Fluer De Lis Stenciled Curtain

So after making drop cloth curtains for my bedroom, I thought I would take a shot at making one for my dining room. We live in an old house and for some reason none of the closets have doors. Not sure if they did at one time, but I don't think so. Sometimes I don't mind the open concept, but we use this particular closet for our winter coats, boards games, and gaming systems (we hung our TV on the wall last year, and so we had to make a new home for everything), so needless to say it is not the most organized.

Here it is after I was done. This ended up being a no sew project, since I don't know how to sew and I didn't want to bug my mother in law with another sewing project! I ended up using hemming tape, which worked perfectly and I love the results.

After passing by my new project for a couple of weeks, I decided that it was a little boring and it needed a little pizzaz. I figured I could stencil a design on the curtain, and what better design to use than a Fleur de lis, since it is the symbol of our city. I picked one up from my fave store Hobby Lobby, and it worked perfect. The brand name was Show-Offs and they had so many different patterns.

First thing I did was take the curtain down and measure how close to the top I wanted the pattern. I ended up doing 8 inches I think. In this pic you get a little glance at how disheveled that closet is.

Here is the stencil. I didn't realize that they were 2 different Fleur de lis designs until I started painting, but I kinda liked having the 2 different ones.

After I measured, I taped the stencil to the curtain and started painting. I used a small brush, but the stencil says you can use a sponge as well. I thought the brush would give me a more even coverage. After each application I lifted the stencil and then moved it over, re-taped and repeated the process until I got to the end. I decided to do a row at the top and one at the bottom, but you can do any pattern you like.

For paint I used what I had on hand already from a sweet pea project. It was Folk Art brand acrylic paint in bark brown. Since the curtains are made from canvas, the paint went on really well.

It took me about 4 hours total to complete this project, but it was totally worth every minute. I LOVE the finished project and I think it adds a lot to the room.

Oh there is my new cloche that my lovely friend Amanda gave to me for my birthday. I just love it!
A close up of the pattern. Pretty nice if I do say so myself! Well I hope you enjoy this project as much as I did. Until next time have a lovely Wednesday!

Linking today to Savvy Southern Style

DIY Monthly Photo Calendar

A long time ago when I was around 14 or 15 I helped one of my friends out with a babysitting gig. I remember walking down the hallway of the home and seeing these frames that had every month of the year on them, and the parents had put pictures of the kids from each month in them. I just loved the idea, and knew one day when I had children of my own I wanted to do the very same thing.

Last year after I had sweet pea I decided that it was time to try and replicate those frames, but in my own unique way. Since I frequented Hobby Lobby just as much before I had sweet pea that I do now, I remember seeing all different kinds of cute little wooden cut outs of animals, trees, etc.. I decided to get one for each month that went along with the season or particular holiday of that month.

My original plan was to buy 12 small frames and then glue the wooden cut outs to the frames. But I decided I would save money and just use what I already had at home. I had some ribbon left over from a lamp project for sweet peas room, so I decided to use that, glue some clothes pins to the cut outs and hang them from the ribbon.

Here is what the calendar looked like originally. (I got a little ahead of myself and almost forgot to take a picture before I took it down, so all the months are not here)

I still liked the concept but I started thinking of what I could do to make it more finished looking. During one of my "weekly" trips to Hobby Lobby I noticed some frames at 90% in the clearance aisle from the custom framing area. At first I didn't know what I could use one for, but then it dawned on me that I could use it to frame the wall calendar. So I snatched one up for only $15 marked down from $115, WOW!

Of course the color was not going to work in sweet peas room, so I got out my trusty can of spray paint and went to town.

This is a before picture of the frame

And here it is after I sprayed it

I was not able to reuse the ribbon that I had on the wall originally, so I purchased 3 yds of light pink grosgrain ribbon. I cut the ribbon into 3 strips measuring 1 yd a piece and then spaced them accordingly. I then turned the frame over pulled the ribbon taught on both sides and used my staple gun to attach the ribbon to the frame.

Here is a picture after I attached it

Once I attached all 3 pieces I was ready to hang it on the wall and hang my pictures up.

Here is the finished product hanging in sweet peas room. Isn't it cute!!

Here are some close ups of just a few of the clothes pins.

June is sweet peas birthday month obviously!

Mommy's little firecracker! :)

I have had a blast changing the pictures out and seeing how she grows and changes every month. Makes me kinda sad though to see how big she is getting. Well anyways, hope this project inspires you to make a little something cute for the special person in your life.

Until next time, BYE!

Linking today to: Savvy Southern Style

Life Made Lovely

A New Project: Can You Guess What It Is?

So I went to my favorite store Hobby Lobby yesterday and got some things for a new project. Can you guess what it is going to be?

Guess you'll have to come back in a few weeks to see if you were right! :)

Dreaming of Fall!

I don't know about you all out there in blog land, but I am SO ready for Fall to get here. Don't get me wrong I like Summer and going to the pool and things like that, but I LOVE Fall. Out of all 4 seasons it is my favorite. I love to be able to go outside in a sweatshirt and jeans and be comfortable. I also love all the colors and outside activities that go along with Fall like, football games, pumpkin picking and Halloween.

Now that stores have out all their Fall decor, I am chomping at the bit to start decorating. Yes, I know it is too early and I will resist the temptation as of now, but come mid September I don't think I will be able to resist anymore. I am also ready to plant some mums, as most of my flowers have burnt up from this ridiculous heat. (OK, so maybe I might have not been the best at remembering to water! ) So what are some of your favorite things about Fall??

Here are some pics from my house in Fall last year. Enjoy!!

Homemade pumpkin vase

The view from my kitchen window. Isn't that tree gorgeous!

Hope you have a great day!!

Lady Antebellum and the KY State Fair

This past Thursday I attended the Lady Antebellum concert which happened to be the kick off to the Kentucky State Fair. One of my best friends Amanda and I went to the concert together (because hubby did not want to go for some reason) and we had a blast! We decided to go a little early before the concert so we could walk around the fair a bit, and then of course we had to eat fair food, which consisted of corn dogs, funnel cake, and fudge. YUM!

A Fair performer

Love the little piglets!

If you have been to the fair at least once you pretty much have seen it all. I don't think much has changed since I was a little kid. There were however some new food items on the menu that we did not try, but were told were appealing by some other fair goers. Three new items happen to be fried kool-aid dough balls, fried Derby pie, and a Krispy Kreme buffalo chicken sandwich. (Yes, you heard me right!) Last years big draw was the Krispy Kreme donut burger, so of course they had to up the anty this year. I was however tempted to purchase the friend chocolate chip cookie dough, but decided against it.

Donut Burger, YUCK!

Freddy Farm Bureau is a fair favorite!

After walking around a bit we made our way to the concert. The opening act for Lady A was Lee Brice, an up and coming star who sings the hit "Love You Like Crazy". He put on a great show, and was a great intro to Lady A! Of course Lady A put on a fabulous show and I was so impressed at how good they sounded live. Not to mention I wanted to steal the shoes that Hillary was wearing. They were silver sparkly stilettos and they were GORGEOUS!

I didn't get to take many pictures because my camera sucks and was about to die the whole night, but here are a few I did manage to capture.

Amanda and I

Only pic I got of Lee Brice performing

My cute mom and her sisters were there too!

Me and my mommy

LADY A!!!

It was a great night, and I am very thankful to hubby for staying at home with sweet pea so mommy could go out. Thanks babe! Until next time, BYE!

Garden Destruction

Last Saturday we had some bad weather sweep through the area so quick that if you blinked you might have missed it, but it definitely left loads of destruction behind. Much of the city lost power because one of the main lines went down and had to be restored one by one. We ended up being out for 3 1/2 days and had to throw almost everything in our refrigerator away, bummer! Luckily the weather was cooler than it had been so people didn't sweat to death in their homes. We were fortunate enough to bunk with my parents for a few days until our power was restored.

Anyway the reason I am sharing this is because our garden pretty much got destroyed by all the high winds. It blew most of the zinnias and okra over, and then blew the water barrel over which crushed our corn and some of our peppers. Here are a some pics that I took a few days after is happened.

We haven't surveyed the damage real closely yet, but hope to this weekend. Hopefully we will be able to salvage some of what is left, and might be able to enjoy a few more of our crops. I am just so thankful that this was the only damage that we endured, because there were many that lost vehicles, massive trees, and even one home that had a tree fall right through the middle of it. Just goes to show you that you should never mess with mother nature because she can be pretty wicked sometimes!!

A Lovely Birthday Surprise

My birthday was a few weeks ago, but I am just now getting around to showing you what hubby gave me for my birthday. While roaming around in blog land I came upon the most adorable garden/potting bench that someone had found at none other than BIG LOTS. I got real excited when I saw that she only paid $35 for it. I showed it to hubby and asked if I could get one, and his response was not at all what I wanted to hear, "NO"!

It turned out they didn't end up having them at our BIG LOTS anyway so I kinda forgot all about it. Little did I know that my hubby was busy concocting something in that large brain of his. He instead constructed me my very own one-of-a-kind garden bench. I had no idea that hubby was so good at building things from scratch, and I think he kinda surprised himself a little. I was very shocked to come home that day and find my perfect bench waiting for me. The fact that he put some much time, effort, and sweat into it means the world to me, and makes me love it that much more!

So without further ado, here she is:

And her she is all dressed up. I still need to get some hooks for the peg board so I can hang up my hand tools.

Pretty good, right? Can't decide if I am going to paint it or not, because I kind of like the natural look. What do you think? Hubby may have just made a huge mistake letting me know that he was so handy, because now I have some other projects up my sleeve for him!

WINNING THE FIGHT

This is my sister in law Leah (hubby's sister) and sweet pea when she was born. Leah is 31 years old, and has 2 handsome sons, Heath 8, and Caleb 4, and a wonderful husband Michael. In February of this year Leah was diagnosed with stage 2 breast cancer. There is no history of breast cancer in hubby's family, so we were all very shocked to find out that Leah had been diagnosed.

Since she is so young, Leah and her Dr's decided that the best possible option for her would be to go ahead and have a double mastectomy and breast reconstruction. It was a long (8 hrs) and hard surgery for Leah, but she came out of it like a champ, but this was only the beginning of her fight. After healing from her surgery, which took about 8 weeks, Leah had to have 6 rounds of chemo over a period of a few months.

Tuesday of this week marked the end of Leah's chemo treatments and I am happy to report that she is CANCER FREE. Thank you LORD!!! Loads of family and friends stopped by to see her while she was finishing her last treatment, and the Dr's and staff even threw her a mini party complete with confetti and bubbles!

Here is the HAPPY patient right after her last treatment. Doesn't she look beautiful??

Leah and I. I am so proud of her for winning this fight!

Unfortunately this was not the first time that one of my family members was affected by breast cancer. In 2008 my mom was diagnosed, and by the grace of GOD hers was caught early enough and she just had to complete radiation and take medication for 5 years. It was still a tough road to go down, but she only has 2 more years of medicine to complete, YEAH! Love you mom!!

I am so proud to call these 2 ladies and all the other ladies out there battling this ugly disease my HERO'S! This October will mark the 4th year that my family and myself will participate in the Susan G Komen Race for the Cure, and I am so excited that we have so much to celebrate.

Thank you to my LORD and SAVIOR for allowing Leah and my mom to live full and happy lives!! Until next time I will leave you with this picture of Leah having one of her chemo HOT flashes!!! :) (Sorry Leah, hope you aren't mad at me, love ya!!)

One more year closer to 30!

28 years ago a darling little girl was brought into this world, ME! Yep that's right, today is my birthday and boy do I feel old! Can't believe in just 2 short years, I will be 30! (Insert silent scream here) What better way to celebrate your birthday, than a whole week of celebration. Here's how it went and will go down.

Friday night hubby and I and a few friends went to Shogun, which is a Japanese hibachi restaurant, and had some delicious food from the hibachi grill. Complete with a birthday fruit boat. (Which by the way they sneakily charge you $7 for, and you don't realize it until you've already paid. Whatever happened to a FREE birthday dessert??) Below is a picture from that night.

Sorry about the poor quality, but I don't have a scanner, so I had to take a picture of a picture.

Sunday we had a cookout at our house with all of our family. It was so fun, and we had some delicious food. Hubby even made his own barbecue sauce for the chicken, and it was pretty tasty! We then had some birthday cake made by my sister in law Leah (she make the BEST chocolate cake), and after that I opened my gifts. I received so many wonderful things, and I am so grateful.

yummy barbecue chicken with homemade sauce

me and sweet pea

cutest bird vase ever. Thanks Mom!

Can't wait to decorate for Fall!

new necklace from sister and book from hubby's Grandma

Monday (Today) I am going to get my toes done, which I have been wanting to do for a long time, so what better day to do it. Not sure what else the day has in store for us, but I'm sure whatever it is it will be fun.

Tuesday we are going out to dinner with my grandmother to celebrate mine, my dads and my sisters birthday. August is the birthday month for my family.

Wednesday I am going to dinner with my best girlfriends, whom I don't get to see very much, because we all have such different schedules. I can't wait to catch up with everybody!

WOW, I am so blessed to be able to do all this stuff, and to have such wonderful family and friends to celebrate with. Thank you to our LORD for allowing me another happy and healthy year. Can't wait to see what next year has in store for me. Until next time I will leave you with this pic of sweet peas new trick. BYE!

Guess it's time for some drawer locks!