CAUTION: Woman In Progress

It took us three days/nights to get the tree together. Well, five, if you count how many days the tree sat in it's box on the dining room floor before I took it out and put it together. We--and I use the term "we" loosely  here because Libs mostly just pouted while I worked--put it together and strung the lights on one night...Tuesday maybe? and decorated it Friday night. It's a miracle it got done at all because I am totally Scrooge/Grinching it out this year. Not feeling Christmas at all.     I'm not really sure WHY I'm not feeling Christmas much this year. I wasn't really all that into it last year, either, if memory serves. Maybe it's that I'm getting older. Or maybe I'm just over the whole commercialization of it. Or maybe I'm just tired. Or could be that I'm not into much of anything anymore.   I could probably get by without going the whole decorating/putting up a tree route. I mean, in all seriousness, nobod...

So my faucet started leaking several months ago. I had to put a towel behind it just to wash dishes or run water at all or face mopping up my counter for days. My handy uncle moved away almost a year ago so I was at a loss as to what to do to get it fixed. I didn't want to hire a plumber after my last gouging experience with one a couple years ago. My dad knows how to do that stuff but physically isn't in a good place to be crawling around under a sink.  Thankfully, my uncle decided to come up to visit my grandparents and offered to help me out. While I had him, though, I also got him to switch out some light fixtures. Yay for Uncle R!! Sort of in love with the new faucet. I actually raced it the sink to do dishes last night, I was so excited. haha   I love that it's a goose neck which means easy rinsing and easy pot filling. Also love the levers because I don't have to grasp any knobs to turn the water on. Handy for when my hands are gunked up.  ...

So, I've been staring at this blank wall in my living room for about three years. I can't seem to quite figure out what to do with it. I made that cross that's propped up in that chair (and by "made" I mean painted and such) about a year ago to put there. But it's too small to stand alone. And with a gallery wall right next to it, I don't know that I want to put a gallery style wall there. I'm afraid it may make it feel too cluttered. Also, I have no idea how to secure the cross to the wall. It didn't come with any brackets on the back and it's sort of heavy so I'm scared to use command strips. Then Thursday night I got inspired to finally do some crafts with the things I bought at Hobby Lobby and JoAnne's in December. I mean, I've had the stuff for six months and it's been literally gathering dust in Libby's room. I did the following:   A wood plaque painted and decorated with a ceramic cross that Sis2 ga...

Finally got something new added to the guest bedroom.  Photos that BIL took if Emmy when the were on the coast in the fall.  Now, if only I could muster the energy to remake the bed that Emmy so thoughtfully left in shambles. Ha!

Is it weird/sad that a new lampshade purchased with birthday money makes me happy dance? Cause it totally does. :-D

Remember a while back I mentioned that loggers were cutting timber from down my road? Well, they have officially moved down to the worst possible spot and one of my dreaded nightmares is coming true.   Witness, the new view from my front porch. :-(   Not only are they cutting the lovely woods that face my house but they have set up their equipment there which is noisy, ugly and ruts up the road. The whole thing makes me sad, disgusted and anxious. I dread the end result because I fear all that lovely tranquil privacy I've enjoyed for nearly five years will be gone and all I'll be able to see is highway where I once only saw trees.   I mean, I knew when I bought the house that someday this might happen. With the economy the way it is and people needing money, it was only a matter of time before someone sold all that gorgeous timber. But I had hoped that it would never actually happen. Even when they started cutting further down the road I told myself that ...

I added a clock. Swanky. And I also added a little "graphic" to the frame on the top shelf. It used to just be a couple of layers of patterned card stock. But a few months ago when I ordered a couple of photo books from Snapfish, the interior flap had a little circle with blue print that read, "Happiness Within." Um, yes please. haha So I carefully cut out that little circle and stared at it for a few days before it dawned on me where I could use it. You can't tell much about it in this shot, though, so maybe I'll remember to get a close-up of it sometime. Ignore the junk on the left. I can't figure out where to store the old twin sized down comforter. It's too puffy to fold successfully. :-/ I made a starburst mirror out of dowel rods, skewers, and chopsticks. Oh, and an auto mirror and cardboard. It was terribly complicated. ;-) The tutorial . You know. In case you want it.  I posted a photo of the mirror on FB and so...

I think I told y'all that I had to redo the guest bedroom since I loaned Lyssa the daybed, right?  Well, it's taken me awhile to find what I want for what I could afford but I finally did. (at Fab.com, btw) crappy cell phone pic The DP approves. The headboard is actually  part of Lyssa's old 3-in-1 crib/toddler/ full sized bed. The foot board crowded the room too much so it is currently residing beneath MY bed until Lyssa's ready to reclaim it and the headboard. Hidden storage at it's finest, y'all. haha The mattress set came from the folks when they downsized "Emmy's" room to a daybed and the metal bed frame came from an uncle who downsized everything when he moved further south a few months back. So yeah, a lot of the people I love contributed to this "re-design." I, for one, will never look a gift horse in the mouth. All hand-me-downs accepted. Well, maybe not all , but you know what I mean. The bedding, however...now t...

So where, exactly, is it written that the childless in the family are responsible for "taking care of" all the mothers in the family on Mother's Day? haha As usual, I hosted Mother's Day lunch at my house. This year M-Day totally snuck up on me and Sis2 and I were last minute "planning" what to do for it. Or, rather, planning the menu. Cooking on Mother's Day is hard because a) I still hafta go to church that morning and b) while Mama is happy (usually) with whatever cooked for her, Daddy is picky. And while technically it's Mama's day, Daddy still has to eat, right? So planning a menu that is Daddy approved and can be prepared fairly quickly after church is a bit of a challenge. A good crock pot recipe would be ideal but there is precious little that Daddy will eat out of a crock pot. So anyway, we finally decided on the menu, I worked up a game plan on how to get it all cooked in time and prayed. A lot. Saturday morning I got up with my l...

Room's not finished but here's the cabinets in action, thanks to the my dear ol' daddy. I'd been slowly working on piecing them together all last week. Between my bum knee and the fact that I lack any powerful tools (Daddy teases me about my "manly" tools) it took me all week just to get one cabinet put mostly together. Daddy had been sick with bronchitis, though, so I swore up and down I would not ask him to help. Plus, I hate asking for help. It's a single gal thing. Probably. And I didn't ask him. Friday morning, he just rode up on his white horse truck, anyway, and saved the day. As usual. It must be exhausting being such a hero. ;-) We spent probably an hour and half hanging doors, assembling the last cabinet and cracking jokes about how unfair it was that it took me a WEEK to get one cabinet put together and it took him twenty minutes with his powerful cordless screwdriver to do the other. I marvel at how awesome it must be to be a ma...

So. What did I do this weekend??? Tada! Libby's newly greenified room! Plus some cabinetry I've yet to actually, you know, put together. However, since the boxes sat unopened on my front porch for four days, simply unpacking and bringing them inside is a major accomplishment if you ask me. Also a major accomplishment? All that green on them there walls. Not only is my having tackled yet another paint job an accomplishment in itself, it's a MAJOR accomplishment because the can of green paint had sat unopened in that room for...a year? Two years? I can't even remember. Let me check. I bought it the same time I bought the stain for the small chest I stained a while back...(back from checking) So apparently I never actually blogged about that whole thing. Best guess is, I bought it in the fall of 2011 so it's been at least a little over a year. A year of good intentions sitting in my floor ignored. I had hated the almost white "timid violet" paint ...

I don't know if I've mentioned it before but I'm totally into the television show Nashville . And while the storylines are good, in the interest of full disclosure I must confess that, for me, the real draw is the music. Actually, mostly just Scarlett and Gunnar. I wish the two actors who portray them would just cut their own album so that I don't have to rely on Wednesdays and Youtube to hear them. Although there is a Nashville soundtrack out there, it's full of Hayden Panatewhatsherface, too, and I could actually live without that. Anyway, here's one of my faves...LOVE. Ya'll have a great weekend. I've got big plans with...something. Let me see if ya'll can guess what's going on at my house this weekend... And no, I'm not moving. ;-)

I mentioned yesterday that we had done a little bedroom redo for Lyssa over the Christmas break. At five, she was really outgrowing her toddler bed but was reluctant to switch out to a larger bed. Mostly, we think, because she couldn't picture where she'd sleep if she didn't have her bed and her Dora sheets. And while her dad (aka Goofus) wanted to convert her toddler bed/crib into the full sized version of itself (it's one of those three way convertible type beds), Sis2 was not into that idea at all. Partly because a full sized bed would take up so much of Lyssa's play area in her bedroom but mostly because she knew if there were a full sized bed in the house her MIL would think she could start spending the night with them during her overnight trips. Sis2 and her MIL don't, um, get along. Several months ago when they first started realizing that they  needed up upgrade Lyssa's bed, I offered the simplest solution I could think of. Move the daybed from ...

So. I'm sorta thinkin' maybe I want to paint my kitchen cabinets. Actually, I'd rather someone else paint my kitchen cabinets. Or heck, since I'm dreaming, I'd really like NEW kitchen cabinets. Or a complete kitchen renovation that would enlarge it a bit. But since it's just me, myself and Libby who'd be doing the work and since we have no real monies to do it, I think I maybe want to paint my kitchen cabinets. They're not hideous or anything. I'm just maybe a little sick of them? And maybe a little jealous of people who have very stylish kitchens? What I'm thinking of doing (and the colors I'm thinking about) is probably not going to be a very popular decision in the land of Jana. My family can be a little weird about stuff. Like when I painted the paneling my family was split on their feelings about it--some very passionately against painting it. Being a rebel with specific taste I went ahead and painted and nobody told me it w...

So I don't really remember Friday night. Like, at all. I'm pretty sure I was alive and awake through most of it, I just don't remember. And no, there was no drugs or alcohol involved. Just exhaustion. Oh, but wait! I do remember Haven. You know, the show on Syfy? Love it. So glad it's back for a third season. Saturday morning, though, I got up and did my usual trip for groceries. I know at one time I told ya'll my weekly grocery budget was around $30-$40. Well, back when I got my promotion and raise I upped it to $60. I've been using pretty much down to the penny of my weekly budget just because I like being able to actually buy actual stuff I need. Like fresh meat and vegetables. But I'm in desperate need of new towels as mine are eleven and a half years old and getting threadbare. But since I don't actually make enough money to just go BUY a boat load of towels, I've priced the ones I want and have decided to start a small savings for them. I ...

So. Life has been full of weird dreams and angst lately but I'm only going to share the happy with you today. And where does most of the happy happen in my life? If you answered: "In the kitchen" you'd be correct. I'll send you a virtual cookie. ;-) This happened Saturday night. "This" being roasted sweet potato rounds drizzled in a heavenly candy-like mixture of peanut butter and maple syrup. I don't really like sweet potatoes unless they are mixed with tons of brown sugar and cinnamon and topped with a brown sugar, oats and pecan mix and/or marshmallows. Whenever anyone on the nutritional circuit says to swap out a white potato for a sweet potato my general reaction is less than mature. (It involves calling them "stupidhead" if that's any indication.) Because ya'll? The only thing sweet taters have in common with white taters is the "taters" portion of their name. Oh, and they both grow in dirt. Otherwis...