Married Christmas

The season is upon us and I am knee deep in the gift buying/planning phase of the rat race that is Christmastime. I've pinned gifts, written ideas on scraps of paper, scoured sale ads, and just about everything else that you can think of. I'm on top of the gift finding. Now, if money would magically appear in my bank account I could buy my bestie and I matching Hunter boots!

...BofA isn't showing any sudden surplus of money. It must not work that way. Well shoot.

Anyhoo, while making my annual Christmas list for Santa, it dawned on me that everyone who gets married laments the fact that they don't get as many gifts from their parents Santa. Why does this happen? What scrooge made this a rule? Does this mean that my fireside plaid skirt from J. Crew will not be under the tree? Do I not get to pick my favorite things and have them magically show up after I order them myself with someone else's card? What about my stocking? Will it be empty? Am I loved less because I'm married?

I couldn't let those questions go unanswered, so this morning when I dropped off Polly, I had a talk with Santa. It went like this.

Me:"We need to talk. Just because I'm married now and I don't live here anymore doesn't mean that Santa doesn't have to keep up his annual tradition. I figure I'm costing you less, therefore you should have more to give!"

Santa: "Well what do you want baby?"

Me: "Can I get back to you on that one? I need to check Pinterest."

Whew! Thank Bob! I will get my skirt and A will get whatever I tell Santa he needs! All is right with the world!

I write this to restore hope to married girls everywhere. Don't settle for the "Married Christmas" gifts. Tell your mom and dad Santa that you're still their his favorite little girl! Milk it ladies!

Happy Pinning and List Making!

Love,
a VERY good girl

Blogging on the G-O!

Update: This is my first mobile post! I didn't even know this was possible! Is this for real? (P.s. I'm sitting at my desk but I thought I'd pretend like I'm sitting on my couch so you could be in the moment with me.)  Anyway, last night I (and by I, I mean A) hung a curtain rod above the front windows! Progress! The scrap of fabric hanging by two bobby pins over on the right is muslin left over from my tree skirt project. Do we like cream? Bueller?

I must add that this morning when I walked into the living room I was slap giddy over that curtain rod and scrap of muslin.

Oh, and yes, that is Polly laying on a Gucci blanket. I had it to myself for all of a month before it became "her blanket." Spoiled. Rotten.

TTFN,
SM

Overexposed

I have made absolutely no bones about the fact that my new residence is a bachelor pad. I'm talking wood on the walls, wood on the floor, wooden cabinets, wooden furniture... Wood is literally everywhere you turn. Only the doors are painted. Here is a picture of my entry area so you can get a handle on what I'm sayin'.

The ever so adorable poodle is my pup Polly. She was in time out for eating Mommy's razor, a beloved sandle from Loft and mauling a bar of soap beyond recognition.

Here is a less flattering view of the living room to give you an idea of how the living areas are.

I could have helped her out and enhanced some colors, but this is straight out of my Crackberry, so we'll work with what we've got.

Spanning across the front side of the house are three windows and a door with another window to the left of the cranberry front door.

Okay, now that you get the lay of the land, I need some help picking out my window treatments. Seriously, I am in dire straits here. My neighbors have the option of watching me get dressed in the mornings.

I am exposed! Overexposed! I was watching tv in my PJ's the other day when one of my boyhusband's co-workers pulled up into the yard on his GOLFCART. Does he live in the neighborhood? No! Is he within a mile? No! He lives five minutes down the road! I sprinted to the bedroom to put on some jeans and a sweater before he made it to the front door. I thought that I'd gone unnoticed until he said, "I saw you streak across the yard like a cat caught on fire. Didn't have your pants on?"

Ugh. The joys of country living. Country folk don't mince words and they don't spare your feelings!

Also, do you see the windows by the dining room table? See those benches on the back deck? What would I do if someone was just sitting there watching me? I would just die. Absolutely die if I saw somoene sitting out there creeping. Ahh! Needless to say, something has got to go over these bad boys!

Anyway, here's where you can help me. I need to make a decision soon. I've been on the fence for far too long. I'm going to put something over these windows whether it be newspaper, aluminum foil, curtains, blinds, sheets or animal hides. But what do I do?

Do I do shutters? If I do, which color? Wood to match everything else?

Should I go the panel route? I have decided that, should I go this way, I will definitely do cream. However, do I have them just straight down with clips securing them to the rods?

These lovelies are from Restoration Hardware. I wouldn't be purchasing these,
but they would serve as an inspiration.

Or do I do something more tailored, like these beauties?

These were actually found here, at my newest favoritest blog.

Now, I know that these aren't "rustic" but I want something that will bring some feminitity into the space and make it more modern and tailored. I've come to love all of the wood, but it's time to bring some textiles to the party, baby.

The couches are on my list of things to do, but for now, they are clean and newish and they are comfortable for movie watching, so they shall remain. I've got to work with the sage-ish-ness. What do you think? Link me some ideas!

Pinteresting

Pinterest. Haven't heard of it? Good! Stop right here and pretend you never heard the name! Shh! Don't talk about it! Just go!

I discovered this little website about a month ago. It's a compilation of pictures, DIY projects, recipes, clothes and pretty much anything else that a person may be interested in. All in one website. You can organize the links much like you would a bulletin board in an office. Since the beginning of my love affair, I have pinned some 350 different projects and whatnot. Last night, however, I lost my pinginity. Get it? Pinginity? Lalalala.

This wreath was the first of many obsessions that I would have with all things burlap.

You see, my house is a cabin and burlap just fits right in. It's like peanut butter and chocolate. Cabin and burlap. See how it flows off the tongue? Anyway, in my quest to blend more creams and whites into the color scheme, I discovered this little beauty.

Isn't she lovely! I love the texture and the rawness of it. I love everything about it! I just died when I learned that I didn't have to sew a darn thing!

So, it is safe to say that I lost my Pinginity to this adorable tree skirt. Not this one, but the one that I made. This is the dirty on how it went down.

I went to the Walmarts yesterday after work to gather supplies to make a burlap dry erase board (which I will share with you tomorrow), and also to get the materials to make my simple little tree skirt. Of course I ran into a friend of mine, Sarah, who went on to tell me how much she loves my blog and made me blush. Then, she followed me to the fabric department where I used expressions like "how in the heck" and "sam hill" while contemplating how to go about making a template for this little tree skirt. (I still don't know how, I just decided to use an old one I had in a container in my closet.)

Two yards of muslin and burlap and a bag of glue sticks later, I was on my way to convert our clean little living room into craft central.

I had romanticized how everything would happen. It was straight out of "Leave it to Beaver"...

A-dub and I would arrive home around the same time and we would exchange hugs and kisses and say how we'd missed each other so. After dinner would be the perfect time to settle in for an episode of  Law and Order: SVU followed by Glee and begin on my project. I would simply cut the fabric into 3" wide strips and simoultaneously glue/ruffle (gluffle?) them onto an existing tree skirt that I found in my box of Christmases past. It would take me no longer than 45 minutes to complete this simple task. Then my boyfriend that I married would gaze at me adoringly, telling me how creative and wonderful I am. After that, we would sit on the couch and sip coffee, going over the happenings of the day.

I think Sinatra was playing in the background and there was candle light. Lots of it. I don't know where my mind gets these ideas.

Ha. Ha. Ha. Silly, silly gehl.

This is how it really went down.

A-bomb was late getting home from work so I beat him there. By the time he arrived, I had a hot mess strewn about in the living room. He ate leftovers while I scurried about, trying to find my glue gun and scissors. I settled down in my spot on the loveseat to commence cutting the burlap into strips.

**Word to the wise: that crap isn't straight. If you think that you're going to cut in the direction of the fabric and get a straight line, think again.

I finally just went with it and had crooked strips. I later realized that the curved strips were actually better for ruffling around the skirt and made it look more home made. Score! Once I had all of my strips, I began attaching the first row of burlap to the skirt with molten lava hot glue. 

**A word about burlap: it is wild. It will not be tamed and you will not get perfect pleats unless you get an iron after it. So naturally I just let it do its thing. Burlap and I are kindred spirits.

I worked my way from the outside in with a row of burlap ruffled, then two rows of muslin, and repeated until I got into the center. Mine got kind of wonky towards the middle so I had to improvise. It's ok though, no one will see the center once there are gifts under the tree.

Here's how mine turned out. There are some places that the red from the skirt peeks through that will get patched with muslin later. After three hours of burning myself and peeling layers of glue and skin off of my digits, I was ready to hang up the gun. Yeah, you heard me. THREE FRACKING HOURS!

The Fruit of My Labor

 All in all, it was a very successful project. Although it's not the most durable tree skirt out there, it was relatively cheap (I figure $10 by the time it was all said and done). If nothing else, I know that Polly loves it. I found her sleeping on it this morning! Although it was a beautiful sight- black standard poodle gracefully curled up on a bed of ruffled muslin and burlap- I shrieked and scared the crap out of her. I have a feeling I'm going to be one of those people with this skirt.

Like, if I could find a plastic cover for it, probably I would buy it.

Anyway, I'm off to re-apply my burn ointment onto my poor digits.

Get ready for a bombardment of DIY posts! I've got 80 glue sticks and I'm not afraid to use them!

Holler.

Swizzle

Unscented: Undetected

"I need some unscented soap, shampoo and conditioner, deodorant, and laundry stuff."-Husband

First off, does that not defeat the purpose of all of the above? I mean, if you have an allergy to fragrances I guess that it would make sense to have those products, but I know that A has none of the above. He is actually enthusiastic about new toiletries. In fact, when I stock up on shampoo when it's on sale, he puts every. single. bottle. in the shower so that he can try them out. Annoying? Yes. Charming? Sometimes.

After I mentally prepared myself to answer his question, I replied: "I can make all of those things with recipes I found on Pinterest for toiletries and even cleaning products." Then, I asked the obvious. "Why, husband, do you want all of these items unscented?

Are you ready?

"So the deer won't smell me."

So... the deer... won't smell him? The same deer that literally run out in front of my car on a regular basis?

**Side Note: This is not uncommon, I have learned. There is an entire market of these items targeted at hunters. You can buy female deer (doe) URINE to spray on your shoes so that the buck (male deer) will think that you're a female looking for love. You can buy dirt scented dryer sheets so that the deer don't smell you and detect a foreign invader in their habitat. The list goes on and on. I will post a list of my favorites at a later date, but now, back to your regularly scheduled program.

Yes, he wants these products to completely eliminate the smells associated with humans so that he can then have a "blank canvas", if you will, onto which he will spray deer smells that he has purchased from a mass producer of all things hunting related.

Obviously, I didn't sense the urgency of the need for these products, because I put them on my "to do this weekend" list. Well, my resourceful husband took matters into his own hands.

He woke up early on the weekend to return the vases he had purchased for our wedding reception, since he had no use for them now that they had served their purpose. There was absolutely NO WAY I was going to sit in that return line with him while he returned the used vases. However, they were much cleaner after we used them than they were when we purchased them. Maybe we actually did them a favor? Who knows.

Anyway, when he returned from town, he had two bags in hand and a look of sheer glee splayed across his face.

 He had spent $60 on unscented products. I literally could have made everything he wanted for $15.00 and had enough to last him for five hunting seasons.

The only thing that kept me from blasting him for how ridiculous it was for him to buy all of his stuff was the excitement on his face as he examined all of his new products. He looked like a kid at Christmas.  I've never seen the boy so happy to go take a shower. Or wash clothes! The icing on the cake was when he took his freshly washed and dried laundry and, wait for it, folded it and placed it inside of the SCENT FREE plastic bag that was so graciously included in his kit!

So, this morning when he went hunting, I smiled to myself as he showered with his special shampoo/conditioner and green bar of soap that I'm forbidden to use, extracted his clothes from the scent free bag and carefully dressed without touching anything in the room as not to pick up "human scents". And when he walked out the door, I knew that he paused underneath the deck to spray down in an additional layer of scent killer before he struck off for the woods.

It may be the most ridiculous thing I've ever heard of, and I may think that it is absolutely insane, but I can honestly say that it's worth it because it buys me more time to sleep in. God bless the scent blocker. Amen.

So Thankful

A number of my Facebook friends have been posting what they are thankful for each day of November.

"What a great idea!" I thought as I first saw it. "I should do that," I also thought. But, you know me, I'm lazy so  I didn't.

Today it struck me that I have so much to be grateful for. I will probably write a few of these posts when I'm feeling nostalgic, but this one is dedicated to my favorite dynamic duo.

 I didn't have a traditional two-parent upbringing and I literally had a village raise me. The chiefs being Granny and Papa, of course. Today, and every day, I am thankful for them.

Here are some, not all, of the reasons why:

-They are consistent. I always know that they're going to be at church on Sunday and when I come over in the mornings I know that they'll be having coffee in the sun room.

-They are predictable. I always know what to expect- good or bad- and that is worth more than gold.

-They love me. So much that I can't even comprehend it. They know everything about me, and they still love me.

-They tell me to be nice when I don't want to be. Sometimes I listen to them.
-They tell me to calm down when I get upset at them for telling me to be nice.

-They show me every day what it is to live for Christ and to love eachother unconditionally.

-They babysit Polly while I'm at work. I mean, who has ever heard of this nonsense?!

-They are addicted to sweets and they hide them from eachother.*Ok, so it's just Granny hiding her dumdums in her sewing room, but Papa eats ice cream straight out of the gallon container!

-They are an endless source of entertainment.

-They are always there. They've never missed an important event in my life. Ever.

-They tell me every single time that I see them how much they love me. Come on, put a price on THAT.

Anyway, I 've got snot running out of my nose and my eye make-up is wrecked. I'm such an embarrassment to myself.

What are you thankful for today? If it's a person, call them up and tell them. It just might make their day!

Over and Out,
Sunny