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Gardens, ying and yang?

For the last several months we have been working on the front yard tearing out plants that weren't our style and taking out the weeded lawn. It is coming along nicely and soon it will be ready for the big reveal but not quite yet. As we decide how we should landscape, I've looked for inspiration in various places. The first place is of course my neighbors' yards to see what grows best in their gardens, as well as what it looks like especially this time of the year when things are in bloom.

Our front yard is south facing so it gets sun all day, so that is a factor in what we decide to plant. Now Mr. Incredible and I have completely different taste in plants and the type of gardens we see in our minds eye...I'd say he is more tropical {think Palms} and I'm more cottagey, can they co-exhist? I would like to think so.

Can we find a happy medium...we have two beds in our front yard...mine and his.  Mr. Incredible loves to do landscaping and he often says, if he was to have a different job it would be a Landscaper and I just love to garden and plant interesting, beautiful and sweet smelling plants.  On the side of our house where our bedroom window is, is an overgrown, night-blooming jasmine...Oh, I love to walk into our bedroom and take in that sweet fragrance.  

The previous owners had quite a few of granite rocks in the backyard flower beds I'm not quite how we will use them..but I think this inpirational photo is a great jumping off point.  I love the Cream-colored hydrangea in the left hand corner.  

I like the look of the boulders with lots of plants crawling willy nilly on top of them.

Mr. Incredible bought some Kangaroo Paws, {the orangeish plant in the center of this photo, they also come in yellow and pink}, I think this garden composition shows how the two styles can mix together? 

I love how full and lush this garden is......it has a lot of texture, color and a variety of plants.  

But then again I would love to have a BIG, beautiful bush of blue, blooming hydrangeas......oh be still my heart.  Stay tuned for our big reveal of the re-landscaped front yard......

 

Annie Sloan Chalk Paint, what do you think, it it worth the hype ?

I'm sure you have all heard of Annie Sloan Chalk Paint, it's all over the WWW, everyone is talking about it on all the painting blogs or designer blogs. Miss Mustard Seed, painter of reinventing furniture with a few swipes of paint ravs about it and her pieces look fabulous. {she is also going to be coming out with her own line of milk paint} yippee skippy! I'm sure it will be a fabulous painting product too. For a few months I have been wanting to try ASCP out. They have classes in some of the stores that sell her paint. I have yet to do that because my schedule will not allow it so far but I figure with some online tutorial from Miss Mustard seed I can tackle it and I have a perfect guinea pig...Remember this table?

I think this would be the perfect specimen to try out on..................

AnnieSloanChalkPaint....it is sitting right now in the garage loaded down with stuff crap because the farm table is being used for our dining room table.

 Which I like inside but I like it outside too...

But as the weather starts to warm up I LOVE to eat outside...just LOVE it, nothing is more relaxing than eating a Barbecue dinner with fresh garden salad and drinking wine under the ceiling of stars.  So out it will go....but before I take her out I have to replace it with the round pedestal table and it needs a paint job, so why not try on ASCP? But what color?  There is so many...I really need your help...Here is my dining room...when we first moved in...a year ago...

Without the tables in it, the rocking chair has been moved to the family room.  Now to pick a paint color......

                            Annie Sloan chalk paint in Cream......

                                                in Old White

                                    in Country Grey

                                in French Linen

                                                        in Duck Egg

                                            in Provence

                                            in Louis Blue

         Or a Pure White, which you can not see, so use your imagination

                                        or back to black in Graphite?

 

Decisions? Decisions?    Please I would love to hear from you, please email me or leave me a comment or message me on Facebook too!   

 

 

 

country living's DREAM porch..

Today is the last day to get on over to Pinterest if your a "pinner" like me..someone who pins all kinds of inspiration especially HOME INSPIRED inspiration to their boards.  What!!! you have never heard of Pinterest? Well, It is a virtual space where you can create inspirational boards from Beauty, to health, to exercise, to quotes, to home design.  Quite a number of the shelter magazines and some catalogs {Pottery Barn} are jumping on board and you can follow them on Pinterest. 

Country Living is having a contest of designing your "dream" porch inspirational board" and a random selected pinner will win a Rejuvenation Light.  COOL?  Yeah! Rejuvenation has vintage-look lighting with a variety of styles to choose from.  Here are just a few of my "dream" porches with country living flair, as the mercury will begin to climb in the next several months and we head outside to dine alfresco or enjoy something cool to drink. Here is what my backyard brick patio looked last year, right now it is not in the best shape so I need all the ideas I can get....

Aren't those two Dachshunds just precious?  I love white wicker on a porch anytime.....I have been collecting white wicker since I set off to college in 1982.   

If you don't have a lot of mula for a tiled or brick patio, gravel can fit the bill.  Look how nice this gravel patio looks? Those think cushy green buffalo check cushions seem to say...come on over and have a seat.

If you have room for it a twin size mattress can be made into a porch swing....and if you have a porch big enough to accommodate it.  More cute poochies on the porch....

Or a small porch with a couple of Adirondack chairs sitting and taking in the fragrance of lavender...

Or having one Adirondack on the porch {looking at this picture I realize I have way too much clutter out there I need to edit, but what to get rid of?} 

Head on over to Pinterest and create a Country Living Dream Porch and then come back here and join me for a glass of wine, I'm sure I can round up another Adirondack for ya..

 

 

Watching the NBA...

It all began with this.....{my girl is number 3}....she made the 7th grade team last year but this year while she was on the 8th grade team (the 8th graders get to play in the gymnasium} watching them play on a real court with the fancy scoreboard seemed to make it more like they where playing real basketball.

                                                  {the 8th grade team}
Or maybe it was because in the regular season games when they played the school that they previously had lost to TWICE but during the tournament when they were playing against that school they where behind by several points in the fourth  quarter and they came back and won the game to advance them to the finals. Which was so exciting to watch and I came to the conclusion I LIKE Basketball.  I was on the edge of my seat and when they shot a basket I jumped up and cheered very enthusiastically, me? OH YES ME?!!.  I've even taken it a step further with my basketball phase, {is it a phase?}....when I'm subbing and I'm on recess duty I've been joining in with the 5th grade boys...well.  Madison's coach has the girls do this thing where they wave their arms up in the air and back and forth and yell, "BALL, BALL, BALL".  I'm quite competitive and don't like to get beat by some 11 year old boys so I started doing this and they looked at me like I was a lunatic and I grabbed the ball and shot a basket or two.  They told me I could not do that and I told them, "oh yes I can, the girls do it at middle school".  You might of guessed but I don't know a lick about basketball so not only do I drive the 5th grade boys CRA CRA {slang for Crazy, yes I live with teenagers} with my antics I have to question any fellow parent at the games all of the Basketball details and rules and why they got that foul while watching the game. {you don't want to take me to Vegas, I do this to at the Craps table too}

But in the end the girls took FIRST place in the middle school basketball tournament.  I must say they had an OUTSTANDING 7th grade player on the team and she really was like a 12 year old female Kobe Bryant.  Now because of this I've been following the NBA....who would of thought I'd turn into a basketball nut.  I loved watching the Clippers a week ago come back from way behind and win against the Oklahoma City.   It's so face-paced and can change in just seconds.  I watched the Lakers tonight against the Denver Nuggets {Kenzie thinks that is the funniest name for a team} and it was really close but the Lakers are leading 3-1 now in the series. I think it will be really interesting if the Lakers and the Clippers make it to the finals.  What do you think?  Are you a basketball fan?  What is your favorite team?   

 

                         {the tournament team with 7th and 8th}

Herb Garden

Since we moved into this house last May there was this small area that looked like this when we first moved in.  The bushes were huge and boxy so Mr. Incredible pulled them out but it left a small plot of dirt which I thought would be a perfect place to grow a herb garden.

As you can see it is right outside of our kitchen door.  {please don't look at the falling stucco, we need to re-stucco and repaint the whole outside of the house}  You can see my little garden window above it {we plan on taking down the awning to let in lots more sunshine into the kitchen}. 

Here is a shot from the top of it...as you can see in the right back, I've planted lavender, in front of the lavender is mint, Mojito anyone?  To the right in back next to the lavender is basil, orange thyme and in the very back I planted dill seeds.

On the right side it has rosemary, oregano and more lemon thyme.  I love to cook with fresh herbs and having it right outside the kitchen makes it so convenient, don't ya think?  I don't have as much time during the school year to get my coolinery groove on but come summer when schools out I get down.  I got the cute little silverware markers from Anthro awhile ago but they would be super easy to make.  With a hammer and metal letter stamps and some vintage silverware from an antique store or flea market, they always have a lot of mismatched ones.   The stamps I think can be found at the Home Depot or Lowes.  If you have been following my blog for sometime you might of remembered  the planted herbs in mop bucket I did a couple of summers ago.   Also you can go here and get the markers with the seed packet combo if you so choose...or make your own. 

On another note have you seen the new Agrarian Line at Williams Sonoma?  Wow...they have all kinds of neat stuff for the garden,  such as growing herbs or veggies for example these herb bombs.

or the seed bombs from here . 

or some heirloom seed packets...

I love the packaging on these form WS...I would like the packets just to frame them and put them up and decorate my dream potting shed....

We talk a lot about having a garden in the backyard, right now it is such a overgrown weed mess.  We need to get it into better shape so we can have our meals out there and enjoy when the warm weather is here to stay.  One area behind the garage I've been cleaning up that I thought would make a great area for some raised beds and a garden full of fresh veggies, there is nothing better than a homegrown tomato in my opinion.

a chicken coop.  I love this one cause it has wheels and you can move it around.  I don't know if I told you but my neighbor behind us has chickens and I love that you can hear them clucking when they are laying eggs.  I'm really hesitant about having chickens because we have a Jack Russell Terrorist on the property and she might think they gets KFC every night for dinner.   My favorite chicken coop hands down would have to Heather Bullards, you can get it has a kit and make it yourself from Country Home.  Those of you that have chickens...what about your dogs or cats?  Can they co-exist?  Does it depend on breed or temperment?

 

the artsy town of Laguna Beach

After walking down the path..this is the beach that greeted us at the end of the steps.....just gorgeous...

going to the right and around the corner there are tide-pools..

the waves were a bit big that day so we had to be very careful, the girls came home with some cuts...

lots of Sea Anemones in the tide-pools.....

this castle-looking-lighthouse was really neat, there is an iron door but it was "glued" shut due to rust..

My girls with their good friend...they all play soccer together....

yep..it's the beginning of spring and they are looking mighty white....

It was a gorgeous day...loved seeing the dolphins swimming by in search of fish....for lunch

Looking behind us was this gorgeous home under some construction....all I kept thinking, what do they do for a living?  How lucky are they to live here..I hope they apprecitate it...can I be your friend?

Yep their property line ran from the top of the walkway all the way to the beach...

loved the landscaping....I would love to have that view!!

Loved that old fashioned light post....trudging back up the stairs....after catching a few "sun-rays" we headed into town for some Ice Cream...

the girls were watching a Violinest, I told them they should of brought their flutes and play for tips {they have had good training from a school that gets invited to play at Carnegie Hall} so they could pay for the ice cream, at 4.50 a scoop!

Isn't that picket fence sign a riot!   This town is a bit quirky...

Who needs to go to New YORK when we have the Statue of Liberty right here on the Pacific...

We went into the Wyland Gallery....LOVE HIS WORK, wish I could afford a piece....his murals are all over Hawai'i, he lives right above his gallery, come to find out.

After our ice cream we headed into town to shop....

lots and lots of cute shops...which the girls did not fail to remind me has signs that said, "no photography allowed"....I obeyed...I'm a good girl like that.

I bet this town gets a lot more crowded in summer, but with everyone being on a different spring break schedule it was not today.

all the parking on the streets are metered so bring your change...

we had to make sure we kept track of the time so we didn't go over.....

this store was the one we spent the most time in....it had "my name" written all over it...{no pictures of inside :( , sorry}....

It had everything beachy-cottage chic in there...trust me..I'll be back for sure.  I did buy one thing that I traded one of my daughters in for....it was so cute, I could not resist....

the cottage store is on the main drag like this Tommy Bahama restaurant.. I had no idea there was a restaurant.....

I liked this building beacause of the painted wood and brick....so I took a picture...

I liked this two kids so I took a picture..oh yea..I'm supposed to like them, they are mine...

follow me....

keep going....

Isn't that a nice {lots of work }piece of ironwork that overlooks this beautiful place with the most gorgoeous view....

Love that wall!!!  just a hodge-podge of brick and stone...

aren't they cute?  we are related...

Creative, Quirky and Beautiful....

is the beach town of Laguna Beach...

Easter Table

We interrupt the Laguna Beach tour with some images of our Easter Table...I did NOT cook a special dinner like in the past because as I mentioned in a past post Mr. Incredible recently had surgery on his lip for skin cancer and it is all stitched up about the size of a peanut. Thought it would of been cruel for him watching us eat a nice honey-glazed ham, mashed potatoes, asparagus, rolls and Carrot Cake. 

I set the table for seasonal decorating{for next year's idea} I waited really late to pick up the bunny dish towels, contemplated on the placemats {I had been eyeballing for awhile}.  I used them as a table runner instead of their intended purpose.  I also picked up the small bunny taper candle holders when they went on sale and then went back and got a price adjustment when they went down to $9.99, originally marked at $19.95. 

The white taper candles from World Market, I had to cut them down to fit.   The large white cake-plate holder was from Pottery Barn Kids years ago and the floral wreath nest is also from Williams Sonoma a few years ago.  I see another one similiar to this one but not exact.  I love mine and keep it out year round. The robin's egg blue plates where from Homegoods. 

 It is lost a bit of color and the truffle eggs that came with it our long gone but I reupped and ordered them for next year.  I actually like to use them on my Carrot Cake.

Here are a few ceramic creations that I have had forever, they were made by my ex-boyfriends' aunt, she had an Art Studio in Diamond Head and loved to create all kinds of things.  I've cherished them forever and will never toss them into the yard sale pile...

The plastic eggs are from TJMaxx and the nest I can't not remember where I got it. 

Here are a few of my other cloches decorated for Spring, the lavender egg is also from Auntie Clo{in Diamond Head}.  The large cloche to the left I love to fill with Lilly of the Valley but I can't find it anywhere, meaning the normal garden centers I browse this time of the year.  I used to pick it up at Trader Joes, but the last few years they stopped selling them.  Does anyone know why?   I think I'll have to try and grow them from seed or order online.  Anyone have a good resource? 

 

Victoria beach at Laguna

We are on spring break this week and we have had really nice weather so far, but it is expected to get cloudy and rainy for the rest of the week.  We took advantage of our good fortune and headed to the beach town of Laguna Beach...

If you are not from Southern California, it a small beach town between Los Angeles and San Diego, very expensive with million dollar homes in the hills or nesteled on the shore.  Cute, quaint houses on the shore...which I could not help but snap up a few pictures of and dream of owning a house there, {yes, DREAMING in capital letters}.

Love the fragrant lavender growing on this picket fence and the charcoal shingles house.  I'll take it one please...

See how healthy that lavender is..must love the sea air...

Cute cottages up on stilts to capture gorgeous ocean views...

Made me smile to see window boxes that has beautiful, colorful flowers in them. 

My friend calls this one "Snow White's Cottage"...I can see why..

I love this one...I loved that color of shingles with the crisp white and WOW look at that view!!

here is the slate rock-way with river rock leading to the front door....

this was guarding the pathway...do you know what that is? It is a Sticks of Fire succulent, if you touch it and get the sap on your hands and touch your eyes it will burn like HELL has no fury. 

Here is the pathway that leads next to that house...so beautiful, no?  Since I took a lot of pictures I'll do another post tomorrow of the beach, a cute little turret lighthouse lookout and the cute shops we browsed in after our day at the beach...so stay tuned.

The Cottage on Cullen St. Spring Mantle and Scentsy

Have you heard of Scentsy?  Well it's a cross between a candle and a fragrant plug in, the website calls them flame-less candles. I first smelled {made aware} of them when I would go into the classrooms to substitute and the rooms would smell so GOOD! Another teacher saw them in the classrooms and wanted to know where she could get one and if I might know where to purchase them and I said, "my old neighbor from the old house sells them".  One thing lead to another and before you know it I'm having a Scentsy catalog party, {yes..I went in kicking an screaming, I don't "need" another "thing" to get hooked on}.  My other neighbor sells Partylite so I jump on her bandwagon sometimes when she has parties.  I am so glad I jumped on the Scentsy Bandwagon... I LOVE my new scentsy container, I ended up with a very Beachy ceramic holder that goes perfectly with my home decor and my home smells so good when I get home after a long day of teaching. {It sure beats smelly soccer socks!}

Here is my robins-egg blue ceramic scentsy holder, this one is called the Montauk Full Size. It has  a variety of shells hanging with twine as you can see from the pitcher.  They have so many scentsy scents to choose from it will make you dizzy smelling so many that you might go home with a headache. But after your nose re-cooperates you'll be back in business and order some scents to fill your home with lovely fragrance. In the end this is what I got; lot of "beachy" scents to go with my home.

This is what the bars look like and inside are individual "chunks" of wax that you plop into the top of the well to melt.  I choose the Beach scentsy bar and I could not stop there with so many scents to pick.  This one smells like you are sitting on the shore and smelling fresh rubbed up bodies of suntan lotion and the ocean breezes.  I also picked up the Ocean scentsy bars which smells like flowers that grow near the sea, very different than the Beach one.  I had to have Lush Gardenia, of course ya know it is my favorite flowers, eva!  It has a very strong scent.  I love all kinds of floral scents, I'm really not into the vanillas or "food" kind of scents, for example Cake Batter or Cinnamon Roll.  I also got the Lilacs and Violets, which is a very soft floral scent.  I also like the fresh clean scents like linen, cotton or rain.  To feed my love of fresh scents  I got Thunderstorm and Wishing Well {Madison picked that one out}...which are very light scents.  

I know there have been a lot of Spring Mantle "show and tells" on blog land since spring but I have not been able to get my post up until now. Recently Mr. Incrdeble was diaganosed with Skin Cancer on his lip and in the last couple of weeks he has surgery to remove it and then reconstructive surgery to repair the cut out.  I will spare you any pictures of THAT!!  But he is on the mend and he is doing great!  Everything is good in the hood as they say in these parts.  

Speaking of Mr. Incredible..see those ceramic vases over on the left of the mantle..he made them in high school in Ceramics Class.  He loved ceramics class and we have saved them all these years.  

I got inspired looking at this PB picture and thought geez I could pick up a couple of spring cheery blossoms and put them in the vase Mr. Incredible made and create a very cute springy mantle display....mine is a bit more sparse or simple but I think I like it.  So if you have heard of scentsy what scent is your favorite?  

 

 

Bridges of Madison {Cerritos} County...

One of my favorite movies is Bridges of Madison County with Meryl Streep and Clint Eastwood,  She is my favorite actress (I loved her in Sohie's Choice for which she won an Oscar}. Mr. Incredible's favorite actor is Clint..hands down he can watch all of his movies over and over and over again, but he has never seen The Bridges of Madison County up until a couple of weeks ago.  It was on again last night and I can watch it over and over.  Love the scenery, the farmhouse and the old trucks they drive up and down the dirt roads. 

Well I don't live in Iowa but we have a little park near our home and it reminds me of the movie.  The girls call it Pirate Park, I call it Paul Revere Park but its actual name is Heritage Park in Cerritos, Calif.  We LOVE going to this park. I love to take a good book and read under the trees, my Li'l one loves to take my camera and take lots and lots of pictures, {me too} and my eldest likes to jump on the rocks or kick the soccer ball around with a friend. 

This is why they call it Pirate Park...it has a stone boat out in the pond to play on...which looks like a mini pirate ship.

I call it Paul Revere Park because throughout the park their are places engraved in metal plaques with the poem of "The Midnight Ride of Paul Revere"...

there is play equipment, slides and jungle gyms enclosed in the cutest little buildings....that are replicas of a village in Massachusetts.

Can you see it through the doorway?

 

Love all the brick and all the White clapboard on the little buildings....

And here they are with their besties :)....

Yippy Skippy it's Spring!

I had a post all ready yesterday for the "First Day of Spring" but somewhere, somehow it disappeared. :( 

I'm looking forward to the days lasting longer with daylight savings time change.

I'm ready to start planting my Herb Garden.

Painting some very Shabby Furniture, not looking very chic right now.

Pulling all my funky containers out and heading to my local nursery to see what beautiful specimens I can bring home to enjoy.  

Walking through the neighborhood to see flowers blooming everywhere.

Pulling out all my Spring decor that has been hibernating in the garage.

Painting my toenails so fun Spring colors and getting new "slippers" {flip-flops}

Listening to all the birds chirping in the trees and watching the hummingbirds visit the flowers growing in my yard

Picking Gardenias from my bush and enjoying its sweet smell

Cheers to spring!  What are you excited about to bring in the New Season?