Category Archives: Style

The Barn House Show 2013

Good evening!

This past Saturday, I got to spend the day on my own with no responsibilities. With my camera in hand, and I headed out to Turner, Oregon to spend some time down at The yearly Barn House Show! I like to try and get out there every year, get inspired, and see if I can find any treasures to take home with me.

The Barn House ShowThe Barn House show is held every year at the Turner Memorial Tabernacle! This building is HUGE, and I often dream about purchasing it and turning it into my sweetie and my dream home!! AAAAAAAAAAAAAW!! That would be AWESOME!! 😉 and check out how BLUE that sky was!! 😉

 

Barn House Show 2I love this chippy little sign, and I saw it as soon as I walked in – how fitting!! 😉

 

Barn House Show 7I think these bottles were faux mercury glass! I had just stumbled onto some instructions on how to do this, and I may have to give this technique a try. So pretty!!

Barn House Show 6Who knew that an old painted, rusty ceiling tiling could be so beautiful??? I LOVE this!!;-)

Barn House Show 5This chair is JUST SO ME!!! I love the sexy, curvy shape, and I simply ADORE the zebra stripes!!! 😉

Barn House Show 4Being a bibliophile, I just LOVE finding unique bookends, and these ones are so industrial-chic!!! BRAVO!! 😉

???????????????????????????????I just LOVE this oversized wall clock!!

Barn House Show 19This bag is tres cute! I need to learn how to sew me some ruffles!! 😉

Barn House Show 18I love these signs!! I dream that one day my sweetie and I will be able to say, “Welcome to our farmhouse!!” 😉

Barn House Show 17My sweetie thought this marionette was creepy, but I have ALWAYS LOVED harlequin clowns, and I just FELL IN LOVE WITH HIM as soon as I saw him (that applies to both my sweetie and this cute little clown)!!! 😉

Barn House Show 16Every single one of these items could EASILY find a place in my home!! 😉

Barn House Show 15I really never knew I was such a industrial-chic kind of girl, but I really just LOVE the mix of architectural details, rust, and a bit of chippy paint!!

???????????????????????????????Who couldn’t use more glittered feathers in their life??? I know I could!! 😉

Barn House Show 13I LOVE these brooches!! 😉

Barn House Show 12AIEEEEE!!! I LOVE these ones too!!! 😉

Barn House Show 11These last three pics are all from one of my FAVORITE vendors down at Aunt Bee’s House – you might recognize a couple of these quilts from my post on Aunt Bee’s House a couple of weeks ago!! To see more of that, click Here!

Barn House Show 10Who knew that metal siding could double as art?? I need to get me some of this!! 😉

???????????????????????????????I love this vintage button bracelet!! I could use this in my accessory wardrobe!! 😉

Barn House Show 8I have always wanted an oversized mirrored armoir like this!! It always reminds me of the book, The Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe!

I had such a great time at The Barn House Show,  spending the day seeing all of the vendors’ booths, and all of the treasures for sale, and the weather truly could NOT have been more perfect!! I ended up taking a few vintage magazines home, as well as a stack of vintage crochet books!! SCORE!!! 😉 I really do look forward to going every year, so if any of you are in the area, and would like to go with me  I think that would be a BLAST!!! Don’t you??? THE MORE THE MERRIER!!! 😉

With that said…

Here is to a FABULOUS evening!!  ;-)

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If you want to have a different life, you have to live differently!!

Some Home Updates!

Good afternoon!

We are having a lovely four-day weekend here at the manse!! LOL! 😉

I thought I would share some new pics of some things going on around our place this weekend! 😉

Here are some pics of our garden! It is so fun to watch the plants grow and getting out there and weeding, pruning, and making everything look lovely!!

We are so jazzed to see how much lettuce we are going to have! They are growing so much faster then us newbie-farmers could even imagine!

Here are our snap-peas, and 3 strawberry plants! We already have one red strawberry!! We will have to flip a coin to see who gets to eat it!! 😉

Here are the two blueberry bushes! I can’t wait to see how much they produce! 😉

Here are a few of our herbs!

Here are a few more! We have 3 pots of herbs growing! 😉

Next, on to our living room!! As many of you know, my sweetie and I are getting ready for Bariatric surgery. One of my goals before surgery is to make sure that the house is clean, organized, purged, and no muss, no fuss ready for us to just concentrate on getting better!

One of the things we have been hearing from past patients is that a recliner is almost imperative to post-surgery resting! Well, I have been a long time naysayer of recliners. They are large, ugly, and I have just really never liked them! So, when I picked up two leather ones this weekend, I was sure that I was losing my mind, but my rationale behind doing that was twofold! 1. I know that we will both be having surgery, and I don’t want either one of us to have to sleep on the couch! 2. It has been really hard to have company over when there is just not enough seats in our place!

So after a ton of time spent cleaning, purging, and redecorating, and along with the help of my FABULOUS sweetie, we were able to take our living room from this:

To this:

Aaaaaaah…SO MUCH BETTER!!

The feeling in here is now so much more calming. We moved the large television out from in front of the window, so the room is now awash in sunlight! What a much more positive feeling, and way less drab and gloomy!!

 

Also, now that I have a bunch more of our favorite art work on the wall, the space feels sooo much more like us!!! I can’t wait to see what the rest of the house looks like once we are finished, but we are really so close!! I will make sure to share pictures with you as more progress is made!!

Here is to a FABULOUS evening!! ;-)

 If you want to have a different life, you have to live differently!

Finding My Creative Stride!

Good evening!

I have been busy in my art studio, practicing various mixed media techniques, trying to figure out what my art style looks like. I am very happy to be sharing with you my latest two pieces.

Art #1:

I love incorporating positive thoughts into my pieces. I feel like in some small way, I am able to help encourage other women, possibly, just like myself.

There is something in the way that these womens’ eyes have turned out, thoughtful, withholding some secret, and just a hint of sadness. I didn’t realize that would show up in these paintings.

Art #2:

I just LOVE the texture that the joint compound created when I used it with my doily stencil.

This is a thought that I am learning is really true. Miracles really do happen everyday!

Both of these pieces were adapted from a couple of doodles that I had drawn a few weeks ago. I was playing with the idea of learning how to draw women’s faces. I figured if I could doodle it small, maybe I can doodle it larger as well. They turned out just like my doodles! I used book pages, acrylic paints, markers, stamps, ink, joint compound, gel medium, and a stampinella, and doily stencil to accomplish both of these pieces. I also incorporated a lot of smaller doodles in these pieces. I am finding that doodling has really helped me stay loose, and relaxed when trying to come up with something to fill my blank white canvas.

Well, I hope you enjoyed these two pieces, I know I have really enjoyed creating these and hope to have a lot of art studio time in the next few days to create some more! I would love to hear your thoughts in the comments section. 😉

Here’s to a FABULOUS evening!

If you want to have a different life, you have to live differently

A Quiet Evening!

Good evening!

I am having a nice quiet evening at home, well that is except for the sneezing and the coughing – that is a little noisy, but seeing that I am the one doing it, I will excuse it!! 😉 My official plan for this evening is to continue spending this evening cuddled up on the couch with my girls while watching French movies!! I just LOVE doing that!!! 😉

This evening, for my blog posting I thought I would share some more Christmas Craft Fair pics from the Douglas County Christmas Craft Fair from last weekend! Most of the items I have purchased while there were used to decorate my drab cubicle at work, and I am just LOVING the change of scenery there!! The market has also really got me thinking about officially starting my own business where I can sell refinished home furnishings and one-of-a-kind home accessories, but that is another blog posting!! 😉

As I enjoy the rest of my quiet evening…

Have a FABULOUS evening!!! 😉

My Tree Is Done!!

Good evening!

It has taken me three days, but I have finally finished decorating my Christmas tree!! WHOO! HOO!!! I know it is early, but I really have needed a little Christmas spirit early this year! 😉

I wasn’t going to put up our tree this year, because I was thinking that it is an awful lot of work for just my sweetie and I, and we aren’t even going to be here at Christmas, however, when I expressed my thoughts to my sis, Alex she convinced me that even if it was just to enjoy the Christmas tree while I am reading on a quiet evening – it would be worth the work!!! 😉 She was absolutely right! AS SOON as I got the Christmas lights on the tree I was IMMEDIATELY put me in the Christmas spirit! It also helped that my sweetie helped my put the tree up this year, which I REALLY appreciated it!!

My theory on decorating my Christmas tree is to basically put EVERYTHING and ANYTHING that I LOVE on the tree!!! Which means that every single solitary inch of that tree has something on it!!

I love to tuck little treasures and momentos into our tree too. I especially LOVE pictures of my sweetie and from various different Christmas’!

We are such babies in this picture. This is one of our first Christmas’ with my sweetie’s family.

I also have lots of little signs, and this little red bird. One of my pastors, growing up, used to tell me that the little bird in her tree would wake up every evening and fly to the north pole to report to Santa whether or not we were behaving or not. Even though we don’t have children, I sometimes wonder if our little red bird flies to the north pole while we sleep and give a full report of our behavior to the man in the big red suit too!! 😉

Oh, and with my love of Santas, how could I not at least have one or 10 Santas on my tree??? 😉

Here is our Christmas star. Everyone always makes fun of me for this topper. Apparently it isn’t quite as flashy as the rest of our tree, however Jason and I bought this tree for our very first Christmas almost 17 years ago and every year I pull it out and PRAY that all of the lights in it still work. Every year, I am always amazed when they do!! WHOO! HOO!! 😉

When I describe our tree to anyone who has never seen it before, I always say that it looks like a jewelry box exploded ALL OVER our Christmas tree!! I still think that is pretty fitting!!!

Have a FABULOUS evening! ;-)

PS. Thank you, Alex, for cheering me on when I was having a moment of weekness!! I dedicate this blog posting, and my lovely Christmas tree, that has made me ABSOLUTELY SMILE to you!!!You were 100% right!!! I love you, Sissy!! 😉

Dreaming of Christmas!

Good evening!

I woke up this morning with a head cold that has made me move a little slower than normal, so I haven’t gotten as much stuff done around here as I was originally planning on. Namely, getting my Christmas tree up and decorated. It is up, but it is bare!

Anyway, I decided to spend a little time on Pinterest today, and wanted to share some dreamy Christmas pics with you! 😉

Don’t these just make visions of sugarplums dance in your head?? Oh, I know it is not yet Thanksgiving, but I am just soooo excited for Christmas to get here!!

Have a FABULOUS evening!!!  🙂

A Candlelit Evening At Home!

Good evening!

I am having a nice quiet evening at home. The house is clean, I have all the candles lit, and I am sitting on our sofa with the girls sleeping next to me. My sweetie is in the dining room with his friend, Don. They are trying to fix his laptop.

I am watching a documentary on the life of Frank Lloyd Wright. I have always been fascinated by his work and his architectural style. For those of you who may not know, Frank Lloyd Wright, was an innovative American architect, interior designer, writer and educator, who designed more than 1,000 structures and completed 500 works. Wright believed in designing structures which were in harmony with humanity and its environment, a philosophy he called organic architecture. He had a very distinctive arts and craft style, but he combined that with great rooms, and open floor plan living styles, which really went away from what was happening at the time. He used a lot of horizontal lines, low ceilings, stained glass windows, cantilever rooflines and distinctive color schemes. He was quite a visionary! I dream about living in a house similar to one of his homes.

Anyway, this week is the week of the Breaking Dawn opening. My sweetie and I already have tickets to the midnight showing on Thursday evening. I know, we are a little insane, but we just really have so much fun making an event out of these movie openings. We agree that the movies may not be so fantastic, but we both really enjoyed the books, and the stories are really a lot of fun to fall into! We want to take the time this week to watch one of the movies each evening before Thursday night, and then we will be at the theatre, early, with our folding chairs, kindles, and a deck of cards so that we can entertain ourselves while we are waiting for the opening of this next movie!

What else? Well, maybe that is all for the evening! Don is just now getting ready to leave, and Jason is getting ready to have us watch Twilight this evening! While I enjoy some silly time with my sweetie…

Have a FABULOUS evening!!! ;-)

A Lazy Naked Sunday!

Good evening!
I have had the best kind of lazy naked Sunday! There have been no plans, no agendas, and no to-do lists! THAT IS THE BEST KIND OF SUNDAY!!

I have been spending some time this evening perusing new blogs, and websites. Places that have inspired me to do a little decorating for the Winter holidays! I thought I would share some of these with you!

Dreamy Whites

One that I just happened to stumble upon is called Dreamy Whites. I am in LOVE with this site. It is so romantic, chic, and so homey looking! I just LOVE this site!! This site has inspired me to cover my red sofa with a scrumptious white blanket!! Aaaah!!! LOVELY!

Peony & Sage

Another site that I have been enjoying is Peony & Sage, they have some very beautiful vintage-y fabrics! These make me want to have throw pillows done for the entire house in these great fabrics!

The Paris Apartment

The last site I want to share with you this evening is The Paris Apartment. I know, I know, I have talked about this site before. This is actually one of my FAVORITE sites!! I could just jump right in to anyone of the lovely vignettes that she posts! I would be SUCH A HAPPY GIRL!!! French chic!!! DIVINE!!!

I am going to go do a little more inspiration induced perusing!

Have a FABULOUS evening!!! ;-)

Sharing the Style!

Good evening!

As you may remember, I have been looking into putting together some new looks for myself. I have been busy perusing some magazines, and I have come up with some tear sheets that I am pretty happy about!

I love the big curly hair, and the even bigger flower!

Again with big glamorous Hollywood style hair, and I am a sucker for cat-eyes!

Ok, so it is obvious that I have a thing for big hair and cat eyes!! Now if only I can figure out how to recreate the look on myself! Hmmmm…

I love this fun, feminine style!

Hello?? Wingtips anyone??? I need at least 3 pairs of these this Winter!

I love this boho hairstyle! Cute!!

I am also having a lot of fun playing with colorful eye makeup applications!

Simple, sweet, awesome hair accessories, I love the freshness of this look!

Cat eyes, and pig tails! Seriously??? Super-CHIC!!!

So after going through all these pics from my style-file clippings, I would sum up my dream style with adjectives like:

  • glamorous
  • bombshell
  • creative
  • ultra-feminine
  • diva-esque
  • dramatic
  • fun
  • sexy

Tell me, what do you think? 😉

Have a FABULOUS evening!!! 😉

 

Keeping the Momentum Going!

Good evening!

Here is a warning that this is going to be a quick post! The time change that happened yesterday was GREAT for making the weekend relaxing, but for my workday, it made it seem like it just draaaaaaged on forever!!! SHEESH!!

Click on picture to enlarge

I just wanted to take a few minutes to share with you a couple of scarves I have recently finished crocheting! Even though I hadn’t been doing too much creating in my art studio over the past few weeks, that is, until this past weekend, I did make a point to try and keep something creative going and these scarves is what I chose to keep me busy. The white one is for my sweetie, and was done with all rows of half double crochet, and double crochet.  I thought this would look great with his winter coat!

This variegated one was created using all double crochets, I am not sure who the other one is for yet, but I I thought this would be fun to let the color be the interesting part of this scarf.

Anyway, I am planning on crashing early this evening! Hence the short post, but I have been putting together my style file, and I will be very happy to share some of those pics with you tomorrow!

Have a FABULOUS evening!!! 😉