Project Mode

This entire vacation has been about house projects. Since I was able to do so little last year with the baby, I am trying to make up for lost time. I have done so many projects including: Decorating the side porch, spray painting all the register vents with a bronze color to cover up the rust and ugly tan color they were, ripping up not one but 4 rugs so far to expose wood floors and replacing with beautiful decorative rugs ( and a GREAT hand hooked rug for the upstairs sitting area, scored a great sale price), decorated Anna and Ava's room as Tinkerbell Hollow, finished stenciling Miranda's room, recovered her vanity bench, put stars on her ceiling, found perfect print to frame in old antique frame I "repurposed" for sitting room, organized closets with new hampers, organized pantry, and that is just the stuff I rememer.!!

We had the garage sale this weekend, which in itself was a HUGE project. Made a clean sweep of all my closets, cabinets, and in the kitchen the appliances. I donated a truck load of stuff to Salvation Army, and blankets to the Humane Society, and saved some of the nicer sale items for our next sale ( I am a girl always cleaning closets, may as well plan the next sale, I will find stuff!). With our garage sale money, we gave some to each girl for helping, and will now purchase some things we need for the house including a freezer, new picnic table for the back patio, and a deck box for the pool.
So now I eyeball the house and see what I can do today. Here is what I have come up with: Hang our framed degrees in the offfice, fix the frame on the framed tinkerbell print for Anna and Ava's room, and "repurpose" the lantern we took off the side of the house ( oh yeah, a project I forgot we did, Brian removed the old black outside lights and put up nice bronze looking ones, old style lanterns, and one even has a on at dust off at dawn feature). The one I want to repurpose looks like a lantern you would walk around with in days gone by. I have pulles out the wires, and am going after the part the light bulb screwed into today. After I pull that out, I am painting it bronze to match the new out door lights. I am going to use it to put on the floor of the porch over a big pillar candle for nights we sit out. I am excited about my idea because it will not only look great, but go with the old style we are trying to maintain for this historic 1850's house. One final thing I want to do this summer is to get a plaque made for the front with the date on it.

Happy projecting! I am off to "repurpose".

Has Anyone Seen my Carbs???

So, I have been trying to lose weight, and lower my BMI number since January. I am happy to say I have lost 22 pounds to date. However, holy crap has it taken a long time! I know I know....... the best way to lose weight is slow. I had gotten impatient with how long it's been taking on WW, so I boosted things alone these past two weeks. I did what always workds for me, I gave up carbs. It's been 10 days since bread, potatoes, or refined sugar has past my lips, and I have entered the zone where I feel awesome. Why does it take giving up carbs to make me feel full of energy, and GREAT? It's not fair, but I did speed up my weight loss. The scale, which had stalled out is moving again. I am happy to report I am currently wedding weight, which isn't my all time low, but it's on my way. ( 1995 weight!!!) My 12's are FINALLY loose, and I bought a skirt last week that is a size 8. Today I am wearing shorts I haven't been able to wear ever ( they are from Sandi) and yesterday, my favorite American Eagle denim shorts were feeling very loose. 10. 10 is where I am heading, and trying hard to be there by the fall.

So, keep eating the meat and veggies, and keep the carbs out of my house and keep the scale moving!

My Farmer

Miranda took Acrobatics this year along with her Ballet class. Remember how it was how I got out of enrolling her in cheer leading? Anyways, it was a nice class and she can do these amazings things now with her body. Instead of the regular split she could do, she can do two others, including one you run into. ( who knew about that?). Her routine for the recital was choreographed to "Devil Went Down to Georgia." Some girls were the Devils, the older ones, and Miranda was a farmer. The girls kind of dueled it out on stage with the things they could do. It was a great routine, audience loved it. Here is my daughter, granddaughter of a farmer, daughter of a farmer's daughter, but please note I never knew a farmer to wear something like this.

Look at me GO

Now that the baby is a little older, I am finally able to get some things done! It also helps that school is out, and I am a stay at home mom for the summer. Yesterday I had one of those days again where I went to town! It started off in the AM when I decided my fridge was full and I needed to cook some things before they go bad. So, I cooked 2 home made pizzas for dinner to use up the veggies, cheese, etc....Then, I chopped up the Rhubarb I got at the farm stand and made my dad 3 Rhubarb pies for his birthday ( it's a tradition, nobody else makes the man these pies). Somewhere in between, I did 2 loads of laundry, ran errands ( returned bottles, dropped off something at the Docs, went to LNT for a rug for my porch, and AC Moore to get stencil paint). Then, after dinner, I finally spent time organizing and pricing items for the garage sale next weekend. Finally, at around 9:30, I spent an hour stenciling Miranda's room while she is at camp.

What a great day! It's starting to feel like I actually live here now that I have time to decorate, antique, and plan the kitchen remod. Let's hope for another day today as productive.

Summer Time

Summer is finally and offically HERE! With 50 days till back to school, I am almost besides myself trying to do it all! Today, there were swim lessons for the girls, strawberry picking, complete with peanut butter sandwiches eaten in the fields, cookies to be made, 2 loads of laundry, housework, my famous home made Stromboli, and I even jammed. There are 8 jars of strawberry jam cooling on my couter, and "pinging" as they seal.

What a perfect start to summer. I am thinking it's going to be a banner summer! And picture if you will, little Ava sitting in the strawberry field, on ripe strawberries, filling and unfilling her basket. She was great! Anna ate more than she picked, and Miranda picked her heart out, filling an 8 quart basket.