These Are a Few of my Favorite Things...part 1

I may not have any cream colored ponies and crisp apple strudels, but I do have a lot of other favorite things! Here are a few of my favorite things in my home.

Thing One: My kitchen hutch, this was a garage sale steal! I have way too many items that belong in the kitchen, so the extra storage is much needed.

I also love putting anything and everything in Mason Jars, I got that idea from my good friend Kaitlyn!

Thing Two: A fun painting given to me by my Grandma. Apparently, my parents gave this to my Great-Grandmother a long time ago and it has now been handed down to me. My Grandma tried to give it to my parents first, but they did not want it. I guess I just got stuck with it by default, but I love it!

 Thing Three: Picture Walls!
 

 Thing Four: These amazing Sharpie drawings by a local artist. This are done of trees and each tree represents the seasons.  These were given to my for my Bridal Shower and will be something I keep forever!

 Thing Five: Super cheap shelves from Kohls ON SALE.

I reused some of the decor from our wedding!

Thing Six: Nightstands. This sounds funny, but for the first six months of living in our new house, we have gone with out nightstands and I have HATED every minute. I don't even have anything in the drawers yet, but I am a happy gal!

Thing Seven: Little dishes everywhere. I am so messy and scatter-brained, so this is a way for me to ensure that I will never lose my wedding ring! One by the kitchen sink is good too.

Thing Eight: SAMSPSON!!! Tehee, I am just joking, I just wanted to throw this picture in here because he is so cute.

Thing Nine: Jars. I absolutely love these etched glass jars from Anthropologie. I use one for buttons, one for cotton balls and one has a candle in it!

 Thing Ten: This item caused much controversy in our home when we first moved in. This is not something I can say was a steal or a deal. It is my wonderfully amazing, beautiful and magnificent shower curtain. Because it is from Anthropologie, it was not very cheap. Luckily, my mom came through for me and got it for me as a Bridal Shower gift...which I of course, coerced out of her long before my shower.

I have many more favorite things, and I think sometime soon I will share my favorite kitchen things! Part of why I love to cook is because I have so many neat kitchen tools that help me along the way! You should sit down and think of your favorite things!

Halloween Craft

My mom was inspired this year to not only decorate my front porch for Halloween - but also make this spooky Halloween shadow box.

The clear block on the right flashes light! 

 Fun paper inside.

 Love the knob, and the Scrabble piece. The Scrabble piece says Happy Halloween on the back.

The top middle is a bottle cap with a picture of me in my Halloween costume from years ago!

Thanks Mom! I will put this out every year!!!

Cookie Decorating Party

I must  start out by saying that my cookie baking certainly did not go as I had planned. Luckily there were no tears, or no throwing of utensils (yes, I sometimes resort to those things when cooking/baking does not go my way). My mom was not home to relay our usual Sour Cream Cut-out cookie recipe, so I Googled it. Apparently, the recipe I found was not the same as the one my family uses. They tasted the same, but were not cookie cutter friendly. Thus, my cookies were simple circles, not fun pumpkins and scary bats. Luckily, we all survived.

I invited some of my favorite kiddos over to enjoy the festivities with me. Messy of course, but always entertaining.

 

We made fun Halloween Monsters out of pom-poms, pipe cleaners and googly eyes (I can't find my pictures of them).

Milk is a must when cookies and frosting are involved!

 Parker would make a Windows cookie

 Tessa has become a much better cookie froster than last year when her strategy was, "put one big glob of frosting on followed by a sampling of every sprinkle within reach. 

My mom decorated cookies with us every year as kids, and let me tell you - I now know what a HUGE mess she had to clean up each time. Yikes!

 We embarked on a walk after our cookie decorating madness. As you can imagine the kids had a lot of extra energy they needed to use up after I allowed them to "try" the frosting. To them try means GIANT spoon-full. So we explored and laughed and played...

I would say it was a success.

One of my favorite things...

Fresh flowers. I swear there is nothing like a few beautiful blooms to brighten up your home. I know I have written about flowers before, but I cannot stress the difference they make in making a home feel like home.

I went with my lovely friend Jessica to check out some of the wonderful things her sister has done in her house. Her home was beautiful and full of creative projects and decor that really made you feel welcome and surrounded by inspiration. I know it definitely got me motivated to make some changes in our house and get everything organized (finally).

The point to this post is, I left her house with not only inspiration - but fantastic Hydrangeas as well! She had them coming out of her ears and was more than happy to share the wealth and sent me off with some purple, green and amazing blue bunches of flowers! As you can imagine, I was quite ecstatic. I rushed home and put together three arrangements to spread around my home. Here are two of them:

Don't you think they make quite the difference? Thanks Mandy!!!

Halloween Mystery Solved!

 Apple Cider.
     Pumpkins.
          Warm Sweaters.
               Decorations.
                                                                                               Cute Kids in Cute Costumes.
                                                                                         Spooky Stories. 
                                                                          Wonderful Candy.
                                                               Hot Starbucks Drinks. 

I love the Fall.

 

 

 

On Monday evening I came home to such a spooky surprise! Our front porch was decorated wonderfully for Halloween! After a hand full of phone calls and interrogations we still did not know who the culprit was!  Luckily, my Dad is horrible at keeping secrets and he finally spilled the beans. My parents were the mystery Halloween Elves!

A little recharging...

Since I was about two, my family has rented a family friend's beach house almost every year. The beach house is in Tierra Del Mar, which is Pacific City I believe. The house is spacious and right on the beach. The view is amazing and we always spend the weekend watching movies, playing games, and of course...eating.

This year was a little chaotic because in the house were Michael and I, my Parents, my Brother and 3 dogs! Sampsy Pants had a blast and was clearly saddened by our departure. He moped around at home for about 3 days, poor little guy.

 Our days were filled with numerous walks on the beach, where Sampson tested the waters (get it!?) to see how much trouble he could get away with.  He spent his walks exploring, chasing Mike, and visiting other doggies. It was this trip where I discovered his stubbornness and complete naughty-ness!

It was incredibly entertaining watching Sampson with Daisy. He followed her everywhere and had to do everything she did. For the most part, Daisy enjoyed his company. When she was sick of him, she did not hesitate to let him know.

We could see the big rock from the sand outside the beach house. So pretty. I didn't even mind that it wasn't warm and sunny.

 Like I said, Sampson was pretty sad about leaving the beach and his best friend Daisy. He slept almost the entire way home.