Fish Story

About a month back my dad was fishing in the "lake" behind our house. He came running up with a story about how he caught a fish that was a foot long, but it managed to get of the hook and flop back into the water. We all laughed. We figured it was just a another fish story!

Well guess who proved us wrong! He came back to fish several times and caught nothing. Then, one Sunday, he showed us this...

We all ran out screaming, there is no telling what the neighbors thought!

Dad was proud that he proved to us he was not lying about his fish, and I was amazed at how long a fish can be out of water...and live!

It was a good 5+ minutes, and that's no fish story!

Very belated Happy Mother's day!

I am back! I am also embarrassed because it has been way to long since I have posted. I had planned to post these pictures right after we took them. Unfortunately, it took me almost two months to do it! I promise to have Harry Potter 7th birthday pictures up before Christmas! For now here are some pictures we took on Mother's Day.

This is my mom, Super Cutie (sporting Hermione hair), and me on Mother's day.

Here is a picture of my mom and dad. They will be married 41 years on August 15th. Wow!

Super Cutie got braces in late May. She looks so cute! I will see if I can snap some pictures of them. She says her teeth looked like a roller coaster!

Cookie Exchange

I love to have parties!

Its been several years since I had done a cookie exchange. This year I threw a cookie exchange/decorating party for Super Cutie's classmates. I mailed the invitations along with the rules about 3 weeks prior to the party. I had planned to entertain the little girls with a craft, and cookie decorating, and the the big girls (Moms) with food, and big girl drinks!

The rules were simple...

1. Cookies had to be homemade

2. Everyone needed to bring the recipe, and about 6 dozen cookies (so everyone would have plenty to take home)

3. Christmas party attire was required!

The girls all looked so cute! The problem was in all the excitement I forgot to take a picture before they destroyed their outfits! The evening was fun for all! Great to see other moms outside the school, and fun to see Super Cutie interact with all her friends. Here are a few pics from the evening.

Decorating cookies

Super Cutie and her friend

Crafting

All the cuties!

Dressed up????

Christmas 2009

Merry Christmas!

This has been a busy holiday season. It flew by too quickly, so here are a few little reminders for me and you!

This is my mantle this year. I have always wanted to put a Christmas picture of my Super Cutie above the fireplace. This picture was taken in 2008, she was 51/2. Her smile lights up the room! Girly Stuff helped me spruce the mantle up a bit. She wanted me to track down even more stuff to add to it!

I have a bit of a Christmas decoration obsession. Once I counted, I had 5 full size trees and 5 mini-trees. I had a hard time taking what I thought were good pictures of them lit up.

Our big tree is all red and white ornaments. It is a 12ft prelit tree we have had for four Christmas'. This was its last, if you looked at it funny, half the lights went out, I would scream a profanity, my husband would come running and wiggle a few strands and on it would come. I can not handle that stress again. So I will buy another tree....darn!

In my formal living room or as Super Cutie calls it the Thanksgiving table room I have a pretty tree. All the ornaments came from Hobby Lobby, and I added red feathers at the top. It was one of my favorites this year.

In the breakfast room the tree is all gingerbread ornaments. I think next year I need to add some bows to it. I actually have some cute ribbon. I just haven't made the time to make them.

Sorry about the star. My dog almost knocked this tree over everyday it was up! I finally decided to only fix the star if company was coming!

I also have a little tree in the kitchen that has kitchen utensil and appliance ornaments on it.

I have a tree in my laundry room. My dream has always been to have a Christmas tree in every room. Every year I try and add a tree to the house. Imagine how excited I was when I found this Santa's laundry garland in an Avon catalog! I added lights to the tree this year.

My last tree down stairs is my Santa tree in the family room. It sits on top of an end table.

Upstairs Super Cutie has her own tree. It has a ballet theme. Of course, this year she made ornaments to add to her tree. I bought this tree this year, it is not a slim tree so it ate all my ornaments. I think next year it needs some bows, or more ornaments to fill it up!

(Whats with all my stars!)

My , I mean super cutie's pink zebra friend room AKA 2nd bedroom, has a totally girly tree. I need to find a tree skirt, or maybe make a tree sak for it next year. (sounds like I am already planning for Christmas next year with all theses to do's!) It has hanging crystals, and french themed ornaments from (where else?) Hobby Lobby! The crown on top was actually an ornament.

Speaking of hanging crystals! When I first saw these chandelier ornaments at Hobby Lobby in October I think I screamed out loud! I know I called girly stuff so she would help me restrain myself, and wait for a sale...which I did!

This was my favorite tree this year. I love chandeliers, and animal print! So it brought my two loves together!

The last tree is a filler tree. I needed some Christmas lights in the game room and had all this just hanging around.

These are just some of my other favorite decorations.

Santa hanging out on my front door.

This a playmobile Nativity set. It is so sweet, and I do not have to worry about it getting broken.

Last, but not least, my whole reason for going crazy decorating at Christmas time!

I love these 3 crazy kids!

Oh yeah! One more thing! Happy 12th anniversary to my wonderful hubby! I do not tell him enough how lucky I am to have him, and how good he is to put up with my crazy self! I love you King Pookie!

Halloween past and present

I wanted to do a post remembering all of Super Cutie's Halloween costumes. It is actually fitting that this will be the post to introduce you to her, since Halloween is her favorite holiday. (Other than Christmas of course!) Super Cutie is my gorgeous, intelligent, caring, funny, and dramatic 6 year old love of my life.

For her first Halloween she was a dalmatian, and also had a cute onesie.

She was almost 7 months old.

Halloween 2004, she was a ballerina kitty.

Isn't she amazing. That is pretty much the word for her!

Just like her mama, she loves chocolate! Once she figured out she was getting candy everytime she walked up to a door, it was on!

The next year she was Daphne from Scooby Doo. To this day she still loves Scooby Doo. In fact her 6th Birthday Party was a Scooby Doo Theme.

She was 2 1/2 at this point.

When she was 3 1/2 (Halloween 2006) she actually had two costumes. She went to a local school carnival as...
Lava Girl!

Halloween night she was DeeDee Doodle

Super Cutie's favorite person in the universe is my sister, better known as the babysitter. When she is in town, Super Cutie only wants to play with her! Babysitter comes almost every Halloween to trick or treat with us. This particular year I got the crazy idea to dress my mom, sister and myself up in matching shirts!

This is my sister, dad, me and my mom Halloween 2006.

DeeDee and Babysitter.

In 2007, Super Cutie dressed up as Rapunzel

She makes a cute blonde!

My little wacko!

Halloween 2008 Super Cutie was Queen Susan of Narnia. I surprised her with this costume on Halloween day. All she wanted to be was Susan, but of course she knew that I could not find one in the stores. I found this one on ebay. She was sooo excited!

I think this pictures gives you an idea of the drama I live with daily!

This year my child wanted to be Hermione Granger from Harry Potter. She has seen the movies, and knows that I am obsessed with the books. (I bought my tickets a month in advance for the midnight showing.) She made a beautiful Hermione! I crimped her hair, and she loved it!

Here she is in action!

Me and my super beauty!

My husband said my beanie was my costume! I think its too cute! We had a great Halloween. I hope you did too!

Super Cutie's Room

I just started blogging and I already took a hiatus to plan Super Cutie's first Halloween party. She has always loved to dress up, so Halloween comes in a close second to Christmas as far as holidays go at our house. So as a filler post until I get the pictures together from her party I was going to show you a few pictures of Super Cutie's room.
P.S. The party was a hit! This comes directly from my two favorite boys in the universe. They belong to Girly Stuff , but I'd take them in a heartbeat.

Super Cutie's bedding and bed came from Bombay Kids. I am so sad they are out of business. All their bedding was so cute!

The glitter M above the headboard was a Canton Trade Days find, as were the lampshades. My husband and I painted the room when we moved into this house 5 years ago. We had done the same faux "treatment" in our first house in her nursery. One of my favorite things in the room is this book chest that sits at the foot of her bed.

I borrowed the idea from KooKoo Bear Kids.

The chest was purchased at Michael's unfinshed. I primed it, then painted all the white parts. I added the stripes by taping it off, then painting all the purple. I just glued the letters and stars on the top after I painted them.

My latest project in her room was a new chandelier! They are my newest addiction. The chandelier came from Lowe's. It was originally "antique white", but did not look it. However for $39, I took it anyway! I spray painted it white, then spent 4 months making the amazing lamp shades. In my defense I was not working on them for that long. I did not buy enough flowers. So I spent 3 months searching every Hobby Lobby in south Texas for more!

I bought the lamp shades and flower bunches from Hobby Lobby. I pulled them off the stems and hot glued them to the shades. Here is a close up. I think it looks so pretty!

I would like to say I work on decorating one room in our house at a time, finish it then move on...but that is not what happens. I plan a get together at our home and then frantically try to complete some projects that I always have on the back burner.

The curtains in Super Cutie's room are my next update. I have purchased some, but they need a little something. I'll keep you posted!

This is what a few margaritas will make you do!

I am in the process of redecorating my office. I am going from a grown-up pretty office to a cute, sassy and fun office. If you know me, you know I am not one for change. So letting go of my beautiful leafy green wall covering took a huge shove from Girly Stuff! The area I am currently working on is the reception area.

Here is a sneak peek into the redo!

One of the things that I wanted to add to the reception area was an armoire to serve our coffee and cookies. I was inspired by this redo by life in grace. I was able to find an armoire I could work with on Craig's List. (It is amazing the stuff people will sell on that site! It is a post on its own!)

The shape and size were perfect. Unfortunately, the finish on it was as highly varnished as you could get! After consultation with my DDS, (that is Doctor of Decorating Services, aka Girly Stuff!) we decided to prime the surface, paint, and then distress the armoire. I purchased the paint at Lowes. The color is Deep Turquoise from the Laura Ashley collection in a satin finish. This is the painted, pre-distressed work in progress.

I am lazy, I admit it. The bottom cabinet doors will remain closed so I did not paint the inside. Next step was the distressing. My first thought was to sand it, however, when I started too I could get through the primer in some areas but it was not even and some of the primer showed through. So I decided to glaze it. I used some dark brown paint from the office, and added glaze from Sherwin Williams to it. I brushed it on and then wiped it off with a rag. It really was not difficult to do. The hard part was that I wanted it to look old and naturally distressed, but my old and naturally distressed had to be perfect!

The finished product was moved into the office last week.

This photo was taken before the armoire left my really clean garage! HA!

I must admit I had a bit of a meltdown when I first saw it. (Remember I have issues with change, especially drastic ones!) The back of the armoire is tin I purchased at Home Depot. It comes in sheets that you just overlap. There are different patterns and finishes to choose from. It is a pretty neat product!

Because I am an honest person I will tell you I PFIY 'd the tin part. Paid for it myself. I will also tell you the armoire is growing on me. I may still go back and paint the inside of the cabinet, and possibly add a little more "distressing" to it. There are a few missing accessories that are needed to tie everything together, but the reception area is definitely on its way! Stay tuned for some home projects, and a spooky Halloween Party I am throwing later this month.

Me and parties...that is a whole other post!