A cure for what ails you

I received notice today that Apartment Therapy's The Kitchn site is hosting the spring Kitchen Cure. Without hesitation, I am in! You see, I have a new kitchen (just a year and a half old). I am certain that I could clean better. I am certain I could be more organized. I think this Cure is just the thing to kick off some spring cleaning.

Will you be joining The Kitchen Cure too?

**For fun, here is a (bad) picture of my kitchen. Please ignore the things that are out of place! :) This pic is the only one I can find at the moment.

Am I the luckiest girl ever??

Seriously. I feel so blessed this morning.

I woke up this morning to the sound of my six month old chatting in her crib. It's not a bad way to wake up really. She's very sweet. But this morning, I was still tired and my feet were dragging.

One of the first things I do after getting my little one situated in the morning is to check my google reader. BAM! First blog listed. I won. What? So excited!! I am sure you know of the blog, Nesting Place. I became acquainted with the Nester just a few months ago. It's one of the blogs that you find and then spend whatever time required to read EVERY POST EVER WRITTEN. Such great ideas! I especially love her tag line "It doesn't have to be perfect to be beautiful." So true! I feel that way too!! Anyway, thank you Nester! I am so grateful for the $50 gift card to Dayspring. I can't wait to start shopping! With so many great things there, I am not sure how I'll decide!

Another blessing was winning some beautiful picture frames from The Crane Family blog. Holly has an eight month old, so I can totally relate to her family. Check it out! Also, those awesome frames are from CSN Stores. They have an amazing offering. I can't wait to get the frames and put them up in my home. I'll try to get pictures posted here once they find a home.
Thank you to both ladies (and their sponsors)! You have totally made my week! (An otherwise tough week - my baby is getting her first tooth and is pretty miserable..)

Also, because I haven't update you for a while, here are a couple pictures of the "she" of "while SHE slept":
Have a great day!

A star is born

Okay, so nothing was born, per se. However, my idea has finally come to reality... finally. As in, I have had some of the materials for MONTHS. I am sure others can relate. Please, tell me you can relate! :)

So the idea really started probably a year ago. I had been looking for art to go in our master bathroom above our tub. I've tried to use a very subtle shell/beach theme. I am not one to be overly theme-y, so I've been cautious with every addition. I found some gorgeous framed shells from a website. I thought a series of three or four would look terrific. Also terrific would be keeping the $400 that those four pieces would cost. So I hemmed and hawed for months trying to decide if I should splurge or if I could find something else.

Then it hit me. I was going to do it myself. I was inspired by an episode of Deserving Design. (I think that's what that show was called. It was hosted by Vern Yip.) Anyway, he inspired me with a starfish canvas piece he made. I decided I would get a shadow box and fill it with starfish. Easy peasy. Kinda.

I went to the craft store to buy the starfish. Do you know what they cost at a store like Michaels???? $4 each. No thanks. But I did find the shadow box there. It was black and that was totally not what I was looking for, but the size was good. So I went with it. Then I found a vendor on ebay that sells the starfish for a MUCH better price. I think it was something like $25 for 50 starfish or something great like that.

I painted the shadow box the same color as our trim. It's color matched to Restoration Hardware's Right White. The back of the shadow box was a black fabric. I bought some inexpensive cotton fabric for a couple bucks. Unfortunately, you could see the black fabric through it, so I had to line it with some cotton duck fabric I had laying around. That did the trick. Stapled the fabric into place. Filled the shadow box with starfish and it was done.



After over a year and a half in our home, I finally have something on the wall of my bathroom. Feels good.

While I am here, I don't want to forget to let you know about an awesome giveaway being hosted by Centsational Girl. Great blog. Great giveaway. You can check it out here.

Thanks for stopping by! I'd love to hear how you've incorporated themes into your home successfully. I'd love new ideas!

Linking up to:
DIY Day at A Soft Place to Land
Metamorphisis Monday at Between Naps on the Porch
Get your craft on at Today's Creative Blog

Shaking out the cobwebs...

I am back (again)! It's been an interesting month since I've been here. Both for the good and for the bad. My father in law was hospitalized for a couple of weeks. They found a tumor in his stomach that turned out to be an aggressive and rare form of stomach cancer. Praise God, the surgery to remove it was successful. However, following his surgery, he had a stroke. This was really the more devastating of the two events. His prognosis for both is good. He is regaining his strength each day and thankfully it seems he will be able to fully recover soon!



Because of this family emergency, my husband was gone to the hospital pretty much all day, every day for two weeks (after just getting home from a trip for work). This left me to take care of our little one and hold down the home front. We also made several trips to the hospital all while trying to prepare for and celebrate the holidays. But we are so blessed! It turned out that my father in law was able to come home before Christmas and we were able to celebrate all together. I hope your holiday was as blessed as ours! Here we are on Christmas Eve:


I have also had a couple of exciting things happen in the last few days. First off, I won! I actually won! Whisperwood Cottage was kind enough to host a wonderful giveaway last month for what should prove to be a fantastic book, The Find by Stan Williams (aka The Elegant Thrifter). I haven't received the book yet, but I am eagerly awaiting its arrival. Also, if you haven't spent time on the Whisperwood Cottage blog, don't even hesitate... go there now! She has great ideas (such as her recent wreath make over) and inspiring makeovers that WILL make you drool (such as her master bedroom makeover, my personal favorite). So, thank you again to the Whisperwood Cottage, not only for the wonderful giveaway, but for hosting a wonderful blog that I enjoy so much!


The other excitement is the new year. Notice I didn't capitalize that. New Year's Eve is not my favorite holiday since we usually end up being very low key. In fact this year we stayed home with our little one who is dealing with her first cold... pretty minor in the scheme of things, but still has thrown her off her regular game. So back to my new year... It's a wonderful time to re-evaluate, re-configure, and re-organize both the tangible and intangible. I've never been big on setting resolutions of the new year, but this year is different. I want to really focus on being better... as a mom, as a wife, daughter, sister, friend, homemaker, etc. I am planning to share some of my resolutions here as a way to keep me accountable. So I guess I am giving everyone permission to call me out on those resolutions!! (one of which does involve being a better blogger!:))


I've rambled and I apologize for that. I look forward to sharing more of my thoughts, projects, and ideas here in the coming days and weeks. So if you feel so inclined, come on back and see what 2010 brings for me while she sleeps!! (And while you wait for those posts, be sure to check out a FANTASTIC giveaway at Beneath My Heart. Traci is hosting a $75 giveaway for Lisa Leonard jewelry... one of my favs! You can check out the giveaway here. Don't miss it!)


~Alisa