Adventures in Decorating - week 6

The cleaning and organizing continues... The craft stuff that was in the dining room has been moved:



It looks so much bigger without the stuff in there (and neater too):



So where is all the crafty goodness? Hidden behind the love seat:



I got a sturdy little bookcase from Target. It's much stronger and better made than the Ikea cabinets that the TV is sitting one. That's a good thing because those steal dies, punches, paper and paint are not light.

It's still close to the dining room table where I work. This is what it looks like from the dining room:



And here it is all tucked in behind the love seat... no peeking, no mess ;oD



Other than that the only other house stuff that's gone on is to take Jim's mom's painting in for reframing. I hope it ends up looking good. I am truely clueless when it comes to frames.

That's it for now... I think there is going to be some paint going on next week, YAY!!!

Glory Glory Man United

I took the day off and Jim, Cheryl and I headed to the Rose Bowl to see Galaxy play Manchester United. Chris couldn't come because he had class... poor Chris...



Jim is a BIG Manchester United fan.



We got there early and had time to walk through the Fan Fest:



We had some good seats right behind the ManU bench.



Here are the starting 11...



There were some BIG names there!



GAME TIME!



Things didn't go well for the Galaxy...



And then things got worse...



And worse...



And even WORSE!



That's okay though because we were here to see Manchester United, along with 89,0000+ other people:



And when those 89,000 people all left the stadium at the same time, YIKES! Traffic was ridiculous! We finally got home just before midnight. Then it was up at 6am for work... I kept it low key today ;o)

Have a great day tomorrow, everyone! It's FRIDAY!!!

Happy Birthday!

Happy birthday to my niece and nephew!



Buddy was there too:



Showing off some new tricks:



Where's Jena?



Jena couldn't come... she had a friend over to play :oD



Jammer stayed with us for a few days. What a sweetie she is!

Adventures in Decorating - week 5

I have picked colors... FINALLY!!! Here they are:



In the paint picture on THIS POST, it's the one on top in the center. I LOVE how this color makes my MIL's sunset picture glow!

We got a notice that our dining room table is here! The baskets and behind the sofa shelves should arrive this week... things are happening now!

A Good Day for a Run

Cheryl has been working hard training for her 50K race coming up in October. We have been running in some beautiful places. Today we ran from the top of Peak Park in Newport Beach to Crystal Cove in Laguna Beach. I'm still on my bike, but my foot is getting better. Thanks for the strap, Dad! It's really helping!



The weekend before she ran at Malibu State Park for 17 miles. Look at the size of Cheryl's Water Pack compared to everyone else's. I didn't go on that run (it was too rough for a bike) so she had to carry her own water... It was HEAVY!! But she said that she was the only one that didn't run out of water "oD



The weekend before that she ran 18 miles in Dove Canyon. I was along for that one. That's when we learned how much water is needed for these long runs. I was carrying 72 oz of water for the two of us and we ran out.







Well, that's it. I hope to be running again in a couple of weeks!

July Card Kit Reveal

Welcome to the Club Mojo July card kit reveal! We have 10 ladies in the club this year!!! These are all wonderful ladies who I've had the good fortune to meet at Scrappin' Mojo.

It's time for our Club reveal, and this month's card kit was put together by Niki!

I'm in the middle of redecorating the house, so I only had time for one card this month. I still have a lot of this gorgeous kit left over, and plan to make more. I used a great sketch from Sktech N' Dies as my inspiration:



And here is my card!





I'm going to enter this card in the latest Sketch N' Dies challenge.
Have a great weekend, all!

Adventures in Decorating - week 5.5

Caroline ordered us some new samples. YIKES!!! Look at all those colors! My top three and Cheryl's top three are the same (the ones with the stars), but how to pick which one? This is a tough decision! I don't know how to pick! Oh, the STRESS!!!



The light beiges are so much the same that I don't think we can go wrong with either....



The darker beiges is another story... I don't like either of them. The hunt for dark beige continues.



Want to know a nice thing about this paint from Dunn-Edwards? It cleans up very easy! Want to know how I know that?



When I got home from work, I ran over the poster board... It cleaned right up with a wet cloth, YAY! ;oD

Adventures in Decorating - week 5

We have homework... or I should say that I have homework, but the good kind :oD Caroline gave Jim all these books of paint chips to bring home.



These are not the tiny chips that you get at the hardware store... these are HUGE! Ethan Allen makes it easy for me to pick out some colors that make me SMILE! I went back to the store today. Caroline is going to order samples in my choices and; now that she knows my preference for bright colors, she's going to add a few of her own.

Time to go get some more poster board!

Adventures in Decorating - week 4.5

Jim picked up the paint samples this week. Here are the accent color choices that Caroline picked out.



None of them make me feel happy. They all have a touch of grey. I can see how that tones down the color so that it's not so "in your face" but to me they are all blah... drab and dingy...

And here is the main wall color.



I'm going to ask her for a brighter accent color and the tan color is going to be too dark for the entry way. We'll see what happens next...

Adventures in Decorating - week 4

Back to window dressings... we went to see Caroline today, and I got my first look at the blinds. The one I liked had a yellow/green tinge to it, so I went with my second choice.

Next we picked fabric for the curtains. We were going to do something fancy with a colored panel/runner (in teal) going through the off-white curtains, but since the blinds had a pattern in it, it looked too busy for me. So I just went with a plain off-white.

I thought that would be it, but NO!

What curtain bar do I want? After much deliberation... Dark wood.
What type of top? Grommet, reverse pleat, goblet pleat, french pleat, triple pleat, double pleat, plain? YIKES!!!
What type of finial? Uh, what's a finial?
Lined or unlined? Whew, and easy one... Lined.
What type of finishing on the sides of the grass blinds? Uh.... brown?

{{{WHEW}}} Okay... window dressing is done. Now on to PAINT!

I had to NIX the orange. YIKES! Way too scary! Most of the walls are going to be beige and there are going to be two accent walls. One behind the sofa and one in the dining room. Jim has to pickup the color samples from the paint store. Here is what we decided on today (I greyed all the paint sample colors except the ones that we decided on):




We picked the curtain top on the right (it's less fussy). It was a compromise between my plain top and Jim's triple pleat:



And here is what it all looks like together now:



Other than that, I'm still cleaning out craft stuff this week and the basket hunt continues this weekend...

Adventures in Decorating - Week 3.5

Next up we have blinds....

Here are the choices that the designer pulled together for our collection (checkout those paint colors... they look a little scary to me) :bug eyes:



We want to put the same blinds in the kitchen, since the rooms flow together. Right now the kitchen has no blinds (I've been meaning to get some for the last three years o-O ) Here is what they look like in the kitchen:



And here are what they all look like with the light shining through them.



I think I like the one on the left the best, but I need to see them all in person.
Which one do you like?