No More Excuses!

Lately (as in the last several years) I've been bemoaning my lack of progress on sewing projects. For instance, I began I quilt for Elizabeth 6 years ago and I still haven't finished piecing the top. I finally realized that a big part of the problem was that I didn't have a place to keep my sewing machine. Evey time I wanted to sew I would pull out my machine and set it up on the kitchen table and then would have to put it away again before the next meal. It was enough of a hassle that I rarely sewed unless it was absolutely necessary.

For Christmas my wonderful parents bought me this craft table to use for my sewing. It's set up in a corner of my room near the window just waiting to be used. But, as you can see, that corner still looks a bit... unloved. Boring. Blank.

I'm notoriously slow with decorating my home and it was high time to give this corner a bit of attention. I wanted to create an inspirational environment that would fuel my creativity and would make this corner personal and inviting--a place where I wanted to sit down, relax and spend some time. So, I started collecting items from around the house that are meaningful to me but that had not yet been hung on our walls.

I laid the hodgepodge of items out on the bed and tried several different arrangements.

And I finally decided on this one:

I included some of my personal photos that I plan to change out from time to time.

The icons are my confirmation saint, St. Catherine of Sienna, Eric's confirmation saint, St. Gregory the Great, and one of our favorite saints and Gustin's namesake, St. Augustine.

The gold framed picture is a gift from my parents and is a collage of images of Blessed Pope John Paul II--a man I admire so greatly. It's beautiful in that it contains images from the early years of his papacy when he was so energetic and engaging as well as images from his declining years when he suffered so much but with great dignity.

My favorite piece by far, however, is this image of the Madonna and Child. Isn't it gorgeous? Kristin of the Small Treasures blog briefly had an etsy shop where she sold these wall reliefs and when she posted that she was going to stop making them I quickly snatched one up before they sold out.

Here's the finished space all ready to tackle some sewing projects. I'm very happy with it even though St. Gregory refuses to hang straight. See, even a saint who has earned "Great" at the end of his name isn't perfect.

10 surprising things about me

Sweet Shannon tagged me for this fun meme. So, here we go! 10 surprising things about me:

1. In 4th grade I was a part of my little Catholic school's choir (which is amusing because I am a lousy singer!). That year Pope John Paul II came to the U.S. and one of his stops was in San Antonio. Our little choir auditioned and was chosen to sing before the big outdoor papal mass! It was an incredible experience and is my earliest memory of our beloved John Paul the Great.

2. I've mentioned on this blog before that I'm a nerd, but I don't think you all know the extent of my nerdiness. I was valedictorian of my high school class and I graduated from college with a 4.0 in mechanical engineering. Yes, I was the girl with no life who spent her Friday and Saturday nights studying! Actually, that is one of my few regrets. I wish I hadn't spent so much time worrying about grades/scholarships/internships/etc. and instead spent more time building relationships in college.

3. I really enjoy modest fashion and home decorating. At this point in my life I don't have much time to shop for dresses or the money to buy the furniture I drool over in a Pottery Barn catalog, but I really have fun when I do get the chance to go clothes shopping (maybe 2 or 3 times a year!) or when we pick a new paint color for a room.

4. Eric and I have had a dream to live on a few acres in the country since before we were married. I want a huge vegetable garden, an herb garden, a small orchard with a variety of fruit trees, a cutting garden, lots of flower beds, and plenty of room where the kids can run, run, run! Only the Lord knows if or when it will ever happen!

5. I think about baby names all the time. A long time favorite that Eric has always vetoed is the name Jane. I love that it is a plain, simple, no-nonsense name. It also happens to be a saint's name as well as the name of my favorite author (Jane Austen) and my favorite heroine (Jane Eyre). I would so love to have a baby Jane!

6. There is one thing about being open to life that scares me. The idea of having more children isn't too intimidating, though the idea of being pregnant with all the suffering that comes along with that state does make me a little nervous. But my biggest fear is... I don't want to have to drive one of those gigantic vans! Bring on the babies, just don't make me drive a 15 passenger van!

7. I'm not the type of person who gushes over babies. I love my kids dearly, but I don't do baby talk and I don't squeal and go ga-ga over every baby I meet. I've heard women say that they don't know if they are meant to be mothers because they don't gush over other people's babies. I want to set the record straight: Gushing over babies is a personality thing, not a measure of how good a mother you will be.

8. For years I've had a "one day" list. As in, "One day I want to...." On that list was that one day I wanted to take a photography class. Well, I never have taken a class, but I sure am glad that I jumped in and did it anyway! The other things on my "one day" list include learning how to play tennis and the piano. Given what a blessing my photography has been, I think I really need to make doing the rest of my list a priority!

9. My second toe is longer than my big toe.

10. I was diagnosed with scoliosis (curvature of the spine) when I was little, but somehow it corrected itself (which isn't supposed to happen). My dad says that's it's proof that miracles really do happen!

If you guys are up for it, I tag:

Blair at Blair's Blessings
Lillian at Smithflections
Veronica at the little way
Christine at Good Company
Jill even though her blog is private :)

The Kids' Room Projects

Hobbies are funny things. They are such a gift because they give me a way to relax and as well as a creative outlet. But, sometimes I feel like my hobbies are just all about me and take away from family time. Of course, as with anything in life, I must strive for balance.

So, when my photography hobby both brings me joy as well as my family, then I feel like I've hit the jackpot. For instance, I did portraits of my in-laws for their 35th wedding anniversary. They hadn't had portraits made of just the two of them since their wedding, so they were way overdue and I was happy to offer my mediocre talents to help them. I also used some of my pictures to decorate our master bedroom and a bathroom.

Now I have my decorating focus shifting to the kids' rooms. They really need something on their walls. I wanted whatever it was to be very personal to each child, so we decided to photograph some of their favorite things and hang those pictures on the walls.

Elizabeth loves the Fancy Nancy books by Jane O'Conner and all things fancy. Combine spring wild flowers and her Fancy Nancy doll and we have the perfect subjects for the pictures for Elizabeth's room.







For the boys' room, we focused on Legos and Star Wars. I only have one of those pictures done so far and, believe me, it really tested my photoshopping skills!



I'm no graphic artist, but I think the results are good enough for the bedroom of an 8 year old and a 3 year old boy.

Hopefully I'll get these pictures completed and printed sometime soon. Then the goal will be to get them framed and hung on the wall. It's amazing how difficult it is for me to actually complete a project these days!

But, I wouldn't trade any of my four distractions for the world!

House Progress

This post is mainly for myself. We've been making progress on the house, but at times it seems so slow and it's easy to only concentrate on how much we still have left to do. So, to change the focus to all we have accomplished in the last couple of months, I thought I would do a picture update to compare with this post, shortly after we moved in.

The living room is the most complete. Here's before:


And after:


I finally found our family portrait and hung it over the mantle. I bought the pots and plants that are on the mantle and bought and hung the curtains. This room is really coming together (except for a couple of remaining boxes, as you can see in front of the fire place)!

I also got the kids' portraits framed and Eric hung them for me last night. I'm so glad I got that done instead of the portraits sitting in the box on my desk for months like they normally do. :)


There has been virtually no progress in the office. We are stuck on the paint color.


Eric and I both agreed that we wanted to have two colors in this room with the color above and below the chair rail being different. I prefer the lighter tone on the left and Eric wants something a little more dramatic, like the color on the right. I would gladly give in to Eric on this, especially since the office is mostly man territory, but we actually don't like either of these colors. In person they have a greenish tone to them, which was not what we were looking for. And, looking at the paint color cards, I'm really having a hard time finding anything better. I've never had so much trouble picking out a paint color!

We finally settled on a color for the master bedroom.


We'll go with the darker gray color which I think will nicely complement our pale blue bedding. The master bedroom has always been a rather neglected room during our entire marriage. But, this time around we're making it a priority to make it into the soothing sanctuary that it should be. I'm even planning on printing some of my nature/flower photos and using them to decorate the walls. I can't wait to see it finally come all together!

Elizabeth's room now has curtains, a nightstand and a mirror on the wall. We're getting there!


The boys' room, however, looks exactly as it did two months ago. The biggest hangup in that room is a very opinionated 7 year old. I want him to be able to have input as we decorate his room, but his ideas and my ideas are polar opposites. For example, he would like to paint the walls and ceiling black and then he wants me to paint stars and planets all over them. That's not going to happen! I think we may have talked him into putting up a chair rail, painting below it a dark gray and above it a lighter blue-gray and adding posters of the planets on the wall. Jonathan's room has definitely been the most debated room in the entire house!

The play room has been primed, but I still haven't settled on a color. Here it is, still in it's normal, messy state.


Any recommendations on a paint color for this room?

Now for Eric's pride and joy. He calls it "the farm".


We've already picked some black eyed peas and made a batch of pesto from the basil. Eric added two more beds a couple of weeks ago and hopefully we'll have squash and tomatoes from them before the cold weather hits. He also created a box (at the back near the far fence) for compost. It might sound silly, but we really enjoy composting our kitchen scraps and lawn and garden waste. Yes, I said enjoy! I think it's the engineer in me who loves the efficiency of the whole process. Nothing goes to waste and we use the compost to make our garden even more healthy and productive. I love it!

And, here's our most recent addition, completed just two days ago.


The kids are so excited to have a sandbox again! I'm not so excited about walking through the house and finding sand sticking to the bottom of my feet, but I'm glad they have such a great place to play and create.

So, that's it for now. Sorry for the long, picture laden post. But, it sure has made me feel better about all that we have been able to accomplish!