one printed. Once I mastered the art of burning edges without catching the whole paper on fire I burned the edges of our pictures. After everything was ready we glued the frame to the canvas then modpodged the picture in the middle. 

 Then we had beautiful, unique and classy Halloween art! 

More from our vacation... water falls!

My kids were not near as thrilled as I was about hiking to find waterfalls. We went to North Carolina last year and I got to see and photograph my first one so now I am eager to do more! I was able to see three different ones while in TN and here they are! Enjoy!

A taste of our family vacation 2014.. Hooray for Chattanooga!

I know this blog was set up for sharing home decor ideas and diy projects but I also want to share what its like in our lives as well. When the kids make good grades all year as well as good behavior grades we take a trip during the summer. This year we chose Chattanooga, TN. If you didn't already know I did portrait and wedding photography for about 6 years. I quit doing it for compensation this past year so I could focus more on my family and home. I still have my camera and it is still one of my favorite things. These images were taken at the Chattanooga Aquarium, one of our many adventures. These were edited... because well I like editing. I am thinking they need printed and hung in the house some where. Andrew agrees. They kinda of look like paintings! 

I will have a more detailed break down of our trip with LOTS of new photos. So stay tuned! 

If interested in prints of these contact me for details. 

Jadyn and My Birthday Extravaganza!

So.. I turned 30 today. I was not looking forward to it but here I am... 30. My initial plans were to go to New Orleans and pretend I was 21... That is the key word... pretend. In reality I do not look or feel 21. I decided instead I would rather have close family and friends over to my home and cook an obscene amount of food and sweets. A good time was had and I am still stuffed. I am older, a little thicker but... a whole lot happier than I was 9 years ago. As I think back on my adulthood so far being 30 is really not so bad. I have grown tons and I have become a better person. My life is more stable and just all around awesome. So I will take 30 and not feel like I have lost anything because I really have gained so much. Here is to more happy times and to an awesome life with awesome people. Oh we also celebrated my little nieces birthday! She is turning 5! What another great milestone age. I am glad to have shared my awesome day with her!