Lighten My Life - A Few Updates

Since I was gone for so long w/ the dying computer, here are just a few updates on lightening my life for you:

1. The vegetable garden is planted! We have tomatoes, peppers, squash, zucchini & cucumbers.  So far, all plants are still living, and we even have some tomatoes appearing! Can't wait to enjoy homegrown veggies soon!

2. Lightening my body via Weight Watchers and the Portion Control Meal Plan from E-Mealz is going very well - not ready to share how much I've lost, but I'm getting close to a big milestone, so I'll be sharing more soon!

3. A little progress has been made on Teen K's bedroom makeover.  She has finally settled on a plum quilt & shams from Target.  So now we're on the search for some printed fabric to tie together the blue couch & plum/purples that she wants.  This is our big challenge.  Here are a couple we're considering right now: 
 
Then it's on to paint for the walls!

So there are some updates for now!

Round Top Round Up....

I was lucky enough to spend the day last Saturday exploring the Round Top Antique Fair with my good friend Audrey and my new friend Lindsay (as in Living with Lindsay).  We didn't go to the actual Round Top Antique Fair venues, because they charge you to enter there, but there are PLENTY of free places to check out great stuff along the way and in nearby Warrenton.  I didn't end up buying too much, but it was great fun to check everything out and get some inspiration.  

While honestly the quality of this chair seat cover wasn't fantastic, I loved the idea of the 2 colors of burlap and the embroidery on the seat - there were 4 chairs and they were each numbered 1-4.  It looked like those seams would really fray, but I might have to try something like this on my dining room chairs.  I need to check the place at our mall that does embroidered shirts to see if they would embroider something that I brought in to them. 

I also loved these cards above - but I am sure that if I could find a similar font and then print them on cardstock and use a corner rounder on them for the same results.  They were only $.50 a piece, but why buy when you can print?  Goodness knows I have enough cardstock here!!!

This light fixture was so cool!  Not the greatest photo since I was using my phone, but those are wire baskets on a simple board.  It was actually part of a display and not for sale, but the lady in this tent said people had been photographing it constantly.  She said that you could find it on the internet, but I haven't found it yet!  We started a search for wire buckets after seeing this fixture, and the cheapest we found were $30 a piece.  There's got to be a better way!  It was so unique though - great idea!

 

 This entire tent was just amazing - all lamps made out of things like the fan above, manhole covers, musical instruments, old phones - absolutely incredible!  They are made by a man from Alabama, and were just so cool - and expensive!  I wish I would have gotten more photos of his work, but he looked at me a little funny when I took this picture....The fan would probably be the easiest to recreate 

with a lamp kit and old fan, not so much welding!

This was my favorite find that I didn't actually buy - I just loved this ball!  But not the $40 price tag!!  What the heck?  I am thinking if I could find a similar material and a styrofoam ball, I could recreate it for much less!  I'll let you know how that goes....but I am determined to recreate this one!!

Oh, what DID I buy - well I only spent $25!  Here were my finds....

I love these kinds of plates - this one has scenes from Atlanta, where we used to live.  It reminds me of toile - which I know is no longer a hot trend, but it is classic and I love it still!

I got these little guys where I saw the cards above - that 4 is for the four of us and the letter is from our last name.  I have plans for these in a shadowbox frame as part of my gallery wall I am cooking up in my head. 

And here is my find of finds!  I got this at our first stop, and it was $14 and then 25% off - so for $11 and change, I got the gym locker basket that I've wanted forever.  The tab on the front has a locker number on it (109).  Lindsay saw one later for over $30 in Warrenton, so I feel like I got the deal of the day!  I have no idea what I am going to do with it yet - thinking of maybe rolling up some towels in it for our powder room, but not totally sold on that idea yet.  My father in law said that his high school had baskets just like this in his gym locker room! 

And Lindsay was the winner for finding the creepiest item of the day in the same place where I got the gym locker basket - and NONE of us got a picture of it!  I'm not sure I can even come close to describing it, but it was framed with a cut out drawing of a sleeping baby's face and hand with what was obviously the baby's real satin pillowcase and blanket and....curls of REAL HAIR on the cut-out paper baby head....CREEPY!  I'll definitely have to look for that little gem when we go back to the fall fair on October 1st! 

New Posts Coming!!

No, the computer is not fixed, and no, we haven't bought a new one yet....but it is working for this 5 minutes, so I thought I'd jump on and say I'll be back asap!  Truthfully, I haven't accomplished much, but I did head out to Round Top this past Saturday with my friend Audrey and new friend Lindsay and I did find a couple things that I am going to share....so hang in there with me....I haven't forgotten about my blog! 

Quick Tip

I know I have been largely absent lately, but my computer is barely functioning, so I have to use it for things like banking and tracking my teen's grades online....blogging comes last unfortunately!  So before it dies again, I wanted to share a quick tip that I learned recently.....

I guess everyone in the world could already be doing this, but it was news to me.... When you need to spray cooking spray in a pan or dish, and don't want to also cover your kitchen counters in overspray, open your dishwasher, hold your pan/dish in there and spray away.  Any overspray will wash right away the next time you run it.  Brilliant! 

Hoping to be back soon with that linen closet - haven't tackled it yet, but I'm getting myself psyched up for it!  We did do some de-cluttering in the bonus room over the weekend.  I didn't take any pictures because frankly, it's too embarrassing up there to even share.  BUT 2 trash bags full of junk are gone and there is the beginnings of another Goodwill pile, so progress was made.  Life a little lighter again...

Pantry DONE!!

This is going to be a quick one - my computer is dying a slow & painful death, and just shuts off randomly when I'm in the middle of something.  It took me over an hour & a half to get that last pantry post published, and I just don't have the patience for that tonight!!  BUT - I got the pantry doors done, so I can officially say that my Pantry has been Lightened as well!!

Before on the doors:

This is the side with spices - notice the 4th bin down - those are the smaller spice containers stacked on top of each other.  Yep - that's super fun to rummage through when looking for nutmeg!!  A couple of important facts to know about this side:

1. Now-a-days, spices have expiration dates on them (usually on the bottom or in SUPER small print on the label
2. Spices without dates are probably too old to really be any good.
3. I used to live in Atlanta
4. When in Atlanta, I shopped at Publix grocery store
5. I moved to Central Texas in 2005
6. I found MANY spices that were Publix brand....

Do that math - over 6 years old!  YUM!  I'm sure they were adding a lot of flavor to my cooking....ha ha....Consequently many spices were purged and the containers recycled.  Now I just have to remember to really check the spices before I go to the grocery store!   Here's that side now - and yes, the spices are in alphabetical order cuz I'm just that dorky (except the top shelf which are my Paula Deen spices that I LOVE - they get their own shelf!)

On the left are vinegars & cooking wines, jelly, honey and teas. 

I had WAY too much tea.  So I pared down to my favorite flavors and got rid of the rest.  And, once again, Publix brand vinegars & cooking wines went down the sink & bottles in to the recycling.  I also left that bottom shelf empty (it's not in the after picture) because The Wreaker pulled those koozies out ALL THE TIME and spread them all over the floor - now they are JUST out of her reach....for the moment....

So one more area lightened and organized in my home!  Next up is the linen closet upstairs....that's gonna be a doozy....because it's shaped like a TRIANGLE!!!  I'm not kidding....you'll have to come back and check it out!

Lighten My Life: The Pantry

I've been needing to tackle the pantry for a while now, but, I finally made it happen this afternoon. I had a limited time, because I had to get done while Baby A was napping. Besides the need to organize things and get rid of items that are no longer any good, we needed to baby proof in there.  Baby A, who is now called "The Wreaker" around here (as in wreaks havoc), grabs anything in her reach, so we needed to make sure that anything she could reach was safe for her to grab and inevitably, put in her mouth. 

So here's the before of the pantry:

Just like our master closet clean-out, everything had to come out. I emptied out all the shelves first. Knowing my time was limited to naptime, I was prepared to have to put the doors off until later.  There was shelf paper on the shelves when we moved here, and I thought I could just wash it all down, but wow, it was DISGUSTING!! See:

So I yanked it all out and washed everything down really well.  Now it would be great to repaint the shelves, or paint the pantry a fun color, but let's be realistic, there was just no time for that.  I needed to get this done! So clean shelves were going to have to be enough!

My plan was not to change too much - the overall layout was working for me, but I did need to make a few changes.  We have used white bins for a couple years now to group things together and make it easy to pull out a bin & grab what I need.  For example, there is a bin called Soup & Fruit - so if I am looking for a can of mandarin oranges, I can pull out that bin & grab the can - much easier than going through cans to find the right one! So I was definitely keeping my bin system, but I tweaked it a bit.  I got the bins at Big Lots for less than $2 a piece.  I took a picture of the label to share - looks they are designed to wash dishes, but they are perfect for pantry storage!!

Another reason I needed to clean out this pantry - I found duplicates of some things because it had gotten so disorganized - case in point - 2 kosher salts, both opened - nice...Oh, and they're impossible to combine without ripping the boxes open, so I still have 2 kosher salts in the pantry...

So here is my redone Paper/Plastics bin - everything in one place.  SMILE!  This was one of the most important ones for me because, do you see my plastic sandwich bags in ANOTHER plastic bag? That would be because The Wreaker spent some time the other day pulling every plastic bag out of the box one at a time and spread them out all over the floor, and who knows where the box went, I haven't seen it in days!  So I had to get those plastics above her reach! 

Here's the shelves all finished!!

And, just as I finished this, she woke up from her nap!  The bottom shelf is all plastic, so she can pull down either bin and play away.  The floor is all plastics too - so no worries for mama when she's in the kitchen with me! So the doors will have to wait, but the big part is done, and I'm so happy!  I was able to combine a lot and repackage and this was my stack of recycling when all was said & done with the shelves!!

Yay for pantry reorganization!!  Yay for a safe space for the Wreaker! Yay for a lighter pantry!  Next up - the doors and we'll be all done! 

Mantle-in-Transition

So now that Valentine's Day is over, I felt compelled to get the hearts down from all over the place.  BUT, it IS still February, so this is kind of a "mantle-in-transition" for right now.  For right now, I have kept the snow in the hurricanes, but when March rolls around, I'll switch out the snow.

 Here are some close-ups of each side.  On the right - I just got these 2 sweet little birds.  I had been hoping to find some little birds for the mantle and was so happy to find these little guys - and for only $11 for both!  I am thinking of spray painting them white or cream, but for the St. Patrick's theme right now, they are perfect in green!

 On the left, I was liking the frame that I had on here from Valentine's Day and I have been loving all the subway art out there in the blogosphere, so I decided to try my hand at making one myself.  I created this in Photoshop in several different fonts & colors of green, and then sized it to fit in my frame.  The green vase belonged to my grandmother and it usually lives on a small table, but I really like to have things in 3's on each side of the mantle, so it was a perfect fit for this space.

And because I like to share, here is the St. Patrick's print I created - just right-click on it and select "save image as" if you'd like to use it too.  It's a square, and I'm not sure how well it will print if you grab it off the site, but if you want to give it a try - knock yourself out!

 

I'll be updating the mantle again soon, but this was certainly a quick fix!  Oh yes - I mentioned here that I would show you my cute $1 find for St. Patrick's Day at the Dollar Tree for the cookbook cabinet. And here it is:

It's a terrible picture, because it's night-time and the lighting is not great, but I think it's pretty cute for a buck!