Goodbye February

I think this is the coldest winter we have had in a long time.  Right now we are in a cold snap and it is awful.  It is -37 with the wind chill.  Cold, bitter cold.  I give up.  So here's to a better March - but the weatherman told us tonight that it will be cold until mid-March.  Boo!  We've also had a lot of snow and I am tired of shovelling. 



Crazy Snow! 




Go away snow!

 Thank goodness that I can now start to count the days until our next getaway to the sun!  I hope you all have something to look forward to.  Stay warm....



The Princesses in Honduras March 2010



A little project

I found a lovely little tray one day at a thrift shop for $3.00 but the centre was an ugly beach scene...

I love the beach just as much as the next person but it needed to go.  I began by peeling off the laminate coating and then the paper.  I went and bought some lovely wrapping paper and had the thought that I could use my extra large bottle of modge podge to seal it on.

But the modge podge had other ideas and it was ruined!  My lovely tray with the great wallpaper had a few wrinkles - not the look I was going for! Oops!

The next best solution was to cut out another piece of the wrapping paper and just place it on top!  No modge podge was touching this.

Happy Birthday!

Yesterday was my Mom's birthday and we celebrated together on Sunday.  We went out for a lovely brunch.  Lots of great food.  The best part was the waitress didn't think that Mom was a senior!  That made my Mom's day I am sure!  Mom was a bit surprised and was very happy with her new e reader.

It will be great for our upcoming vacation (more on that later). I hope you enjoyed your day, Mom!

My Mom and her brother have birthdays one day apart - I think that is very neat! 

So Happy Birthday Bubba!  I hope you enjoyed your day!

Happy Birthday Bubba!

And just for the record I hear that seniors get discounts!

Painting my world white!

It's no secret that I love white furniture - I think it looks so clean and fresh.  However, I had very dark furniture in my dining room.  I was given a matching sofa table and dining room suite by my Mom about 6 years ago.  It is oak with a walnut finish on it.  I know she wouldn't be happy about it being painted but I figured that since I had it for several years it was now mine to do with it what I pleased, right?!  With her sort of blessing I decided to start off painting the sofa table white. 

After looking at lots of blogs that seem to be able to do furniture painting and gourmet cooking all in an afternoon I figured I could too!  Except it didn't work out that way for me.  Don't you hate when that happens?  I had some major SLS - more on that in a separate post!

We used Ben Moore Aura paint that one blogger in particular recommended because it was SO great.  Well in my opinion it was a complete disaster.  It is like applying liquid plastic.  You get ONE opportunity to put it on - meaning that you put it on your paint brush and then on the project you don't get a chance to feather it or blend it.  Heaven forbid if you tried to blend it out as it just rolled off like glue.  Not so cool.  I really thought that I/we could bang this off in a couple hours.  Well let's just say that it took a lot longer.



Getting ready for a makeover!



Look at the lovely brass strip - but the wicker will look lovely white!

And here is the finished and much improved (in my opinion only, Mom)!

Behind Closed Doors

Everyone needs an old door in their front room, right?!  Well I knew that I needed wanted one.  The trouble was trying to find the right one.  Rhino took me on an adventure when it was -35 out and the roads were shoddy and I was hoping that we would make it.  I was being to think I was crazy for even attempting to go outside.

We found lots of old doors - but the one I had envisioned in my head had green chippy paint on it.  The doors that we saw had old paint on them but not necessarily chippy paint! There was a door that was in the running and it had great color, however, it had a huge crack right down the center so that got it crossed off the list. 

I found a white door that had great potential and as an added bonus it even had the crystal doorknob!  If you know me I usually like my furniture white but this still wasn't the green chippy door I had in mind.  I had it up for a couple of weeks and then decided that I would attempt to change it and make it mine.   I found that the white made it just blend in to the wall too much.  So here is my attempt to get my green chippy door.

Before painting

During painting

My door - with the wreath made by October Moon

I think having a door in your front room is very cool.  So far though no one has noticed it!

As an added bonus the green paint I used was a Lowe's mistint and cost $2.50 and the blue was a little sample size from Home Depot. Not bad for a first attempt and if I ever get bored with it I can paint it again!

Happy Valentine's Day!

I really don't make a big deal about Valentine's Day.  I don't really decorate and usually Rhino and I exchange a card and we get the kids some chocolate - umm maybe I should take the chocolate instead!  Imagine to my surprise when the doorbell rang at 8:15 pm and one of Princess Belle's classmates/friends had a nice surprise for us.

What a great treat!

Happy Friday!

Cupcakes

The Princesses have been invited to activity days in our community and last weeks activity was to decorate cupcakes.  I was amazed by how beautiful the cupcakes turned out.  Princess Belle was very upset as I accidentally dropped one - oops!  Bet you can't guess which one!  They tasted just as good as they looked.

Pricess Belle's creations

Miss Cinderella's creations

Every other week they do something different and they love it...sometimes sports, cooking, beading, crafts you get the picture.  I am so grateful that the girls have been invited to attend.

I would feel like a Queen!

If only I had this chair!

Can you imagine the things that I could do with this chair?  I could wear long dark colored dresses and have fake fingernails and DIRECT the peeps in my house to do things.  Wouldn't it sound grand to sit there and tell the Princesses and Rhino "bring me my dinner now.  Or better yet "mop the floors and then when you are done you can do the wash".  Oh yes it would be grand.  But there is a slight problem with this the chair retails for about $2000 depending on what fabric choices you make. The other problem I have is where would I put it as it seems rather large.  But just in case you want to buy it so you can direct the peeps in your house it can be purchased at Restoration Hardware.  The only thing that would make it better in my mind is to have wheels on it so your peeps could push you around the house!

Also a benefit of having it is I would feel as if I am in Disneyland/world all day long as it reminds me of the doombuggy that you sit in at the Haunted Mansion!  Just in case you need a little Disney fix here it is.  So maybe considering the cost of a trip to Disney the chair is a steal.  See how I can justify anything?! Enjoy your day!