HOME...be inspired everyday

14!

Here is my girl in the plum formal with her besties at the Pops Concert, the theme this year was The Grammys.  I can't believe how much she has grown up especially this past year.  She'll be going to High School next year and I know that will fly by in the blink of an eye and we will be looking at colleges soon..Yowza!

It seemed like yesterday she was wearing SpongeBob PJ's and missing teeth.  She is such a good girl, smart and super athletic.  I'm proud that if she doesn't make the team {volleyball} that she does not let that deter her and she'll try out for it the next year, {and make it}.  

She is tall {at 5 feet 8 inches and growing}, beautiful and kind.  She is sure of her self and yet soft spoken.

She plays a mean flute.....and always gives 100 percent in school or sports..

She has a few close friends and is a loyal and true friend.  

She is a leader {Captain of her club soccer team and school team} she helped them take first place at the tournament in Soccer and Basketball.  

She is a great big sister {yes they do fight, that is normal I hear} and loves her to death......but above all she is a wonderful daughter and friend....we LOVE her soooo much and can't believe she just turned 14!

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}