My generous sister in law

My SIL changes loves to change up her home decor and generously shares what she has "edited" out in the process. Isn't it great to have someone who loves to share as much as they love to decorate???

My dining room has benefited from one of her remodels- these are all three signed artist prints from a gallery she purchased them in. At first I wasn't sure they would work- I don't use much rich dark greens- but, the gilded frames and the burgundy is dark enough to look well with the more vintage fabrics in my living room.

I have come to really enjoy these pictures.



OK- the dining room isn't finished. I am not used to ceramic tile floors, and we need nice rugs in the dining room, living room, and a runner down the hallway. This room looks a little barren without a rug under the table. P.S.- she also gave me the centerpiece on the table. The dining room table, along with the china cabinet pictures below this thread and a buffet were all auction finds in West Virginia. Isn't this all beautiful? Yes, yes, the china cabinet or the buffet would fit on the opposite wall- but, thats actually where we store the high chairs, which for picture purposes, were pushed into the breakfast room. :-P




The above were parted with because of the chip in the frame on one of them. Until she saw it on my wall, I don't know that she realized it wasn't noticeable. I have two ovals with similar rose "library prints" and ornate frames that match these perfectly. We are just looking for a spot to hang them.



This is the prettiest lamp I have ever seen, and she decided it didn't go with her new tables at the new house. I was actually trying to find something close to it on our budget, when she pulled it out and gave it to me this past Christmas. I was so afraid she would change her mind that I nudged Duane to stick it in the trunk of our car that minute. Isn't that horrid??? He knew I had spent months trying to find that lamp! *edit- she replaced that lamp with one thats even prettier! Oh my goodness does she have good taste, its the prettiest lamp I have ever seen and its in her keeping room. Its dark with ceramic fruit on it in the most gorgeous shades of green and bright cranberry and the shade is this gorgeous pleated latte color. Now ITS my favorite lamp!




So, here my challenge. She visited me this week and brought me *these*. I don't really care for them (and they are larger than they appear here). She was very enthusiastic about how nice they would look in our home. I don't own anything mauve, and this is an odd shade of green. I might could make them look shabby if they were above a shelf with some vintage china, but I don't know... its probably the oldest pictures shes given me- they were at one of their offices (one they haven't used since 1999) and they have decided to sale the building this office was located in. So, she and her husband were prepping the building for sale and "thought of me". *edit- I have stared at the three prints for so long trying to figure out where to hang them that now I want to keep these. Hee, hee. Something about them is very sweet.

My mom begged me to one of them to my grandmothers home. She is 87, and has a bedspread with magnolias on it. I might would do that, if it weren't for driving seven hours with three pictures that would be taking up the space of a jumperoo for the babies!!! *edit- my grandmother did take one of the pictures and I know my sil would be thrilled with how happy this made her~ she put the picture of the victorian like lady with the purple background in her bedroom. My mom says grandma is very impressed with it.

If anyone has advice on how to make these look less "country victorian" let me know.

In sad news, my grandmothers dog died last night. "Precious" has been my grandnothers best friend for 13 years. She had a autoimmune blood disease and died in her sleep. Whats sad, to me, is that I believe my grandmother believes her health is too ailing and she won't "live long enough" to invest in another dog, and yet having Precious gave her so much joy and also Precious was a barker so no one could come in on my grandma without her knowing.

This also makes me feel a little sorry for myself because at the time grandma was given Precious, I was given "Mr. Smith"- my shihtzu. And my aunt found her dog "Kelsey". Smitty is 12, and Kelsey is also 12. Kelsey is on medication for her heart- she has too much fluid on it. Smitty, thus far, has been healthy, but he doesn't hear as well as he used to. He is my first pet as a "grown up". I am not prepared to have an adult lesson about losing him!!! Precious dying just hits a little too close to home.

Grandma does have two cats- "Pumpkin" and "Annie".

Speaking of ANNIE, and now I am just rambling... my grandmothers name is "Anna-Mae". She LOVES her name. She passed on "Anna" to my mother, "Ann" to her older sister, and "Mae" to her youngest daughter. Then, she gets this cat and names it "Annie". It kind of gives us all the giggles... how much she loves her own name! I only hope Matilda loves her name so much. :-)

lavender hearts!

Thanks to Lynda at Hedgerow Hollow and Alison at Foxgloves for this lovely small hand craft idea. I had fun creating these, and they will be so nice to tuck into linen drawers and stationery boxes.

I used felt like Alison did, but ribbon roses and a blanket stitch to close them up. I want to try them with fabric next.

cupcakes and bathtime

I made 36 cupcakes for Easter. In my family, we get together for every holiday. We usually go to my grandmothers home, or one of my aunts. My mother is one of four girls, so we have an ample supply of chefs and bakers for big foodie gatherings. When we were children, my grandmother would hide big plastic eggs in her yard filled with coins, candy, or the rare one dollar bill. We would gather around her kitchen table an color eggs with our cousins while my mom and her sisters prepared the ham, mashed potatoes, green beans, pineapple sauce, yeast rolls, and deserts. Then, after dinner we had a egg coloring contest where we would try to make the most absurdly colored egg by mixing dyes, and finally- *finally*- the kids would get to go hunt eggs in our baskets. My mom or one of her sisters would team up with the youngest cousins to be sure they found eggs, too. The older kids all knew that if an egg was obviously in sight, that we were to walk past that one because it was meant for a little sprite.

My grandmother is 87 years old and still buys herself a Paas easter coloring kit and every Easter sits down and colors herself a pretty egg. Like me, her favorite color is robins egg blue.

My husbands family, on the other hand, do not "get into" holidays. My husband has only been on one Easter Egg hunt his entire life! There aren't any large family gatherings in spite of there being four children. His parents prefer to spend their holidays alone. Its all very strange to me, and also quite lonesome living 7 hours from my own family in West Virginia.

But, this Easter we were invited to an Easter Egg hunt at my SIL's family home. I can't tell you how excited this made me!!! But, sadly, it was canceled, and no less after I made the 36 cupcakes. Duane and I had Easter dinner with the twinkies at Cracker Barrel instead. And, I froze the majority of cupcakes to pull out and frost with buttercream icing in small portions.

I learned a lesson here. We are going to have four children by next Christmas, and its time that I start my own family traditions and not lean on others so much. This is a difficult lesson for me as I enjoy getting together with extended family, but, its not fair to our children to rely on my husbands family for holidays when they aren't interested in them as we are. Next year we will have a huge Easter Egg hunt and egg coloring here at our own home and I will make a ham, mashed potatoes, green beans, pineapple sauce and yeast rolls. Suddenly, I feel very grown up. It is an odd thing to find yourself becoming the own matriarch of your family.

Last night I made six of the cupcakes, and this morning while the twinkies slept, I had one for breakfast.



Last night we had bathtime before bedtime. Lucas has such fun in the tub, and we just had to take a picture when he put the bubbles on his little chin.



Matilda is still somewhat cautious in the bathtub, but she loves to chew on the yellow rubber duckie.

After their bath we give them a massage with lavender lotion and then they go in their fleece sleep sacks and off to bedtime. Duane and I take turns reading their favorite story Dr. Seuss "Mr. Brown can Moo can You?"... And I have to leave the room when he reads to them because I want to correct him on the way he says the sounds!!! We have a very different interpretation of what Mr. Brown sounds like. Hee, hee.

Right now they are laying beside me, halfway interested in their breakfast bottles, and halfway tuned in to Higgleytown heros (whose theme song is done by "They Might be Giants").

7 weird things?

Thats a toughie.

1. I always read the back page of a novel first, and never see a movie I don't know the ending to. Suspense makes my tummy hurt, and knowing the ending allows me to relax and savor all the parts that lead up to it!

2. I am going to be the mother of two sets of twins. The odds of this happening is 1 in 3000.

3. My husband is a better dancer than I am (he used to instruct ballroom dance).

4. I love old Haley Mills movies and watch them when I am feeling under the weather. My favorites are "That Darn Cat" and "The Parent Trap".

5. I am the Bermuda triangle of sunglasses.

6. I often daydream about spending time in a nudist colony- I think it would foster better self acceptance and allow me to give up my false illusions of an "ideal body".

7. I love Rex Stout novels. I don't care how chauvinist debonair Archie and "1/7 of a ton" Nero Wolfe are, they are just too much fun!!! I love that Archie woos and is wooed by every female he meets, and that Nero Wolfe would rather plan out his gourmet dinner than solve a case he is overpaid for.

We managed to find time this weekend to finally get the curtain hardware and curtain panels hung in the master bedroom, guest room, and living room. The weekend was dreary, and it was a perfect time to work indoors.

I was rewarded for my hard work this past weekend by bright sunshine peering in through filtered white lace this morning. The house looks so much less "naked" now, and I quickly took a picture of the guest room (not yet finished) so you could enjoy the airy room with me.



My husband isn't a fan of shabby chic, so the guest room is sort of my "play room". Not that he is a fan of deer heads either!!! He happens to prefer more traditional decor, and leans toward formal- even Victorian. I tend to like both, so having the guest room for my romantic tendencies and the rest of the house more Victorian suits me just fine. And he is particularly patient with my love of mounds and mounds of frilly feminine pillows which can be found in every room of our home! Neither of us can even fit on the sofa without moving a few ruffled necessary fancies aside. Heh. I love the idea of a sinking into a pile of lush downey pillows when tired, or settling down with a nice book for a pleasant afternoon respite with tea in hand, but, they are seldom functional and often when I do try to settle into the pillows in my current fat preggy state, I end of toppling to one side and asking my husband to help reposition ME.

The twinkies and I had a pleasant squealing match this morning. They both speak "babble squeal" now. The one comment I consistently get about them (after "Are they twins?" "Are they Identical?" and "Whose older?") is "My, they are LOUD babies". It is true. Neither of the grandmothers will take credit for this either, although they are quite willing to duke it out over where Lucas inherited his cleft chin (my dad), or Matilda's colouring (Duane). To the high pitch constant squealing they both say "None of my babies were ever like THAT!!!" And "I hope they grow out of it!!!".

Well, I *do* take credit, and attribute it to how wildly happy we are, and the fact that they are free to express themselves as much and as voluminously as possible. I only find it even remotely awkward when we are in restaurants and one of them discovers that they would like to announce their happiness to the surrounding patrons. Hmpfh.

Off to feed the twinkies breakfast- its pears, oatmeal, and cinnamon this a.m., then nap time!

My Great Great Grandmother was an artist. She penpaled with Liberace and he helped her publish a few hymns. She wrote poetry and lived an artful life.

Her daughter had 13 children and didn't have much time for poetry and hymns. Her home was decorated sparsely and my only memory of Maggie was that she had an orange lava lamp and she liked to pin curl my hair into tiny ringlets all over my head when I was in grade school. I would sit on her hardwood floor staring at the lava lamp watching the beads of wax float up and down in the light mesmerized by the fluidity of molten wax in water while she would work with bobby pins behind my head to created a 1920's masterpiece. I loved my ringlets and wished I really did look like Shirley Temple as she claimed. She was the sweetest lady and always had perfect hair!

Her daughter is my grandmother, who is the queen of crocheted toilet tissue covers. The artistry of hair that my great grandmother inherited from her mother was lost on my own grandmother who seldom shaves her chin, let alone bothers with a bobby pin. She has the tackiest home ever- surrounded by dancing Elvis dolls, crocheted toilet tissue covers, oil fountains, a fake fireplace that makes crackle sounds, and her multiple furniture throw covers which never coordinate. Her only inspiration in decorating is curtains of which she must have 5 sets per window. She does love a good drapery. My grandmother loves all her things and has a cement goose in her front yard that she excitedly dresses for the season. My mother recently put her little gooses summer frock on. My mother also bought her a light up pink flamingo for her yard last Mothers Day. Perfect!

Its amazing then with this example of decorating that my mother manages to make tacky look wonderful. My mothers home is a mixture of vignettes of all her favorite things. The best one is the wall by her (real) fireplace where she has some vintage Christmas tins hung with her childhood wooden sleigh and my fathers scooter from when he was 3. Anyone that walks in my mothers home inquires about it, and remarks on how lovely such an interesting display made on her wall. In her guest room she has a vintage door plopped up against the wall with a display of old hats and purses. And in her bathroom she has a hodge podge of vintage tins and dried flowers that look like they were snagged straight out of a country magazine. She buys nothing to make these things, its all stuff she finds places, and things other people might have cast away.

So why is it that I can't create small romantic vignettes? I can compose poetry. My twins would say I can write songs (of course they are 9 months old, I can put two syllables together, to them thats impressive!), and I do believe I can decorate. But, I fail miserably when I try to create the same small eye candy centerpieces my mother does, and things I put together either look forced or sparse.

Here is the little area above my china cabinet in our living room. If anyone has any ideas on how to make it more "full" let me know!

This is the first outing the twins had outdoors- and it was a few weeks ago at their aunt Susies. Lucas loves his feet- they are both little "yoga babies" and enjoy sucking on their big toe. Ewwww. I love this picture because they look so happy.



I have ate 16 chocolate dipped strawberries in the last two days! And the days not over yet! My SIL gave me a box of Shari's Berries for my birthday, and their spring catalog started me craving some. Rather than pay 65 dollars for a two day supply, I went to publix and bought some strawberries and dip. Isn't it nice how you can buy the melting chocolate right in a microwavable container now? Certainly efficient for those of us with limited time. I even used the dip at Christmas to make yummy "Oreo Truffles". This weekend I am hoping we can make our annual pilgrimage to the local "you pick" Strawberry farm. I love small farms, and there are a few in our area that have public access. One has blueberries, and this one has Strawberries and figs. I could easily eat an entire gallon for dinner! And what a lovely preview of summer- fresh red strawberries bursting with earthy yumminess!

So, in honor of Hoffman Media, I sat down this afternoon with Victoria magazine in hand, and a plate of chocolate dripped strawberries. What a lovely way to spend the twinkies naptime.