Neil, I love you

      I honestly couldn't sing Neil Patrick Harris' praises any more. His autobiography, Choose Your Autobiography, was just awesome. I've always been a fan of him, and this just made it even more so. It really does cover pretty much everything. He tells all the good (hanging out with Elton John) and even some bad (moody, difficult to work with costars), no holds barred.
   
     He really opened up the floodgates allowing me to actually learn a lot about him. By far this might be my second favorite celebrity memoir. Second only to Julie Andrews, because, well, duh. My favorite parts were learning about his amazing childhood, his relationship with David, his partner, and his children. Just beautifully and hilariously written. My one and only complaint would be the format in which it was written. I thought the choose your own adventure idea sounded awesome, however once I got into the book, I found myself back tracking a lot just in case I missed something. I ended up just reading the book start to finish because sometimes rules are meant to be broken :)

     I give you 4 stars out of 5 !!

Winter 2014 Book Challenge

    I've been following a lot of book bloggers recently. I'm always trying to find something to push the boundaries a little bit. I came across Semi-Charmed's Book Challenge. I'm so in !
    The rules are pretty simple. The challenge will last from November 1, 2014 through February 28, 2015. Each book must be at least 200 pages, and a book can only be used in one catagory. There can only be 3 rereads, so most of these books will be new.
    Without further ado, here are the books I'll be reading in the coming months:

Freebie ~ I'm thinking its going to be Neil Patrick Harris's new book, Choose your own Autobiography. He cracks me up to no end !

Read a book written by an author that has published at least 10 books ~ Deeply Odd by Dean Koontz

Read a book of short stories ~ How They Met, and Other Stories by David Levithan

Read a book with food in the title ~ Eat Cake by Jeanne Ray

Read the first book in a series that is new to you ~ The Lost Hero by Rick Riordan

 Read a book that was originally written in a language that is not your native language ~ The Phantom of the Opera by Gaston Leroux (originally printed in French)

Read a book written by a local author ~ The Road by Cormac McCarthy (He went to school in Knoxville, TN)

 Read a "bookish book" ~ What We See When We Read by Peter Mendelsund (This actually came in my Quarterly box which I LOVE btdubs)

 Read a book with a direction in the title ~ Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West by Gregory Maguire

 Read a book from a genre you don't usually read ~ The only genre I really don't like is historic fiction, so it will be something from that. I might get my grandma's help on this one.

Read a book with a song lyric in the title ~ Dear John by Nicholas Sparks (Dear John by Taylor Swift

Read two books with a different meal in each title ~ The Girls Guide to Love and Supper Clubs by Dana Bate and .... Gah ! I don't know yet ! I'll end up going to the book store and just looking at titles until I find something :)

    I'm super excited ! I haven't read any of these yet, so I'll try to post a couple reviews.

My red bookshelf

Hello all ! I'm not gonna lie, this project took much longer than I thought it would. It all started last week. I hate just sitting around the house because I get bored really easily so I was trying to figure out what I could work on without spending a lot of money. I up and decided that all the furniture in the living/dining room is too dark and something needed to be changed. I nominated the book shelf.

Yep, its messy I know. Also, boring, I've had this thing for like 4 years almost, and its from Walmart. I figured, if I mess it up, I'll just hunt for another one at a thrift store. No harm in that. I cleared it off and man, I have a lot of books !! I took what shelves I could out and carried everything outside to my little patio area and started sanding. This shelf is pressed wood and laminate, so I did a bunch of research on what to do for prep work.

One blog told me I would have to sand every surface until white specks showed up like so.

A lot of surfaces to sand. I'm pretty sure my neighbors hate me.

I bought Kilz spray paint and went to town ! I didn't buy enough for sure, but I"m lazy so I figured it would all work out in the end. Here's what it looked like after I had run out of primer.

Not enough, I know. I'm lazy !!

Before trying this project, I had decided to try using just spray paint. There are so many bloggers out there that exclusively use spray paint for all their furniture and I honestly hated it. It was splotchy and if the wind blew it would get all over me. Back to the story though. I painted one side, noticed it was super spotted, so I figured it was from lack of primer. I grabbed some white paint and went ahead and painted everything white, then painted red over it. Some spots are still kinda spotted, but I was so sick of painting, I announced that I was done.

Honestly, It doesn't look so bad. I'll probably touch up just the red later, just not now. I had googled a red and white bookshelf and didn't find anything that looked quite like this, so I'm pretty proud of it.

*Sigh* I just love books.

(I'm currently looking for another shelf, same size to put on the other side of the window. Shhhhh)

How it looks in the room. Fabulous !!!

Some notes: If i was to do something like this again, I would just skip the sanding part and just buy some heavy duty primer made for glossy surfaces, and then of course not use spray paint. I like spray paint, just for smaller pieces.



My June to do list

I've been thinking with all the extra time I have that I need to make a list of stuff I want to accomplish. I have so many things I want to do and things I've pinned that I never know where to start. I wanted to make a list and put it out there for everyone to see so it would keep me accountable. I need stuff to do so I don't sit on the couch and waste away beautiful weather. No lie, there is a butt print on my couch. Anywho, here is my list for June :)

1. Get to the YMCA and get my membership started. (I get a free one because of the military, holla !)
2. Lose 5 lbs.
3. Find a tall dresser for the bedroom
4. Rearrange the living room
5. Go through all our stuff and make a pile for a yard sale
6. Go to the flea market
7. Clean !!!! I've been so lazy since my man left.
8. Find a few more vintage books and work on making a lamp with them.

I may add to this, but for now that's good enough. I'll let you know how I do ! 

 

My first dresser

Hello all !! I have been slacking soooo bad ! Bad blogger... My life has been turned upside down for the moment, so its taken me awhile to get used to it all and let things sink in. Phew ! What a month or so I have had ! Anyways, lets get to the point: my dresser !! I have finally finished it (besides for a couple things that no one will see but me) and I'm pretty proud of it. Lets start at the very beginning (I just started singing "The Sound of Music"). We live in an apartment and people are constantly moving in and out. Well, we got new neighbors a while back and when I was coming home one evening, I noticed a lonely little dresser sitting out at trash pick up. I ran back outside with a flashlight and checked it out. It had the cutest legs !! The only downside was it was missing a leg. Like, a dinosaur came and gnawed on it missing. I marched right back inside and told husband that he needed to come out and carry it in. He took one look at the poor thing and walked right back in. Now, you say, what did sweet, calm Susie do ? I carried it in all by myself :)

I completely forgot to take pictures of it before we started sanding, but the poor thing was in some rough condition. I think there had to be at least 3 different colors of paint under the black. Aren't the legs cute though !?

We finally got her all cleaned up ! Took what seems like forever and a lot of sanding. Bleh sanding. I also forgot to take a picture of the no legged-ness. After taking out the drawers though, I found the dead leg ! That made things soooo much easier. Husband took me off to Lowes and got us some wood glue and wood putty.

We stuck the sucker on and stood it up so the wood could dry. After that, he added a ton of putty and let that dry. Then came lots of sanding. Bleh.

Same leg but painted !! Its magical :) Eric also added a bracket in the back to just take some pressure off the glue and putty. Its wonderful :) There were lots of coats of paint. I'm sure my neighbors will be knocking on my door asking for me to paint something beautiful for them any day now :)

Bam ! So beautiful ! I grabbed some new knobs from Hobby Lobby half off and it looks good as new. The top is the part that makes it unique. I had originally planned on modge-podging things from my memory box onto it, but after some thought I didn't want to lose all these things I've saved for years. My second idea was to put letters between Eric and I when he was in Iraq. I actually tried that, but they were written on just regular notebook paper and became a see-through mess. After a girls night (thanks Ang, Car, and Kath !) I went back to Hobby Lobby to hunt out some scrapbook paper. I found a goldmine !! I love all things with script or writing on it. I just die for it, so I found scrapbook paper with old school postcards on it !! I know, I know... I've got crazy luck.

Its just lovely ! I'm so proud of it.

I'm now on the prowl for a tall 6-drawer dresser or armoir. If ya see one waiting for the trash, call me ! Haha. I hope this inspires you ! See what you can do with less than 50 bucks :)

Wedding Present

So, this is the first thing I've actually made by myself and I am so proud !! I was recently Matron of Honor in one of my oldest friends wedding. I've been trying to think of fun, imaginative presents to give recently and I finally thought of something I felt was appropriate as a wedding present. I absolutely love quotes, I have a whole notebook dedicated to them, and I know my friend, Bethany, likes them as well. I found one that would go really well in someones bedroom here on my pinterest page, and asked her what their colors were.

I ran to the store and grabbed yellow and white acrylic paint and a 12x18 inch canvas and went ahead and painted the entire canvas yellow.

When I had gone to the store, I had planned on getting a pretty stencil but I couldn't find anything I liked enough to get. I remembered something I learned from The House of Smiths that involved stickers, so off I went hunting for stickers ! Lucky me, I found them for 30 % off at Joann's and also in a cute font. I put the stickers down exactly where I wanted them after the paint dried.

Such a cute quote !! I'm totally using it one day. Well, I mixed some paint to make the perfect shade of grey and painted over everything, stickers and all. Just be careful around the edges of the stickers cause they had a tendency to come up. After painting a couple coats, I let it sit for just a couple minutes before trying to pull up the stickers. For that, you'll need tweezers.

Ta da !! I had gotten a little paint under some stickers so I had to do a few touch ups and add punctuation, of course :) After letting it sit for awhile, the more I looked at it, I felt like it wasn't finished. It needed something else on the right side to complete it. I'm not a painter at all. I've taken a couple of classes and I managed to learn a couple of things. The number one thing I took from it was, don't worry, its just paint. It can be painted over ! I decided to just to a couple little swirls and see where it went from there.

I actually love how it came out. I told Bethany that my feelings wouldn't be hurt if she didn't like it, I'd get to keep it for myself hee hee ! Unfortunately, she liked it and it will look great in their room.

Congrats, Mitch and Bethany !

My home

Hey guys ! Sorry its been soooo long ! I've been working on a couple things and been busy with the hubby. I wanted to kinda put down on paper (or website) what I want my home to feel like.

I've always always always wanted my own place. As long as I can remember I had always wanted a place to call mine, and to decorate how I want. I remember moving my room around all the time trying to find the best way to have everything. I would change my mind constantly !! Something as simple as those cheap foam stencils on the wall would make me feel like it was my own space.

Now that I have my own place with a very sweet husband that (almost) let me do just about anything with it, I'm trying to figure out exactly what I want it to say when someone walks in the door. The first thing I want is cozy. When someone walks in the door, I want them to feel like this is a place they could walk in, take off their shoes, and curl up on the couch. I've never understood why anyone would have a room that no one would be allowed in !

The second thing I want is for everything to have a purpose. I mean like when you go somewhere and they have this fancy pants dining room that is only used at Christmas or Thanksgiving. I just don't see the point ! I also don't see the point in fancy china but that's a whole 'nother story. I want anything in my home to be for a purpose, and not just sit there for 362 days of the year.

Next, I want my house to be exciting. I live a crazy, fun, exciting life and I want my home to reflect that. The decorative pillows on my couch are the queen of hearts and king of diamonds :) They're probably one of my favorite things in the house :) I just love anything that can reflect the fun life my husband and I have chosen to lead.

That's all I can think of at the moment, but I'm sure there's lots I'm leaving out. No pictured in this post, but I promise, I'll hopefully be done working on my project soon so I can show it off :)