A soft place to land

Jane, Our Bible study teacher is BIG on all of us finding a place to sit and just be....
Be alone with the Lord;
Not to mention...
Be away from the television, be in complete and total hiding from our children, Be out of reach when someone is trying to call us on the phone, Be out of pocket for some time sucker such as paying bills, cooking a meal ....
You get the point.
In my last house, this room, was such the place. Overlooking the garden, I planted butterfly bushes that came up and slapped themselves against the glass.  I used to sit there, on that yellow squishy sofa where I would drink my coffee and stare out the window at the humming birds coming to feed. Nestled amongst the jungle I put out a bird feeder, the squirrels trying to steal the seeds were almost as endearing as watching the humming birds.
This room was a total disaster when I first bought the house. The floor slanted so I had to level it; and covered the floor with brick pavers. I brought in my favorite furniture for my favorite room. On the shelf towards the back, sat all our family photo albums. Some are stuffed with baby pictures, some are magazine cutouts I have saved for many years and have them even today.
I encourage you to create a quiet special place in your home....just you, the Lord and the humming birds and just Be.....

What Paint Can Do...

If you had walked into my house, the first thing you would be thinking is...
this girl likes her some COLORS!!! Which is the truth...believe me.
Looking at these pictures now, I have to wonder...
what was I thinking???

What's up with the teal brick and gold background in the book shelves!!??
Oh yea, I remember, I was pulling colors from the chair to the left of the bookshelves.
(Hey ~ it worked at the time)
A lil paint goes a long way.
My advice?
Be bold. Go gold!!!
And if you don't like it, you can always start over! 

Birthday Dining Table Ideas

This is the dining room in my last house.
There's a glare because of my 'fine picture taking abilities' but if you look closely, you can see how I took out the wooden shelves and replaced  them with  glass.
The back wall was already mirrored and had lights that showed off the glasses.
We always include decorating our antique sideboard to incorporate it into the theme.

This table setting is for PBC's birthday dinner. The plates are some of my favorite TJ Maxx finds! They are in the shape of fish and if memory serves me, I believe I paid about 8 bucks a piece.
 PBC and I decorated her table together and used hot pink taffeta as a runner.
Next, we cruised Ross Dress for Less to buy some bags full of sea shells to sprinkle on top and around the flowers.

The container centerpiece is actually a crystal punch bowl filled with
blue oasis. Pink, purple and blue hydrangeas from the garden are stuffed in and amongest Calla Lillies.

French Country Kitchen

I've re modeled 7 houses and found some pictures I thought you might like to get some ideas from. I'm all about Gilding The Lillies with as much punch..... as my pocket purse will allow. In other words, I will spurge on some things, cut wayyyyy back on others. Below, above the sink, there was an ugly window leading into an even uglier glass room. My carpenter cut the window completely out and made me a pass through. The room became my children's playroom. This worked perfectly for us because I could be cooking in the kitchen and keeping an eye on them at all times.

When I bought my my last house, the cabinets were old, wooden and very outdated.  The kitchen was so big, I hated to rip all the existing cabinets out, so I hired a carpenter to take each top door off the hinges and cut a hole in the middle.  Instead of using glass, I put chicken wire in the middle to display all my china.
With the money I saved with not ripping out the cabinets, I put beautiful Salmon colored Thibaut wallpaper on the walls.

Then I hired painters to come in and paint the inside of the cabinets a moss green.  On the cabinets that didn't have the chicken wire, we painted a cream color and put a wash over them to give them that warm feeling. 

Next, I hired an artist to come in and paint different animals on my cabinet doors.  Grape vines, pigs, peacocks, roosters, rabbits, birds, monkeys, a fox and even a bee hive decorated my cabinets.
Later, I had her come back and put a darker mustard color on the island to add some UMF!

I kept the double stove and tile flooring (which I didn't love but it ended up going with the french country theme and I kept it shiny and waxed at all times!!!!
I bought a trash compacter, new frig, put in a double sink and had enough money left over to put granite on the counter tops.