Quote for the Season

Creativity is allowing yourself to make mistakes.
Art is knowing what to keep.

Need I say more?

The Smith Center

My incredible husband just had a birthday.  He already has everything he needs and most everything he wants. Gift giving is not my strong suite, and I fret every time a birthday or gift giving holiday comes up. This year, I decided to give him a gift that will keep on giving, and enrolled him in the "cheese of the month club".   Just kidding.   I decided to take him out on a date to the Smith Center for the Broadway Las Vegas Series.  I'm super excited to see 4 remarkable shows over the next 4 months with my awesome husband.  This is a gift that gives to me too. (That sounds bad huh?)  Well, that isn't why I gave the gift, but it turns out to be a nice perk. We are going to see... The Color Purple, Memphis, The Million Dollar Quartet and Mary Poppins.  I am sure we will really enjoy these shows, and time out with each other.

Kitchen Redo Opinion Poll

 I really want a new kitchen.  Mine is functional, but dated. My kitchen layout is very similar to these photos.  Stove, sink, island and table placement are very much like this picture above. I don't have as big an island as this one with the bar stools, but would love to change that as my island isn't very practical for the size of my family.  I already have dark, hand scraped 6" hardwood plank floors. This will not change.  I love this floor.  So now the decision is what color should the cabinets and island be? Do I go light, or dark?

Imagine this with dark floors...

 Currently my cabinets are oak... boring and tired. I like the look of the island being a different finish from the rest of the kitchen, but wonder if this will be a trend that will date my new kitchen faster.

Charming...

I love the idea of a farm sink, but don't know if they are as functional as a regular sink.  I know I can get a split farm sink, that may be very close to what I'm used to.   They sure look nice.

This is nice too.  I love the marble island top

I like the table that's attached to island. Any thoughts?

My kitchen layout is the opposite of the above photo, with the fridge being on the left side of the photo out of view.  Family room is at the bottom of the photo just past the table.  We really use our kitchen a ton, so it needs to be functional as well as aesthetically pleasing to the eye.  I would love your feedback and opinions.  Please leave a comment.

The Locket

So I just read a little book called The Locket by Richard Paul Evans. My mother in law was a huge fan of his and bought every book he wrote. When she passed away, quite a few of them ended up in boxes in our garage. I just pulled them out and put them on an empty shelf in my family room. I only did this because they are cute little books that look nice on the shelf, and I have a "new" funky compote that looked lonely on the shelf without books. Turns out that was a great move on my part, because looking at those cute little books made me curious enough to pick one up and start reading.

Little did I know what an enjoyable book I would find it to be. I grabbed the first one of interest, and it turned out to be the first of a series. It was a great, quick read. The next book I'll dive into is called The Looking Glass. I'll let ya know what I think when I finish it, but for now, I'll leave it to say, if you haven't read The Locket. You should. It was good.

Finding fun

When life gets dull, my awesome husband & I look for ways to find fun. We don't want to spend much money doing this, in fact most of the joy for us is in finding free fun. He has this hobby of buying vintage items that he loves and thinks are cool. Now our 10 gallon house has about 20 gallons of stuff in it. This is the reason we started our Etsy shop and named it finding fun!  You really ought to check it out, we have some very unique items for simply fab prices!  We have vintage picnic hampers, umbrellas, typewriters, books, vinyl records and postcards, just to name a few. http://www.etsy.com/people/findingfun.
 Have Fun!

Abigail & Co.

My girls used to share a room.  After my oldest moved into a room of her own, the younger one wanted a "new look".  I played around with design ideas for a while, and then worked on convincing my good husband.  Once we were both on board the project began.  We remodeled this kinda bland white room and gave it a more grown up look.

This is their room before...

 White walls, white furniture,

 pastel bedding and drapes.

 Not much to write home about.

 Even the flower boarder at top of walls is unfinished.

With a pop of Tiffany Blue paint, we were off and running.

A Breakfast and Tiffany's theme was my jumping off place,

 and I added touches of bling and black and white and french things.

I painted french looking harlequins around the top 

of the walls, making an interesting boarder.  In 

keeping with the "Tiffany & Co." theme, I then 

added bling to the corners of each diamond. 

She loves her bedding. We got t-shirt soft sheets 

and had "Abigail & Co." embroidered 

on her pillow case. (not shown)

Check out the tassel hanging from
the ceiling fan. Love it!

This is the start of my daughters bedroom redo. 

 It is a work in progress I still have things
 in mind for it, but she loves it this way.

I have splendid ideas for things to hang on the walls, 

and a project for her antique kitchen hutch.
Sometimes I have problems with finishing
 stuff I start. Oops! That's what happens
to busy moms. 

So I started a blog

Really???  I am not sure why I did this.  I am a very private person and not usually one to tell it all, especially when I don't know who is listening.  In a weak moment today, I just did this.  I'm not sure what I'll blog about, but probably it will be things of interest to me.  Family, art, food, architecture and design, and reading are things that interest me.  Maybe I'll just use this as a way to showcase things I have for sell on my etsy shop, or just use it to journal.  Come along with me on this work in progress...