Remember this post? Well, here is the finished project featured in the corner of our living room I never take pictures of due to the bareness of it. The chandelier helps that, but to the right of the chair is a HUGE blank wall that I need to do something with...I think we'll fix that over Christmas break...maybe. Anyways, back to the chandelier. I didn't put any bulbs in it because Jonathan found a 2x4 in the ceiling so we didn't have to switch light fixtures after all (long story). We just hung this one in the living room but since there is no electrical there I just put candles where the bulbs go! Fantastic!

Thanksgiving and Beyond!

At 10:00 AM we had a Thanksgiving breakfast with my dad. Here was the setup at my house. This was Thanksgiving #2 at my house (about 8 people). Remember, Thanksgiving #1 at my house was on Sunday, prior to Thanksgiving (more than 20 people).


Thanksgiving #3 at my house came at 3:00 and here is a little slice of that one. (maybe 15 people)

Once all of the people were gone Jonathan and I began our Christmas decorations and finished the next day. I will post about all my decor later but here is just a little bit...we took our family photo by the tree just like last year.

I also made these two wreaths over the break. I was inspired by a wreath form wrapped in silk ribbon I saw in a magazine and decided to use yarn instead because that is what I already had. I used buttons to add details rather than a bow because...well, I had a lot of left over buttons from a previous project.

Making s'mores in one of our first fires in our fire place!

How cute is Perry?

On Saturday we went camping with our friends Erik and Rachel for just a night. Here the boys are being very mature and fighting each other off of a log.

There was a really pretty river and bridge at the park.

Notice Erik at the top of the bridge...

Resting in the middle of a LONG walk!

Ugh, now back to work for 14 days! THEN Christmas break! (But who's counting?!)

Show Us Your Life - Christmas Traditions

Hello All!

Since Jonathan and I have been married nearly a year and a half this will be our second married Christmas and I am super excited to be spending it in our first home. Here are a few things Jonathan and I did last year at Christmas and some things that have always been done with our families.

Picture Ornament: Our first Christmas I got a picture ornament to hang on the tree and wrote "2008" on the back. This year I bought another one and put "2009" on the back. I want to keep doing this because in 10, 15, 20+ years how funny will it be to look back at Christmas family photos of the past?!

Hand Painted Ornament: I painted this ornament to celebrate our first Christmas in our new house. I think I am going to keep making an ornament each year to commemorate a special event in the year so that at Christmas we can remember how blessed we are!

Photo Albums: This is something Jonathan's mom always does and I love the tradition. Every year Hallmark comes out with a new holiday photo album and she buys one for her and Jonathan's dad, my sister in law and her family, and for Jonathan and I now too! It makes me remember to take a whole bunch of pictures because I'll need a lot to fill the album and then when Christmas is over they get packed up and only taken out again the next year. It's a super fun way to remember the holiday FUN!

Christmas Eve Service: My parents are divorced so Christmas Eve is time with my mom's side. We all go to the candle light service and then go home and do our secret Santa exchange. Since my mom is remarried there are a total of 7 kids between my mom and step dad so the gift exchange is a must and super fun because we try to guess who has who!

Donating to a Family: Jonathan and I are not extravagant people by any means and we rather buy each other a few gifts so that we can spend more money donating gifts to families in need that live in the area. This is something we feel VERY strongly about. Neither one of our love languages is gift giving so it's not that big of a deal to us to spend more money on a family or kids in need rather than on each other. (Don't get me wrong, we buy each other great Christmas gifts but we just like to keep ourselves in check...if that makes sense?)

Travel / Memory Tree: This one if pretty simple. When we travel we pick up an ornament to remember the trip by. Not always a huge vacation (sometimes it's just a date night hence Travel / MEMORY tree) or a huge memorable event but fun none the less! Here is a picture of the 5 we have so far. This is a separate, smaller tree in the front bedroom that you can see through the front window :)

I hope you enjoyed our start at traditions!

Happy Thanksgiving!

What I am thankful for this year! (In no particular order)

1. My wonderful husband as well as my entire family!
2. Jonathan and I being able to purchase a beautiful home.
3. (Student art work) My job because I have been blessed with a job and my job because being an art teacher is low stress and allows for a lot of creativity.
4. My God and His grace. Without him I would have no hope and nothing to be thankful for.
5. My adorable little Perry!

Chandelier Part I

I really want to hang a chandelier above our antique chair in the living room and I saw these on PBteen.com for only 49.99. What a great deal! But, they only come in yellow and blue and while those are the 2 colors in my living room I wasn't looking for that much of a statement piece...our walls are bold enough already! So, I got to thinking...these look just like those builder grade brass chandeliers I see for sale on Kingwoodyardsales.com all the time but just painted. I could totally do that!

So I found this one for 20 bucks. When Jonathan and I went to pick it up the house it was coming from was HUGE and little did we know this baby was ALL BRASS so it weights about 50 lbs! It was not a builder grade chandelier but it was just ugly because I don't like brass. We decided this one has to take the place of the chandelier in the bathroom because it is already wired for a light fixture and is reinforced to hold the weight. Where we were going to put it above the chair, we were just going to hang it from the ceiling and have it be a candlier but it would fall out of the sheet rock because it would be too heavy. Anyhow, so the one in the bathroom is really light weight so it will be repainted to go in the living room.


Here is a detail. All the curves are actually birds...pretty cool. We didn't notice that detail until we got home.


Here is the first phase of painting I did last night.

Off to paint some more...and to go to the dentist. :( Then I am DIYing a fun wreath!

About Me

What is your favorite book? Jane Eyre

What is the best vacation you’ve ever had in your life? My honeymoon to SanFran! It was great! Way better than Jamaica this summer that's for sure!

How were you as a kid ? Independent, strong willed, very girly but I had two brothers so I hit a lot...not at school though. I was always perfect at school. I only got in trouble for talking too much.

If given a choice to skip work for a day, how would you spend the entire day? Probably DIYing the house and shopping at TJmaxx or Homegoods

What is the funniest prank you have played on someone? I put a rubber band around the hand sprayer on the sink and waited for my mom to turn on the faucet. Of course, when she did it drenched her! It was great...this was in high school and she didn't even get mad!

What is your favorite color and why? Blue and green (blue like the sky and green like the grass)

What career do you plan to pursue? Well, I am an art teacher but this summer I am going to try to start doing professional organization. We'll see how it goes...but I do love organizing my house and other people's homes so I should love it!

What is your dream car? Current car shopping includes BMW x3, Jeep Commander, Volvo xc90, Mazda cx7...my dream car is a G-Wagon so I don't think I'll get that :(

What do you love for breakfast? On the weekends I love waffles, or omelets, or french toast. Those are my favorites but I am really good at making chocolate chip pancakes.

What is the first thing you notice about people? Teeth and shoes...generally

What do you usually do on Sundays? Wake up late, eat something yummy for breakfast (see previous question), head off to church with our friends, go out to lunch, come home and go grocery shopping, get ready for Monday.

What do you think you will be doing five years from now? Five years from now we'll maybe have a toddler so I'll be "retired" from teaching and will maybe be doing organization full time so I can be a stay at home mom or working at a mother's day our type of thing at our church.

Where do you think you'll be living five years from now? I have no idea. Since Jonathan is getting his masters (he'll be done in 18 months!)I really don't know where that will take us because I don't know where he'll be working or where he'll get his Dr. degree. Maybe we'll still be in Porter maybe not...close by though probably...

Office Nook and Guest Room

Welcome from Kelly's Korner!

In our home we don't have a designated "office" but we do have 2 areas that we use often.

The first space is the office nook.  My husband and I designed and built this area ourselves.  (See the full story here)

The second area is actually one of my favorite rooms in the house because it is totally 100% finished!  This is one of our guest rooms but we put a desk in here so it could do double duty.  It's worked out for us great!

It's a good mix in our opinions.  It has a desk, computer, diplomas, and Jonathan's guitars but it also has drapes, a bed, a comfy chair, a dresser, and some of my decor.  All in all the space just really works well for us both!

a hodge podge

This post is just a whole bunch of things from this weekend.

First are these cute owls. Apparently someone gave these to me when I was about 4 or 5 when I was at my grandmother's house. She didn't want me to lose them so they've been at her house ever since until today. She brought them by and said they were actually mine so I should have them. Aren't they cute?


Our first Thanksgiving of the season and at our new house was a hit! Here we are watching "Christmas Vacation" outside in our back yard! This was super fun and we made smores! YUM!

Here is the big table in the living room for extra seating since we had 20 adults, 2 kids, and a dog in the house. I covered the table in butcher paper (idea from here The World Fascinates Me),drew a huge tree and "Happy Thanksgiving" on the table, and then put out crayons to color with. It was fun!

Here we are at my Dad's book signing which went great!

Perry, and his HUGE bone. He was in puppy heaven!

I find this pretty funny! A student drew this of me. Notice my hair covering my eye...yeah, my hair was in a ponytail that day but I guess she would prefer it to be down. Also, notice the length of my pants...um, I don't wear high waters! Still cute though.

Here are a few second grade self portraits looking out a window. Some of them actually look like the students!

And, another baby hospital sign I made for my cousin's little one due in January.

That is all...since I have to work tomorrow AND TUESDAY! UGH!!!!

Busy, Busy

The weekend is nearly here but I feel like I have more going on during the weekend and holiday than I actually did this week. Tonight we are going to pick up our photo cd, due some early Christmas shopping, and I'll be working on another birth announcement sign.

Then, on Saturday Jonathan and I are going to a couple's baby shower with my mom and precious nephew Cooper. After that we are coming home to lay low and Jonathan will be doing grad school work...not sure what I'll be doing...something crafty I'm sure.

Sunday is the day of my dad's book signing at Barnes and Noble in the Woodlands (@ 2:00). His book, Third Party Candidate, was released a few months ago but this is his first signing. After that my mom's side of the family is having their Thanksgiving at our house...yes, this weekend!

Monday and Tuesday I have work but I have a shorter schedule because I'll just be working with Kinder. This past school week I only taught 3 days and had the other two with NO KIDS and next week I only teach 2 days...not a bad two weeks in teaching.

Wednesday I have a dentist appointment but after that Jonathan and I will be DIYing again to get the house ready for 2 more Thanksgiving celebrations.

Thursday (Thanksgiving) My dad, step mom, brother Austin, brother Travis, Sister in law Ashley, and nephew Cooper will be joining us for breakfast and then Jonathan's family will come over for Thanksgiving dinner on Thanksgiving day!

I'm getting tired just thinking about it!

Then on Saturday and Sunday we're going camping with our friends Erik and Rachel!

...phew! We have a lot going on!

AND in other news we had originally thought my step sister was having a baby girl. (She did a gender pee test...usually right and looked at the Chinese Lunar Calender...again, sounds crazy but usually right. Both said GIRL) Well, she had her Dr. appointment and drum roll please...it is a BOY! So, Jonathan and I will go from 5 nieces and nephew to 8 in the next few months. Currently we have (in birth order) Isabelle, Grace, Zakary, Cooper, and Caleb. In January, Abigail will arrive. In March Joshua Aaron will enter the world and a few weeks later in April Molly Kathryn will make her debut. I don't know if I can handle that many baby showers!!!

Wednesday Want

Jonathan and his mom are always talking about how they want to get a small RV. While they're having these conversations I make fun of them because I think RVs are so dorky. I told Jonathan we could get one if we got a Tumbleweed Home (Tumbleweed Houses) or an airstream. Well, since a Tumbleweed house is 40,000 dollars (at least) and the cheapest used airstream I could find on Ebay was 10,000 I don't think we'll be getting either anytime soon! I'm pretty bummed about the prices because they are both SO CUTE! Tumbleweed also makes real (non-mobile) floor plans as well! How cute would one be for a lake house? Jonathan's grandfather has land on Lake Livingston that he said he would give us (he said if we wanted to buy it we could have it for 1000$ and if he was dead when we wanted it we could just have it...ha!) so maybe one day.

Ahh...SO CUTE!

P.S. Funny RV story: On the way to the BU homecoming game I saw a HUGE RV with BU on the tire cover. I sped up next to it and saw the drivers were in their late 60's, honked my horn, and did the Sic'em sign to them...they laughed and honked back when they saw "Baylor" on the back of my car...ha ha! I love BU!

P.S.S Jonathan and I are thinking of getting me a German Shepard to make me feel safer when I'm home alone so, on this Wednesday I also want this beauty. An all white German Shepard!

Hostess with the Mostess!

December 5th there is going to be an engagement party at my house. Here is the invitation and the envelopes I printed for the occasion! I LOVE them and am rather proud of myself!

And, just for good measure...a picture of my sweet husband and I at a wedding a few months ago.

A Teacher's Down Time

Being an art teacher allows me a little more free time than a normal teacher. For example, I didn't have any classes today because I switch between two schools and am given a full day to switch when I go to my next school. Well, I am usually busy in my room setting up but it is just SO QUIET that I can't stand it so I get on United Streaming (web site with TONS of educational videos for your classroom) look up something I am interested in and then listen to the documentary while I work in my room...don't make fun. My school blocks EVERY music/radio web site so this is all I can do to break the silence on my free days.

Here are some of the documentaries I have watched.

Emily Dickinson

John Singer Sargent

Impressionism

Protestant Reformation

Martin Luther

The Bronte sisters

Renaissance Art

Jane Austen

Tchaikovsky

Greek Art

Roman Art

Baroque Art

Thomas Jefferson

I actually enjoy it!