Red, White, Blue....and Pink:

It's time to celebrate our wonderful country!

What better way to do that than to decorate?

The sunflowers are from the grocery store by my house and the vase is one that I made at a Pottery Painting place.

My "tree" looking festive:

The vintage style Cracker Jacks are from Walmart and the trunk came from an estate sale last week:

And nothing says "Happy Birthday America" like a pink cooler, right?





I saw this cooler at Target last year and I didn't get it. I regretted that foolish decision all year. Yesterday it came back into my life. It was the last one on the shelf and ON SALE. I took that as a sign from God that it should be mine. We do have several coolers, but none of them are pink. And I am pretty sure all of them have had dead animal parts in them at one time or another from my hunting husband. So now we are the proud owners of a pink cooler.



Now Marcus has not seen our new cooler yet, and he reads my blog, so this is how I am breaking it to him. He also reads the comments, so it would be helpful if you could confirm the fact that this was a wise purchase, and how lucky we are that I was at the right place at the right time to get Target's last pink cooler and on sale! Basically, I think he should thank me!



You're welcome! :)

Where We Dream

Kelly's Korner is touring master bedrooms today!

And as they say on cribs, "this is where the magic happens":

I've mentioned this before, but I know most of you don't have my blog memorized so I can say it all again;

This bed was a wedding gift from Marcus's parents. I love it! It's especially fun to decorate at Christmas time. And since today is Jesus's half birthday, and Christmas is only 6 months away, and it's 103 degrees outside and I need to dream, here is our Christmas bed:

My lamps are from Hobby Lobby and the dresser belonged to my in-laws. The curtains and blinds are from Walmart. Our wall paint color is Favorite tan and the ceiling is sea foam breeze.

And our view from the foot of the bed:

Marcus and I don't have "sides of the bed". We switched sides almost every night. Most people think that's weird.

And why stop there with the Christmas stuff?

Here is the fireman tree. And Marcus's mom recovered this cute chair for me. It is usually holding a load of laundry, or three, that needs to be folded.

And this verse and window are my latest addition to my room:

The yellow dresser on the right is really a changing table. I got it at a garage sale a long time ago for $15. The tv armoire is a garage sale find too.

Oh, I almost forgot. Here is the BEFORE we moved in picture.

Not a lot of magic happening here:

Have a great weekend!

Save The Drama For Your Mama

Do you need some more drama in your life?

My old friend Michael Muhney is starting on Young and the Restless today. He is going to be the new Adam Wilson Newman. I don't watch Y and R, but I hear he is a pretty evil character. Some of you might remember Mike from Veronica Mars. I remember him from Jr. High...

I'd Like To Thank The Academy...

I got this blog award from Maggie Elizabeth.

She has a super cute baby and super cute hair!

So with this award you are supposed to tell blog land 7 things they might not know about you, and then nominate 7 other bloggers to do the same. I nominate everyone, because I can't choose. And I want to learn 7 things about all of you.

7 Things:

1. For those that don't know me in real life, you might be saying my name DINAH, like Dinah shore, but it's pronounced Dina, like Gina or Tina. I get called Diane or Diana too.

2. I would prefer my husband surprise me with a Coke Slurpee rather than a diamond bracelet. For real.

3. My high school won a radio contest and Vanilla Ice had a concert during the school day for us!

4. My husband is a much better cook than me. He is pretty much better at everything than I am. And I am OK with that.

5. I get home sick real easy. I don't usually enjoy going out of town. I didn't become that way until I was married.

6. After I graduated college I moved to Myrtle Beach, South Carolina for a year by myself. I did not know one person there and I had never been there before in my life. I don't think I'm that brave anymore.

7. I hope this is not something unknown about me...I am a Christian and my relationship with God is the most important thing in my life. Although I put a lot of importance on decorating, reality TV, coke, food, and stuff...I know it's all meaningless and has no eternal value. I'm pretty sure there will be Coke in Heaven though!

Happy Summer

The official start of summer is in two days. In Texas it has felt like summer for about 2 months now. The weather men can take a long vacation and just say it is going to be hot, humid and miserable for the next 100 days. Don't bother doing your hair or make up.

Summer time has it's perks though. I love that it stays light later. Now Marcus will stay up past 8:00 like a big boy. And another perk of summer is that you can see fireworks every Friday night at Grapevine lake!

The dogs just couldn't believe that we were sitting in the back of the truck with them. It was like it was the best day of their lives and they kept smiling.

My sister and brother in law met us there with the kids to join the fun:

It's kind of hard to get pictures of fireworks. I was committed to at least get one good one for you.

And then we finished our summer night with Sonic.

And now I only have about 5 months until I can start decorating for Christmas. Can't wait!

Where I am the Queen of the Laundry

Kelly's Korner is touring bonus rooms or laundry rooms today. I don't have a bonus room, but I do think it's a bonus to have a laundry room. So here it is:

I have old aprons as my valance and I decoupaged the counter. I just used some wrapping paper and scrapbook paper, all from Hobby Lobby, and modge podged it.

It's hard to tell in the picture, but I painted my washer and dryer the same color as my cabinets. Sea foam breeze. I just used regular paint it stays on fine. You can buy appliance paint if you want to do it the right way.

The door to my garage is painted with chalkboard paint. It is super easy. You can get it at Home Depot and paint it on like normal paint. I had to come up with this little piece of artwork real quick before I took the picture:

It did say "laundry bites" on it for a couple of weeks. That's not the image I wanted to portray today. :)

me:

My laundry room chandelier:

This is my washer and dryer the first time I painted them:


You've got to make laundry fun somehow!

The Writing on the Wall

Decorating rules say, don't have words or sayings all over your house. I am usually not a rule follower and this is no exception.

I just added a Bible verse above my living room window. This is what you see right when you walk in my house. I love words, verses, and sayings. It tells you what we're all about and what's important to us. It's worth breaking the rules, I think.

I don't think I broke any rules here, but I just wanted to show you my plates from Anthropolgie that I just hung:

And I really wanted to share a chocolate cobbler recipe that I got from Tina at Cherry Hill Cottage. I just made it tonight and it turned out great and it was super easy.

I dove into the cobbler too quick to get a picture, so here is a picture of Tina's pretty cobbler:

You can get the recipe step by step, with pictures, here. I love that she included pictures of every step, because that's the kind of help I need.

And it doesn't have enough calories, so go ahead and add some vanilla ice cream too!

***EDIT***

Answers to some questions:

The letters are vinyl and are from Hobby Lobby. You can get them half off when their wall decor is on sale. It was pretty easy to do and I have another one I need to do above my front door.

I didn't make the curtains. (but thanks for thinking I am capable of that) I got the panels in Dallas at Interior Alternative. It is a discount place that sells tons of Waverly fabrics. These panels were already made. I didn't hang them on a rod, because I didn't really need them to be functional since the window faces my backyard and it's pretty private. I just hung them up with nails. I wish I could say it was something fancier than that. First nail in the two ends with tons of fabric draped in between, then grab the center of the fabric and nail it in the center of the two other nails and then you do the same thing on either side of the center nail. Does that make any sense at all?

Where We Do Our Business

Kelly's Korner is touring bathrooms today!

I'll start with our guest bathroom, since you're my guest:

This dresser was the first piece of furniture that Marcus's mom and dad bought as a married couple. I acquired it a few years ago and it just happen to fit in this space perfectly. Marcus was a little bit nervous about cutting a hole in it for the sink, but it was worth it.

Here I took off the cabinet doors on these shelves. I had these two shutters that happen to fit perfectly too!

I added the stained glass window by the potty area for more privacy.

And the basket shelves hold a ton of decorating magazines, towels and t.p. Which it looks like we need to make a run to Sam's and get more.

That space where the wreath is, used to be a door into our t.v room. We thought it was a little awkward. Especially if we had company over; they might get stage fright if you know what I mean.

And my shower curtain is from http://www.target.com/.

Here is a BEFORE we moved in picture of the bathroom:

And now our master bathroom:

The Verse over the cabinets is Jeremiah 29:11.

We have two sinks, but I always use Marcus's. Mine usually has a hair dryer or Chi sitting in it.

Having these home tours every week, sure gets me motivated to finish projects. I started beading these windows last year, but I just finished this afternoon. Don't touch them, the glue's not dry yet!

This old drawer sits at the end of my tub holding towels and bubble bath stuff.

I got these initials and frames above our closest from Hobby Lobby:



The potty area; fully equipped with magazines and Yahtzee:

I attached some hooks on the back of a cabinet door to hang my necklaces. It's not fancy, but it keeps me a little organized. I am not known for my organization.

Here are the BEFORE we moved in pics.

You may be into peach tulips, but we aren't. I am thankful for a handy husband.