Upcoming Excitement

There are so many activities (if you don't get why that is funny and italics, you need to see Step Brothers or visit this link and try to ignore the language) coming up!

Tomorrow

Sawyer gets to experience his first Christmas parade! He didn't get to go last year thanks to the cruddy weather, so I am hoping he will enjoy it this year!

December 8

My friend Rachel is coming home from Hungary where she has been teaching since August so some ladies are getting together with her to do a low-key, but fun reunion hitting up a comedy club and grabbing some dinner.

at Rachel's going away party in August

Me, Rachel & Hope in our friend Dana's wedding (2009)

I can hardly wait to actually see her in person instead of just skyping and emailing!

December 13

Sunday school Christmas party, always fun with Bingo and steaks (did I mention that we go to the "old people" Sunday School class because my dad teaches it, so we are the youngest people by about 50 years?

December 14

Moody/Harrell/Edmondson Christmas party with my family and sister's boyfriend's family. 

Sawyer "helping" unwrap gifts at last year's Christmas gathering

Me, John John & Dee at the ECU//UNC game in 2011

December 15

Christmas Tailgate Party. Not like a literal tailgate, but we having our tailgate crowd over to the new house to not only let them see it but also to celebrate Christmas! And get to see each other now that football season is over.

Life Update

I swear I am still here ya'll. Things are a little hectic right now around the Edmondson household. We've had more than too much going on.

My precious Mema Dean has been moved to a rehab facility following a fall that resulted in a back surgery that caused her to crash on the operating table. Praise God for amazing doctors who brought her back to life, even if it did mean her being intubated, having a few broken ribs from chest compressions and scaring our family to death. She is recovering well and slowly getting back to her usual self, but it has been so hard for her to go from being an independent matriarch of our family to having to be taken care of, doing constant physical therapy and living in an assisted living/rehab facility. She will hopefully be home before Christmas, but keep praying please!

Mema Dean, Mama, Me & Deanna on Mother's Day 2012

Sawyer has also been sick with an ear infection... eye infection.. AND upper respiratory infection. He is on ear drops, eye drops and an antibiotic and let me tell you, putting eye drops in a squirmy 21 month old's eyes? Yeah, it is seriously next to impossible. He started feeling bad the Sunday after Thanksgiving and is just now getting better but has definitely spread the love and given Josh and I the respiratory stuff.

little post-Turkey lunch nap for the Bug

Then of course there is Christmas shopping, decorating and planning for the fun-filled (but busy) next couple of weekends.  Can't wait for things to calm down so I can have some time to sit down and blog again! See ya'll soon!

photo flop.

taking a little break from the house tour to talk about how I have a major love/hate relationship with taking pictures.

We took a moment Saturday to grab some shots to use for our Christmas cards.... and I didn't like hardly any of them.

Not because they aren't good pictures (after all, my dad took them), but because I didn't really think through them too well before we took them (which is insane because I am usually a little bit a major over-thinker)

I wanted to go take another picture by the water tower in my home town, since my favorite wedding picture was taken there. I thought it would be cool to have another one there, two years later with Sawyer.

Well the weather didn't corporate since it was SO windy and sunny we squinted for every picture.

see, I have no eyes.

AND our reds don't match (Yes, i realize how petty this is)

But I did get three that I like.

This one:

But wait, my Christmas cards say "merry christmas from our new home"... so what sense does it make to have the water tower from our old town in the background?

Also, could my shirt be any more wrinkly? And why did I think red was a good idea for me?

And these two, mainly because it is just too precious of our little bug and Josh needs more pics of just them two.

So now I am stalking Pinterest for better ideas for posing and such, since I didn't even think about how I need the picture to be close together and close up to fit our Christmas cards the first time. 

These are my favorites...

except maybe we could have Sookie in one our laps since we obviously don't have a second childvia

this is my absolute favorite, and probably what we will go with, close up and "homey" so it would fit with the "Merry Christmas from our new home" theme
via

this is a close second favorite since I could hide all those body parts of me I don't really care for behind Joshua haha
via

Decor Amour: Part 2

read part 1 here

...When you walk through our living room there's a nice large entry way to our kitchen.

I am still working on a few things I want to do in here (in other words, I am waiting for some Hobby Lobby gift cards in my stocking and hopefully Santa brings two rugs).

I made the table runner from some Hobby Lobby fabric and wonderful Heat Bond tape for the hemming (because I sure can't sew). I just spray-painted the silver chargers I already had a nice bronze color, bought the napkins and little topiary tree things at Target and found the cute succulent napkin rings at ZGallerie. 

close-up of the napkin rings from ZGallerie

better view of the napkins (this is actually the table runner in the same fabric)

My favorite part of my kitchen - besides finally having a dishwasher and pantry are the things i have hanging on either side of the front window.

That big smudgey thing on the top left is a mirror that needs cleaning bad, the two picture frames are old ones that I just spray-painted to match the new color scheme (green, red & yellow), I found the "Roll With It" print at Over the Big Moon and just made some color changes, the key came from Hobby Lobby and I made the chevron/Joshua 24:15 printable. That big red sun was once my Mema Kay's, I had it in the back bedroom in the old house and I am so glad I got to paint it and put it somewhere more visible now!

For the right side of the wall, I used a metal flower sign from Hobby Lobby, spray painted an old frame red, covered a wooden "E" in the same fabric as my table runner and used an existing frame for the picture of Sookie. That big red fork (which came the Hob Lob)? It totally fell off the wall and every one of his tines broke off, praise God for hot glue guns. I think it needs a wooden spoon to go underneath, thoughts?

Between the two walkways (one that leads to the play room and the other that leads to the living room) I have my old china cabinet. I spray painted (are you sensing a theme here?) one of my tall flower tub things bronze and got some flowers from the Hobby Lobby, along with some candles and a little owl figurine (which I also spray painted). The big "E" picture was a wedding gift from Josh's step-grandma and didn't really match much in the old house, so I was happy to finally have a place to hang it. 

and finally - a PANTRY!

We also have a nice desk area and laundry room right beside the pantry but woof, it needs some work. Right now it is still storing some unpacked boxes and a bunch of mess, I need a weekend to dedicate to that area.

Decor Amour: Part 1.

When I discovered we had to move for husband's job, the feature that excited me most wasn't the bigger size of house we would be getting, or being closer to work (and more importantly, Bojangles), instead I was most excited about getting to decorate a new house!

Thanks to Hobby Lobby, TJ Maxx, HomeGoods and spray paint. I re-decorated on a budget and I love the results.

Here are a few shots of the entry way at the new place...

as you can kinda see, my little silver tray on the table has become the drop-off point  for keys, wallets and etc.

by spray-painting old frames, printing out that little "Edmondson" sign and modge-podging it onto an old piece of wood and printing out some printables I made, this was a pretty cheap little entry way. Also, you can see my DIY Initial Art post here.

Directly to the left of the entry way is the living room and a little wall between the living room and play room, where I put some of our wedding pictures.

Then we move on to the living room..

The only new things in the living room are the chairs and couch (Hardees Furniture), green lamps (Target) and silhouette art (DIY project). I spray-painted existing picture frames, then brought the shelf from over our fire place in the old house to put over our new couch, and used our end tables and other furniture from the old house.

Then... there's the other corner of the living room.... that I definitely haven't unpacked. But I have a good reason: we plan on putting the Christmas tree there. And lord knows I don't want to unpack all the books that are filling those gray totes then have to pack them right back up.

Monday, I'll share my favorite room.. the kitchen!

Saw it, Pinned it, Did it #3

I am linking up again with Katie @ Keep Calm & Carry On and Steph @ Beautiful Mess again for "Saw it, Pinned it, Did it"!

My new memo board!

I saw a great Memo Board made from fabric, scrapbook paper and a picture frame at Red Heads Craft More Fun (how fitting right?) and I just had to make it for the empty wall in our laundry room area, right by the door to the garage.

(I didn't include the scrapbook paper and such because I did things a little differently). 

1. Find your old framed picture or poster (or buy a new one) and take out the existing inside cardboard piece or poster if it's hard (that's what she said). 

love this poster, but doesn't really match the new decor.

2. Now, this step can vary. If you want, you just cut a piece of scrapbook paper, but I used fabric, so I wrap the existing poster in the fabric (leftover from my monogram art project) and secured it with packing tape. 

Make sure the fabric is pulled really tight, to prevent bubbles and ripples.

3.  Either use scrapbook paper and letter stickers or print out cute little things that you may want on your memo board OR just use the Memo Board like a plain dry-erase board and leave it blank to write anything on. 

sheets I made (with the amazing Adobe Creative Suite) for my board

4. Secure the scrapbook paper or whatever you used on your fabric then put back into frame.

This is totally photoshopped - forgot to take a picture of it not hanging with the things on it.

5. Hang your new memo board and enjoy! Also, don't be like me and forget to buy dry erase markers....

And here's how it would look without the printables...

Go link-up, and check out all the other crafty ladies!