Decorating dilemma

If someone were to ask you what your decorating style was, what would you say? And would you be able to summarize it in one style alone?

If you can, I truly envy you! I am beginning to think I have some sort of multiple decorator personality disorder, and it is not pretty! I can't seem to define what I like when I decorate. Shabby Chic? (Yes.) French Country? (Absolutely.) Vintage or Retro? (Both.) Cottage? (Definitely!) Do you see what I mean? And this isn't all either. When it comes to colors, I am SO conflicted lately! If you know me, you know I LOVE to paint! Painting furniture is fine, but painting walls is one of my favorite things to do! I love changing a room around, and this has been the primary way I have introduced color to a room for years now. So I see a room like this~

(Disclaimer: I have posted this picture before!)

~And my heart skips a beat for the love of color! But there is also something very attractive about this picture~




And this~

(LOVING this refrigerator!)

~See the beautiful simplicity? The fresh, clean feel of the room? Lately I'm thinking neutrals aren't so bad...

And a dash of rustic farmhouse wouldn't be so bad either~





And I will admit that there is something appealing about these pictures~










~Although I'm more into red than pink, isn't that pink refrigerator so cute? :)

I started this kitchen project with one idea of how it would look, and now it seems I am going in a totally different direction, loving the simpler, neutral look. So now I find I am trying to combine this~







~With some of this~







~And hoping that when it all finally comes together, it will be just right. :) Although if truth be told, I think our kitchen will end up more neutral with bits of color here and there...

(* All photos from Better Homes and Gardens and Country Living.)


Oh, and on the matter of IKEA, and the recent trip there: IT WAS SO MUCH FUN! My main thought when my sister and I left was how soon we could go back! :) I did buy curtains for our living room, but the color isn't going to work so it's back to IKEA...do I mind? Not a bit, although it will be nice to find the right curtains! I also found a couple of other things, including a duvet cover with matching pillow cases, and I will show you those soon! :)

I will be around to visit you all soon! I hope you are having a good week! :)

BLESSINGS,

And off we go...

I am so excited because tomorrow morning my sister is coming over, and we have a fun day planned! Our first stop will, of course, have to be Starbucks! We will need the caffeine when we get here...



The last time I went to IKEA is almost nine years ago! It is only about an hour or so away, but for some reason seems so far away that I haven't gone back! But tomorrow I'm going to change that! I'm hoping to find curtains for my living room windows, so cross your fingers for me! :)

I hope you had a good Tuesday! :)

Blessings,

Five things

DID you know that just ten weeks stand between us and Christmas Day? Gulp. Yes, it was a shock to me to when I was reminded of this. I only have TEN weeks to: finish decorating for Halloween, undo that and decorate for Thanksgiving, and prepare for Christmas?! Yowzy! Now, add this to the fact that we have a major revamping going in on in our kitchen right now, and all of the other projects I have planned, and well, I have been really stressed!

But, I am not nearly as much now, because I joined "The Five Things a Week Challenge" at The Shabby Chic Cottage. The deal? Every week, I will post on my sidebar the five things I plan on completing, and at the end of the week, I will show you what I have done! I will cross off the things on the list as I complete them. This takes a major edge off the stress because there's a plan!

I have finished one thing so far, and am working on two others right now...all are house or decorating projects save one, one of which is a FuN project I have had in the works, an idea from a fellow blogger, that involves turning this sweater~




~into something else entirely! Can you guess what? :) I finished this wrought iron fruit stand I found at a local antique store:




It was in desperate need of a new coat of paint, and I am much happier with it now! :)

SO, do you have a list? One with just a few things on it, or maybe one like mine, with so many things on it you could do five things every week for the rest of your life and still not catch up? If you want to join in on the fun, just make a list on your sidebar, and link up to The Shabby Chic Cottage. She has such a wonderful blog, and it is one of my favorite places to visit! Make sure to check it out! :)

I hope you all had a wonderful Monday, and have a great night! :)

A new blog design and some crafts

Hi all! I hope you are having a wonderful week! :) I am so excited over here because anytime your blog gets a new look, it's a good day! It is a lot like getting a new hair cut that you love! It has been a year since I went bright aqua and red, and I just wanted something SIMPLE this time. Neutral. Clean and straight-lined. What do you think? If you too have been thinking of giving your blog a little lift, I would highly recommend Michelle at Shabby Creations. She even has dozens of amazing pre-made designs! I ordered my package last night and she installed it tonight! (WOW!) Now she is making new little category buttons for my blog, so if you are seeing aqua boxes around my current buttons, that will be updated soon! :) Okay, I promise I'm done talking about my new blog design, but I wanted to say "thank you!" to Michelle, and let you know about her work! :)

I was inspired by The Happy Homebody to make a framed pear picture that I just think is SO cute! She also did an adorable framed pumpkin too, and if you click on her blog name, it will show you the directions. (I just used her pumpkin instructions to copy her framed pear idea.)





The idea is to cut the pear (or pumpkin) in half, and so I started cutting and it went well for a while until I hit something hard and rather unyielding! I thought it was metal of some sort, but look what they put inside of this pear, most likely to make it more sturdy and such... But good grief! It turned out fine~ I just burrowed around it and yanked it out...




And in the end it all turned out fine! But I must admit, sometimes I truly do wonder how it is that I can take a simple project and turn it into something so difficult! :) I was so nervous before cutting the pear, you would have thought I was about to perform brain surgery! I was afraid I'd mess it up, and I only had one of these large green pears!





Okay, now are you already tired of my crafting "soap opera"? I hope not because I have one more craft to share! :) If you have been reading this blog for a while, you probably know I'm kind of addicted to framing letters. And every fall, it gets bad, really bad! It's kind of an obsession...so when I saw these frames at JoAnn's for one dollar a piece~ yes, one dollar I tell you! ~




I snatched some up and bought them! I was inspired yet again, this time by Wendy over at The Shabby Nest , with one of her lovely fall displays with white pottery on white shelves, with the letters "e-e-k" spelled out. SO, of course I had to "spell" eek too because it was just so darn cute!





I just used simple white cardstock for the paper and stuck pn these cute sticky letters I found at Michael's.





And have any of you been in the paper section at Michael's lately? I haven't seen such a variety of cute paper there in a while! I never can seem to find what I am looking for, but my sister and I were there yesterday and we both found a lot of cute colors and patterns! We were so happy! :)





Well, it is LATE here and I'm falling asleep at the computer so I'd better close for now! I hope you are all doing well! :) We're almost to the weekend! :)

Blessings,

Pumpkins!

There is a little nursery near me that I love. It is not the biggest or the fanciest, but it is such a lovely place to spend a little time. I was driving by it this week and noticed their sign said they had white pumpkins. Yea! I was so excited! Rose went with me and we had a fun time there.
I was bummed when I realized I didn't have my camera with me, because they had such a gorgeous display of pumpkins there. They had French pumpkins, white pumpkins, "blue" pumpkins (that looked a pretty pale green to me), and they sold tall, tall cornstalks as well.

As part of my little "fall porch preview", here are the pumpkins we chose...






I didn't know before that these bright, almost red, orange pumpkins were called "French" pumpkins, but now I do! :) I'm sure most of you already knew that! I'm still working on the front porch, and hope to have pictures of that soon. :)


They also were selling cut dahlias, just a dollar a stem, and they were amazing! I am NOT a good floral designer, so they were very simply cut and placed in a vase, but the flowers don't seem to mind and have cheered up our little kitchen! This picture does not do these flowers justice at all...

(please tell me you will try to ignore the ugly blue painter's tape!)

The nursery also had various pots of kale planted with pansies and violas, and they were so pretty together that Rose and I picked out some to plant...




...Which we did later that day, in pots I already had at home. I don't know about that smaller one, I think that plant is looking a little sad, maybe it should join the others in the biggest one...Have I mentioned before how much I DON'T know about gardening? It would fill many books, I am sure! :)

Okay and I'm excited about this so I must show you these BEFORE I decide what to do with them...more milk glass!




It is hard to see in the picture, but one is bigger than the other two, and they are in perfect condition. I found them at my favorite little "hole in the wall" thrift store, for three dollars each, which really isn't bad at all considering! :)

So, I hope your week is going well, and that you have a good night! :)

Blessings,