Gallery wall pondering...

In my quest to continue decorating our first home, I have a decided to attempt a gallery wall in a little space in our living room.  I was already thinking about this, inspired by a few different house blogs, and then, my favorite house blog- Young House Love, did this in their home, which you can see here.  

I'm taking it as a sign. 

Right now our old entertainment console is housed in this space, and there is a large expanse of open wall above it.  I have debated if I want to do a conglomeration of family wedding photos, or images from trips we've taken, if I should do all the same frames or a mix of different frames in the same color, or different frames in different colors. 

I think I've decided to do different frames in the same color, and as for the images that will fill the frames, right now I'm thinking it will be some wedding, some travel, and some others I have in mind.  I still need to collect more frames, and decide how to get them all the same color (I'm thinking brown spray paint of some kind), so this won't be a Here's-what-I'm-going-to-do-and-now-it's-done post.  Instead, this is a I-will-post-it-so-then-I-have-to-do-something.

I'll keep you updated.

Welcoming baby Kyla

A few weekends ago, some friends and I threw a baby shower for an expectant couple in our small group.  April and Sean will welcome baby Kyla this Tuesday, and I am so excited to meet her!  Everyone really pitched in and the shower was a great success!

I got the cake from my friend Erin over at Caked by Erin!  She did a great job of making the cake match our theme (Kyla's room decor), and it was not only gorgeous, but delicious too! I definitely recommend her for your next special occasion!

We played some fun games...

And opened presents, including Dr Pepper Marinade for baby Daddy...

My friend Jamie made the diaper cake.

 Now just waiting on Kyla to make an appearance!  Pray for a safe delivery and a healthy baby!

Dining room redo!

While all the snow was falling here in Oklahoma, we were making a big change in our dining area. We had a pretty clean slate to start with:

Boring, neutral, blah blah blah.  The table and chairs were actually purchased from a college roommate, and while they have been perfect for hosting friends and family, it was time for a bit of an update.  And so, I announced to Blake that I was going to paint them white.  I googled how to paint wood furniture, he laid down a tarp (no way was I painting out in the freezing cold garage), and I started on step one: sanding.

 Sanding= boring.  And tedious, and boring some more.  So, as I finished up the table and side table, I decided the chair didn't really need to be sanded.  Now, some sites had said sanding wasn't always necessary, so I wasn't too worried about skipping this step on the chairs.

Then came step two: primer.  Except we didn't have any primer.  And there was over 14 inches of snow on the ground, so a quick trip to Walmart wasn't an option.  So, I pulled on my non waterproof suede boots, and trudged over to our nice neighbors house to ask to borrow some.  Some neighbors borrow an egg, or a cup of sugar, but I go for Kilz water based primer.

 So then once everything was primed, I got to painting.  Just joking.  By the time everything was sanded and primed, I had been working on this stuff for about 7 hours and I was dunzo for the day.  I was also kind of regretting my decision to start this massive project.  I mean really, what's wrong with neutral and boring?

However, apparently primer is not an acceptable final look so the next morning I started the first coat of paint.  The first of four coats.  Five in some areas.  And somewhere between coat two and three I started thinking very not nice thoughts about all of my favorite home improvement blogs.  Blogs that had led me to believe that it's easy to paint wood furniture.  That the money you save is worth the time and energy you pour into the project.  I started to think they were all a bunch of LIARS.  Nice liars, but liars nonetheless.

Midway through the second day, we ventured out to pick up some paint for our accent wall.  We had gotten curtain material (score!) from Blake's grandma, from some old curtains she didn't use anymore, and when we put them up we realized they didn't exactly "pop" against our neutral wall.  You can see the beginnings of the blue we chose in the background of the above image.  Blake actually painted that whole wall while I was in Chicago for my birthday, and when I got back we finished up the rest of the furniture.  We also bought a bench for our dining set and Blake hung the rest of the curtains this past week.  Without further adieu, here's the finished product:

We're really happy with how it turned out!  I still need to work on some different artwork, and I bought a vintage Pottery Barn table runner on ebay I'm still waiting on, but this is what the room currently looks like.  Definitely a big improvement!  What do you think?

Snow-klahoma!

This post is a bit delayed, but I didn't want to let the blizzard of 2011 completely pass without mentioning it here on the blog.  My 26th birthday was February 1st, and that was also the day we got 14 inches of SNOW!!!  Blake's classes were canceled, my work closed, and I got 4 snow days for a birthday present:)  We never lost power, so I actually really enjoyed the time off.  I noticed over on Facebook a lot of people complaining about cabin fever a day or so in and personally, I thought they were all crazy!  Everyone always talks about never having the opportunity to slow down, or having enough time at home with loved ones, and then it was dropped in our laps and they were all complaining!  We took the snow days as a little stay-cation, filled with sleeping late, snuggling, watching movies, and eating way too much food!

The view out our front door- still snowing!

Blake and Gus playing in the snow- Gus LOVES the snow!

But of course I couldn't be completely lazy for long- Wednesday I started in on redoing our dining room.  But that's a story for another blog post- don't worry, I've been taking photos!  If you're in Oklahoma, how did you spend your snow vacation?

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas...

Blake and I don't have a LOT in the way of Christmas decorations, but what we do have, I love.  So, here is just a glimpse of what makes our house festive this time of year.

This is my newest Christmas decor- just a bundle of poinsettias for our dining area:)

Our stockings hang above the fireplace- Ellie and Gus's are more exciting as ours.  We hope to have Blake's grandma make us some next year.

Our tree was given to us by my parents, and it's decorated in silver, white, and Crimson (Boomer!).

My favorite decoration is our Willow Tree Nativity.  It was a gift from our wedding and I just love it.  I've even told Blake we could just put it up, place the presents around it and forget about the tree haha.

So there you have it, some of our Christmas decor.  We have a few other pieces, but it's definitely a process, collecting things we love.  What does Christmas at your house look like?

The week before Thanksgiving.

I adore Thanksgiving.  It is so wonderful to have a holiday set aside to spend time with family, eat amazing food, and remember all the blessings in our lives.  When I was little, right before eating we would always go around and name something for which we were thankful.  This was quite possibly my favorite part of the day- this and my Grandma's mac n cheese (Grandma makes a mean mac n cheese). 

The other day, I was checking out one of my favorite blogs: YoungHouseLove.com and found this post: http://www.younghouselove.com/2010/11/thanks-glassing/

I MUST DO THIS.  When I hit the Black Friday sale, a glass container and that etching stuff is on my list.  I could go beforehand, but I make it a rule to only step foot in stores when I have to:)

The Election

This past Tuesday was a big day for Blake and I.  He had a big test (which he did well on), and the election was Tuesday as well.  My boss was up for re-election, so there was a lot of nervous energy around the office.  I drove precincts that evening, calling in numbers, and then Blake and I went up to celebrate at the watch party.  My boss won by quite a bit, and it was a huge relief for Blake and I as we suspected my job was in jeopardy if it had gone the other way.  So glad it's over!

This weekend we're heading up to Lamar for the opening day of duck season.  Blake is hunting with his brother and dad, and we're also going to all attempt a family photo this weekend using the fabulousness that is a tripod.  We'll see how it goes.

I'm thinking of trying to make my own curtains in the dining room and my studio.  I found some material I loved for the dining room, but I think it's been discontinued.  The search continues!

Lori as a decorator: FAIL

Blake and I bought our lovely home in June 2009 (or July- maybe I should check my blog).  Before this we rented, and I was constantly thinking how excited I would be when we finally had a home I could decorate.  And here it is, a blank slate before me!  Our house is fairly new, built in 2005, and has a great layout, and wonderfully neutral walls.  I could do ANYTHING I want.  So what do I do?  Nothing.  Because I'm too stinkin' indecisive, and feel like a move in any direction will have me on this path I can't reverse in case I change my mind.  I'm afraid to decorate.

The way a home is decorated says so much about the people that live there.  I adore home decor and home improvement sites, and I come up with tons of ideas about what to do in our house.  Painted walls, interesting art, homey touches.  I'm a creative person, gosh darnit.  I love color, and shapes, and texture, and the way a perfectly placed image can make you cry (just me?).  And yet, my house is boring.  Neutral.

However, I will say that a bit of this neutrality and indecisiveness has come in rather handy lately.  We recently did a little switcheroo in our house.  Our former game room/ formal dining is now Blake's office.  Blake's former office is now our guest room, and our former guest room is now my photography studio!  We had talked since the day we moved in about buying a futon for Blake's office, but never got around to it.  Good thing as we now have no place for a futon.  We JUST purchased curtains for the guest room, but hadn't purchased anything for the office.  Good thing, as we just purchased the same curtain rod and moved the curtains into the new room and have a rod in my studio begging for curtains (won't that be a fun decision?)

What I'm saying is, it's been a good thing so far I wasn't super decisive.  But, seeing what a difference curtains in one room made, I'm motivated to move forward.  Plus, I'm pretty thrifty, so for the most part, decor decisions will not be breaking the bank in the Crockett casa.  If I change my mind, it's ok.  Explaining to Blake I've changed my mind... well, it's a good thing he loves me:)