I am alive, incase you were worried

Hello blog world, remember me? No? That's ok...I haven't forgotten you. It's not that things have been busy as to why I haven't had a post in over a month, it's that I've had quite possibly the most difficult month of my life. I really don't want to use this time to vent and make you feel sorry for me, because the reality is, I am truly blessed. And....

I'm pregnant!

And that is exciting, joyful news. However, this pregnancy has been quite difficult thus far, but it is still truly a blessing and I remind myself of that daily. I won't get into all the details, but on top of normal pregnancy sickness, I had terrible debilitating migraines for a few weeks straight. Then, just when I was starting to feel better and feeling like my life was back to"normal", we had a scare with the pregnancy last week which was probably the most terrifying moment of my life. But, the baby and I are fine and healthy.

Anyway, I want to get back to blogging, because I truly do miss it. I would also like to get to all the things that I want to do around the house, but one thing I am learning through all of this is that I need to give up some control. That things aren't always going to get done or happen in the time line I want them to, and that's ok.

So, hopefully, I'll be back soon with new posts, and lots of inspiration!

Until then, doesn't this nursery shot make you swoon?

De-cluttering

It's been almost a year since we redid the kitchen. Ever since we have owned the house , there is a corner of the kitchen that is my nemesis. No matter what I do, I cannot keep this area clutter-free. It makes me crazy. It is the place we throw keys, wallets, mail we don't want to throw out but don't have a place for ... you know the deal- every house has a place like this.

This is a picture taken last year, and it pretty much has looked the same but more cluttered. Every few weeks I would clean it out, only to have it get cluttered again within days. So, I decided I couldn't take it anymore.

We took a trip to Ikea this past week to look at stuff for the office (a work in progress). Ikea has such great organization items. It makes me happy. So we got these gord-like-pod-things and hung them on the side of the cabinet as a place to throw keys, pens, or whatever. I really wanted to get most everything off the counter. I also picked up these cute little tins which now keep tea and other hot drinks in easy reach, which is crucial this time of year.

It makes me much happier to have this space clutter-free. I have realized when you don't have a place to clutter, it makes you deal with that mail as soon as you get it, rather than add it to that corner and forget about it.

This year we have lots of plans for de-cluttering and organizing. The big one of course being the office that we are making in our old closet. I have to go through lots of stuff in the now guest room and organize everything to have its own place in the new office. The other project will be the basement at some point. We have done a lot of organizing down there already, but we want to invest in getting some shelves or other storage to help keep it organized.

And while we're on the subject of organizing, if you have kids, you know how difficult it can be to keep all their stuff organized. A constant battle for us is Aiden's toys. I like things to have a place and to be put away at the end of the day. We picked up these fabric bins from Ikea (did I mention how much I love Ikea!!) which are perfect because they slip right under the sofa for storing.

Do you have any organizing tricks or plans for 2011?

Updates

I'm back! Happy New Year! The holidays were crazy busy and I am so relieved to have the Christmas decorations down and to be back to our normal schedule.

I relized that I have not shared some of the little changes we made around here in December with all the busyness of the holidays.

First, I will give you an update on the bedroom. I finally finished the curtains for the closet space. These were way more complicated than I wanted them to be. I will spare you the details. Now that they are done though, I am happy with them. I thought that maybe it would be too much white, but, now that they are up and hemmed, I do like them.

I got some new throw pillows for the bed. The yellow flower one is from Target. I think I see it on every blog I read, but it is a great pillow. The gray one is from CB2. You may (or may not ) also notice that we got rid of the Malm end tables that attach to the bed. With the new room configuration, they were too big/ So on one of our Ikea trips, we picked up these stools for $20 each. I have had plans (since getting them months ago) to change the covers. It hasn't happened yet, but it is going to happen, and maybe even this week. I'll keep you updated.

Now, I have a bit of a confession, we had this grand plan of putting tall, skinny, bookshelves on either side of the bed, in between the wall and the windows. We actually did get them, and it looked great, until we got the closet up. It was way too crowded. Book storage is a serious issue for us, so I knew I had to find another place for them. So, out into the hallway they went, right outside the bedroom, at the bottom of the 3rd floor stairs. Aiden helped me take off all the books to move them- he thought it was so much fun. I forgot to take a before picture of them in the bedroom, but here they are in the hallway.

I also hung up our long mirror which used to hang over my dresser horizontally. I like having the mirror in the hallway, and to add a little light, I hung a paper lantern pendant so that we could actually see if using the mirror.

And, speaking of light. I am really weird about light in our home. I like soft light, and I like it evenly dispersed. When we got the sectional, I got kind of stressed out about the fact that we couldn't have a light in that corner anymore. There was definitely no way a floor lamp would work, so it was actually Rob that suggested a pendant. I realized when we needed to move the dresser to put up our Christmas tree, that we would only have one lamp in the room. So, I finally gave in and ordered this pendant from CB2. It was actually a great price ($50), and it looks good too. It makes me happy.

When we took our tree down, I realized now that we have the pendant, I don't need as large of a lamp on that small dresser. So I brought this one down from upstairs, which was a wedding gift. It is from Restoration Hardware and is so nice, so I am glad that we can uses it downstairs.

I have lots of things on my to do list around here. The first being finishing up the bedroom. I think I found something for over the bed, however, I am having a hard time finding a frame that would fit it. Hope everyone had a great holiday and I am looking forward to lots of projects in 2011!

Deck the Halls

I wanted to share some of my Christmas decorating, and some tips for low/no cost projects.

As I said before, twinkle lights- so cheap, easy, and instantly make everything more festive. I even used them in the kitchen.

This little tree was something new I tried this year. I simply got some branches from the backyard, spray-painted them white, stuck them in a vase, and decorated.

Wrap stuff up- I'm sure I am not the first to do this, but seriously, this is probably the easiest thing you can do. I used scraps of fabric for this little bundle of packages. It is 2 empty boxes and a book. haha- Rob was concerned about what book, but I assured him he won't be needing it between now and Christmas. And of course, frames on the wall. I tried something a little different this year- brown paper packages...

I took this card display idea from an old Domino issue....ooooh Domino! How I miss you!!

It is an easy, creative way to display Christmas cards. And it is great because every day you can add to it and change it if you need to. This large bulletin board cost under $10 at Target and then you can either use wrapping paper or fabric to cover. I used paper.

Still LOVE this Christmas banner, an Etsy purchase from last year.

Oh Christmas tree...

Sparkle on the dining room buffet

Of course, festive, new pillow covers

Also, don't hesitate to change/put away furniture if you need to accommodate a tree or whatever, especially if you have a small space. Our living room chair is up in the closet (soon to be office) for the time being and we had to move the small dresser from next to the sofa.

Hope you are enjoying this Christmas season and able to take some time to slow down from all the hustle!

An Etsy Holiday

You may or may not know that I love Etsy. Unfortunately my Etsy Fridays have fallen by the wayside, but maybe I will get back into doing them after things quiet down from the holidays.

Anyway, I didn't take the complete "buy only handmade" pledge this Christmas, but I have been really trying to find gifts on Etsy before looking other places. In fact, my goal is to not do a lot of in-store shopping at all. Between Etsy and Amazon, I've been doing pretty well. Although, you do have to weed through things since there is just so much on Etsy. I would much rather be sitting in my warm house in my pjs doing that than out at a store in the freezing cold.

The one thing that I decided to do this year was purchase our Christmas cards on Etsy. I've never been a huge fan of the photo cards (only because they feel impersonal), but they do make mailing out a ton of cards so much easier. Etsy has a lot of great options, but a lot of them are to purchase the design, but you print out. Well, I am not savvy enough for that, so I was able to find a great seller with great designs at a GREAT price. They arrived yesterday and I am so pleased with how they turned out. They are also on a heavier cardstock (instead of photo paper), which I makes them much nicer.

Here are a few of the designs you can choose from- I won't post a picture of ours, only because I don't want those receiving one to see it before it arrives in the mail.

Consider Lillies

I suppose I can't really blog about any gifts that we have bought incase the recipient happens to read this. So, just one more shop to mention....

The great thing about Etsy is that you can find things that you can't find anywhwere else. One of my favorite things to look at is stationary items. I went a little crazy in this shop. She has SOOO much in her shop, and it's not more than you would spend on cute tags at Target. That's what is so great about buying handmade- it makes you feel like a better person! The money goes directly to the seller, not some huge corporation. Some people are even raising money like things for adoption (like the above store where we got our cards). So, I don't feel guilty even if I do spend a little more money on something (like gift tags!) because it just feels like the right thing to do.

Lazy Day Cottage

Anyway, love this store, and love that she literally has thousands of tags. I bought a bunch to use on gifts, and to hopefully use in some decor around the house.

Speaking of decor around the house, hopefully I will have a post about what I've done around here soon. I have a couple more things I am working on. But, here is my biggest piece of holiday decor advice- use twinkle lights inside. They make everything more festive. And use the ones on white wires- Target has them seriosuly cheap. Here's a little preview for you...

So, are you buying handmade this year? Let me know if you've found something fabulous.

Cozy

It's been getting pretty chilly around here recently, so a few weeks ago, I cozied things up around here. I've been meaning to share it with you since, but time seems to get away from me.

I realize that I can officially start decorating for Christmas in less than a week and that I just ordered some fabric for Christmas pillow covers, but......I made some different pillow covers for the sofa because I felt like the ones that were on before were a little too summery. I also bought some knitted pillow covers from West Elm because I have been wanting something like these since last winter.

On an Ikea trip last week, I picked up a faux sheepskin for only $12.99 which I draped over the chair in the living room.

Also, I mentioned before that I moved the white chair that used to be in our bedroom up into the spare room. I have always loved how cozy this room feels, and this just adds to it.

That's all for now. We got curtains for the closet in the bedroom, but some tweaking needs to be done before I can share it with you.

Happy Thanksgiving!!

More in the bedroom

I started this post a week ago...I can't seem to get things in order around here!

So, here's another picture update of the bedroom. This is the wall opposite of where the closet is. We moved both of our dressers onto this wall, which was obviously necessary because of the closet. Sadly,we had to get rid of the chair in the bedroom, but I realized that there might be room for the chair that I have yet to recover in the new "office space" (old closet). We moved the white chair up to the guest bedroom and it fits in perfectly up there.

I explained all the artwork we got for this wall in this previous post. We also included 2 pictures from a photo shoot last spring that my friend Christy did. She's awesome.

I made a new cover for the lampshade to make it fit in more with the overall feel of the room.

I realized once we were putting up the frames, I didn't have room for this favorite Etsy print that I got for my birthday last year, so I put it on the bookshelf where I think it fits in nicely because the green/yellow color in it perfectly matches the ceramic bottle on the top shelf.

I also wanted to mention that this vase on this shelf is made by my sister, and it is one of my favorite things.

Right after this mirror we have hanging in the living room.

So, there is a bedroom update for you. We're hoping to get curtains up around the closet some time next week. This is (obviosuly) a slow moving process, but we're getting there. I had originally thought the office would be done before Christmas, but I can probably guarantee that is not going to happen. But, I'll keep you updated!

If you're still out there- thanks for stopping by!