live what you love.

painting. and glazing. and painting some more.

Dave took a couple of days off last week and we had planned to go on a mini-vacay, but instead decided to jump head-first into some projects that have been waiting a long time... painting. Lots and lots of painting. I've talked about it & thought about it for so long that it didn't take me long in front of the paint samples at Lowe's. I grabbed the first creamy color that jumped out at me - it was important to me that it didn't have too much yellow, since I would be doing a glaze over it, and Alpaca by Laura Ashley was perfect, with a grey undertone.

We started in our master bathroom first, cleaning & sanding & un-hinging & finally painting. They were oak with brass knobs. Yeah. So anything would've been an improvement. After two or three coats (I didn't keep up) I grabbed a few old socks and started glazing them with this translucent glaze in Mocha. The first time I'd ever done it... and didn't even practice, which was probably really stupid, but it ended up working perfectly. When you're going for the old, antiqued look, it's really difficult to screw anything up! Love that. I just kept going back & forth, applying it then rubbing off, until it looked just like I wanted. And things got a lot more fun when I pulled out a little art brush to use in the recesses. I totally forgot to take a "before" photo but the one below is a "middle," I suppose... after I'd gotten the Alpaca on. For a while I thought I might like to leave it at that, but am so glad I didn't. As soon as the glaze went on, I fell in love.

After that bathroom we moved on to the hall bath and I didn't do the glaze with such a heavy hand there and ended up liking it even more. We picked out a really pretty paint in there, a little dark for my taste but I love it. Is it grey? Is it green? It's hard to tell... and I like that. We have a khaki shower curtain & brushed nickel accessories and it all works. I've got a little lot more cleaning to do and then will take photos, I promise!

And then Saturday - finally - we moved into the kitchen. I didn't count the doors that we took off but do know that we have 33 knobs... that's a lot of freaking knobs. I'm looking for a cheaper - but still good quality! - source for rubbed bronze knobs... anyone know of a place online? I bought some great ones for the master bath but they would be way too expensive to use in the kitchen. We spent all day & night there on both Saturday and Sunday. On Sunday I almost cried, looking at all that laid ahead of us, but somehow we got it done. Dave did a lot of the door painting and finally got them back on their hinges last night when I woke up from a much-needed nap. I almost cried again, but this time in a good way. I had spent the morning glazing the face of the cabinets, so now all I have to do is the doors... and I'll do it soon, just really needed a break today!

After that, we're going to install new counters and paint the walls, which are now a butter yellow. I'm going to do a chocolate that I think will be perfect with the counters & will look great behind my custom pink/green/yellow valance that I've been in love with since my crafty friend Mary made it for me six years ago! I'm always pretty quick with decisions, but cannot decide what to paint the master bath. You can see a sliver of the pale green in the photo above, and it's just not enough. I had wanted to do grey, but now with the cabinets & bronze knobs, I feel like it needs something warm. I found a great color called "Glazed Pot" that looks like, well, a terracotta pot. What do you think??

human nature.

It's a gorgeous day, but here I sit, on the couch with my laptop, watching the MJ Memorial. I was just talking to Dave about what a polarizing thing this has been - there is no in-between on him. I've just been sort of shocked by all of the hateful comments I've seen from people. 

And I'll say this and shut up... I was completely weirded out by the freakshow his life turned into. But have always felt that he never progressed past childhood, mentally. I don't believe there was anything sexual about him whatsoever, that it just wasn't a part of his makeup, just like any "normal" child. 

Clearly I have no basis for this other than my gut instinct, but it's also what Whoopi, his friend, said yesterday (and I loooove me some Whoopi!) and I want to believe it. You have to have faith in our judicial system. And God has the final word. So I'm just enjoying remembering all of the childhood memories I have that were set to his music. I'll never forget the little pleather red purse I had with his photo on the outside, and I carried it everywhere, when I was six years old and it was empty because what does a six-year old need to carry around, right. And I wanted to marry him. But later changed my mind on that one. :)

So... the fourth of July! :) It was a great, jam-packed weekend. We spent Friday at the pool - even Daddy, who happened to be off! - and our friends Erin & Eileen met us there. Strangely, it was overcast and cool. On July 3rd. In Tennessee. When we got out of the pool we were blue. It was SO weird. Felt like football season. But that night, it was perfect weather, not blistering hot for once, and we went to the Smokies game with, apparently, the rest of East Tennessee.

It took us 45 minutes to get off the exit ramp. We had no idea what was going on, and then heard it was the largest crowd they've ever had. Of course we would pick that night to go, after we hadn't been for four years. Sigh. So we ended up on the berm with no blankets, etc., because who would've thunk it? But it was lots of fun anyway. And at the end we got some awesome fireworks & got to see Ryne Sandberg bump chests with the umpires & kick dust all over the place! It was awesome.

Dave had to work on Saturday & Sunday, and the kids & I just stayed home until Saturday afternoon when we went to the Loebners for some fried chicken & s'mores & Coronas & fireworks!

We had a blast. The kids are sooo funny together and thankfully Daddy was able to come over earlier than we'd thought so he & Josh got to set fireworks off in the road and giggle like a couple of little boys. :) And Dave let Parker light a few, which almost sent me into convulsions. But I held it in and let them do their boy thing and was glad that at least Daddy was teaching him the right way instead of finding him in the yard doing the Beavis & Butthead laugh with a box of matches in his lap.

I was so excited to get Heather's new kit so I could get on scrapbooking these photos right away. I just love everything about the Fourth, and this year was such a good one. We have so many things to be thankful for, including living in this country where we're free to do and say whatever we want and have blogs to ramble on about everything and nothing anytime we please. :)

And now John Mayer is on, with the most incredible rendition of Human Nature. Must. Go. Swoon.

yes, nine.

So I've had a few comments on here and on facebook about my daughter's, um, abundance of swimsuits. It's hilarious & ridiculous, I know, I know... So last night I started flipping through my photos from the last month & pulling out a shot of her in her suit anytime I found one. And I ended up with nine. Sigh. Yes, I really did. And naturally thought I better make a layout about it. Seriously, she is so freaking cute, especially when you multiply her by nine, how could I have possibly resisted any of these??

That's what I thought.

A post by PW hit me straight in the middle of my heart earlier today. She said everything I feel but haven't ever gotten into words. It shouldn't even need to be said but I'll say it anyway - of course I love both of my children exactly the same and love every little quality & quirk of each of them. But Mary-Kate and I absolutely qualify for a relationship defined as symbiosis. I'm pretty sure it all began when I left my job last summer and it has grown & manifested itself over the last year, as we've spent almost every waking moment together. And just as I love her brother, she loves her daddy just as much as she loves me. She's not clingy; it's not that. It's just this crazy magnetic attachment. As PW said so perfectly - Like both of us would wither without the other.

Today was a good day, all the way around. Up early (relatively speaking), several hours at the pool that were spent happily, with no thunder, no lightning, no dreadful children I had to lay down the law on (and no, not my own - that's another post for another day). Quick trip to the grocery store where I found good plums (have only been able to find pluots there lately, which I'd never even heard of before this season, and actually bought them the first time because I fell for their evil disguise and they are nowhere near as yummy as my favorite fruit that ends in UM, not OT!).

Even though Dave had to work late, we had a nice dinner of spaghetti & yummy yummy homemade garlic bread (well, not the bread - just the topping) and then the kids spent two hours playing Wipeout. Wipeout is basically just a game of "Mary-Kate, do whatever your brother tells you to do, no matter how dangerous it is or whether your parents have warned you against it." He straps this Nerf vest around her, plops a construction hat (from his costume when he was two) on her head, and throws her to the lions, aka, the obstacle course he's set up throughout the house. And that girl... she just laughs & laughs through every bit of it. Tough as nails.

While they were running wild with virtually no supervision, I was knee-deep in every travel site on the Internet. You know me, I love to dream - and spend 100% of my waking hours doing so - but I have a nervous breakdown when it comes time to actually commit. But tonight, I did it. I booked a trip for my symbiotic girl & I to visit some other fabulous girls in a few weeks, and then booked what looks like a really fantastic hotel for our anniversary in October.

But it's only by chance that we'll be spending our anniversary there... There just happens to be a very big concert one night before the big day, which my husband would not have missed come hell or high water. So he says we're going down for the concert of a lifetime, I say we're going for our anniversary. :) Either way, it's sure to be a good time. And we have two more tickets to the concert for sale (Dave, who joined the fan club so he could purchase tickets as early as possible, was able to get on at two different times & bought at both to see where we could get better seats). So if you're interested just comment here & I'll get you the details!

catching up.

I feel like I've skipped so much here. I'm sure I've said it before, but I feel like I do nothing all day long but somehow always come up short on time. Have I mentioned that I'm ready for school to start back?? :) I guess I really do function better with some sort of routine to follow. And once school starts back for the kids, that means I'll be starting too, which is both exciting and terrifying.

We've spent just about every day at the pool, and the kids start two weeks of swim lessons on Monday which will require us to be there each morning. Again, having somewhere to be at a certain time can only be good for me. And now, just to rewind a little...

Dave had to work on Fathers Day (shocking, I tell you), so we visited him at the office with a little red velvet cake (delish!) and his gift, a t-shirt from Michael Scott's Dunder Mifflin Scranton Meredith Palmer Memorial Celebrity Rabies Awareness Pro-Am Fun Run For The Cure. It was a big hit. :) And now I'm dying for this one for myself.

I've tried to be better about snapping photos here & there, carrying my little point & shoot with me everywhere I go. I can honestly say that this is one of the best purchases I've made in a long time. My big camera is my baby, of course, but this one (with the same mp as my big one!) has been really awesome. Especially where videos are concerned. I've caught some pretty priceless moments with it.

And that pretty much catches us up on the last week or so! Over this past weekend, the kids begged me to pull out the baby pool that had been propped up, out of use, since last summer (and should've been taken to the dump then, too). So I pulled it out, threw the kids in there with some sponges and soap, and we attempted to get one final use out of it. "Final" became definite when MK stepped onto the first step and her little foot shot straight through the plastic! (Again, should've been thrown out a year ago!) But they were determined to play in it, so we spent the next couple of hours filling it up as far as it would go until it met the hole made by her foot, and they sprayed each other & threw themselves down the baby slide (emphasis on baby) over and over again. I can say we definitely got our money's worth out of that one.

I actually spent some time scrapbooking this weekend, and had Saturday all to myself, with a jewelry class in the morning that was so fun - will post about it later - and then Dave took the kids to a movie birthday party in the afternoon & they were gone until dinnertime. We worked outside on Sunday - or I should say, the boys worked outside & Mary-Kate and I went out & attempted to help for about 30 minutes, until we both started itching like crazy & I realized we had more bug bites than non-bug-bitten skin and we ran inside!

Look at my poor baby's legs... I counted nine on just one leg. And she doesn't react normally to bug bites - when she gets them, they turn huge, red, hard... disgusting. And we've gone to the doctor every single summer when she gets her first one because we're always afraid it's something worse, and it's always just "how her body reacts to them." So this year I've tried to remain calm & can only give her a little relief with Benadryl & hydrocortisone, but it just looks so painful... kills me. All I can say is that the Edwards girls really must be very, very sweet... And the boys... not so much. :) But we already knew that.

baby pool from Raven Edwards on Vimeo.

in the closet.

I scrapped! It had been way too long and I missed it. Cute kits always get me motivated, and it had been way too long since I'd even shopped, so it was like Christmas morning for me. I went back to my (old) kaboodle list for some things I'd forgotten about, too. I've got to get back to my Disney album before I forget everything.

Even though we did Disney and a cruise this year, and I'm very thankful for both, this is the first summer we haven't had a trip to Destin planned. And I am so bummed. At this point it's too hot to even go. It's not fun when you're so hot you don't even want to get in the ocean. So maybe we can come up with something for the fall. I'm just - ugh - so sad we didn't get down there.

Yesterday I worked on a project that made me really, really happy. Well, at the end, anyway. During the project... not so much! I decided to tackle our master bedroom closet. I hadn't even been using it because it was full - and I mean full - of clothes that didn't fit, clothes that were completely unorganized, and honestly, just so much stuff you needed a map to get through it.

Dave was off so it was a perfect time to get into it, knowing the kids would at least be slightly entertained in another room and not hanging off of me or the closet rods like the monkeys that they are. And oh my. I really did not know what I was getting into.

I cleaned everything out of it (then making our bedroom look like something from Life After People), took a deep breath at the sight of an empty closet (that I hadn't seen since we moved in five years ago) and started filling up giant black trashbags for Goodwill. I ended up with six or seven. Full of some crappy stuff, yes, but mostly really good stuff that I could've made a ton of money off of at the consignment store. It was worth much more to me just to get it out of the house & out of my sight.

I wish I'd taken a REAL "before" photo but I was too intimidated by it all at that point. So the first photo is the "before" after I'd cleaned it out. Pay no mind to the crazy blur of a child at the bottom. Monkeys, I tell you. The photos are terrible but I was just too tired to put any kind of effort into it.

So here's a shot of most of my shirts. I tried to keep it somewhat organized with tanks, solids, prints, sweaters, and then cardigans (which I realized I have an infinite amount of). And seriously, if I ever want to buy a solid colored shirt again, please shoot me. You can find pretty much every color of the rainbow in there... and apparently I'm drawn most to pinks & oranges. Who knew?! Black, of course, was a given, which I also have infinity of. 100 black shirts that all. look. the same. And I can't even tell you how many I got rid of.

My shoes were the next challenge. I had at least 15 without matches. Ridiculous. So these are the ones I wear most and know I will wear. I counted 14 pairs of flip-flops (no, I only wish I were kidding) and they're on a different rack on the back of the door. And my favorite-favorites were actually in the family room (where they clearly do not belong).

Then there are the bags. These are also a small portion of the ones I know I'll carry again. I have several hanging on hooks here, there, and everywhere throughout the house. They'll be making their way into the closet today. The rest went into the garage for the next yard sale. And cleaning out the bags... no, didn't go there yet. God only knows how much change, gum, and single packets of medicine you could find hidden on that shelf.

So that's it. My giant armoire in the bedroom is another story... there is where I stored my pants, t-shirts, sweats, sweaters, etc. And these are the jeans that I kept. Totally unnecessary, I realize. But hard to get rid of.

I woke up this morning and you know how it is when you've gotten your hair cut the day before and you forget about it until you've been awake for a few minutes... It was that way for me. I rolled over and my sleepy eyes must have popped wide open when I looked over and remembered what a pleasant, happy closet I had there to greet me. Worth every single minute and sore muscle that came with it.