My favorite paint colors!

Today the Nester is having a favorite paint color party on her blog.  The Nester is my all time favorite home blogger.  If I ever win the lottery I want to hire her to decorate my house.  She has such great taste! I always get such great ideas from reading her blog.  She has a beautiful armiore in her living room that she painted  Halcyon Green.  It was SO pretty so I decided to use that color in my dining room.  I have a lot of rooms painted various shades of khaki and brown-(tobacco road in my living room, behr haze in my office,  behr country club in our bedroom,  behr gobi desert in our upstairs hallway)

It isn't a green color at all it's a robin's egg blue and it's a great color.  I love it because it looks good with so many different colors and  I always get compliments on this room!

I also painted the back of the shelves in our living room with the same color. 

Another color that I love is Behr Promenade which I used in our kitchen.  It's a light sage green color.   This is on the light side which I like because our kitchen is tiny.  This color also looks great with black and white which I  love. 

Happy Monday!!  We are suppose to get 2 big storms this week so I went to the store today to stock up on groceries and movies if we do get snowed in we will be all set :)

Valentines Day decorations!

I always think it's fun decorating for Valentine's Day!  I don't have a lot of stuff so I concentrate my decorations in our dining room and a little table in our living room.  I got them out early this year so I would be able to enjoy them a long time!

This decoration took the longest but I LOVE how it turned out.  It's a Valentine Ribbon wreath.  It took me about 3 hours start to finish but I really like the way it turned out.  I used about 12 different ribbon that I got from a wholesaler on ebay.  All this ribbon was only about $12!  The shop is here.  I just made  loops and hot glued them and then I hot glued the loops on the wreath frame.  I used an 18 inch wicker wreath frame from the Dollar Tree.  I also got black and white ribbon to make another one for after Valentines Day! 

Here is the table in our living room.  I bought this stand last fall from Southern Living at Home.  I'm still not sure if I like it but I think it looks pretty cute for Valentine's Day!

This is the hutch in our dining room.  I got those white and red dishes at the Dollar Tree!  I love them, I think they are perfect for V-Day!

This is a little jar that I got on clearance last year at the Cracker Barrel.  Those candy hearts are my favorite!  I can't stop eating them!   

These hearts are actually Christmas ornaments but I like to put them out for V-Day. 

 I made this cute little sign this year.  I printed this out from the Craftily Ever After blog.  I love all of her printables!

This is our dining room cabinet.  Yes I still have a poinsettia from Christmas-it won't die and I feel bad throwing it out-ha ha!  I got that cloche last fall and I am never sure what to put in it so I just put in a candle and some heart shaped felt ornaments. 

 A LOVE plate in our kitchen.  I love the design on this plate I got it at the Salvation Army and added the chalkboard sticker. 

This is our centerpiece on our dining room table.  This looks much better in person I promise.  I just used white, pink, and red candles and put them on a large white platter. 

Have a great weekend!  We have a busy weekend.  Brock has his last basketball game of the season and Ava has dance. I also hope to get some things done around our house (I feel like I always say that-ha ha!)

Catch Up!

Things have been SOOOO busy for our family since the beginning of the year. Nothing too exciting for me just work and driving Brock and Ava to all of their activities. 

Our house is always so sparse after Christmas so between working and being a taxi driver to Brock and Ava I have done a few little projects.

Painted this little box with chalkboard paint.  I want to get some little plants to put in it. 

Printed this graphic from the Graphics Fairy.  I LOVE this turquoise color!

I also decorated this little table in our living room for winter.  This is the corner that our Christmas tree was in so I wanted to spruce it up a little bit!

I hope everyone had a good weekend!  We had a lot of fun but it was SOOO cold!  Tonight we are going to watch football and eat pizza it should be a fun night!

New Year's Eve!

For the second year in a row we went with 5 other familes to spend the night in a hotel in our town for New Year's Eve.  It is so hard to know what to do with kids on New Year's Eve so this is something that is fun for all of us!  The kids swim and hang out and all the parents hang out and eat and play games.  It was a really fun night! 

There were 10 parents and 11 kids there this year so it was really crazy!  Brock wasn't with us this year he went to Massachutes for the weekend with his friend Noah and their family.  It was sad not being with him but I know that he had a GREAT time and didn't miss us one bit-ha ha!

I really wanted to get a group shot but it was SO hard so I took a few pictures of the kids in the pool.

Here is Graig with his New Year's Eve hat.  He looks thrilled right?

I am excited for 2011!  I think this year is going to be a great year!

This and That!

We are finally getting back into the groove after Christmas break. We have all been super busy this week and I am SO glad it's Friday!! I haven't taken one picture this week here but this is what we've been up to.

• Brock and Ava went back to school on Monday and I went back to work.
• I finally got most of our Christmas stuff taken down!  Graig  just needs to organize it in our attic this weekend.
• Graig's Grandma Jessie passed away :( She was 87 and she had heart failure so we kind of expected it but it's still SO sad.  Her funeral service is tomorrow.   She was the Town Clerk for many years so many people knew her and SO many of them have said  to me how much they are going to miss her. She loved rooting for the Chicago Bulls. When I went to her house for the first time she had a life size cut out of Micheal Jordan in her living room-ha ha! 
• I really want to put out some V-Day decorations but I think it's too early.  I am planning on making a V-Day ribbon wreath this year and I hope to get started on it this weekend.
• I signed up for 4 exercise classes per week at the YMCA.  They are fun but I am SO sore!  I am way out of shape!
• We are suppose to get a snow storm today and it's snowing but so far B and A still have school.  I hope they get out early.  It would be nice to start the weekend a little early.
• I am painting-AGAIN!  I feel like I am always painting.  Anyway, we have needed to touch up our upstairs doors and trim (they are painted white).   Since I have no idea what shade of white the previous owners of our house used.  I am painting it all.  I usually don't mind painting but for some reason I HATE painting with white paint. 
• I am also painting Ava's room pink and green.  I am almost finished-thank goodness!  Last week I got her some peace sign vinyl at Kohl's since the girl LOVES her peace signs!
• Graig got a new job at the College!  It's a promotion for him in a whole new division (business) so he is really excited!  He will start on January 17. 
• Brock does the paper route still every morning and during the Christmas season he got over $500 in tips!  He put most of it in the bank (he is JUST like Graig-ha ha) and he has been writing a lot of thank you notes!
• My 35th birthday is next Thursday!  I can't believe I will be 35 I used to think that 35 was SO old now I think it's young-ha ha!  Graig and I are going to celebrate by going out to dinner with 4 other couples.  Graig's 39th birthday is on Jan. 20 so we will do something to celebrate that too. 

Christmas Day!

Christmas Day was fun at our house.  In the morning the four of us  just stayed in our pj's and opened presents.  It was nice to have a quiet morning at home.

Ava opening one of her presents.  

Brock and me.  I was opening a present with about 15 white frames of different sizes for a wall photo gallery. 

Graig opening one of his gifts. 

Ava REALLY wanted pink uggs for Christmas.  She was SO excited when she opened them up on Christmas morning!  I love this picture. 

This year Graig and I decided that it would be fun to stay at a hotel on Christmas night and then get up and go shopping on the morning of the 26th.  Santa left Brock and Ava money for our shopping trip.  We left for the hotel after lunch.  We stayed in a hotel in Albany and we were one of the only families there.  It was great for us.  We went swimming, ordered room service, went to watch a movie (Little Fockers-it was really funny!), and went out to a late dinner at Denny's (it was one of the only places open).  Special thanks to Grandma Jan who stayed at our house to watch our doggies so we could go :) 

The next day we went shopping and Brock and Ava got to spend their Christmas money.  It was fun for them to get to pick out some things that they wanted.  Graig took Brock and he got a video game, new shoes and an air soft gun.  Brock also wanted to save a lot of his money so that's all he bought.  He is just like Graig when it comes to saving money-ha ha!

I took Ava around and she spent ALL of her money.  She got pink ugg slippers, a rolling backpack and lunch box at Pottery Barn kids, and she made a Build a Bear. 

Santa left Graig and I money too!  I got a new shower curtain, towels, and pictures for my bathroom, a wallet, and some clothes.  Graig bought some dress shoes for work and some clothes.   It was a fun day for all of us!

Christmas Eve 2010

We have enjoyed our Christmas break,  but tomorrow is back to reality!  The week went by SO fast, we didn't do anything too exciting but it was nice to be together and celebrate the Christmas season.  We watched a lot of movies, ate a lot of good food, and spent time together as a family.   I downloaded my pictures from this past week and I had over 100!  So I am going to break up my Christmas posts into 3 because I want to be able to look back and remember our Christmas. I am going to start with Christmas eve, tomorrow I will post about Christmas day and then on Tuesday I will post about our fun New Year's Eve. 

Christmas Eve was really busy for us because Brock and Ava had school and I had work until the 23rd!  So I spent Christmas eve cooking, cleaning and getting ready for Christmas.  I also took Ava to dance practice at church because she and some other girls did a dance during our Christmas eve church service. 

Here is Ava in front of the Nativity before church.  She is in her Angel robe for her dance :)

Ava with Papa Larry before Church. 

Here is Ava during her dance. We were in the front row so I got some good pictures!

Here is Graig, Papa Larry his wife Shirley, Brock and Ava after church.  Brock looks thrilled-ha ha!

After church we went to Grandma Jan's to eat dinner and open presents.  We had a good time.  Here is Ava with Grandma Jan.

Ava and me :)

Graig and Brock

Brock and Grandma Jan

Brock and Ava with Grandma Jan, I love this picture of the three of them!

We are spending tonight getting ready for school and work tomorrow.  I can't believe our vacation is already over :(  I am looking forward to getting back into our routine!  Graig always says that the Monday after New Year's is his favorite day of the year-ha ha!  He loves his work and routines and  getting back into the swing of things.