Some Thoughts on Unplugging

1. I'm not very good at quitting things cold turkey.

2. I don't even consider The Yellow Pages anymore.

3. It's good to remind myself I survived high school AND college without the Internet.

4. Having a laptop makes it easy to spend too much time on the computer.

5. Moving your laptop out of the kitchen results in less time spent on the computer.

6. Stepping away from the computer allows you to focus on your family.

7. It is possible to find a balance. I'm going to continue to challenge myself to cut back on computer use.

Thanks, Kimba for the encouragement and the idea to unplug!

My Baby Boy

Happy Birthday!

You are 1 year old today.

Your tender soul warms my heart.

You are so familiar.

When I look at you, you remind me of everything good in my life . . . .

your daddy, your brother and your sisters.

I'm so thankful for you and look forward to watching you grow over this next year.

These Boobs Were Made For Walkin' - Wk 1

I was 15 when I lost my grandmother to breast cancer. She was too young to die, and I was too young to lose one of the most special people in my life. In October, I'll have the privilege of walking 60 miles to raise money to help fight this unforgiving disease.

My personal fund raising goal for the Washington, DC 3-day walk is $2,300. Each Monday, I'll report on my fundraising efforts and discuss a few facts about breast cancer. If you'd like to support me by making a small donation, there's a button below which will take you directly to my fundraising page.

Any amount will be helpful and greatly appreciated. If you would like to make a donation on behalf of someone special in your life, please include their name in the comments.

More than 200,000 women in the United States will be diagnosed with breast cancer this year, and almost 40,000 will lose their fight. I feel it is my responsibility to do something to make that number less!

Birthday Tutu Shirt

The little girl is turning three this Friday. I wanted to make her something special to wear for her party, but I think she might insist on wearing it everyday this week!

This was my first time doing any type of machine applique. There are tons of useful resources out there to show you how to create an applique.

The whole project cost right around $10. I purposely got a larger shirt size so she could wear it with some little leggings and still feel like a ballerina.

The inspiration for this project came from a tutu tutorial over at Joy's Hope.

The Dining Room: Choosing A Chandelier

The dining room transformation will be closer to completion when we find a replacement for this shiny brass chandelier.

I've been browsing around and found a few I really like.  What do you think?  I'm not going to give you too much detail just yet.  I will tell you the prices range from $99 - $650.

Which one do you think costs $99?

The Dining Room: A Work In Progress

Let's start with a before picture. That's my friend and awesome realtor standing in the kitchen.

I'm sure you can see the 80s showed up in this dining room and said "let's party!"

I knew I wanted to totally update this space. The first thing we did was replace the carpet with hardwood floors. Please know when I refer to "we" I mean professionals we hired who knew what they were doing.

Next was taking down the wallpaper. My mom was a huge help with this one. Let me tell you, the person who hung this wallpaper was top notch. Not only did he use the strongest, stickiest glue he could find; he ran a bead of caulk around every piece of molding, insuring it would last for several decades!

Here we are a little halfway through. The painters had a lot of prep work to do once the wallpaper was down. They did a great job! We're going to add molding underneath the chair rail, and I need to find some fabric to recover the chairs.

This beautiful rug was a Christmas gift from my in-laws. We used colors from Benjamin Moore's Historical Colors: Stratton Blue above the chair rail - Palladian Blue on the ceiling - Cottonballs for the trim.

In case you're wondering why I chose to paint the ceiling a color.



See how much the crown molding stands out with a little color on the ceiling. Tomorrow we'll talk chandeliers . . . .

Checking In

It's seems like forever since I wrote a post. The kids' are slowy getting over their sicknesses. After wiping noses, feeling foreheads and administering medicine, I'm a little worn out and find I don't have much to contribute to the blogging world.

We do have two birthdays this month (Meg turns 3 and Kale turns 1 four days apart), so hopefully I'll have something fun and exciting to write about soon.

I did find this wonderful blog and got my supplies yesterday to start my first quilt.