Finally all the halls are trimmed
Posted: May 21, 2013 Filed under: Decorating | Tags: Chair rail, molding Leave a comment »
Had a guy come and finish the trim job our builder started 6 years ago. They did the entry hall and all along the inside of the staircase. We had John finish outside the staircase, the back hallway and the upstairs hallway/foyer. We also had him do the hall bath since I had the painter make it delicate white earlier in the month and it needed a little more architectural detail. It is finally how I envisioned it. He did a great job and got it done in two days including painting. Ahhhh. Now I can focus on the 6 yards of mulch sitting in my driveway.
Adventures in Gardening: Late Spring 2013
Posted: May 20, 2013 Filed under: Gardening | Tags: Daisy, Dicentra, Hakuro Nashiki willow, Hosta, Lavender, Mr Lincoln Rose, peony, raised bed garden, russian sage, salvia, Square Foot Garden, Willow, window boxes Leave a comment »There is not much going on in the yard right now, the iris needed thinning so I yanked it all out last year and haven’t replanted yet.
Yesterday I trimmed the willow trees to actually look like trees instead of bushes, trimmed the spruce, got started on killing the grass that keeps cropping up.
I attended to the climbing rose and put a few tendrils better on the trellis, pulled a bunch of weeds, and removed the square foot gardening grids so I can work in those beds too.
Trimmed the Russian Sage, and re-potted all the tomato and tomatillo seedlings I started in February. I have a list a mile long on what needs to be done in both the front and back yards.
Well, I need to make the list on paper instead of in my head so I can prioritize, I am hosting a wine event in mid-June and I’d like the garden to look a smidge better than it does right now for sure.
Here is where we are so far, looks like it is going to be an expensive plant year! The Salvia is new and I need some on the west side of the retaining wall to balance it out a little better.
The window boxes have turned themselves into a snapdragon nursery bed, trying to figure out how I can cultivate those and still get the mats and plants replaced for new ones this year.
Antique Zephirine Drouhin Climbing Rose
Posted: May 19, 2013 Filed under: Gardening | Tags: Garden, Maison Joseph Drouhin, rose, Shrubs Leave a comment »
Zephirine Drouhin climbing pink rose. Year #2
Year 2, and there are blooms already! If I can just keep the beetles at bay and the black spot away I should have a wonderful pink rose show!
Holy Moly it’s a Gardening Day
Posted: May 19, 2013 Filed under: Gardening Leave a comment »Happy Sunday Lovies! I’m so glad my indoor projects have come to almost completion because oh my goodness do I have a ton of gardening to do.
So far this morning I have harvested cilantro and made green sauce with last years roasted peppers from the garden, harvested chive flowers and have them drying for chive oil and vinegar.
I have SOOOO much clean up and prep to do before I can even plant, I have sunflower and zinnia seeds to get in, a rose to tie to trellis, willows to cut back, weeds to pull. Oh my the list just goes on and on.
I want to have it all done by Friday so I can spend Memorial Day Weekend, NOT at the Chateau, but here in the yard. It’s a mulch year for the whole garden, a dirt year for the raised beds.
I have to pull out and fill the window beds, I have things to spray paint and hoses to untangle and yeesh!
Hope this finds you enjoying the outdoors today as well, hope to have some pics by the end of the day!
Happy Gardening!
This is the Truth: Stay Strong
Posted: May 17, 2013 Filed under: Fearlessly Be Yourself, Quotes | Tags: Fearlessly be yourself, loving yourself, quotes about haters, quotes about staying strong, This is the truth Leave a comment »
This is the truth: You know who you are, what you stand for, where your heart and intents lie. Don’t allow anyone else to define you for you or convince you something opposed to the truth you know inside yourself. So what if they can’t, don’t, won’t see it. Stop wasting time trying to make them see something they couldn’t comprehend to begin with, YOU know it’s there and that Lovies, is all that matters. Put it out there as best you know how and screw the haters, they are everywhere and they WANT to derail you so they can feel better about their own evil, pitiful, shameful, pathetic, ugly selves. Give them empathy and a knowing smile of understanding because we all have moments of hate, evil, ugliness, and shame. Some just choose to live and wallow there versus working their asses off to find a better way to love themselves or learning to throw up their arms and shout ”Let it go!” Stay strong, proud and smiling. You are worth it, you can do it and you are strong! Don’t let anyone strip it from you or give it away to the haters.
Happy Friday! <3
Laura
Hair and Eye Narcissism
Posted: May 16, 2013 Filed under: Fearlessly Be Yourself | Tags: curls, curly hair, green eyes Leave a comment »It was time for a new header pic, so after roughly too many times of playing around, I am so out of practice, I got a few good shots. 
Adventures in Decorating: The great refresh of 2013
Posted: May 14, 2013 Filed under: Beautiful Disasters, Decorating, Fearlessly Be Yourself | Tags: chalk paint, cork, decor refresh, Furniture, Home and Garden, moss, Redecorating, topiary Leave a comment »It all started out innocently enough, we needed a new bed because our mattress was older than my daughter ish and I decided we would keep waiting until other things were taken care of before dropping 2000+ on a new one. But then, a friend had one for sale, a great one, cheap and very gently used. So I bought it. I knew it was going to kick off an entire domino effect, I just had no idea how far reaching that one little purchase would become. So one day during Thanksgiving Break while my BIL was here, I had him and Babu
- Take my son’s old nasty bought used for MiniMe mattress to the basement
- Move MiniMe’s newer twin mattress to his Race car bed
- Move MiniMe’s twin bed to the basement
- Move the queen frame from the basement, set it up and move our mattress and box springs to her room
- Move the new mattress into our bed
Voila!
No wait, this meant her room had to be redone into a bigger girl room, between Thanksgiving and Christmas, on top of the Holiday Decorating, shopping entertaining etc…
- A newly acquired on the FB Marketplace french desk, chalk painted, distressed
- A new set of memo boards made big enough to go on her walls, thanks Pinterest
- A semi custom set of shelves and bench for her wall
- Moving her dresser into her closet
No wait, after I took down the Christmas Decor I wanted to move the couch to the other side of the room, which caused the black buffet to get moved to beside the fireplace.
Which looked AMAZING.
But…totally screwed up my accessories, because now the couch was sitting on a big, blank, wall and the metal piece was all off placed.
Then came Valentines Day.. I made roughly 1000 home made valentines and approximately 47 gajillion batches of fudge, some heart shaped.
Then came Easter and the invasion of the Bunnies…..
I was clearly trying to occupy my mind, myself, and my time during the fighting for my marriage by keeping my mouth shut, going into super internal processing/change mode, and not throwing my husband out like I wanted to roughly every 1-7 days when I reached the, OMG this is hopeless or OMG I’m going to have to call Momma M and have her dig me a hole on the compound for his beaten to death body. I couldn’t run because I had plantar fasciitis. Strength training and sending my friends out of nowhere really long cussing tirades so I wouldn’t SAY them to Babu became my only outlets. The weeks wore on, and on, and on. I read books, I journaled, couples therapy began to actually work inside my marriage, the man began to actually baby step toward something I considered, considerable… as in I’ll consider letting you stay here. Things became less painful, I became stronger, more educated, more understanding, more patient, more capable of managing myself, him and what we were going through. Right before Easter I read an article talking about surrounding yourself with things you loved in your home. Every room should feel right, not just look right. I’m pretty sure it showed up in my Taptu or FB news feed. I read it, thought yeah that makes sense I already have lots of things I love in my home, and went on with my day. Later I read another article talking about photo walls, putting large groupings together vs. more groupings that are smaller. A few days/weeks who knows later I started pulling Easter down and it hit me…
Everywhere I looked things were the same as they were 3+ years ago when we had round 1 of almost divorce. He moved out and took some things with him, he moved back in and I put them all right back where they were before he left. At the time it made perfect sense, restoring everything to its pre-PJ days, making it whole again, all nice and tidy just like it was before. Three years and 1.5 crisis later as I looked around amidst gathering bunnies, it all just felt stagnant. Everywhere I turned and looked felt like bad JuJu.
It was time for a full on refresh. When I was younger and I’d break up with a guy, or get dumped by one, I’d spend the Saturday after I picked myself up from the trauma completely cleaning my apartment from head to toe and completely re-arranging as much as I could. Back then it took all of 4-8 hours. Apartments are small, furniture was not that movable and accessories while plentiful were easy to “redo”. This time, I also had the excuse of the blank wall behind the couch. It was making me anxious, an empty space needing to be filled. I don’t like undone projects, in spite of having more than my share of them. I don’t like unfinished business, in spite of learning to live with so many instances of exactly that. So I kept taking things down from walls, from table tops, moving tables and other small furniture into big piles. I needed as much of a clean slate as possible. Then I proceeded to spend the next 6+ weeks living life, working and pulling off a refresh. There is no way the pictures could convey the true nature of the work involved in making a few simple changes. Ha! When have I ever done anything simply, it just doesn’t seem to be my style, but I’m learning to embrace it more. I wanted to add more black and white. I wanted more natural elements. I had to play and tweak and replay and re-tweak until everything felt just right. I had to not only redo the pictures but wash and clean every piece of glass in the frames. I had to have the staircase, The Destroyer and the guest bath painted. Here are the pictures of the journey and the fruits of my, and the painters, labor. The trim guy comes in the next 10 days to finish the downstairs with chair rail and dado squares. The pergola is getting built over the back patio before mid- June, weather permitting. I think I’ll try to tackle things in smaller chunks from now on. Lord am I tired.
Before-
During:
After:
