Grapevine Wreaths

One of my favorite things for a house is a good grapevine wreath! I feel like these beauties can be made to match any season, and you only need 1! I have had this grapevine wreath since we got married 2 1/2 years ago, and am constantly changing out the flowers for a new fresh look! Here are 4 of my favorites! 

1. Cotton Bolls - I love this one for late summer/ early fall!

2. Fall Berries - This one will last me from early Fall through Thanksgiving if I want. I put the berries through the entire wreath, but you could also just do a corner like I did with the other wreaths. 

3. Ombre Hydrangeas - This is always my favorite, it's so full, and you could do any color! I've also hung an initial in the middle for a personal touch. 

4. Roses - I did this one for Valentin'es Day this year, you can do as few or as many as you like! 

Do any of you have grapevine wreaths you use throughout the year? What type of decor/flowers do you put on them? 

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Throw A Bow On It!

Sorry for the long break! It's been a little hectic around here this holiday season! We spent our Thanksgiving week touring a majority of the Southeast, and are still recovering considering the fact we've had evening plans 7 out of the 9 nights we've been back! Anyway, I am so happy to be home! And honestly and am glad to be so busy, it just means that our ministry is growing, and we have so many friends and family to be thankful for!

Well we all know that this is the season of gift-giving, and I've already shared my Wish List, but there are always people you aren't sure what to get, and you don't always have a lot of time to invest in pretty and ornate packaging! Here are a list of my favorite things to give, that I can easily just throw a bow on, and they look beautiful enough on their own!

We do a Secret Santa from December 1st until our holiday break, these are the perfect small gifts to give throughout those weeks! I also like to use these for birthdays I may have forgotten until the last minute, as a thank you, and for people that just need a little something to cheer them up!

1. Hand Soap - My mother always had at least 5 extra Bath & Body Works hand soaps laying around, as a just in case gift. Now if you look in my bathroom cabinet you'll see probably 8 or 9! I probably give one out about once a month. I write a simple note and tie it on around the neck of the soap! It is definitely my go-to small gift! Someone can always use it, and they can go and exchange it if they don't like the scent, and B&BW is constantly having buy 3 get 3 free deals so you can easily stock up!

2. Framed Print - This print is from Etsy, but really you could hop on Pinterest and find hundreds of free ones! I wrote a post about it here! I love to put these in a frame (another thing people can always use) and you automatically have an inspirational, or seasonal gift!

3. Nail Polish - I always pick up Essie's at Marshalls and TJ Maxx for $4, but really any nail polish is awesome! You can never have enough!

4. Coffee Mug - I love a cute coffee mug (really, who doesn't?) You can stock up on general ones to hand out, or finding a monogrammed mug will make the gift even more thoughtful! Put a couple packs of hot chocolate in, and your gift is set!

5. Coasters - I'm sure you all have seen the tutorials for tile coasters, they really are that easy! If you know the recipients decor, you can match the tiles to it. However, if you're running short on time, pick up a packaged set, like these cardboard ones. I know that often I don't have enough nice coasters at parties and these larger 10-packs come in handy! This is also a wonderful hostess gift!



I hope your holiday shopping is going well, and that this list will help knock a few more gifts off your to-get list!

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Five on Friday!

I am so glad it's Friday! I am leaving work today at 2:00 PM and not coming back for over a week! That's what I call a happy day! Without further ado. . . here are my top 5 moments!

1. Zeke's Haircut - This poor guy. . . he couldn't even see! We had to re-schedule his haircut twice because of different things, and it was getting pretty rough, I can't believe how soft he is now. . . and those eyes! I forgot how cute he could be ! <3

2. Pinterest Party - Our teen small groups had a Pinterest Party on Wednesday, and it was a success! I think everybody loved it! We let them make 4 crafts (if they had time) They just brought a few dollars and some mason jars. We had chalkboard paint, and glitter to decorate jars, and then they could make cookie jars, and sugar scrubs. It was messy, but totally worth it!

3. Christmas Decorations - Christmas decorations go up tomorrow night!!! We always put them up before we travel for Thanksgiving so we can come back to a beautiful Christmas filled house! Cannot wait!

4. Glazed Bisque-It - Some of the ladies in our office went out last night for a night of painting pottery, it was so much fun to get to know them out of the office, and enjoy some pizza and crafting at the same time!

5. Cinderella - Hasn't happened yet, but tonight we're heading down to Durham to see Cinderella!!! My husband and I saw it in NYC this past January and it was so wonderful when I heard it was going to be so close to my parents I decided we would make the 3 hour drive to see it, and them!

I'm linking up with Lauren Elizabeth, Meet @ the Barre, Carolina Charm, and The Farmer's Wife! Check out these awesome ladies, all of their blogs will keep you entertained for hours! 

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Five on Friday

Wow can't believe we're already back to Friday!! Hope you guys all had a wonderful week!

1. Halloween Giftcard! Our office does a Halloween scavenger hunt every year. Last year my team won. . . and I may have talked some smack to everyone about how my team would be winning again this year! But we did win!!!! $5 Kroger giftcard - I am living the high life! 

2. Saturday Shopping - A friend of a friend was selling all of her open house Christmas decorations, and we went there on Saturday, wow everything was such a great deal, and there were actually a lot of things that weren't Christmas. I got that boxwood wreath for $10, the acorns for $2, and everything was in great shape! We then went to a local gift shop, and I finally found some cotton bolls! I have been looking everywhere for them, and either they don't sell them or they were sold out. I was so excited! Now I just need to decide what I'm going to do with them! I'm thinking a wreath!

3. Birdseed wreath - Speaking of wreaths. . . my Dad's birthday was on Monday, so they are coming up this weekend to celebrate! He absolutely loves birdbaths, birdfeeders, basically anything to do with birds. I found this nifty recipe and made him a wreath and some ornaments! I'll be sharing the recipe next week!

4. Voting = Starbucks - I hope that you voted on Tuesday! As a reward for doing my duty as a citizen I picked up some Starbucks on my way back to work! 

5. Umm Pizza - I couldn't really think of a 5th item, but I am going out for pizza at lunch today, and that always helps me get through a Friday workday!! only 7 hours to go! 


I'm linking up with Lauren Elizabeth, Meet @ the Barre, Carolina Charm, and The Farmer's Wife! Check out these awesome ladies, all of their blogs will keep you entertained for hours! 

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I Love A Good Date Night!

Date nights are on of my favorite things! Not just the going out to a nice dinner, but anything fun with my honey! We've been married just over a year and a half, so I know some people may scoff at the idea that we need date nights. I know, I know there are no kids in the picture, but life gets busy. Sometimes I come home from work we have to eat super fast and then leave for a youth activity or rehearsal and by the time we're back I'm ready to fall asleep! I feel like date nights are important during all seasons of life. They were really important when we were dating, and I still want us to make an effort to love one another and plan special things for the other person! 

I am all about the dinner and a movie date, in fact it is one of my favorites! However, I think that when you do something different that requires a little thought or planning it just shows how much you care for that person and how important they are to you! Below are a few date nights we've done that I have loved! 

1. This is actually what inspired the post- Star Gazing! My husband and I live out in the country so the stars are beautiful, and so are the lightning bugs in the trees (when I was little I used to love seeing the trees "sparkle" it's still one of my favorite things) We borrowed my brothers truck to move a piano from my husband's mother. Anyway, last night it was so beautiful night we just threw some old pillows and blankets in the back and just did some stargazing! You definitely need to do that at least once in your life. Zeke had a lot of fun hanging outside as well. It was also absolutely free! If you don't have a truck put a sleeping bag out or some blankets that you don't mind getting dirty. 

2. Paint Together!  I wasn't expecting Aaron to like this idea, but he actually loved it! If you have canvases and paints this is completely free. We have those now, but when we did this date night we didn't. I found an art set on clearance at Marshall's for under $5 which was the inspiration for this date night. It was so much fun, we both did 2 pieces (not counting my first one which I threw away!!) Aaron did freestyle - he's much braver than I - I just picked out 2 of my favorite pictures and tried to copy them. 

3. The Mall Challenge! This can be as inexpensive as you want it to be! We went to the mall and gave each other $15, and had to buy each other 3 gifts (or however many you want, depending on the cash limit you give) with only that cash, no going over the limit! We didn't make it a race, but I think that would be a fun twist, like end at the food court for supper or ice-cream? 

4. This was a date night I put together probably just a month after we were married. Make A Date Night Jar Together! I got a large pickle jar and glued some lace onto it. I made the images above and printed them onto some cream colored paper. We divided them in half and had to each come up with that many date nights! Without showing the other person we then folded them and put them in! These were perfect when we had a free night or someone couldn't get the creative juices flowing for a date night! Quick tip: We drew dollar signs on the outside of the folded papers that way if we were on a tight budget we knew not to pick a $$$ piece of paper! ($=under $10, $$=$10-$25, $$$=over $25) Those prices did not include if we did dinner along with the date. Feel free to right click and save the above images! They are 4X5 JPEG files so when I printed them I used 8 1/2X11 paper and chose the print 4 per page option. 

5. Cooking Competition! Aaron does most of the cooking so this probably wasn't that fair - but it was my idea so it wasn't like he was trying to cheat! This obviously takes a little prep work. We already knew we were doing this for a date night, so we picked up all the ingredients on our normal grocery shopping trip. You would also make shopping part of the outing! We each made an entree, and gave ourselves 45 minutes, preparation and presentation included! We then rated the entree 1-5 on taste, creativeness, and presentation. It got a little hectic in our tiny apartment kitchen. I'm sure it will be more fun now that our kitchen is over twice that size! 

I hope you enjoyed these ideas and try them out sometime! I'd love to hear some of your favorite date night! Please let them in the comments, I know everyone can always use more date night ideas!

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Dining Room Table

Alright! The table is finally making it's way on here! We started this project in the first week of May, and have finished the brunt of it, we still need to distress the bench but honestly I don't even care about that right now! I am so thankful that I can eat dinner at a table! This past Sunday we had my brother, parents, and grandparents over for a Father's Day lunch. I cannot tell you how nice it was to have a big table where everyone can stay after the meal to just sit around and talk! 

This table started out as more of a challenge than we thought. We got the table from a lady, Lori, in our church who found it at Goodwill. She was the biggest help ever! She does this all the time, she either refinishes furniture or she'll paint custom pieces for people. This would have been bad without her!

The Long Road To A Dining Room Table: We brought the table over to our house and set it up in the dining room with the cardboard so we wouldn't have to worry about weather, we thought this project would only take a couple days. Lori came over with primer and paint, we started putting the primer on, but soon realized it wasn't sticking. . . so out came the KILZ. That stuff is intense I'm still not sure what it does, I think it's used when you're painting on a smooth surface and need your paint to stick. After KILZ I put a dark gray primer, then I grab the paint can that I thought Lori brought me. . . wrong! It turns out we had a can of the exact paint that we had used on our cabinets, but ours was oil based, and hers was acrylic. Now I had no earthly idea that would make a difference, so I probably would've used it even if I had seen the one word difference on the paint can. Man was I in for a surprise! FYI once you use oil based paint, you can't use acrylic anything over top of it! What probably made it worse is that we think after I had let a couple coats dry over night, I came back and did a couple layers in acrylic. This was obviously not the finest moment in my extensive furniture painting career! (read that in a sarcastic voice!) I came back and kept thinking "wow this looks terrible, it's a good thing we're distressing it!" So Lori comes over for my distressing lesson, and realizes she should have never left me alone with this table! To make an already long story mildly shorter, we ended up having to sand off the entire top of the table, and paint with only oil-based, which requires 24 hours to dry between each coat. Then we were able to finally distress and antique it! I also used a wax on the top of the table to protect it from spills in the future!

The only before picture I have. Ignore the mess! You can see that it was already a cream, and very dirty!

This is it painted completely white after we had to sand off the paint job I had already done!

I'll be sharing the specifics about the chairs tomorrow! 

Forgive the morning light, we got 4 chairs to go with the table, and Aaron built a bench for me. 

Here is a close up of the distressing we did. We used an electric sander, and then put a very little bit of brown antique glaze. 

Zeke photo bombed while I was taking pictures of the table legs!  

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