New Decor

I've been finding all kinds of bumper stickers since I've been sorting out the place. Ollie was my hippie car and she was full of my schtick-ers. That is, until the kid took her over. Ollie had to get cleaned up; and then I had nowhere to put my stickers. Of course, that never stopped me from continuing to collect them. Hmmmm. H word.

They're just one of those things I can't seem to part with {hoarder}. Bite your tongue. I've had these two old chairs from a yard sale way back in my Virginny days--a long time ago. They've looked SO plain, lately! tehe

Before I placed the first one (Elizabeth Cook), I asked my brother Jim if he thought yay or nay. He was all yay.

Eclectic. 

Yes. 

Love.

Labels: Home Redecorating

Project Work

Here's my latest fiasco. Ugh. The pit, rag, bonus room; call it what you will. It's a mess. Time to get it cleaned up. "Must keep this 'moving soon' mental note in my head." Front and center.

The teenager moved into a new apartment this year at UT. The last three years, his places came furnished. So, I had told him, and his roommates, they could have our old furniture, the grey stuff. Now, mind you, this is my first set of furniture I bought when I moved into my first apartment. So, we're talking, um, 25 year-old furniture. It's still in pretty good shape, considering. A queen sleep sofa (have to ask Raphi how comfortable that is, though), love seat and chair? Free. Ok, so long-story-shorter, they changed their minds after the hub and I had prepared for them to pick it up.

And so started the ball rolling in this room.

The table on the right, I had set up many years ago. I got all the kids' photos out and started their scrapbooks, again. Well, I think I may have done ONE page. One. Period. Time to sort and move all of it again. Like in storage. ha.

The hub (as all men do) wants to buy a pit for in here. I don't know 'bout that. But, I do know that once I start painting, changing the carpet, etc. new furniture will be at the top of the list. Sigh.

Spring is in the Air

You'd think, one day, I may just grow my own iris. I haven't planted them in the past two placed we've lived.  That's just not right. I adore them!

My daffs are blooming, so I've made the place look a little springy inside also.

I love these little fellows.

The basement  is coming along just dandy. (Don't look too closely at the smaller "before" pic. HOARDER!) I don't care to admit to how much junk I threw out or gave away. Why in the world do some of us do this? Lawdy me. I got it from my mom. Hope my kids don't catch it from me!

While we had wonderfully warm weather yesterday, there was a nip in the air today. The hub was given a wonderful gift of Chinese tea when he was in Beijing last week. It is perfect for these cooler afternoons.

Today we've had this spring forward time change, which is always a challenge.  I don't much like it.

Puttering

I'm still puttering around the "girls'" room. Adding little things. Moving stuff. You know.

I had found these wonderful note cards way back when and I've stuck them in the card holder on the wall, along with a million other things.

I'll have to agree with both of these!

My next move is adding a Warhol/Marilyn print above this lamp. I've been looking for a new shade, as this one just doesn't cut it with the room.

What do you think about this look?

I started a new cleansing diet. Haven't done a really good one for two years. I try and do a mini one every six months; but this one is the big daddy. No caffeine, no dairy, no red meat, no alcohol, no gluten, no sweetners. Ugh. But I've been good on the pre-diet and start the next part tomorrow when the real cleansing begins. Again, ugh. But it has to be done. I have been putting all kind of bad things in my system for the past six months (probably longer). The weight is coming back and I'm not going back there. So wish me luck.

The hub is driving to Memphis for the night. Of all the places that he travels to throughout the world, it's the drive to Memphis and back that always worries me.

Motivating Weather

You know how the cooler temps motivate me to be more productive.  It seems I haven't done a darn thing for over a year.  I truly need to get back into the swing of things.  The kid was off for two days (fall break, haha), so we went and gathered some punkins'.  I so LOVE this time of year!  Do you see Dave in the background?

It's also GGC time.  This is the bracelet the girls and I made last year at Riverside in October.  I have been wearing it almost every day.  I hope they are too!  Tiz' the season, girlz!  I don't even remember adding the angel charm.  Who would have known that it would have such meaning in such a short time?  We lost mom four days later.  Well, unfortunately, the GGC won't be able to have our annual meeting this year, scheduling conflicts, I'm afraid.  Sniffle. But, I'm workin' on a little sumpin' sumpin'.

I continue pulling together the girls' room, piece by piece.  I hung these mirrors this week after they sat on the beds for like a month or more.  (Beds, I say.  I dont' even have mattresses, yet!) I hung them close to the dresser so the girls can put their makeup there and be close to a reflection.  I'm starting to think more like a girl every day.  Go figure, at almost fifty, right?  Sad, but it's taken me that long--three older brothers and all . . .  (Do you barely spy the wool shag rug?  Squeeeeeeel!)

Natalie Sarabella, the true angel that she is, included this gorgeous Diva (click to her website) when I ordered some presents for friends and family.  Madam D, as I named her, is an absolute delight!  Nat has been so generous to me over the years, and I can never thank her enough.  I send big ol' bear hugs and kisses and prayers and everything good to her every time I eye one of her beautiful pieces.  I know she has angel wings hidden somewhere.  

Who else could come up with these teeny, tiny little precious babies but Nat?  These were made for Dar's (my riversorry friend) little grandbabies!

Going back to the girls' room, how could I resist a little nod to England after such a delightful trip this summer?  I sigh every time I see that Union Jack!

Tomorrow,  Beth and I are heading East to Knoxville to see JJ Grey & Mofro in a real theatre. We are going to have the best time!  Not only am I traveling with my dawlink friend, but I get to see my first born also.  And he's going to the show with us.  It doesn't get much better.

Life is good to me. (Except for the fact that the hub is in China, again.)

Happy Fall Y'all!!!

Piecemeal

I've been working a little in the girls' room. This week, I worked on painting an old chandelier I had laying around that I had never really used. It was black, so I spray painted it off white to add to the white-on-white motif.

Little by little.  I have until just before Thanksgiving to finish, so I'm not really in any rush.  Just taking my time.

Color My World--Pinky

Here I am redoing the teenager's room, once more. The kid never really did like it, said the paint had a schmere of pink in it. Mmmmk. I thought it was quite the taupe, myself. At any rate, he has moved back into his old room--all we have to do is replace the carpet with wood at some point, and boom, done.

And, so, as I've said before, this is now going to be the "girls' room." Since I have eight nieces, and two that visit several times a year, I'm doing it up dainty and sweet. I've always loved the white-on-white but with some color thrown in.

So, I'm getting this and that together to finish it off. Well, I do have to get mattresses for the beds, in order to really finish it off.

Beth and Janet gave me these gorgeous pieces, and I'm going to frame them for the walls. Love them!

I found these two linen-covered side chairs and this great white pillow to match. Love the wool felt.

And speaking of felted wool, looky at what I found at Liberty of London when I was there! I am SO loving these colors!

Today, these two pillows showed up from Thrifty Miss Priss' Etsy shop! How perfect are they with the linen chairs?

Or even the old rocking chair from a dear friend. It is from her Lake Charlevoix, MI cottage. Sigh.

Of course, Bella has to inspect the "new."

I haven't yet decided how I'm going to arrange the room. With the two beds against the windows (which will have to have different curtains now), we get this wonderful openness when you walk in to the room with my brothers' chest of drawers in the corner.

The two wool throws are from Dublin (Avoca) and Edinburgh (Ness). Love them! The little doggy sachet is from London from years ago. I knew he would end up somewhere pretty.

We went and celebrated the teenager's 21st birthday this weekend in Knoxville. Awwwww. Someone hand me a tissue, please. Ok, ok, I'd settle for a piece of that cake. (BACK on diet here!) Oooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooof.

Alive and Well

Just busy. One more week of school and then we're over and out! Planning a trip to Europe, as you can see. My printer spit paper out every which direction which amused Bella, so I left it. K, here's the itinerary: Dublin, Brussels, London, Stratford-Upon-Avon, Edinburgh, Lake District and then back to London. Two weeks. Phew. A lot to see. We bringing my niece Jacq! So, of course, we have to fit EVERYTHING in! Oooooof.

I finally got around to working on the kid's childhood room. The bunk beds, gone. I put them up for sale, along with a whole slew of items included, on Craig's List. My first time using it. They were sold within a couple of hours! I was very pleased with myself. And I was happy that a young family will get another 15 years of usage out of them.

Ew, look how yucky after we lifted the mattress. EW. Bad boy.

And the walls! Oy! Lots of spackling and priming. Yuck.

But it all turned out quite nicely. It turned out to be a putty color. The kid was animate about having a more masculine color. He says the taupe I used in the teenager's old room was too pink. Wha??? Oh well, I didn't redo it for him anyway. Regardless, he was happy to be back in his old room, updated a tad.

And I got "my" room back for the girls (all of my nieces)! I'm going to girly it up. I don't have a girly room in the house, so this is going to be it, by golly! The curtains are going somewhere else and I just pulled the little rug from my room to get an idea of what some color on the floor will look like. My plan is to do the twin beds in white-on-white and then add splashes of color on the walls and floor. Yay!

Look at the last of the cookies from Carlo's. Heart shaped. Aw. I ate it.

Mom's peace lily is blooming happily. Sweet.

The Cumberland River has finally gone down. This is one of the waterways that did so much damage in downtown Nashville. You can barely see our Titan's football field at the top left which was completely flooded. The waters rose two block up the streets. Crazy. It so reminded me of back home in Virginia when the Potomac would flood Old Town Alexandria. We are having storms again today and my alarm keeps going off warning of more flash flooding. Oh no.

A shot at the Hermitage Hotel at brunch last weekend. This was at the front desk. Perty.

Think we're heading down to Riverside next weekend for a week. The oil has not hit Mobile Bay yet. I keep praying that the gush will soon be capped off. C'mon people, we can do this.

I can't even imagine the impact we will see down the road. It makes me utterly sick to my stomach. Literally.

Shame on US.