Happy Pinning!

A few months ago after hearing about Pinterest, I deiced to joined sounded like fun, well it took me until yesterday to actually starting Pinning. For those of you who haven't heard of Pinterest here's the definition "Pinterest lets you organize and share all the beautiful things you find on the web. People use pinboards to plan their weddings, decorate their homes, and organize their favorite recipes"

Even though I've only been using it for 24 hrs, I'm already in love. It's so much fun and a great way to find beautiful and creative ideas, and you can add follower other people and see what their pinning and vice versa. I love how collaborative it is, and the cool thing it it links back the site where the idea was originally pinned at, so you can get the in depth 'how to.' Since I'm a newbie I only have 4 boards: I Love Baby, My Style, Favorite Spaces & Places, My Style and For the Home. Here's a few things I've pinned so far.

Darling kids softie kids bowling set, via Anthropoligie. I really thing Avery needs these, don't you! 

Also from Anthropologie { oh how I love them! } I love this knob and think it might look super cute on out MCM Secretary desk, that's almost finished! :) It says 'Favorite Things to Keep Forever' 

I really really love cake stands, I've been drooling over this style that Martha Stewart & Rachel Ray both use on their shows. I need this jadeite cake stand in my life STAT. It would make a darling present to our kitchen, when its finally done. Yep, I'm a firm believer in gifted rooms goodies once they look pretty :) 

So if you haven't already joined, or on the fence about joining our just learning about go take a peek its a blast!! For those of you already on Pinterest, follow me and I can't wait to see all of your pretty Pinboards. Here's my link to Pinterest. I'm so excited about filling my boards up with pretty things :)

Oh and Happy Pinning! 

Are you on Pinterest? What Do you think about it? What's your link to your Pinterest? 

Spooky Halloween Entryway

This month has just flown by, and Halloween is only a few days away! For Halloween last year we decorated our entry with Spooky Scary bugs this year the black crows took over our entryway. It's so much fun to decorate our entry, it creates a great focal point in out living room { since it opens up right into our living }  For this years Halloween decor we used a mix of paper crows and the stuffed { fake } kind for a creepy look. I also used the Flor rug tiles I purchased last year, if you look close you can see the pattern of the spiderwebs, creepy! Here's our Spooky Halloween entryway.

I might have to paint the inside door jam of our front door, the exposed wood is looking funky! lol

On the inside of the door, I also hung the black feather wreath I made a few years ago. This was a super simple project, here's the how to. Here's a nice full view of our entryway. 

Since we've decorated our entryway two years in a row, I think its becoming our family tradition. We all like taking turns adding to the creepy factor.


Have you decorated for Halloween? If so did you go with a theme? I'd love to hear! 

My Next...

As you know I've been doing all lot of sewing projects for the past few months and have gotten better at sewing, practice makes perfect right? I'm a novice self taught sewer, my mom taught me the basics threading the bobbin and sewing a straight line a few years back, since then I've been learning as I go. I bought this book a few years back when I was first leaning to sew Sewing 101 for $ 16 bucks via Amazon. The project pictures are dated, but it really gives you the good basics. It really helped me and me be a good resource for any one beginning to sew. It also added words to my vocabulary: like bobbin, zig zag stitch, blind hem etc. 

I came across this book, The Complete Photo Guide to Sewing recently on Amazon its the same price I as the one I already own and looks to be worth every penny! If your interested in learning to sew, check out either book. And, nope I'm not getting paid to promote these books! It's my opinion that there helpful and may be helpful to you. 

I have a simple sewing machine a Singer Prelude, I bought on sale at Target 4 years ago the day after Thanksgiving ( Black Friday ) its a good sewing machine has the basic stitches with no bells and no whistles. I think I paid around $ 60 bucks for it? Here's my sewing machine below.

It's a good little sewing machine and every now and then we have words when my thread jams due to tension issues. But I like I said its basic and I've been wanting to get a new machine to tackle more and more projects. I want my next sewing machine to be heavy duty. I really like the look of the Singer Heavy Duty sewing machine and love that it can handle heavy materiel and as 23 stitches and it sews faster too!! Pretty stylish for a sewing machine huh! 

I'm pretty sure this will be my next sewing machine, even though some of the reviews are mixed, which is to be expected. I think it will be fun to tackle larger projects on and be really helpful when sewing outdoor stuff like cushions for our patio. Now that I've shared whats on my Next List its your turn! :)

What's on your Next List? New sewing machine? New Phone? a New Laptop??? 

Roman Shade in the Kitchen

As I mentioned on Friday on our 'To-Do' list is updating our kitchen and making the entire room feel light, brighter cleaner etc. The plan for our kitchen is to take on many mini projects that will add up over time. One project ( or want ) I’ve been wanting for our kitchen for quite some time is a pretty roman shade in to fill the dull void between the two cabinets. Currently we have basic white faux-wood blinds which will stay, it’s all about prettying up the space. I’ve collected some pretty pictures with my vision of what will be very soon. Since we the plan on painting our cabinets white very soon! I know I’ve said these exact words in the past, but I mean it this time. I’m over the dark cabinets, very over. I went back and forth between solid roman shades, woven roman shades, and pattern. I'm really drawn to pattern roman shades because they add such a pretty layer of color into a room. Here’s the round-up of pretty roman shades!

{ via Decorpad }

{ via Atmosphereid }

{ via here }

 I just need a pretty stationary shade since I’m keeping the basic faux-wood blinds for added privacy at nighttime. So I decided to make a faux roman shade. Here’s a reminder of how kitchen currently looks (kind-of) we have removed the left side cabinet doors and had the middle cut out, we are replacing the panels with glass inserts. They’ll go back on after we start painting. Be nice! I know the 1980’s white and brown grout is hard to look at (we ripping that out) In my mind I can see a really pretty space, dream with me OK!  I do like the layout our small kitchen and know that painting it white + new back splash + new counters + new sink + a million and one other changes will all make a huge difference and make the roman shade look great in the space.

Since our dining room and kitchen share the space and I LOVE the drapes I recently sewed for the dining room, I decided to go the ‘matchy matchy’ route and use the same fabric. I purchased two more yards at 5.99 per yard and I used my 20% off coupon. Don’t you just love coupons! I was a little concerned about using the same fabric because the print is very large, but if I don’t like it after it’s hung and the cabinets have been painted white I only spent $ 9.59 so I’m not going to be supper upset. Here’s what I have thus far, the fabric had been cut and sew and the roman pleats widths are be tweaked. 

The roman shade will be hung very soon and I’ll share the how-to and before roman shade entered our kitchen and after! Of course the real after won't come for awhile, but adding up the many mini projects really make me happy and its easier on my eyes! 

Is there a mini project you want to complete in your kitchen? Or do you have many mini projects you want to get done?