$2 Tuesday, a little sneaky-peaky and a new set of printables!

Yes. It is. It's $2 Tuesday. Time to go pick up some GREAT deals! Go on! I'll wait!



I've been having SO much fun creating new templates lately! Here is a little sneak peak of a cute little set that will be going in the store on Thursday!

CUTE, eh? Wait til you see the whole thing!! (And, if you adore that paper, go grab it from Jen Wilson's store!)

Eeek! And, before I forget, you HAVE to head on over to Dianne's store to pick up my latest set of printables!!



I'll be back soon to show you some more fun goodies!! YAY! Wait until you see what I did tonight. Hybrid AND pure traditional goodness. Oh, you are going to LOVE it!!

Oh, and I haven't forgotten about posting the after pics of my garage sale finds. SUCH an improvement!!

I've been to some garage sales!

I'm totally enjoying this garage sale season. I usually forget to check out the garage sales, but this year I am determined to catch them. My husband is, of course, less than thrilled with the "junk" I bring home. I mean, when you buy at a garage sale, you take a risk that this year's garage sale find is next year's garage sale fodder, right?

I think the trick to making it work is to actually DO something with the items you pick up. So, that is my challenge for today. I've checked out the sales around town (not many, by the way) and this afternoon I am going to clean up, paint and USE my finds.

This is what I picked up last weekend. All from the same sale. I think I spent around $2.50.

I plan on cleaning up the basket divider thingy and possibly painting it white or black, then using it as an organization tool/storage in my scrapbooking room. Or, maybe I'll put it in my desk as a handy divider. Or, a place to hold kids art supplies. We'll see!

The mirror has a pretty frame that is a bit bent in the corner. I'll straighten it out, paint the frame, clean the glass, pull the "stand" off the back and repurpose it as a tray. Probably on the guest room dresser. So, it will probably be white.

The little spice rack will be painted black and will hold tubes of embellishments in my scrapbooking room.

The little lantern/candle holder was only 10¢, so I figured that if my repainting efforts are a lost cause, I can always toss it. However, I hope that it will look nice in black.

The card stand/plaque thingy will be a fun scrapbooking project. Don't know what, yet.

But, what I am the MOST excited about is this pair of ornate frames for just 75¢. They WILL be painted black. Today. I plan to hang them from ribbon and put something in them. I don't exactly know what, yet, but I know that they will be gorgeous!


This is what I picked up today for $1.75.


The purse will be a magazine holder next to a chair. I'm probably not going to do anything to it except fill it!

The long glass rods were from an old light fixture, I guess. I don't see it, but whatever. The gal gave them to me for free, and they will become plant stakes in my garden.

The candy dish is just pretty. I'll make it a candy dish. Maybe it will actually hold candy every once-in-a-great-while.

The hole punch and stapler are for Grant's craft area (which will happen soon) so that he stops messing with my stuff.

And, yes, those are free baby food jars. I never fed my kids processed baby food, so this is sort of a novelty for me. I am going to paint the lids and put scrapbooking supplies in them. Maybe. Maybe I'll use them in Grant's craft area.

My garage sale buddy. He picked up a really cool Spiderman mini-lunch pail. He talked the man down to 25¢, without having to open his mouth! So proud. (And, yes, he dressed himself.)

My Space: Unedited

Warning! What you are about to see is plain. It is blah. It DOES have potential. It is quite dusty. And yes, we are watching Bolt.

This is my family room. For my mom, since she keeps bugging me about my recent purchases and black paint craziness. And, for Layla, because I am dying to see if she can do something to help me cozy up my home.

And, yes, these are totally unedited (so no comments about the photo quality, okay?).

First of all, this is the space. The photos are of the room on the left. We have wood floors that run from the front door straight back to the slanted wall where the sliding glass door is, which effectively cuts the space and makes my "Great" room not so great. I'm not complaining, 'cause the floor is super pretty, but the family room is kinda small.


This is what you see as you walk into the house from the front door (down the hallway toward the back). The blue wall seemed like a good idea at the time. We have recently taken down our red curtains, so that is why we don't have any curtains on the windows. I'm thinking that we are going to move the rods up so they are 108" up. (Of course, my windows are a BIG problem for me!)

This is from the dining room. Yes, that is my little digital work-space on the right. Layla, I design digital scrapbooking stuff, and I would like to do this with my family around me rather than holed up in the office. We don't have any concrete plans to buy a laptop right now, plus I LOVE my huge screen. Love it. I'm totally flexible, but that desk is fairly new, so I wouldn't mind keeping it.


From the kitchen area, directly across from the family room. High ceiling. Blech. Next time, I'm not doing a vault!! What to do with that huge space??!?!


Directly across from the windows. The huge ficus is yucky, but we were just testing it out in the space.

Uh, the couch is HUGE. Totally overscale, and I know this. Same with the chair. We just haven't had the money to replace them, but I've been saving up and would like to have at least a plan to replace them!
And the windows. Notice that the window runs into the mantle. Argh. So I am clueless. I don't want to cover the window too much. After all, we paid for that woodwork! I want to tie the 3 windows together (rods at the same height, same type of treatment), except that you can see the huge expanse of wall above the sliding class door. The window in the dining room has the same problem as this window. It runs into the wall. AND, there are wonderful top-down-bottom-up honeycomb blinds on all of the back windows that are a total necessity in the summer, so we would like to keep those. (Plus, they were pretty spendy.)

Mom, look on the mantle. See the new big glass thingies? Cute? And, my new nesting tables. I love that. The little basket under the little chair is new, as is the chair itself (which totally can be moved to a different room, Layla!). And again with the overscale furniture!!


An aerial view!

Check out the painted coffee table, Mom! $20 garage sale find. Oh, and the "entertainment stand" is such a pretty table that I bought at my new favorite store, Serendipity. The screen underneath is just to break it up a little, but I thought it added a little something. Potential for cuteness? The green fabric was $3 and is glue-gunned on. I think I'm going to replace it with my burlap. (Since I have enough of it after my math fauxpas while buying yardage for my bulletin boards.)

And, that is my current decorating dilemma. Boring. Blah. Not at all cozy.

So, Layla, I'm a fan of bright colors (although you really can't tell by looking at this room, huh?), and YOUR style. BIG fan. I'm looking to replace the upholstered furniture and need some direction there. More seating, if possible, would be good. Window help would be nice, too. ANYTHING is better than this!!

(I just have to throw this out there. I KNOW that this room isn't really that bad, it is just not decorated and I want my home to be cozy. That is why I am dissatisfied with the room. Not because it is ugly, but because I want it to reflect my family and not feel so sterile. I have been living in this house for almost 5 years, and I feel like we just moved in. So, please, my wonderful readers, don't judge me as being greedy and weird. I just want my home to be a welcoming space!)

It's $2 Tuesday and I have 2 template sets on sale!

You'll have to click over to my store to see which ones!!

The results are in!

Only 19 people voted. COME ON! Lurkers.

So, 3 of you are family members who think my kids are gorgeous. I know the rest of you think my kids are gorgeous, too. This actually makes me feel a little bit better about the possibility of keeping this blog as my primary blog rather than creating a second blog just for my scrapbooking stuff. After all, I'm only irritating 3 of you when I post about my new releases, right? Well, in theory anyway.

Nine of you are my friends who are checking in to hear about my terribly interesting life. Hi! Thanks!

And, there were nine votes for people who are interested in my scrapbooking stuff. Hiya! How ya doing? Thanks for padding my redecorating fund!

Yep, I did the math, too. That makes 21 votes from 19 people. Some of you are clever and voted twice! Maybe you are friends who also like my designing. Maybe you are family members who like my designing. Or, maybe you just think my kids are cute. Hmmm . . .

And, thankfully, I don't have any weirdos out there. That I know of. Whew!

New poll coming soon!

The Boots: A layout.

Yes, I actually DID complete a layout over National Scrapbooking Day weekend!! Here it is!


Everything by Jen Wilson!

Dear Scotty and Arlene,

We had such a wonderful time watching your house being built behind ours. We walked through it a couple of times before they locked the doors. I still remember your floor plan, and it is lovely. I'm sure you decorated in style (since I noticed that you picked the same top-down-bottom-up honeycomb blinds that we have in our great room . . . thanks for the compliment!).

As I was fixing dinner tonight (which smells quite yummy as it is baking in the oven), I was inspired to write you this letter. See, I can tell that you were enjoying your glass of wine on your back patio, as you do on most sunny evenings, and then my sons sort of "killed the mood", didn't they? They are noisy little dudes, although so incredibly handsome that they light up your whole shady back yard, huh? Especially when the sun glints off of their bare-naked chests, which you kindly commented on. (Where's your shirt, young man?)

Anyway, I've always prided myself on having children that others enjoy being around. Let's face it: There are children in this world that make socializing with their parents painful, to say the least. My children ARE exceptionally well-behaved, wouldn't you agree? Sure, they caused your dog to yap profusely, but that's what dogs do when two curious little faces peek into the dog's backyard from the top of their little play structure. I mean, it's a natural reaction, right? I'm sure the dog loved reciprocating. Thanks for returning the favor by lifting your yippy over the 6 ft. fence to peer into our backyard. The boys loved it!

As I sit here and think about all of the years ahead of us as neighbors; yours in happy retirement, ours in crazy child-rearing, I am thankful that I have neighbors like you. The sound of shouts and squeals (some happy and some spitting mad) emanating from our backyard might embarrass me (since our neighborhood is so dog-gone quiet), but I know that you enjoy them as reminders of years gone by. Thank you for taking pleasure in the sounds of my children. Oh, and thank you for throwing countless balls, frisbees and swords back over the fence for us.

We appreciate you Scotty and Arlene! Until the next time your see two sets of big brown eyes peering over the top of the fence . . .

Take my poll! Why do you read my blog?

I posted a poll over there --->. (So, if you are reading this in a reader, click over!)

I'd love your input. I've thought about separating out "business" and personal stuff. However, it sure would be A LOT easier to just leave it all in one place. Anyway, I'm mulling it over. Right now, I just want to know why you are reading this blog.

Thanks for voting!

Under construction

If you notice me messing with my blog quite a bit in the next couple of weeks, please forgive me. I'm taking a little "customizing your blog" class! Yay! Sure, I could just add a template and go, but I want to know how to do it all from scratch. So far, it has just been basic stuff. However, I did learn something new! See, I've always edited my posts in the "edit html" tab. I just found out that I can resize my pictures in the "compose" tab! Remember when I was having issues with my pictures being obnoxiously big? No more!!

Gosh. I feel like an idiot and a smarty pants all rolled into one.

Edit: The class is here! It was free, but now it is sold out. Sorry!

Correspondence Boxes . . . or pretty boxes for your cards.

Check out what I put in the store today!





You can see my examples in the tiny little boxes on my preview, but I'm not going to post them here, because when I saw what Julee did, I was embarrassed by my efforts.

LOOK at what Julee Tilman made:



(Crazy how two people can look at the same kit and come away with totally different projects!)

Anyway, these babies are on sale for 20% off today! Click on the images to be taken to my shop at The Digichick!