New Bathroom Curtain

Since I have had the past couple of weeks off (the perks of working for a University), I have been keeping busy by working on some sewing projects. One of the projects that I have been working on is a new bathroom curtain. I bought the fabric a couple of months ago from http://www.fabric.com/ .  I am really proud of myself because I am not that great at sewing. I really only know the basics so the fact that I was able to create this curtain without a pattern is really exciting. I did have a little help, I have this type of curtain in my guest room (I bought it a few years ago) so I just studied it to figure out how to make my curtain. I think that it turned out really good.

My next project is to make new curtains for my living room so stay tuned.

One of My Fav Christmas Gifts of 2010

This year one of my favorite gifts was from my brother-in-law and sister-in-law. They gave us two handmade rocking chairs. How cool is that! Of course, I can't wait until spring so I can enjoy them on my back patio. David built them himself. He is a true asset to the family because he can build almost anything. I hope to be hitting him up soon to help me redo my kitchen backsplash and countertops :).

Check him out on facebook at Lunceford Construction .

Thanks Sommer and David!!!!

Wedding Wreaths

Over Christmas my sister in law and I made a couple of wedding wreaths for a family friend who need them for an upcoming wedding she is coordinating in January. I only took a picture of one of them  but they both turned out really good. We were able to sell the for $40 each so that was cool. Merry Christmas to us !

The white ribbon we used was purchased from Hobby Lobby.

It's a Table Runner kind of Christmas!

So every year we exchange Christmas gifts with Chris mom's side of the family. When we first got married we didn't have a lot of money and still don't :), so I made each of them a homemade gift. After that first Christmas I have continued to giv them a homemade gift. I wish I had kept a log of what I made each year. Last year I posted it on my blog so this year I decided to post it to journal what I give them.
So drum roll please...... this year I made them a table runner and monogrammed them matching napkins.See them below. I made a total of 5 table runners. I think they will enjoy them :)!

An early Christmas Gift for Mom

So after seeing my wreaths that I made for myself, my hinted really hard that she needed new wreaths for her door so guess what I made her two for her front door. Here's how they turn out!

Merry Christmas Mom!

Christmas Wreaths

Every year at Thanksgiving my sister-in-law and I make something homemade for Christmas. This year she actually came up with the idea of making wreaths for our front door. So with our two creative brians combined we came up with these two wreaths. I think that they turned out GREAT!!!

This one was for my mother-in-law's front door.

This one is for my front door.

I took it home to show my mom and she loved it....so she may be getting one the next time I see her :)

It's another one...

So I guess just about everyone we know is having a baby and they are all having boys. I made this for Chris's cousin, Maura. I wanted something different that always using gingham fabric. I found this fabric on fabric.com. I think it turned out really cute.

Chris was kind enough to hold it up for me so I could get a good picture of it. :)

Baby Gifts

Here a couple of baby gifts I made for a co-worker. She is having her first baby in January. They turned out really cute!

Trick or Treat!

Halloween is just around the corner, not that I really celebrate the holiday. I do like to put out some decorations for it though. This year I monogrammed some napkins for my table. I thought they turned out cute.

Showing my Team Colors

This fall has been pretty busy for us. We spent a weekend at Callaway Gardens then spent a few days in Washington visiting family. After all that I was able to spend a Sunday afternoon catching up on some sewing and embroidery projects. I have been wanting to have do an Auburn table for when we have our annual tailgate cookout at my house with my family and tailgate friends. I sewed a navy polka dotted table rummer then monogrammed some orange napkins. I am trying to find some navy placemats. Take a look at how I'm showing my team colors :) !

Baby Jack's got some new clothes !

My best friend, Loren, just had her first child in August so I was of course excited to be making Jack some cute clothes to wear. Check them out....he'll be the talk of the neighborhood in a few months :)!

Seersucker Jumper

Gingham Jumper

Burp Cloth (got to get him raised right from the beginning...War Eagle!)

The Birthday Weekend Begins :)

One of my besties and co-worker surprised me after lunch today with this cute card on my desk. Every year we go all out for each other on our birthdays. This year she has started the celebration today (my birthday is on Sunday). So it should be a fun next few days. Last year when I turned 30 I had all these little celebrations planned but ended up getting sick so I had to miss out on everything. This year I am determined not to be sick so I can celebrate ME! :) ! So thanks Deborah!!!!!

AU Spirit Video, 3rd place winner!

My friend, Deborah and I have gotten in to making little videos for work. We are pretty much known for all of our funny little videos. With so many compliments, we decided to test our video making skills by entering the AU Bookstore Spirit video contest. Much to our surprise we got 3rd place out of 15 videos. Not too bad :) ! The video is supposed to talk about AU spirit whlie promoting the AU bookstore. Take a look at it and let me know if you think we have the skills? :) !

It was BERRY, BERRY good!

Last weekend I had a work party on the lake to go to and I had to bring a side item so I decided since to make my Berry Cobbler. I really only make it for special occasions because Chris isn't really a fan of it so if I made it just for the two of us then it would be a waste because I'm the only one that eats it. Anyway, it was a big hit and I know this because there was only one serving left when I brought it home from the party. So for all of you berry fans here's the recipe. It's super easy and oh so delicious!

Three Berry Cobbler (from Southern Living)

1 (12 ounce) package of frozen blackberries

1 (12 ounce) package of frozen raspberries

1 (12 ounce) package of frozen blueberries

1 1/2 cups of sugar

1 teaspoon of vanilla

1/2 cup of all purpose flour

1/4 cup of margarine/butter, melted

Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Mix all the above ingredients together and pour into casserole dish.

Topping

Take a refregerated pie crust and lay on top of casserole. You can make all kinds of fun shapes to cover it. Then brush crust with a lightly beaten egg and sprinkle a tablespoon of sugar on top. Bake in over fro 55 to 60 minutes. Yum!

To serve it warm while traveling you may want to invest in a casserole warmer. My brother and sister-in-law gave me one a couple of years ago. It's come in handy to travel with. Last weekend while the pie was cooking I decided to monogram it so I would know that it was mine.

Summer Vacation

Chris and I at "the hangout" in Gulf Shores, AL

Last week Chris and I spent the week at the beach with his family. It was so NICE!! I don't know who can not like the beach. It so nice to just sit on the beach and read a good book, take a dip in the ocean and pool, stroll on the beach with your loved ones, and really just do nothing. All your worries just disappear. Needless to say I could live at the beach too bad it's not a career option :) ! So if you haven't been to the beach in a while plan at trip, you'll get some much need relaxation and you'll support the gulf beaches

By the way we did see tar balls from the oil spill but it didn't stop us from enjoying the ocean.

This one's for Larry!

This past weekend Chris and I headed down south to visit with his family. My plans were to lounge by their pool all weekend and I pretty much did that along with my mother-in-law and sister-in-law. My brother-in-law and Chris were put to work by my father-in-law. They were recruited to help build a pergola. David, my brother-in-law, was the brains behind it since he does this kind of work all the time. Below are pictures of them working, I like to call it the "butt shot" and then the other picture is the finished product. It's great to have people in your family that can build stuff....it comes in pretty handy.

P. S. Usually on my blog I post about projects that I have worked on but this week I got out of the work. Still I  wanted to brag about Chris, David, and Larry. They worked hard and it paid off :) !

Another room down!

This weekend Chris and I spent Friday night and Saturday morning tearing out the carpet in our second guest room. See pics below. So far this room has the best floors. They turned out really great! No only one room is left with carpet in it. Yea!

 Eventually I will paint this room...it is my last room to really decorate. I ran out of inspiration.

                                                            

The Tile Floors are in!

This past weekend with the help of our family and friends, we tiled our kitchen, dining room, and laundry room. Here are the pictures of the before and after! It turned out great and many thanks goes out to everybody that helped. I even got me a new back door installed in the process !! YEA!

                                                                                                               

                        Before

                 

                Before

                    

       Yep that's me....I actually helped :) !

     It was a true TEAM effort!

                    After

       After (notice the new back door)

       

Baby Kate's Adorable New Outfit!

Front

Back

A few weeks ago my cousin had a baby girl! So of course I took this opportunity to work on my sewing skills. So this past weekend I sewed baby Kate this cute outfit (dress and pink bloomers to match). I am going to monogram it in couple of weeks but I was so excited about how it turned out that I just had to go ahead and post it.

Abby's first lake experience!

On Memorial Day weekend Chris and I spent our holiday at the lake with my family. I got to spend time with some of my cousin's (shout-out to Mallory cause we kicked Pam & Courtney's tails during game time), got to go out on the boat, took a couple of walks with Kim and Abby (my niece) and of course I ate some really yummy food!

My brother brought his puppy Abby and we got her out in the water for the first time. As you can see from above I don't think that she liked it too much. She was skaking like a leaf when she got out. It's was kind of funny! I love going to the lake, not just because of the water but because I get to spend time with my family. I don't think that we would spend time together like this if it weren't for the lakehouse. It's just a great place to get a-way and not to have to worry about anything. Now it's countdown to the 4th of July!

Which tile should I choose?

After spending a wonderful Memorial Day weekend with my family at the lake (I'll post about that later), Chris and I came home and visited our local Lowe's to look for tiles for our kitchen floor. Here's what we are trying to choose from....it's a hard decision (mostly because it's gonna cost some $$ and I don't want to make a mistake. So what one do you prefer? The light one or the dark one?
FYI: My kitchen is a bright green with white cabinets.

Dark One

Light One

A Weekend at Callaway Gardens

Chris and I took a little get-a-away this past weekend to Callaway Gardens. It was an anniversary gift to ourselves. We spent  the couple of days exploring the trails, the butterfly garden & greenhouses, riding bikes, lounging by the pool and from the photo above riding around the lake. I found  great deal on a package that gave us free bike rentals and a free rental for johnboat along with free passes to the garden. I don't know if you have ever been to Callaway Gardens before, I had only been a couple of times and it was to the Fantasy in Lights show (which is pretty cool),  I is well worth the small investment. It was great little vacation, even though we were only 45 minutes  from home we were still able to leave everything behind and RELAX!

Here are some more photos of us on the lake....unfortunately, everywhere else we went I totally forgot to bring the camera!

7 Years Ago TODAY!

Here's some of our wedding photos!!!

7 years ago today Chris and I were married! Time sure has flown. If you had asked me 7 years ago where I would be in  2010, I'd would have probably said that Chris and I would have a couple of kids, drive a 4 runner, live in the home of my dreams and not have a single worry in the world, then reality kicked in and I learned again that sometimes my plans aren't always the right plans, God had some other journeys in store for Chris and I. Our first 3 years of marriage were spent in Johnson City, TN so Chris could go to seminary. We lived in this tiny apartment and paid a whooping $395 in rent. We struggled with being away from home, not having jobs, and well just adjusting to having to rely on each other. Although those years were sometimes unbearable we had some of the best times. God stretched us and continually blessed us. After 3 years in TN we loaded up everything we owned in a U-Haul and headed back home to the Auburn area. Chris had now decided that he wanted to get his Masters in Counseling so he headed to Columbus State University and we spent another 2 years living off one salary, but God provided as He always does and now we are here in Opelika living in our little home with our cat, Scout. Not where I thought I would be seven years ago but it's where I need to be. God's plans are so much bigger than mine. I am stronger now, more confident, more open, more loving, and more compassionate. Even though Chris and I don't enjoy the great luxeries we don't live in a fancy house, drive a fancy car or take extravagent vacations, we do however, know that we get to spend everyday with our best friend, we can share our joys, our sorrows, laugh, cry, act crazy and just be ourselves with each other and for that I don't regret a single day of our 7 year marriage. God has blessed us and will continue to as He unfolds His mighty plan for us in the years to come.

What to do a rainy day!

So what's a girl to do on a rainy saturday besides clean house? Well if you are me, you take the time to work on a sewing project that you have been putting off for about a month. I spent the afternoon sewing this romper for some friends of ours who are expecting their first child in May. When I showed Chris the fabric he thought that it would be too busy so to not make it so busy I added the cream stripe up top. I am quite proud of myself because the that wasn't in the pattern. Today, I added his name with the exception of my machine messing up his name a little I think that the outfit turned out really cute. Hopefully this time next year little William will be sporting this adorable outfit.

Front Yard Landscape

Last weekend after working at an A-day tailgate Chris and I came home and planted some new plants in our front yard. We still have a ways to go but these additional plants sure do make the front yard look 100 % better than before. Chris bought all the plants at the AU Department of Horticulture Plant sale ! He got a butterfly bush,  several gardinas, and a camilla tree. All will have colorful blooms in the spring.

New view from my desk

So I used to have to stare at a blank wall while sitting at my desk (my window with the view of campus is behind me), now I get to stare at this pretty picture all day thanks to my beautiful and talented cousin, Allie!