Winter Warm Up (with CardMaker Magazine) Blog Hop

Welcome from Susan's place. Isn't she the sweetest? And talented? Great combo!!!

I"m participating in a blog hop as part of the Winter Warm-up Crop going on at CardMaker Magazine's CardSwaps message board.

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What do you do to warm up your winter?
Always wear pretty clothes?
Make a special point to have your make-up just so?
Wear pretty scarves to keep you warm and stylish?

This winter I have particularly been into pretty scarves! I have warm ones, pretty ones, ones that are warm and pretty! While each of them work hard at something, some keep me warm, some are just cute to ward of the winter blues, some add bling, sophistication, color, etc to my wardrobe (even my blah, black scrubs from my daily work wardrobe feel fancy with a sparkly red scarf).

Here is a picture me in one of my warm scarves along with a host of warm clothes:


It's working hard because the temperature was 31 degrees and I was out for 4 hours working on Janie's fence...not even cold!!!!

Here's a collection of some of my cute scarves (but not really warm):


Look at the bling on the red one! LOVE!

Using my collection of scarves for inspiration, because I hate to be cold but I love to wear cute stuff, I created this card:


Here's another view:


Loving the glitter paper!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Thank you for stopping by my blog. I appreciate that you took the time to read this far. :) Now that you have, go ahead and leave a comment! I don't bite.

This post is brought to you by the letter S.

Hop on and visit my friends!
Marlene is next (click her name). The whole list is below in case you get lost.

CardMaker
Lora
SusieQ
Laura <--- You are here.
Marlene
Jane
Golda
Angelina
Tina
Judy (PrairieWildflower)
Ivanka
Teresa (WingsNThings)
Ana

Don't forget, go see Marlene!! You will be glad you did.

Pretties

I can share this little find now...



I found these for my friend Holly (Hi, Holly) for her birthday. Her birthday is December 27th but I just got to celebrate with her this past week.

Now these have a story! It goes way back to January '11. We were planning my Sister's bridal shower. We were doing a very fancy tea party type setting and serving our guests on vintage snack sets...did I mention the guest list was over 100?? (thank you sister).

While I have around 30 place settings of my own and my Mom and sister have similar...I needed more. I was calling all my friends borrowing snack sets.

I called Holly. Here's how it went down:

Me: Hey, can I borrow your snack sets for Sarah's shower?
Holly: I don't have any snack sets.
Me: Really?
H: Yes. I don't know why.
Me: Me either. We need to fix that!

Enter Salvation Army while I was looking for white vases. Well, I happened across this pretty little snack set...all four were there, cups included, no chips!

Extra bonus: pinkish roses. Holly's fav. china print. SCORE!!!

Since Jj and I moved twice in the past year, I was in a bit of a panic. I was sure I knew right where they were...wrong. However, they have been properly located, packaged and gifted.

Happy Birthday Holly!

Have you harbored any great finds lately for the perfect gift for that special someone?

Faux Tin Kitchen Back Splash

At our old house, we Jj installed the most beautiful back splash! I still love it. And I swore that I was getting that same back splash in my next house.

Well, I still love the back splash so much I think I want to marry it but my new house begs for a different wall covering...that's for another day, another post.

Back to my old house. This is what the pieces look like up close:


We got ours at Home Depot (I {heart} Home Depot) but I can't seem to find the actual product on their website. However, I'm pretty sure I saw it the last time I was there. I noticed that Menards has the same stuff but slightly cheaper. At the time, our color was not carried by Menards.



We bought glue that goes into the caulk gun. You cut the sheets of back splash (I estimate them at being 18 inches X about 24 inches or so) with scissors. I recommend crazy sharp Fiskars or tin snips. Jj used tin snips.

Then it's basically like putting sheets of scrapbook paper all over the walls. You cut out the outlets, around the windows, etc., to fit.



In the above picture, you can see the J-channel things that go between the back splash and the counter top. He used the air nailer to hold that channel piece onto the wall. Two pictures above, you see Jj fitting the sheet down into the quarter-round/J-channel piece.



Taking a break. :)

But see that piece lying over by the wall. That's the back splash cut to fit the window sil.



The thing that made this back splash take the longest was cutting around our wooden window sil. We elected to not try to take it off as we had a tough time with removing some of the trim in the basement and didn't want to mess up the wood.



Notice that beautiful outlet cover that matches the back splash perfect?? Yeah? Well, I MADE that. Yes, I did.

Let me show you how. And know that it took me almost as long to cover the outlets and switches as it did Jj to put up the back splash. However, I figured out a thing or two that I'm going to share with you so you are faster. :)

First, tools:
-Must have exacto knife!!
-New switch and outlet covers (they don't have to be new but they must be super clean for the adhesive. Covers are less than $1 so rather than scrubbing, I bought new.
-Cutting board



Cut the covering slightly larger than the outlet.



Notch out the corners all around. This is so when you wrap under the corners (next picture) you don't have a ton of bulky product.



Wrap all around.



Cut our the middle with slits going back so it will roll around the edge smoothly. Think about wrapping presents...it's a lot the same.

Press each tab really taught through the hole for the outlet. If there's too much bulk it will be difficult to get the cover back on the outlets. **Trust me**

Follow the same process for the light switches.

Now, I wish I had the back splash before pictures...it was TERRIBLE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Let me just say that thou SHALL paint drywall prior to adhering ugly wall paper. Thou SHALT!

And another thing I loved about this kitchen:


The lighting!!!

It's oil rubbed bronze and simply beautiful! Jj and my Dad put up the track lighting. Apparently it was quite difficult and slightly ugly to make that pretty swirl I wanted.

**Love those guys for working so hard to make my mind's eye come to reality!**

If I may, I'd like to show you my favorite picture again:


Let me know, in the comments, if you have any questions!

**I received no compensation for this post. The opinions and instruction ideas are all mine.

What's your favorite thing about your kitchen?

I'd love to know as I'm gathering inspiration for my current kitchen.

*Edit*
I liked up to Show us your Kitchens at Thrifty Decor Chick.

SunRise!

I want you to see what I saw yesterday morning...beautiful!!!



That's the moon. As I was grumbling to myself about being out and about before the sun, I was reminded of the beauty of God's Earth.



As I drove a couple more miles (obviously in the opposite direction), the sun began to rise... B--E--A--U--T--I--F--U--L!



And I began to be thankful that I was awake and up and outside!





Yes, I took these with my cell phone, yes I was driving. No that probably wasn't safe but there are limited cars on the road and aren't you glad you didn't miss this??

Let us E-A-T! (again)

I received a couple of comments on my first EAT post requesting more pictures to better see the context of our EAT sign.

Here we go!

This is looking from the doors to my sun porch. To the right, the door way is into the living room with our fireplace. The doorway on the left...if you look really close, you can see the edge of the staircase.


This one is from the kitchen side. I think I was standing between the sink and the cook top. Don't you love my pretty white appliances...NOT.


Here, I was standing by the dining room table. Looking into the kitchen area. To the right of the refrigerator, that hallway goes to our bedroom. There's a coat closet, half bath, laundry room and stairs that go down to our family room.


I also noticed that you see Janie's purple dog on the ledge...I took it away from her for ripping a hole in it. :) Also, that's a vintage toast rack up there holding our Christmas cards.

I have huge plans for this kitchen...I'll share them as they get closer to reality.

Time and Money...two things this kitchen is going to require. :)

What's your project for the new year?
And, what do you think of my EAT? Is Jonny right? Should they go? (Fingers crossed you are on my side.:) )

Merry CHRISTmas!

I wanted to take this time to wish my readers (hello, friends) a Very Merry CHRISTmas. May you find Peace this holiday season that can only be found in our Lord.

In wishing you Christmas cheer, I thought the friendly thing to do would be to have you all over for dinner. Now, most of you probably know, that I am a terrible cook. In fact, I really only have a kitchen because it came with the house.

However, since it's here, I thought what the heck, might as well decorate it! Decorating, I can do. Cooking...well I generally require assistance.

Anyway, without further ado, My CHRISTmas table:





A good bit of this stuff, I already had. The table cloth and all but 2 placemats, I've had forever (well, not really but probably 4 or 5 years) and I still love them to pieces!



The white square plates are our everyday plates. I got them YEARS ago from Pampered Chef. We are talking I was still in college and had a PC party to get free stuff and got these plates. And I still love them so I guess I made a good purchase. :)

The red luncheon plates came from Target this year. $7.99 for a set of 4. The holley bowels were from Target too. $9.99 for 2. Thank God for Mommas that work in other towns (with Targets) for saving the day on these new dishes. For my Target was grossly under stocked for my needs. :)



Now this is where the new stuff comes in. The tray I got (and one just a tad smaller) at TJ Maxx, $25 for the pair.



One of the big mercury glass candle holders came from The Maxx this year too; I think $6. The other one I won at Patty K's in California, MO last year at the Christmas Homes Tour.

The little votives on top are nestled into Southern Living at Home cups. I love them because they look like Candlewick crystal...except not as fragile or as expensive. The whole set has a serving tray and 3 votive cups.



The big chunky Christmas tree was from The Maxx this year too. It was under $10.

I also got the mercury glass balls at The Maxx too. I think they were around $4 each. I would have loved to purchase everyone they had! I love them so so much. The down side is they are very heavy so I'm not sure they will be very tree worthy. But beautiful? YES!!!



The taper holders I got for $1.50 at an Estate Tag sale a couple of weeks ago when we were visiting my Parents in Tipton, MO. And! They came with the tapers. Lucky me!!



The pinecones, I got (an entire shopping bag FULL) from a sweet patient of mine.



Chose your seat. And my all means, bust out my pretty cloth napkins. Have I ever mentioned to you that I adore cloth napkins? The really soft kind. Or a vintage flower sack tea towel will do too, in a pinch. But it's CHRISTMAS!!!

Merry CHRISTmas to each and every one of you. I sincerely appreciate you stopping by my corner of the interweb (Jj's word) checking to see what I'm up to. This blog is fun to me and a nice outlet for my schenanigans!

Here's to another blessed, bountiful year. May we have all that we need and be careful not to expect all that we want!

Man Worthy Christmas Tree

In our downstairs, I wanted to have some more Christmas Cheer. Jj vetoed a big Christmas tree. Which I guess was fine considering I didn't have a big Christmas tree anyway...

On Pinterest, my friend Shelly pinned a great little Christmas tree! And it got me to thinking...I bet Jj would go for an unconventional Christmas tree! Because while he likes to pretend he's a Scrooge, I really think he does that just to give me a hard time. :)

Since I've never had much of a vegetable garden, I was fresh out of tomato cages. I put out an APB on facebook and my good friend Margo came through!!!

She brought be 2 tomato cages that were in a perfectly used condition!!!!

Thank you, Margo!!!!!!! (Picture taken at my Mom's house)

I clipped off the tags and bent the tops (actually the real bottoms) together to form the top of my tree. I also had to add some vertical wires to the tree. Otherwise, when I wrapped the lights around, t basically turned into a 3-D triangle rather than cylindrical. (Of course, I didn't take a picture, I was too excited about that I was making.)

I stacked up a couple of wooden soda flats, I had out in the garage, and put the tree on top!



I love it! And Jj doesn't hate it = DOUBLE SUCCESS!!

Since I doctor'ed that photo so much, I took a few more so you could see the actual tree better.





See that blue man on the toilet in the background?



I got it from my Dad for Christmas. If you pick the guy up, his hiney is a magnet and the toilet bowl stores paperclips. Funny!!!

While we are down here, I'll show you around!
We've done quite a bit of decorating down here and making it just so. This is probably one of the areas in our home where we spend the most time.



This is our little bar area. This is our first time having a full-sized extra refrigerator. It has came in handy with our family Thanksgiving and Christmas hosting!

Did you see that "God Bless the USA" sign over the sink? The Girls got me that for my Birthday! It's made from license plates. I love it. It's so so me!!



I love this little setting. Simple, pretty and oh so wintery! (Bonus, I had all that stuff in my stash so free!!!)



This is looking from the bar over toward the TV side. And that's our helper, Janie. She's about 16 months old. She's a boxer we adopted the beginning of November from Columbia Second Chance. We love her bunches!!!



This little area is also on the bar. I'm really liking mini-Christmas trees this year. And, I've committed to trying to have a little piece of the beach in every room of our home. Enter: Brass crab. He's actually an ash tray but...we won't be using that.



Here's standing in front of the TV looking back over the furniture, into the corner...with the bar in the background. I'll have to tell you about my smokin deal on that lamp another day!

Have you had any thrifty finds lately? It's not really the season for such but I'm still stumbling one a few once in awhile.

Oh, And Merry Christmas to you!!!

Cricut Expression = Cricut Cake??

So I was reading through my blog roll a couple of weeks ago and stumbled across a post from Lena @ Scrapbutterfly. Click on her name to read her post.

She said the Cricut Cake is the same as the Expression except with stainless steel moving parts (because the Cake has to be food safe). AND she also said they were on sale on cricut.com for $49.99.


WHAT!?!?

I quickly commented on her blog to double check that I was reading correctly along with, did a quick google search.

HOLY COW, SHE WAS RIGHT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I emailed the link to Jj, we opened some of our Christmas presents on Saturday morning with my family...and I got a Cricut Cake Expressions!

I'm super stoked!!!! And it was a good deal!!!

Looks like right now, Cricut.com has them for $119.99. Still a good deal. Click here.

Mine looks pretty much just like this...except RED! (My favorite color anyway.)
(from photobucket)

Here's mine exactly:

And it came with a "cake" cartridge that has some really cool borders.

Thank you Monster! I love you.

Buh-Bye Sassy Brassy!

Remember when I told you about my Stevie throwing dust rags in the fan?

Remember this fan?

Don't you just love that brass?
That's ok. Me either!!
Remember that I have been spray painting lately?

Did you guess what I have done??

Yep, I did it! Dad & Jj took down the fans...which was a Circus in itself!


Jj brought a 12' ladder home from work. They quickly decided that one on the balcony and one on the ladder wasn't going to cut it.

So, we had to rent a 16 foot ladder! HOLY COW!!!!! It was tight quarters maneuvering that baby around in our living room.



Removing the globes helped a ton with elbow room.



They took a few blades off for opening more space too.



Then they repeated the steps for the other fan.

Prior to beginning, they turned off the breakers and checked (however they do that...I am a bit scared of electricity) to make sure they did in fact have the juice off!

SIDE NOTE: I warned Jj that if he left me a young widow in a big house, tons of miles away from our family and friends...I'd be upset! Basically, I insisted they use the breaker as an off, rather than just the switch. Let's be smart about electricity.

**And now I'm off that soap box**

Once the fans were both down, I started to take them apart.


Basically, I wanted to separate the blades because they weren't getting painted. Then, I wanted to take the main part apart as much as I could. Which basically consisted of taking off the light kit (you just unscrew it) and the blade holders (above picture).

I could have sworn I took pictures of this next part...but I guess not. I ran a light sand paper across all the surfaces just to be sure. I was using something like 220 grit; not much at all.

I laid all the pieces out on my drop cloth and commenced to painting! I dusted them with a spray paint primer (Rustoleum) because I had it and then went to Rustoleum Oil Rubbed Bronze. I did 2 coats, loosely. I say loosely because I didn't really do 2 complete coats but the second coat was more to hit the spots I missed.

After having completed the project, I would recommend priming. If nothing else, it changed all the surfaces to white so I could easily see where I needed to add a little paint.

We let them dry over night and put the fans back together. We left off 2 blades, the bulbs and globes off for ease of handling.





On to fan #2


And that's a finished project!

What do you think?







Thanks for stopping by.

What's your latest finished project? I'd love to hear all about it!
Leave me a link in the comments. I'd love to see all about it too. :)