With a little paint and fabric...

You can change something from drab (or from nothing) into something amazing. I wish I could get paid to learn how to craft lots of goodies and sell them for a living. Maybe one day :)

Ok, so I went to hobby lobby with some ideas in mind but I came out with materials for completely different crafts! I found a couple of neat fabrics in the discounted/leftovers section and went with it. First I found some burlap and I decided to make a wreath with it. I had seen something like this before but it was plain. I bought some bright red-orange flowers to add to it. Now look at my pretty new fall wreath which cost only about $8 bucks to make :-)

Next I have this chair. I found this green chair at Goodwill a couple of weeks ago for $5. I knew it had potential. This chair is a slimy green color....which is hard to see in this picture. The seat cover (which I did not take a before picture of) was a brown velvet. I plan to paint this chair white. My husband says I may be over doing the white lately.

I recovered the brown velvet material with this awesome print that I also snatched up super cheap from the leftover fabric section.

Finally, I purchased these wall decoration from a thrift store here in Louisville a few weeks ago. Look here to see what they looked like before. Then I painted them white :) (Ok I kinda see his point about the white. But if I paint this wall in a nice accent color I think they will really stand out!

I love having time to do this in the Summer!

Are We There Yet?

Oh how I remember pestering my parents every 30 minutes (like so many other kids) with that common question: Are we there yet? I remember drives to Myrtle Beach felt like they took forever. Yet trips Derek and I have taken in the car don't seem quite as bad. The 8 hour drive to Charleston was nice actually. The scenery was pretty boring but with Derek being so busy this summer it was nice to chat.

We had been looking forward to this trip to Charleston South Carolina for several months and it did not disapoint. We went the beaches, took evening walks, ate tons of seafood, toured downtown by carriage ride, and learned a little history all in the process.

The only major downfall was the extreme HEAT! Oh my.....how I may not ever travel in July again. Our conversations generally went like this: "Oh wow look at how pretty these homes are....but it is soooo hot!" or "I can't wait to go to the beach" and an hour later "I'm dying, lets get out of here!". Our carriage ride was really fun....but I was sitting n the edge and teh sun was beating down on my head for the entire hour. I was embarassed by how much I was sweating yet when we finally got off the tour (it was a group tour) I noticed that the back of everyone else's shirts were also drenched in sweat. Gotta love that heat.


I loved the architecture of the building and homes. That makes Charleston such an amazing city.

I loved this picture. One of the old church steeples. Charleston is nicknamed the "holy city" because it has so many churches in the area.

This was the mansion of a Mr. Calhoun. His daughter got married and he decided to build her the house of her dreams as a wedding present. (See her house below)

This was her house....it was incredible. Must be nice: Not too mention that we were told that her new father-in-law not wanting to be out done sent her and his son on a 2 year honeymoon to Europe. I told you I learned some history. :)

Pretty door.

Poogan's Porch- an awesome restuarant in downtown Charleston which was named after a dog, Poogan. We ate here while we waited out a downpour before trying to get back to our car.

I loved that all of the homes and building were such fun colors.

Another church.

I love walking with my feet in the ocean.

Derek by the big cannons at Fort Sumter.

Fort Sumter...this was interesting and we got to take a 30 minute boat ride there and back which was a nice way to get out of the heat for a bit.

USS Yorktown

It all went by way to quickly!

Eye Opening

I've grown very intrigued by blogs about adoption. As it is something Derek and I want to do in the future we have a lot to think about in terms of when, where from, how we can afford it, etc. I've come across several blogs written by familes who have adopted from Africa, Russia, Korea, foster care, and so on. All are so very inspiring. Often though I come across statistics like these listed on others blogs that really get to me:
(About Ethiopia)
* One out of every 20 children born alive die in their first month of life
* One out of ten die before reaching their first birthday
* One out of six die before reaching their fifth birthday
* There are 4.6 million orphans in Ethiopia
* The median age in Ethiopia is 18
* 1.5 million people in Ethiopia are infected with AIDS
* Per capita, Ethiopia receives less aid than any country in Africa

From the Kitchen

I saw this recipe on the foodnetwork website for the show Ten Dollar Dinners and I had to try it. It is sauteed bananas. I only used one banana, 1 tsp of orange juice, 1 tsp of butter, and 1 tsp (or so) or sugar all sauteed together in a pan until they got a nice golden crust. I ate my bananas on a piece of crunchy toast with strawberries. It was so good. It would be excellent in my opinion with a nice scoop of ice cream and caramel sauce. Maybe I will try that next time!

Craft Update

So a few weeks ago I bought some items at a few local thrift stores with the intention of giving them a "facelift". So far I have been pretty lazy this summer so I am moving a little slowly with accomplishing these projects. I have however, finished my shadow boxes. In this post I included the items I purchased. Here are my shadow boxes today hanging proudly near my dining room table!



I bought these flowers at hobby lobby and hot glued them into the shadow boxes. I repainted the front as well.

I love seeing the finsihed product.

Add finally, here is my cute little doggie who keeps me company all summer long :)

Marriage

The sermon on Sunday at our church, Southeast Christian was about marriage. It was the beginning of a sermon series titled, "The Story of Us". I just thought this sermon had such a great message for anyone, married or not.

To view the sermon I attached the link:

http://mediasuite.multicastmedia.com/player.php?v=te9a68j8

From the Kitchen

So I absolutely love J. Gumbo's. Derek and I eat there all the time. One of my favorite things is the bumble bee stew. I decided to try to make it at home and I was so pleased with how it turned out. I love cooking and I love trying to make new dishes. When I am cooking Im usually not so great with measuring. My mom and grandmother said that my great-grandmother (who was a fabulous cook) never measured anything really. She always had just the right touch and knew what her recipes needed. I had a good attempt today with that and would like to hope I could be at least half the cook she was. So here is my attempt to explain what my recipe for today's dish included.

Ingredients:

1 can of black beans

1 can of corn

1 can of diced tomatoes

1/2 of a small onion sliced into thin pieces

1/2 stick of butter (used at different times)

About 4-5 teaspoons of sugar (The sauce is supposed to be kind of sweet and I just kept adding sugar to taste)

Salt and peper to taste

10-12 drops of tabasco sauce (or to taste it you like it really spicy)

1/2 cup of milk

2 Tablespoons of flower

dash of paprika

First I sauteed the onions in a little butter and salt to soften them up in a skillet. Then I added the can of tomatoes, corn, and beans (drained and rinsed) to my skillet and let them cook.

In a seperate pan I made a butter sauce. I used about 2 tablespoons of butter melted and added 2 tablespoons of flour. Mix those together and let the flour cook a bit. Then I wisked in about 1/2 of milk slowly. I wanted a the sauce to be slightly thickened. Then I added the salt, pepper, paprika, hot sauce, and sugar to this sauce.

Once finished I added the sauce to the vegetable mixture and let it continue to simmer. Taste to see if you need more sugar, salt, hot sauce to your liking.

Prepare white/brown rice. Serve stew over the rice and enjoy!