Party Time

So it occurred to me today that Ive never really shared my parties with you guys. I love to plan parties! I love deciding on a theme, then picking out cute crafts to make that will go with that theme. They are not always fancy parties, and maybe not even a technical "party" but just a decorated table for people to enjoy while they are at my house. But whatever it is, I love it. Since this blog is all about the things I love, why not share my pictures with you all?

 Its so fun to see how my "style" has changed and evolved through the years. Its also nice to look back at some of these pictures and see how often I had to use only what we had. The budget is such deciding factor when it comes to planning a party, but when on a tight budget it forces you to become even more creative and really think outside the box! Unfortunately with a lot of these parties, the budget was also small in the camera department so a lot of the pictures are blurry. he he.

Lets start it off with something festive. This was our first Christmas party after Evan and I got married. We were living in a little one bedroom apartment so it wasn't the best place to have a party, but hey that just means less space to decorate! 

One of the my favorite parts of a party is decorating the table. It makes the biggest impact and really puts you in the party mood.

Most of what was used on the table I had borrowed from my mother-in-law, which definitely saved my bacon (or at least my theme).

I made some place holders for everyone, one style for the girls and another for the boys.

I grabbed some spikey balls from the tree outside for my centerpiece.

 Then started on the cookin. Its quite interesting trying to cook a fancy Christmas dinner in a kitchen this small, but with the help of my mom and sister we were able to get it done.

We made the classics.

Sweet potatoes, rolls, green beans, a green salad and my first ever ham!

Mmm...

The food was good but the company was even better.

The next party we had in this apartment was a surprise anniversary party for Evans parents. They were celebrating 30 years! Since it was an anniversary party we went with the traditional material of pearl.

My sister in law made chocolate cupcakes decorated with pearls and their initials. I made banana cupcakes with honey cinnamon frosting. Did you know you can buy edible pearl dust to go in your frosting?! There is also little edible pearl candies too!

 I got this idea off of the Martha Stewart website to do a three sided picture frame.

 

  

You simply get three picture frames and take the backs off. Then you hinge them together to make a triangle, I think I just used tape, and print your pictures on vellum. Then you plop a candle in the middle and voila!

 Don't they make the cutest couple!

Well thats two of the parties I've planned and Ill show you a couple more next time. Hope you've enjoyed them!

Lets Try That Again

We've been at it again! We got that itch to do some painting around here again, and we are all loving the results. When we originally decided to paint our living room blue, we were more than a little nervous. We were afraid that it would look overwhelming, or like you just walked into a big blue ice box. So we played it safe and only painted three walls. We left the entryway and the half wall white to try and balance it out.

We had so much trouble adding some color and personality to that wall, and what you cant see from this picture is that to the left of this wall is the full white bead board wall of our dining room, which you can see here. So if you were sitting in the living room, all you saw was white. Boring!!

While I masked off the space, Ryan starting ripping off the old ugly trim.

Then I got to work painting the entryway and half wall.

 Not only did we paint the walls but we added a fresh coat of white paint to the back of the doors, and we added the new trim.

 Isn't it beautiful?!

It adds so much more personality to that area now that its not just white, and we may or may not be adding some kind of wainscoting to that wall in the future ;)

On on a side note, we also continued down that wall and painted the hallway! Since we recently had a computer switch I don't have a before picture for you :( But just picture a creamy yellow-ish tan color = not cute. We decided to keep it simple and go for a soft white. I looked on one of my favorite blogs Perfectly Imperfect, where she had listed all of her paint colors in her house. She used the color White Diamond quite a bit, so we knew we were getting a color that was tried and true.

 It brightened up the hallway and even made the light look less "orangey" colored. We had to replace the old thermostat, because next to the new white paint it looked yellowed and ugly. We just cant have that now can we? :) This hallway is a bit of a decorating difficulty. On the largest wall is the doorbell box and the thermostat which doesn't leave much room for hanging things. Any ideas? 

Make Believe Mantle

Ya know how when you notice something in your house that isn't quite what you want it to be, then all the sudden its all you can see when you walk into that room? Has that ever happened to you? Well, after we built our coffee table here and I took some pictures for this here blog, I was so annoyed by the look of our too small shelf. Its amazing how looking at a picture can really point something out to you that you hadn't really noticed before.

This shelf was put up in a hurry when we first moved in, trying to make it look a little more "homey" for our first visitors. It worked for awhile, but when we moved the big couch against that wall, it dwarfed the shelf even more. So after bugging my handy BIL and repeatedly showing him pictures I liked, kinda like this one...

 Pinterest

and this one...

 Pottery Barn

So one weekend while my husband and I were out of town, Ryan got a wild hair and decided to build one, (I swear it was like subliminal messaging) and look how good it turned out!

I love that it has that chunky mantle look to it. It is so much more fun decorating for fall when you have a make believe mantle.

Now I cant even begin to explain how he built it, all I know is that I love it :) Maybe someday, I will be brave enough to attempt that wonderful chippy look like the ones above. But for now it works just fine!

I am linked at Home Stories A 2 Z

Dining Room Chairs

So I never did show you all how our dining room chairs turned out after I reupholstered them! If you remember they were stained and old and looked like this...

Ewww! Not pretty.

Well after a little bit of work they now look like this!

I am so happy with the way they turned out. It was so easy to recover them and made such a dramatic difference. As I mentioned here I really wanted to try sewing on a stripe of lace down the center of the seat, because I loved the look of this chair.

So on one of the chairs I tried it.

It was pretty, but it just didn't look right with the style of the chair. Maybe when we buy a new dining room set that has a more country styled chair I can try this again. But as for now Ill just stick with the plain linen. :)

DIY Headboard

Around here we've been busy making all sorts of interesting furniture pieces for our house. Some of the most noticeable being our new headboards. Ryan made his out of an old pallet, honestly I didn't even know that they made pallets this big!

 

For a while he left it just raw wood, which looked good, just not quite finished. Last weekend he stained it, and built a new wooden frame to go around his metal bed frame. He also managed to find some old hinges while working in his parents old barn. They go so well with the "industrial rustic" look he has going in his room. 

 

 

Meanwhile over in our room I decided to make a headboard using more of the old aged fence boards we had. I cleaned them up, then traced the shape I wanted. I only had to trace one side, then Evan could use the cut pieces to trace the other side so it would be symmetrical. Originally, I was going to paint the headboard a distressed white, but I fell in love with the color of the aged wood.

 It has made such a difference to the look of our room. I love that it has a more feminine shape, but then the coloring of the wood brings in the masculine.

That's all for now. Ill try and share more of the projects were working on soon!

I was featured at Perfectly Imperfect