Thanks for entering my Birchbox Giveaway…I certainly plan on doing more of these because I want you all to experience Birchbox…
Congrats to Katie! She won a 3 month subscription to Birchbox!
I know you’re gonna love it, and please let me know what you get!!! I’ll contact you so we can get all of the deets squared away.
We have our summer vacation booked to Tybee Island, and it can’t get here soon enough. Kevin and I talk about it every day, and then when I talk to my sis, we also talk about it. Therefore, I seriously have Georgia On My Mind.
I’ve also mentioned that I am dying to sew something, anything. I’m so in love with sewing right now.
Let me note that I get a lot of inspiration from Pinterest, and I may have seen a similar project there. Also I used this project as some inspiration.
First I sorted through my fabric, decided on this piece of gray, and printed out a map of Georgia.
I used the map as a guide to draw the map on the fabric. I just use a pencil.
Then I sewed.
And then I made a heart. You know, cause I love some Savannah/Tybee. (We were married there if you didn’t know…)
Ironed it, framed it.
I need to do a North Carolina one. And possibly South Carolina since that is where we currently live…..
And in case you now have it going through your mind like I do, enjoy!
You know I love my Birchbox. You can see some of my boxes here, here, here and here. Well, recently I signed Kevin up for the newest Birchbox Man! Like my Birchbox, it will have all of the latest grooming and lifestyle products. However, it’s $20.00 a month compared to my $10.00 a month, but it is a bigger box so obviously it has more… I’ll certainly be blogging about that too!
In the spirit of Birchbox, I’m going to give a lucky reader a 3 month subscription to Birchbox, or, if you’re already a member, you’ll receive a $30.00 credit. Use it for nail polish or on your Birchbox Man.
This may be the easiest giveaway ever! All you have to do is leave me a sweet comment. I have some very loyal readers who have been around from post #1, (yeah, I know who you are…) and just want to make this simple, no need to follow anything (because you all already do!) And I love you for the support! I will choose a winner over the weekend (probably Sunday) and announce it Monday, so you have plenty of time!
You all know I love my driftwood. Remember my driftwood H? When we took our last trip to Tybee, Kevin and I went for a walk on the beach/driftwood hunt. I always have a project in mind, this being the wreath.
So I started with my bag of driftwood.
And sorted through it to get some wreath worthy pieces.
I picked up this mdf circle at Michaels, (for around $3.00).
I placed the driftwood around to get an idea of where I wanted each piece to go. From there I used my glue gun and started attaching driftwood to the circle, and driftwood to driftwood.
The driftwood doesn’t lay flay against the circle (which was a pain to secure). You can’t see it from the front (yay) but you can from the side (boo).
I also made the bow from some leftover fabric. I wanted a rustic look.
I think I secretly want to decorate a beach house. No, that’s no secret at all. And I want it to be my beach house.
I made the decision to keep this on the inside of the door. I knew our hot southern temps in the summer would destroy the hot glue. Plus, I like a wreath on the inside door…..
What type of wreath do you have on the outside? I’m thinking of some ideas, since our outside door is still bare. I even saw some tin monograms that I liked for the door, but I’m unsure. I could always do the moss wreath again.
Oh, and if you missed it, I posted over at The Pink Growl, for my blog friend Nikki!
Today I am guest posting for Nikki over at The Pink Growl! Head over to her fun blog to read about how I deal with Kevin’s crazy schedule…
(Spoiler alert, we make it work…)
(Pic courtesy of Vanessa Schrotenboer)
Remember when I told you I met the fab April Johnston and I was inspired? Well, since then I’ve sat myself down in front of my sewing machine and sewed. Sometimes I sit and look through my fabric with nothing in mind, but the point is I want to sew…something, anything.
I bought this great fabric from Jo Ann’s with a project in mind.
This is actually April’s fabric from her line at Jo Ann’s. There are so many great ones to choose from…yay!
So I knew I wanted to make a flowy, sleeveless, open shirt. And let me state for the record that I’ve never made any type of garment. I did make a bag, and sew this tree though.
I don’t have many pictures of my process, to be quite honest I wasn’t sure how it would turn out. But I’m gonna tell you how I did it. First I grabbed a shirt from my closet that I wanted to use as my guide. I used this shirt to make a pattern. ( I made a pattern from some tissue paper). From there, I cut my fabric and started sewing. I used my own body as a body form, (I really want to purchase a body form now), and kept trying on the shirt, pinning, cut, sewed, etc until I had the finished product.
(Sorry for all of the self portraits in the mirror, no one is ever home to snap a pic).
I actually wore the shirt today as a buttonless button down. (Does that even make sense?)
Okay, so it’s so not perfect, and has a million flaws. However, it made it through the day in one piece!
Who knows what I’m gonna attempt next, but all I want to do is sit at my machine and sew. Plus, how great is it that I made something I can wear?
Oh, and I had a 40% off coupon, plus a 15% off teacher discount that I get with every purchase, so if I remember correctly, I got 2 yards of fabric (that’s my go to amount so I have plenty) for around $9.00. And I made a shirt!
Who wants a flowy, sleeveless, open, buttonless, button down, shirt? I can make you one…
I was looking through some jewelry the other day and found a gold bangle that I haven’t worn in quite some time. (It wasn’t real gold) and it was starting to look kinda cheap. So, since I love to cover things in fabric, you can see what I mean here, here, and here I decided to fabric my bracelet. I had everything on hand, fabric, spray adhesive and the bracelet.
I cut a piece to fit around the bracelet, and wide enough to fold over on the inside. I grabbed my spray and took it outside.
I ended up with this.
That’s the bracelet drying on top of the adhesive. Seemed like a good idea. It was still pretty wet from the adhesive.
After it dried it turned out pretty well!
Plus I like polka dots right now.
This is leftover fabric I used to make a bag I mentioned here. I’ll be blogging about that soon.
On a completely different subject, who watches Downton Abbey? I’ve been obsessed. I’m halfway through season 2, and cannot wait to try to fit in an episode each evening. Let’s discuss!
Remember when my sister painted her kitchen cabinets? Remember, she guest posted all about it. Well, Kevin and I loved the look so much we decided to paint ours. Our kitchen isn’t big by any stretch, but it’s the main focus of our house and we wanted to give it a bit of a facelift. If you’re wanting to update a look, there is nothing easier or more affordable than a little paint. It can be a bit time-consuming,, sometimes scary, but so worth it.
We’ve been talking about painting for a while now but couldn’t decide on a color. We finally decided on a gray, (my sis also painted hers gray so we knew it looked good). Once at Lowe’s we grabbed a few paint swatches and finally decided on a color. Turns out it was the exact same color my sister used….crazy huh?
Okay, so here are a few before pics…remember the kitchen is small so it is hard to get a span of the cabinets.
Before we began we had to clear the kitchen of everything…
Next we primed the cabinets.
And then painted. We painted about 2 coats, and we didn’t remove the doors. We may go back at some point and take the doors off and clean it up a bit, but it actually looks really good as is.
Okay, so next we added some hardware, which we love now that we have it. This was another easy fix to add to our kitchen.
I’m loving how our white appliances look with the gray. I was never a huge fan of the white until now.
That little man you see behind the flowers is our knife set. You can buy yourself one here.
That’s the sign I made. I made it just like I made this canvas.
Well, that’s pretty much it. We love it and it makes a huge difference in our kitchen. We have a few more things on our list that we want to do so stay tuned. Oh, and since this was successful, watch out bathrooms, you’re next!
Would you ever paint your cabinets? What color?
Kevin and I were in the mood for a seafood pasta, and while searching for one we’ve made before, we came across this one. It had us at lobster, and bacon…..
This recipe comes from my girl Giada De Laurentiis. The other seafood pasta we were going to make was also one of hers…basically you can’t go wrong with seafood pasta and Giada.
First of all, if you aren’t a seafood fan you can easily substitute chicken.
Here’s what you need.
Let’s see, we have pasta, diced tomatoes, heavy cream, basil, garlic, clam juice (you would think eeeewwww, but you can’t even taste it), and bacon. One whole pound of thick cut bacon.
And some shrimp.
And these guys.
It’s worth asking to have the shells removed, sometimes they will sometimes they won’t.
Now this is real easy. Cook your lobster, remove shells. Cook your pasta right in that water you cooked the tails in. Meanwhile cook the bacon, remove to a paper towel but keep all that bacon grease. Yep, you heard me. Begin to add the remaining ingredients.
Add the shrimp and cook a few minutes until done. Add the lobster and bacon. Pour this over the drained pasta. Delish.
And this is good reheated the next day.
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Bring a large pot of salted water to a boil. Add the lobster tails and cook until they begin to curl, 5 to 7 minutes. Using tongs, remove the lobster tails and set aside until cool enough to handle. Add the pasta to the boiling water and cook, stirring occasionally, until tender but still firm to the bite, 10 to 12 minutes. Drain and place in a large serving bowl.
Using kitchen scissors or a heavy knife, cut along the underside of the lobster tails and remove the meat. Chop the meat into 3/4-inch chunks. Set aside. In a large nonstick skillet, cook the bacon over medium-high heat until brown and crispy, about 10 minutes. Remove the bacon and drain on paper towels. In the same skillet, add the garlic and cook until aromatic, about 30 seconds. Add the tomatoes (and juices), clam juice, cream, 1/2 cup basil, 2 teaspoons salt and 1/2 teaspoon pepper. Bring to a boil and scrape up the browned bits from the bottom of the pan with a wooden spoon. Reduce the heat to medium and simmer until slightly thickened, about 5 minutes. Add the shrimp and cook, stirring occasionally, until just cooked through, about 3 minutes. Add the lobster and bacon. Simmer until warmed through, 1 to 2 minutes. Pour the tomato mixture over the cooked pasta and toss until coated. Garnish with the remaining 1/2 cup basil and season with salt and pepper. |
I’m still here! I’ve been taking a little blogging break since I am on spring break, but I’ve been super busy with projects to blog about! Some of which are…
So, with all that going on I should have some great posts to share real soon. Is there anything specific you would like to try to see me re-do or make? I’m open to suggestions and plan to take a trip to Goodwill tomorrow to try to find some stuff.
Until then I’ll leave you with our big ol’ girl Mona….
Who looks thrilled to have the camera in her face. Actually, I think she loves it. She will keep a position while I go grab the camera, take a few shots and then thank her.
