Shinola

Tonight was the 2nd annual Leon Trivia Contest. Once again, we did not win. We are sick of being the 1st place losers. Turns out we don't know our shinola after all. However, lots of money was raised for breast cancer. But we still lost. And we are sore losers.

Stimulus

Rusty & I just got back from doing our part to stimulate the economy.... We are pretty confident that GAP and a few other stores will be safe for awhile longer after our purchases. While we I spent way too much money on clothes/shoes/accessories.... I did manage to find a few house finds as well! Here are a couple updates we made..... yes, I managed to pull Rusty away from basketball for a few minutes to help!I have been looking for an area rug since before we finished building the house. It was not a successful hunt. We found this rug for super cheap at IKEA and decided it was better than nothing and IF I do happen to find one I like in the near future, I've already gotten my monies worth. The table is a similar purchase ($12.. and I painted it the same color as our dining room wall) for the same reason. It is more difficult to find a 30 x 30 coffee table than one might think. (Sarah- I looked for a trunk and couldn't find one the right size!) I did make a trip to Home Goods. Found a clock and some napkins..both on clearance! The new napkins motivated me to finally sew together the table runner.. I had the cloth sitting on the table for several weeks now... And while I was crafting I decided to finish my chalk board and picture board and got them hung up as well! And one more purchase I'm excited about... We finally have plastic plates (and other stuff) for when the kidlins come visit! Another IKEA find for super cheap. I never thought I'd say this... but I'm finally an IKEA fan....
We had a great time on our trip up north but decided that in the end it probably would have been cheaper to buy a plane ticket to someplace warm and lay at a beach all week! Next year is looking bright! ;)

Winner....

....Winner, Popcorn Dinner!

Congratulations to the Little Cyclones for winning the state basketball championship game tonight. Rusty's school won the girls (last week) and my school won the boys. We are proud of them!
I didn't take any pictures.... but HB had several dunks... I lost track after 5...
Since I didn't get any pictures of HB dunking..... here is another amazing dunk... ha.

Windows of Opportunity

Updated: Kelly's Show Us Your Life this week is Show Us What You Make. Everyone is showing their at home business. Fun!
I don't (yet) have an at home business, but I love to attempt crafts. I do a lot, but this is one people always tell me I should sell (especially the est. in ones). I don't plan on selling them, but you might want to! So for everyone looking for one more idea... Here's something easy to do with windows!



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Newly married and short on cash flow (we're both school teachers), I wanted to decorate but didn't have much to decorate with. My father-in-law is a window man and turns out, had a lot of old windows laying around. Those could be used for something..... The wheels started to turn.

Fast forward a couple years and the windows were used, and used, and used. Here are a few ways to use them:
I started out making Family Names est in... windows for friends getting married. I didn't take any pictures of any of them but did steal this photo off of the Brown's facebook page. You can see the window above their fireplace and doesn't she look adorable??

I never made an Est. window for our own home, instead we have our last initial above our fireplace.
We also have this window hanging in our home (above a guest bed). It is the scripture used at our wedding and hung in the front of the church.


Want a window that you can change the message on? Just paint it with chalkboard paint instead!

The magnet board may be my favorite way to use the old windows. I first made one because I had a beautifully painted "Merry Christmas" window leaning against the wall waiting to be hung. My every so jolly goldendoodle bounced right into and shattered the glass. Not wanting to waste the red crackled frame, I put in a tin sheet and presto, instant Christmas card holder. Or year round photo holder. Or Birthday display board. Or... 'you decide what to put on it' holder (Note the ever changing chalkboard window).



The windows of opportunity are vast. Oooh and it's so "green." ;)

Matthew 6:26

MyDecoratingStyle.....

...is 50% Modern Elegance, 50% Traditional Country according to Sproost.com... of course that would be assuming we actually spent money on decorating! I LOVED our house at Christmas time once we finally got all of our decorations up (read: the day after Christmas when we hit up the Target sales. Yes I put them up for a week..don't you judge me)... and once we took them down it looked bare again. Now Rusty is really bugging encouraging me to put the snowmen away... of course that will leave our house even more bare.
As of 11:30 am today my "spring break" officially started. Last year at this time, we were packing our bags for Hawaii... this year, we are getting ready to head up to MN to visit friends/family....brr.... (But not bad considering our spring break fund$ is going towards house projects)
Anyhow.... my post was not planned to complain about spring break.... or lack of.... but to point out that we are I am spending some of my MN time to do some shopping.... hopefully for the house!
On my wish list: area rug, coffee table, wall clock, bench, book case, wall art, pillows (yes really), etc. etc.
This is what we are working with...

Any inspiration for me???

And because instead of sulking about going somewhere cold for spring break.. I'm going to praise God for the memories of a warm spring break... here is a memory: