Summer. Living Room Paint Reveal. My trees.

Is why I haven't been around much. I'm not crafty enough to write a post on my iPhone- truth be told- it's just not big enough for these bespectacled eyes...should I just get an iPad?

But then I feel like I'll have a bunch of stuff that I don't really need. So instead I'm taking a break this summer. I'll eat donuts all day because I FEEL like it!

Wine at noon? Kanye does it, why not me? (I don't know if he does or not, just seemed "current"- Ha!)

I give you my Etsy find of the day-You're Welcome, Peeps!

https://www.etsy.com/shop/LookHUMAN?ref=seller_info

I sent my best friend a message just a bit ago asking if we should get two of these? We could wear them on our lake walks together. She has a shirt that says "this is what awesome looks like" which I LOVE! But she says she gets weird stares when she wears it and...she had to buy it in the men's section! WTF?

In other news- we finally painted the living room. I couldn't take the not-quite-white anymore. I know it works so well for some of you and your homes are cozy and lovely. I can't get it to work for ME.

Before:

WAY before:

AFTER!  I love it. It may seem too dark, but it's actually quite cozy. We have a lot of windows and for the most part, privacy. I didn't want to cover up the architectural details and mouldings, so I needed to be able to darken the room somewhat. With the light walls, some days it was just too bright in there.

Mountain Elk by Behr. With built-in primer. One coat! Yeah!!



Before:

After: Please ignore various junk on coffee table and flattened stuffed dog toys:

Two rooms down (Bathroom and Living Room) and a good FOUR to go!




So many favorite spots at this house. We are in the city, but it feels a million miles away. Yet I can walk everywhere and spend my life at the coffee house if I WANT.

Everything is in bloom now. This whole area now has light pink peonies, flowering bushes, some purple petunias planted by yours truly and a huge flowering rose bush.



Front yard view. Please ignore the dead sod that was planted last year. We're going to rip it out and add more flowers to the area. It gets all day sun, so I'm thinking of salvia. Any other ideas?!

Anyway..so happy here! I think it's the trees. We lived in the deep burbs for five years. While it could have been great, we had NO trees. We planted a few medium sized ones that I'm sure will be amazing in 20 years. But after five years..I became increasingly tired of no shade ever and honestly..no privacy ever. Our neighbors here and kind and have their own thing going on.

Have a great Wednesday!

xo

T

Public Service Announcement/Photo

For my friends who are interested in Kimye (Shannan!?!)-I'm sure you've already seen the photo today, but if NOT..please enjoy!

What the baby may look like in the future...


Happy Tuesday, Kids! My peonies are finally flowering and I'm busy dog walking and flower-cutting!

xo~

T

This & That.

It's finally summer here in Minnesota! It has mostly rained, but in between the downpours..there have been some amazing moments.

Yesterday I spent a good 8++ hours with my BFF Kim. We hit the streets of White Bear Lake like nobody's bidness and had a great time. It rained, it poured. The sun came out later and we took a lovely walk around...you guessed it..White Bear Lake! LOVELY. I found a new favorite vegetarian "burger" with chipotle at Keys Cafe in White Bear Lake. I ate ginger cookies, carrot CAKE and a cupcake! In a word- BLISS.



Food porn pics in a second... for now...I have a TREE that is a flowering rosebush in my new frontyard! RARR!! I cannot tell you how excited I am. I told Brad "Free roses all summer long!". It's a good eight feet tall. I cut a few roses today and here they are!

If this doesn't make you happy, nothing will. And if that made you smile, this next picture is going to have you cheering!

Puppy Curtis and his dollar general stuffed toy. The cuteness actually HURTS.




Brad had a week off of work and we rocked it! We did more yard work, had dinners and drinks and he made us a nice cheese tray for our backyard chill-out evening sessions.

Thank you to Aldi for the inexpensive yet delightful cheeses and crackers. Check out that classy Gatorade bottle-as-water-bottle! I could have cropped this pic and made it look fancy, but this is how it was and it was yummy.




Favorite little 10 year old in Stillwater last week!

Shockingly, it rained this evening! We visited his cousins who work at a pizza place in Stillwater. It cleared on our way home, this is a high spot in Stillwater. It's a beautiful place. The whole area smelled like honeysuckle. It was a bit overwhelming..like an older lady who wears too much perfume, but it was lovely as well.




And I give you...cakes!

This is what I love about best friends. We were out all day, but decided to head back to her house with our winnings from Festival Foods at 10:30PM!





I've titled this photo "desperation" as you can clearly see my clawed hand reaching for more cake..

And these are the types of sweets and cakes that I "do not believe in!" ..anything with cake AND fruit is not a combo I enjoy. It just seems wrong. No offense to anyone. I like my cakes fattening, chocolate filled, with icing and all things bad for you. Fruit is not invited on this journey!

FRUIT CAKES ARE A NO!





Finally...feel free to let me know what color you think these two areas should be. We have LOTS of light and the off-white isn't working for us. Brad has a Ralph Lauren brown that he likes or a deep green. We need depth and I want it to feel like a cozy hug when you sit and watch TV or movies here.

I'm off to eat last night's cake leftovers. I am also a week behind on HGTV Star. I recorded it but..it rained and the dish was out, so I had the first three minutes of it. As of now, I have no idea who is great..who is a possible douchebag..or if anyone has any talent. I do find it odd that it is no longer called DESIGN STAR. I assume it's because there's not always a lot of designing going on? Purchases are made, walls are painted..but oftentimes the design is lacking. Still, I watch...

Happy Sunday, Peeps!

xo~

T

Monday Cuteness

Super cute scrabble signs for weddings or kids rooms from:

http://www.etsy.com/shop/mamapicturethis

A pretty way to display paints:

Found this on Etsy awhile back. I THINK it's Katie Daisy or Katie Designs. Either way- it's lovely to me and organized in a way that's pretty.

And a nice, thoughtful quote for the day:

It's been raining here for days once again. I'm tired of even talking about it and it has made me MOODY. I just found out last week that we've had something like 19 days of sun in the past three months here.  None of those 19 days were sunny all day- just fits and starts. It did come out last night for about five minutes, so we walked the dogs. It is not raining currently, so I'm aobut to head out for a wet walk!

I'm pretty sure my 5-10 year plan involves moving someplace sunnier. I'm from Minnesota,  but have lived in Arizona and Tennessee. Was i CRAZY to move back here??!!

Have a beautiful Monday. I will eventually have Before and After house pics...I'm apparently just very forgetful and lazy these days.

HOLLA!

xo~

T

Bleeding Hearts.

I took a bunch of photos of our backyard today now that SO much amazingness is finally happening! Can you say LATE SPRING? Geez!  I realized today that we have irises ( or is it iris'?!- if you know for sure, shoot me a note!) coming up as well as hydrangeas, at least ten fern plants, a large lilac bush, catmint, peonies everywhere - they have not opened yet, but when they do...it will be magical! I joked with Brad today that when the whole backyard starts to flower "We should probably just tell people we're staying home and we can sit and stare at it."

Then I threatened to make him get IN the flowers a la Anne Geddes, so I can take many photos of him, the dogs, my nieces and nephews, my BFF..everyone IN the flowers!

Sounds like a joke, but I actually forced my friend Melissa into taking nature photos like that in our 20's. She used to get mad at me because the photos were never without discomfort. People staring. Mildly embarrassing. Me yelling "NO! Get IN there! This will be worth it, I promise you!"

Fast forward 16 years later and her mom STILL has a framed 8 x 10 of Millie in some flowers at the Lake Harriet Rose Gardens. Now I just tell people "Don't fight me on this."

Bleeding Hearts! These started to bloom just a few days ago. And the ferns..soo pretty! My mom had bleeding hearts in our yard. I remember thinking they looked like a girl's head with cool pigtails. I now see that they are indeed- heart-like. But at age 7, they just seemed like a cool paper doll to me.

I have an early morning so I'll leave you with this teaser..I have more landscape pics and always...more to say.

Sweet Dreams, Sweet Friends~

xo
T

The Great Bath Caper (Or..a Mini Bath Redo!)

When we moved into our sweet cottage, it was for the most part finished. Needed (needs! We're still working on it and just spent a whole day in the yard yesterday. Pulling weeds, getting rid of a year's worth of leaves and mess in the flowerbeds, trees, everywhere..) some TLC and attention here and there, but the bones of this place are amazing.

We didn't love the bathroom and this is our main one. It's small, but cozy. You'd think having gone from a house with three bathrooms, with one being attached to our bedroom, I'd be bummed. But I'm not. I love it here. Everything is well appointed, made to last and the house feels like love. I recently found out the main family who lived here was here for 50 years!

The bathroom before: I am not a lover of white walls in Minnesota. Due to the general craptacular weather, it always seems alarmingly stark to me. We also had NO storage. If you wanted to brush your teeth, you were left holding everything. I am not that talented. Loved:  The beadboard. The pedestal sink. The floor tile.

Oddly enough, I did end up liking the windows just as-is. You get complete privacy (unless you open the window while bathing or peeing!) and we have a view of our beautiful tree from the top of the windows. All of the homes in this area are cottage-like or tudor, so there's no chance of anyone high above seeing in our biffy.

Decent, but plain.





After! Thank you, Ikea! The glass shelf is from Ikea. Not more than $12 which was a steal as they were at least twice the price elsewhere. The wall cabinet- our friends at Walmart. The wooden "thing" above wall cabinet: Ikea! It's a bath tray and I'm in love!  Brad painted the walls a light blue, filled in the cracks in the beadboard with caulk and painted with a new coat of white. Shower curtain: Ikea- less than $15! We saw the same one at Bed, Bath and Beyond and it was $40. I'm thrifty. The silver curtain rod was from Home Depot? I can't recall, we made a lot of trips. The point is it's one of those rounded ones that gives you extra space in the shower. Love it. Can't say enough good things about it. The best part: You install it with the tension of the rod- no screws in your wall or in our case, the tile!

Glass: Free! Well, kind of. An old jelly jar I've upcycled. Flowers: Free! Thank you, God AND woman who lived here previously who did an amazing and loving job with the gardens and all plants. There are plants coming up everywhere! Ferns, bleeding hearts, tulips, phlox, sedum, rosebushes..

This pic doesn't do the room justice- it's an after. But you CAN see that this is Miss Daisy's new fave spot in the home. Why, I don't know. It's cool. She likes good design. The tiles are pretty. She growls when we try to use it so we gently "invite her to leave" and oftentimes she gets mad. Sweet, soft rug is normally CLEANER, but she's been in and out and it's rained for nearly three weeks (minus the last day! Yahoo!) so it gets dirty after a day. I will not launder a rug every other day. 

Should I buy a darker one? Probably so. I'm thinking gray or some kind of blue.

I have upclose photos of the tiles that I love so, but I'm out of coffee and I'm feeling on the EDGE!!

Have a beautiful Monday!

xo

T