Something old something new

Today I was super bored and couldn't STAND the thought of cleaning so decided to take a creative brake from the routine. I had bounced around in blogland earlier this week and was inspired by this refashioned shirt. So I pulled out a few shirts from the junk I had to take to Goodwill and made this beauty.

I cut up a white shirt that I bought on clearance a few years ago that had 3 Christmas trees on the front for the base shirt and then cut the petals out of a longsleeve blue shirt that somehow got bleached out in the wash. I made sure to stitch petals over the Christmas trees and used some purple thread to give it a little punch. I think it turned out pretty good and should be a fun addition to my somewhat boring wardrobe. Throw on a black sweater and now it's an outfit!

p.s. - I took 126 pictures to try and get a good one to post and you can see how many good ones that I got. Maybe I need that point and shoot that has the screen on the front of the camera!

The Basement Redo

Moving on to the month of September...

Jason was gone on a 10 day cross country trip with his students, so my mom flew up to keep me company for a few days. She graciously agreed to my plan to turn her into slave labor, and so, we began a basement transformation. This is the before - the walls were a lemony yellow and it never felt very warm and cozy. I was really looking for a warm and cozy look and feel, since this room feels like an ice box for half of the year. The transformations were mostly through paint, a few new things hung up on the wall that I have been saving for the last year for just this time, and a few new pillows on the couch.

Indulge me a moment to complain. This house is old. I think it was built in '57 or somewhere around there and there is a list a mile long of some of the things we would like to work on when we get the $ chance. Replacing this window is one of them. This poor tiny little thing is the only window in this room of the basement. Since it is probably original to the house, it doesn't work very good. It is super drafty and Jason decided to cover it with masking tape to keep the draft to a minimal. The man just can't stand inefficiency.

On that note, here is our fireplace. Deciding that masking tape probably wouldn't cut it, Jason decided on packing tape around opening of the fire grate. I guess it looks a little bit prettier than masking tape, don't you think? I have to admit that this fireplace is SUPER drafty. The really lovely part about this fix up is the noise that the tape makes when it is windy. Have you ever blown on a blade of grass between your thumbs? The noise of the tape is similar, except in a much lower pitch, which sounds something like a bodily function. We make sure and explain this to anyone who might be house sitting. Now that it is currently getting cold, I am considering robbing a bank so that we can afford a wood burning insert. A what? you AZ people may be asking yourselves, a little wood burning stove that fits into the fireplace. It would be so wonderful, sigh...

And now onto the fun! I picked a warm brown. Yes, you heard me, a brown. I SWORE to myself that I would never put the color brown in my house. I thought the color brown lacked imagination, but I love how it makes this room feel. I also repainted the UGLY blue fireplace. I'm pretty sure it hadn't seen a fresh coat of paint since 1983. Goodbye blue, RIP.

This dresser is one of my favorite finds ever. A Craigslist score. I love the vintage style and the color. And there is our tiny drafty window. And a set of speakers in the ceiling that go to nowhere. But I love me that dresser and I am proud that I have been able to keep that plant alive for almost 2 years. Yes, I am really growing in my skills as a housewife.

Here is the wall opposite the fireplace. The day bed is from IKEA and can pull out into either a queen or a king size bed and the drawers are wonderful for storage. A friend gave me this OLD door from her turn of the century house. It has been several colors since coming into my possession. This is where our multitude of guests sleep - hence, the 'bed and breakfast' sign.

A few new things for this wall. I sewed a few new pillows for the couch.

Kellan refused to move from the table until he saw me trying to take this picture and then he refused to move from the floor.

My ode to Nester

On a small side note, this is a picture my aunt painted of Mirielle that I think is amazing. I set it on top of the piano and it is the perfect thing to match my blue piano.

Ta Da!

Summer Camping

Okay, I've totally given up on trying to catch up blogging this summer. But before I moved on I did want to share a few pictures of our first ever family camping trip. We traveled an hour and a half north east of here to a beautiful lake in Idaho. It was a lovely campground, the weather was perfect and we all had a blast!
I think we should do lots more camping. Jason was in his element and I mostly got to sit around and relax and watch him doing stuff like this:

We went for a walk down this trail and as you can see I had my pants rolled up. As we were walking back a gigantic grasshopper jumped up the bottom of my pants. Panic would not adequately describe what I was feeling. I tried to shake him out, but this only encouraged him to jump in the only direction he was facing which was up. I managed to stop him as he got to about my knee, but then I was faced with a decision. If he wasn't going to go down, then how would I get him out of my pants? I considered many things, one of which was to try and take my pants off while holding onto the grasshopper through my jeans, but I didn't enough guts to drop my pants on a path and not enough skill to wriggle out of them while holding him. So it seemed that the only option was to smash him and kill him while he was in my pants. After that, I managed to shake him out of my pants and then had to think about the grasshopper guts that I got to wear in my pants for the next 2 days. Lovely. That was the worst of our trip though, so overall, not too much to complain about!

Beautiful lake Pond Orielle

Maizy enjoying the water for the first time.