Pandemonium

color inspiration

We're in the process of redoing our little library and Mike and I have been at odds over what color scheme to use.

 I really wanted to paint it a deep chocolate brown and reupholster the chairs we have (this is a photo of the previous owners furniture) in a green and white large leaf print. Sounds cool..huh?

Mike totally hated that idea.

 I thought I could sway him but he's proved to be immovable on the subject. I guess I'm not a persuasive as I thought....LOL! 

So last night he brought home this ad that he had ripped out of a magazine. 

It's perfect! We both love the color scheme...now if we can agree on the kind of fabric to go on the chairs. I'm thinking a nubby linen.

That rich orange/yellow is what color we will be painting the living room which is next to the library. The library is small with lots of white trim, shelves and shutters so I think painting it the rich deep colors we've chosen will work.....I hope! 

I think that I'm going to design a digi kit with this color scheme...it totally pops for me!

Over 100 kits!!! Time for a Give-a-way!!!

First...I need to give a big "Happy Birthday" shout out to my friend Jessi! I didn't even look at my calendar this morning so I didn't realize what day it was! Jessi is one of the kindest, most unselfish people I know and she's gorgeous and a rockin' photographer! Love ya Jess!

Here's my latest 2 Peas digi kit that will be released on Tuesday, May 20th. With is kit, I have designed a total of 102 kits for 2 Peas! I thought that since is such a milestone for me... we ought to CELEBRATE! So I am going to be giving away some $5 gift certificates to 2 Peas. You can use them to get any digital kit or even for regular scrapping supplies. Just leave me a post and I'll enter your name in a drawing that I'll do at the end of the week.

The value of friends

I am very fortunate to have some really GREAT friends.
This past year, I have thought alot about the power of friendship and how your friends influence your life for good.
This week I got to see several of those friends.

Layle has been helping me decorate our new house. She even spent her whole lunch hour helping me look at fabric for a couple chairs in our library. She has such great style and I really value her opinion. Thanks Layle!
She also gave me the coolest housewarming gift.
It's a german license plate.
Even Mike was raving about it.
She also gave me this awesome design swatch book that you keep samples of the paint colors and fabrics from each room in your house so when you are out shopping it's easier to match things up to.

On Friday, Jessi and Allison and I went out to dinner at a little Italian cafe called Al Fornos.
We were celebrating their birthdays which are a little later this month.
We laughed and laughed.
I love these girls.
They are such GOOD people.
And they are fun!

(If you live in Utah...I HIGHLY recommend Al Fornos...YUM! Their fried mozzarella in marinara sauce is to die for!)

We were hoping that Loni (our other May birthday girl) could join us but she was out with a younger/hipper crowd...jk Loni!
And we missed Rhonna too...she had a mother/daughter night planned with her girls.

Jessi set up the camera on the grass so we could get a photo of all 3 of us.
We were laying on the lawn of a firestation and I'm sure that the firemen were getting a kick out of watching us trying to get a photo. LOL!
It was so fun...thanks girls!

Progress

Progress!
That's such a satisfying thing.
We are making progress...thanks to our fabulous painter Jorge and his hardworking crew.
They have been working on my studio (above) and Ski's bedroom and our little library (below).

We discovered that under the wallpaper that we stripped there were 4 more layers! Ugghh! There was even wallpaper on the ceiling. So Jorge is skim coating and sealing our walls so we don't have to strip those 4 layers off. I guess that was to be expected with a house so old.

They are prepping all the walls for me to paint...except for my studio - my sweet hubby said I could have them put up the wainscotting and paint the whole thing! WaHoo! Thanks Sweetie! Mwahhhhh!

So I have moved my studio into the kitchen. The views and sunlight are wonderful but the temptation to jump up every few minutes and grab a snack...not so good!

And I have been scrapping again! Yay! Even though my supplies are spread all over the house, my tools are all in one location again. The folks from Little Yellow Bicycle sent me a big box of products! Thanks guys! My favorite line is Zach's Life which works so great for teenagers...especially teen boys.

Yesterday at 4PM when I went out to pick up the paint from the shed that we want to use, Captian Jack (our resident raccoon) was hanging out in the rose bushes. He is quite a little rascal and doesn't realize that he's supposed to be sleeping at 4PM. Guess he's an early riser like me. :o)

New Kits for tomorrow

I have two new kits for this week and will be released Tuesday, May 13th.
Fanciful Edges was inspired by my recent Art & Soul experience.

Both kits are available at Two Peas.

Happy Mother's Day!

We spent Saturday stripping pink wallpaper off the library walls, putting up new crown moulding and working in the yard.
It was such a beautiful day.
Today started off great with a phone call from Ski wishing me a Happy Mother's Day.
Then we had a delightful little get together after church with some delicious cake.
We had arranged for our friends to come over for lunch during which Mike and the boys gave my friend Jeanene and I each a big basketful of goodies and some gorgeous flowers.
I was really touched that Mike would get stuff for Jeanene as well and she was surprised and very pleased since her husband was out of town today.

We ate banana splits, watched the Jazz beat the Lakers (YAY!) and played some games.
My favorite part of the present was a card the boys and Mike had written in. I loved what Mick wrote:

Thank goodness they love me or I'd be stuck in a house with ugly wallpaper!

So how was your Mother's Day?

MIA

Mothers in Action??? or Missing in Action???
Both apply.

So we bought this new OLD house.....
And there is SO much we WANT and NEED to do to it.

I'm a VERY impatient person too.
So instead of waiting for awhile, I kind of dragged my family into helping me redecorate.

Last week we stripped all the wallpaper out of my studio.

The boys were really good sports about it since I told them it was the only thing that I wanted for Mother's Day. They even devised a removal plan switching off with the steamer and jammin' out to tunes.
One of Spencer's friends even helped us for a couple of hours.

This week it's putting in lighting.
One of the joys of buying a 100 year old house is that 5 of the rooms didn't have ceiling lights.
So today there are 6 Electricians ( I think some are apprentices) working at my house.
And yes...that pink wallpaper is coming down soon!

Since we have plaster walls, we chose to remove the crown moulding, which we'll replace, to fish the wires through rather than have them cut a bunch of holes in the ceilings.

So that's what I'll be doing this weekend...putting up new crown moulding.
Luckily I married a very HANDY man and he's been worth his weight in GOLD these past few weeks.

We've been trying to get out every night and do some yardwork too. This yard is about 4x bigger than our old one was with lots of flower beds.

Last night there was a raccoon in our yard at 6PM. We've heard horror stories about how they will kill small dogs and thought we were pretty safe since they are nocturnal but I guess this one is an early riser.

Anyone out there had any experiences with raccoons? We are thinking of trapping this one and releasing it up in the mountains.

So what Spring projects are you working on?

New kits for tomorrow

Here are my lastest kits that will be released at Two Peas tomorrow...Tuesday, May 6th.

Finding your Mojo

A bunch of the girls from the Mojo Blog scraplifted this layout of mine for one of their challenges.

I think scraplifting is a great way to get your mojo jumpstarted again! It was fun to see what elements of the layout each designer choose to work from. What a fun, creative blog! Thanks for the lift! :o)

New Kits for Tuesday

I have two new kits coming out Tuesday 4/29. The first is a set of postcards that match up in color to the Fine China Papers. The 2nd kit is a 99 cent journaling card that comes with or without the sentiment.

We've had a busy weekend of unpacking, setting up a badminton court (and playing countless games) and entertaining family and friends.

I need to snap some photos tomorrow that will be before photos...before I decorate, paint and do any remodeling photos. Then it's time to start stripping wallpaper! Any tips your tricks you want to send my way will be greatly appreciated!