Busy Busy!

We spent most of our weekend gardening. Our entire yard is basically a hot mess, so we are trying to make it less ugly. It's a slow process. We have a small fenced back yard (it's actually a pretty large yard for a townhouse) and we spent most of Sunday weeding along the outside of the fence, which is about 40 feet long. Because our house is on the corner of our cul-de-sac, I feel like we need to step it up and make the yard look really good since everyone drives and walks past it. 

Once again, I have no before pictures. I think it's because the before is just SO damn horrible, I didn't want to waste my time. I give more credit to J actually - he has seriously been busting his butt working on the yard pretty much every free second of his life. We cleared out about 7 large black trash bags and 1 big garbage can of weeds this weekend. Yeah, it was that bad. 

But now - the after!

Like I said, this would be far more impressive with a before picture. Let's just say you could barely see the fence before because there were so many weeds and vines growing on it. I nearly took my fingers off trying to remove an old dead thorny rose bush that had grown in between the board of the fence - OUCH! 

Basically we left what was growing there from before we moved in - seagrasses and some rose bushes. We pruned everything back. I hope the roses start blooming soon (you can see the one has started already). 

We still need to add a few more things in and we're still deciding what else we want to plant along the fence. We also will be spending next weekend putting in a metal edging all along the mulch to make the garden more distinct.  Also, we don't really have grass in our yard, mainly just dandelions and clover. We are still deciding how to handle growing grass in the yard. I of course want to drop some $$$ and just sod the entire thing and J is being more reasonable and wants to try and grow grass ourselves. We'll see. 

I also planted all our planters on the front porch - I love how they came out! I went with a dark pink/red and white scheme. I really like how it matches/accents our front door color. 

Happy Monday!

Happy Mother's Day!

(photo by Egomedia Photography)

My mom and I are extremely close. We don't look alike at all (as you can see from the picture), but we are very similar in many other ways. I was lucky enough to have my mom be a stay at home mom for my entire life. She left her job when she had me and didn't go back to work until I went to college. She is the inspiration for me to (hopefully!) do the same thing when we have kids. She is now back to work and has worked her way up within her company to a regional manager. I am so proud of her for being able to be a great mom for all of my childhood, and then go back and have a successful career as well. 

She really taught me so much about growing up and I still talk to her at least once a day. Now I call her for cooking advice, sewing help, etc. I don't know what I would do without her - she's the best!

Happy Mother's Day to all the moms out there!

Photo Wall

I made a New Years Resolution back in January to get things hung on the walls of our house, which have seriously been bare since we moved in a year ago. It's actually sort of embarrassing when people come over. I cringe when I walk into our living room and see nothing. But I really didn't just want to throw anything up on the walls (that we spent many hours patching and painting!) until I was in love with it. 

So I started in our bedroom. We have a weird small wall in between our front window and the door to my closet. It's only about 3 feet wide and it's the first thing you see when you look into the room. I decided I wanted to hang 3 picture ledges and then find silver frames for them. Well, my project is finally done!

I found 2' ledges at Target for $8 each. I really wanted to get longer ones, but the wall just wasn't big enough for that. Then I found a whole lot of silver frames from Kohl's during their super major sale. I got the frames from $2-$9 depending on their size. I got 8 of them, and my total was seriously like $21. That was a good bargain day!

Jake was nice enough to perfectly hang them for me and I got to work on figuring out the frame arrangement and finding the right pictures for them. Since the wall is not super big, I stuck to 8x10 frames and smaller, since I didn't want the frames to overwhelm it or look too big on the ledges. I am so happy with the result!

The completed project! And a good shot of our wall color (it's a very very light blue) and our Target curtains that I'm in love with. 

Close up of the bottom ledge. As far as pictures, I didn't want it to turn it into a shrine to me and J. I used a lot of wedding pictures, but I tried to frame ones that weren't just of the two of us. I used a lot of shots of our venue and decor and I actually think it turned out more interesting that way. This ledge shows a floral wreath from our cocktail hour and a picture of one of the brick houses from the venue. And of course, I had to use some pictures of Spencer!

The middle ledge. In that triple frame, I did use wedding pictures of us. I did a semi-montage from the day and used a picture before the ceremony, during the ceremony and our first dance. Then I had to put another picture of the puppy dog up there - she's so photogenic!

The top ledge. This one has two more shots of our wedding venue and then the small middle picture is my favorite engagement picture of us. 

Another view of the wall. This is the angle from the bed - so this is what I see when I wake up. It makes me happy to wake up to these pictures!

And I actually did hang something else on the wall in our bedroom! Back in December, I made a fabric covered headboard (this post) and I was on the hunt for what to hang over it. Well, I finally decided on the starburst mirror from West Elm. Not terribly original, but I loved it so I went with it. 

Don't pay attention to our wrinkled bedding and mis-matched lamps. And super messy nightstands. Yikes. I need to lower the mirror so it hangs closer to the headboard, but other than that, I love it!

So that's all we have in our bedroom right now. Definitely need a few more things, but I'm making progress. It's all about baby steps! Happy Friday!

Edit: Our Bedding is the Pearl Embroidered Duvet Cover and Shams from Pottery Barn, in the color Sandalwood. Obviously I had to have it monogrammed. I got it on sale last year and it's on sale again right now actually! It can be found here. 

Happy Cinco De Mayo!

Hope everyone enjoys margaritas and delicious Mexican food today! It's actually our 8 month wedding anniversary (yay!) but we're just staying in and I'm making Chicken Tostadas to celebrate. Ole!

Wedding Wednesday: The Ceremony

I'm lacking in the blogging motivation, so I'm being lazy and just showing some more of our wedding pictures. Next week is our 8 month wedding anniversary (yay!) and the time is seriously flying by.

Onto ceremony pictures!

Don't I look like I'm about to throw up in this picture? We were waiting in the brides room and this was just as my wedding coordinator told me it was time to go. All my girls were being funny and putting their flowers around me. Apparently it wasn't enough to calm me down - ha!

Waiting to walk down the aisle with my dad. My dad was telling me jokes to calm me down and it was actually working since I was smiling. Good shot of my bouquet as well.

This is when I saw Jake as we came down the aisle. I started tearing up and almost lost it at this point.

I absolutely adore this picture - love how it shows the entire ceremony. We were up on a small deck for the ceremony and all the guest sat down in the grass. I liked how I was able to look out and see everyone during the ceremony since we were higher up.
I look bored in this picture, but I think I was listening intently to the readers.
The kiss - we're married!

Walking back down the aisle. Good picture of my dress and the carnation pomanders we had lining the aisles.

Immediately after the ceremony, our bridal party went and had a quick toast - then it was time to party!

(all photos by egomedia photography)

A little Sunday project

About a month ago, we bought a new dining room set (actually, it's not really new - it's about 40 years old, but it's new to us!) We don't have a seperate dining room, just 1 big room that serves as our formal living room and dining room. I love everything about the table and chairs, except for the fabric that covered the chairs. It's a lovely redish-pink toile, but unfortunately we do not have any red in our house. 

We have a lot of greens and browns in that room, so the chairs stuck out like a sore thumb. 

They didn't exactly match with the modern print table runner that I always keep on the table --eeek!

So I decided I would take an afternoon and recover the chairs in a more neutral fabric that matched the rest of the room. Since this was going to need to be a budget makeover, I found some inspiration from something we already owned:

That is the worlds ugliest couch, which currently resides in our living room. We got it as a hand me down (just like everything else!) when we moved in last year. It was supposed to be a temporary fix until we got something new, but here it is, a year later, still chillin' in our living room. 

We have finally decided it's time for an upgrade and that we would put this baby out with the bulk trash later this week. Since I knew it's time with us was limited, I decided to make use of the slightly less ugly slipcover that came with the couch. I ripped it off and got to work cutting it up to be the new fabric for the chair cushions. 

I didn't take any pictures of my progress, but who doesn't love a good before and after?

Before

After

A Full table shot

Looks much better with the table runner now!

So that's how I spent about an hour and a half of my time and zero dollars for a pretty major transformation this weekend. I'm very happy with how it came out - it totally changed the look of the entire room. Now we're just counting down until Wednesday when the city comes to take this eyesore out of our house!

Yes, that is the slipcover-less couch that we have to live with for the next 2 days - told you it was pretty horrible!

Friday Finds

I've had my eye on these starfish bangle bracelets from A.Tierney for a few weeks. It might just be time for me to treat myself to one! I love the mult-colored one because it could go with so many different outfits. 

Happy Friday!