Mini Projects

While I was working on my garage cleaning and organization project I found several boxes of seashells.  Wonder Hubby had asked me no less than a dozen times over the past few years when I was going to throw them away and I would always respond with my standard "I'm going to use these in a project."  From time to time I did think why don't I throw these away but somewhere in the back of my mind I knew I would regret it if I did.  So they had been boxed and bagged and sitting around here and there for years when the whole coastal feel room was born.

It was now or never to use them.  First I rounded up I glass containers to fill with shells once filled I Wonder Hubby drilled holes in several shells that allowed me to make shell tassels.  So simple but so pretty. 

I still had tons of shells and I still had some sea glass left over from this project so I decided to try my hand at some decorative balls.

First off I did a couple of wash and dries to clean off all the sand....I know I had done this already...why can't you ever get rid of sand?

Then I picked through all the shells and sorted by size to get the ones that were the most interesting and the right size.    I used a paper mache' ball (.99 at Micheal's) as a base and hot glued on the shells.

I did the same process for the sea glass.  Below is a picture of both balls displayed on glass candlesticks for now.  I'm thinking about either frosting the glass on the candlesticks or finding some bulkier wood candlesticks to distressing.  What do ya'll think, frosted or distressed?  I think they turned out really well and were a lot of fun to make.

I have Friends in Coastal Places

Recently I was chatting on the phone with Sherry at Garden of 65 Roses aka The Hawaiian Heifer.  I asked what she was doing and her reply was crafting.   Ok, I'll bite I thought, "so what are you crafting?" I asked.  "I can't tell you" she responded. Strange response because normally she would have immediately begun to tell me about her latest project.  What?  Turns out she was being herself and doing for others and fortunately for me this time I was the others!  Yippee!

Sherry and I have a long history of crafting and junking together and we both LOVE cheap projects.  In fact most of the time the cheaper the project the more we love it.  She had landed some sort of goodie for me at the local Goodwill and was making it over.  All I knew was it was for my coastal room.  So I practically camped out waited patiently by the mailbox for my package.

When it arrived I immediately ripped into it.  Aww...what a cute little candle holder and a bag of sea glass.  Sherry has quite a collection of sea glass and introduced me to this easily addicting hobby when we visited her on Oahu last summer.  I was sorely disappointed this year when we vacationed in Florida to find no sea glass.  Apparently it is some pretty elusive stuff and you have to find just the right beaches to find it.  Bummer, as looking for it is so much fun. 

As soon as I had completed the bedside table I posted about here I knew it was just the right place for this sweet gift.  So I placed it on the bedside table and admired it everytime I was in the room.  Yesterday I was doing a little cleaning up on my paint table and ran across the box this little goodie arrived in.  I was just about to toss it in the trash when I noticed something white in the box.  Upon further inspection I discovered it was a card.  In my excitement of opening the box I had somehow missed it.  The card was a Maxine (my favorites because they are so sarcastic just like The Hawaiian Heifer and I...teehehe) check out what the front of the card says.  Opps!  The good news is there is several thousand miles between us so I am safe for a while!   Also in the note was the printout below of the before and after (what a true blogger!). 

I think it is just about perfect!  It does get a little better, Sherry landed this cutie for only .49 cents!   Woohoo gotta love some Goodwill.   Well now that just makes it even more perfect doesn't it?   I am so thankful to have such a thoughtful friend.

Going coastal may make me go Postal

Ya'll are going to have to indulge me a bit here as I ramble try to explain this post title. I'll try to keep my rambling to a minimum, or ,as my kids tell me, "give us the condensed version please."  Seriously, they don't seem to understand that what shoes I'm wearing, if I'm having a good hair day, whether the clerk at the grocery was nice, or what the weather conditions were are important facts in telling about what I'm doing. Duh!  So hang on, here we go.

Back in May, BDJ graduated from college and took a job in Las Vegas (okay, all you moms out there know that this alone is traumatic and I think I'm doing quite well with it  despite what my family says, thank you very much).  The day after graduation we helped him pack up his house in Memphis, transport it back here, and plopped it all in our garage.  He arrived home a couple of days later and within 2 weeks had sorted through both his belongings in our garage and what was left in his childhood room to make his new life fit into a Ford Mustang...no easy feat.  Piece by piece he threw away pieces of his life that no longer seemed necessary to him (no sweat, I just went behind him and dug it out and squirrelled a lot away in the attic).   His room was now a shell with only his bed and his wall of awards left.  At least I could sit in it from time to time and pretend he was just away at college, right?  Just 2 short weeks after he graduated we stood in the driveway as he and all his wordly goods pulled away from us and headed out on a 27 hour drive into his new life.

Wonder Hubby and Mini disappeared into the house as I stood in the driveway till I could no longer hear his car in the distance, wondering how long it would be till I saw him again.  Pretty emotional stuff.  So I went from copiously weeping to sniffling and headed inside worried that the positive spin Mini had put on this move was only her game face and that I would find her curled into a ball mourning her brother leaving.  I was totally unprepared for what I saw when I went into BDJ's room.  Mini announced as I walked in "I'm moving in."  This was something that had come up from time to time since BDJ left for college but we just never responded.  Apparently she had cleared it with her brother and was well on her way.  By the time I arrived she was ready to disassemble his bed and had already removed his awards from the walls.  She must have started before he was out of the drive.  So much for my shrine (I know it was probably a bad idea anyway) and any hopes that if I left his room he might come home.

Within 2 days, Mini had online shopped new bedding and curtains and had even arranged furniture moving help and was completely ensconced in "her" new room.  The good news is BDJ didn't have room to put his queen bed in the Mustang so I now had a start on a guest room.  Since I am obsessed with really enjoy the beach, I knew that creating a space with a calm, beachy kind of feel was right for this room.  Plus I thought I could make this look gender neutral.

Step one would be painting the room as Mini had painted it a hideous blue 3 years ago and decorated in what I called Early Circus.  I didn't spend much time with her in this room as the colors and patterns made me a bit queasy. 

This picture makes the room look like a nice blue - pictures are deceiving believe me.

 After only a few days of driving Mini and Wonder Hubby crazy with paint chips asking for input on paint colors, I was happily taping and preparing to paint.

 Since I was intentionally dragging around to fill time I was in no hurry to complete the room, I painted on and off for a week or so.  I was actually finishing up the paint when brush in hand I answered a phone call from BDJ.  "What is in my room right now?"  he asks, "Umm, your sister," I respond.  Despite assurances from Mini and BDJ, he seemed a bit annoyed by this information.  For a few moments I secretly was hoping his dream job in Las Vegas hadn't worked out and he was coming home ( I know, I'm a little sick).  Soon I understood why he was asking. One of his best friends needed a temporary home and since I was down a kid we got Bri (aka our spare).   Literally as the paint dried I quickly pulled together enough bedding to make the room presentable and within hours welcomed our spare daughter home.   So, although painted, my coastal feel room went on hold for a few weeks.  Like all kids, they eventually manage to escape and Bri got away as well (kind of, since I demand that she is here at least once a week:).  Down a kid again, I got back to work.

Since then, I have been adding pieces one by one that eventually will come together to create my coastal room.   The process of finding the right pieces and making them work has been seriously frustrating, thus the feeling that I may go Postal.  Especially considering that BDJ will be home in 5 days for his first visit and I'm feeling bad that his room is gone and the guest room isn't complete. 

Now that the room was painted and a bed with doable bedding was in place, I was ready to add stuff.  I had seen this headboard at Pottery Barn.  So finding just the right shutters to create a similar headboard was priority.

Once again my ADD kicked in and I was dragging this old nightstand out of the attic. So much for priorities.  This guy has been around.  In a former life it was Wonder Hubby's when he was a kid and then early in our married life became an "entertainment center" for our big 12 inch, no remote, black and white TV with a coat hanger antennea and then lived on in BDJ's Americana themed room.

Not only was it painted like a flag, but it was crackle painted, and since I was in a hurry being lazy, it really needed to be stripped and sanded.

 After some thought, I decided since I was going for a worn, coastal cottage look I would just paint over it all and make it work.  So I started by sanding with my handy dandy hand sander to knock off any loose crackled paint and then painted it white.  My first intent was to paint it white then black and distress it to show the white.

Red, White, and Blue are hard to cover, so the white took several coats.  Then after candle waxing the edges and a couple of coats of black it looked like this.

Ummm...upon further study I decided that was too much black, even with distressing, so back to white she went.

Finally, after many coats of black and white, lots of waxing, and some light sanding, this is how it looks.







It is now happily living in the guest room, waiting till I get around to finding the perfect hardware.  I will, I will....eventually. 

So there you have it my Coastal feel room is officially on its way.  I am working on various projects to use in this room that I will share in the coming days.

Finding Treasures and Halloween Crafts

Yeah for me....I cleaned the garage!  It isn't perfect by any stretch but it is quite the improvement from where it was.  It is amazing what you discover (both good and bad) when you tackle a cleaning project.  I saw some things I couldn't believe where hanging out in the garage and I found some goodies too.  I discovered an oar that was aged perfectly and a cool old Coke crate that will be used in a later project.  I stumbled on quite a few half done projects, supplies for things to make I can't imagine I ever wanted as well as many things to add to Wonder Hubby's Honey Do list (teeheehee) . 

One of the things I stumbled on where these ghost shapes I had cut out years ago and painted white then abandoned.  I have turned them over for the photo cause..well they were dust covered and pretty nasty.

I have been noticing a trend in vintage holiday decor particularly Halloween decor.  I was talking to a friend a few days ago and she was ecstatic over some vintage decor she had found at our local Habitat for Humanity store for a song.   With this in mind I knew I wanted to somehow make these vintage looking.  I started by painting them both black.  I let them dry then used an old candle to go around the edges and a few spots on the surface.  Then I painted them with a cream paint and sanded the waxed areas.





Looking Pretty Vintage



The ghost on the left is before distressing and little guy on the right has already been given the business and is looking a little worn...just what I wanted.  Now what to do with them?  Should I hang them?  Put them on a wreath?  Lean them against something?  This I would need to ponder.

Remember how I told you I discovered many half done projects?  Among those was this little sign and some old blocks Wonder Hubby had cut for me ages ago.

 Both were already half done projects and I liked neither of them.   Since I am a little ADD when it comes to projects and considering that I was pondering, I dropped my little ghosts and started on the sign and blocks.  Both were painted, waxed then painted again.  I then sanded, did some laundry, cooked, walked the dog and slept a couple of times before I managed to complete them. 

Then I had a little ah ha moment and decided to attach my little ghosts to wood blocks as stands.



Sporting their stands.

 Here they are as part of my fall mantel decor.

Good things happen when you clean and organize :)

Fall Fun

The weather here in Tennessee has been beautiful the last few days.  Highs in the upper 70's and low 80's yet cool enough in the evenings for a light jacket.   The last couple of weeks have been a little crazy around our house.  We almost lost our baby (ankle biter) Chloe to pancreatitis week before last then last week my brother had to have emergency surgery and then about 1/2 dozen other disasters little things came up. Thankfully Chloe and my brother are both recovering nicely and the other stuff has settled down.  Mini and I took advantage of the weather and the calm and visited an annual fall event in Nashville.   

Yesterday we attended the Music and Molasses Festival at Ellington Agricultural Center in Nashville.  If you are from this area or will be visiting the museum at Ellington is always a fun place to visit.  We got acquainted with Ellington Ag Center several years back when my father became a member of the Ag club and then BDJ went on to work there as a gardener all through high school and Mini has worked the festival in years past.

Music and Molasses offers a little something for everyone.  It is billed as a country celebration of the harvest season.  One of the most popular things to do is taking a ride in a mule wagon.  It seemed a little strange this year since my Grandfather usually brings his team and wagon and spends the weekend giving rides.  He is 89 now and this year finally sold his horses and mules and wasn't able to enjoy the festival.  There are many interesting demonstrations like blacksmithing and sheep shearing.

Blacksmith



Sorghum Mill

  There is also a working sorghum mill and molasses made on site.  Lots of great music and dancers including lots of bluegrass and clogging.  For the wee ones the Farmer for a Day gives kids a great opportunity to try their hand at farm activities.   One of my favorites for the kids is the Apple Snap.  Apples are suspended from a tree and using no hands you have to bite into them!  Kind of like bobbing for apples...kinda.

Apple Snap



Booths with a variety of crafts including jewelry, handmade baskets, jams and jellies and much, much more.

Beautiful Pottery

Handmade Baskets

Love the Wagon Basket!

  Then there is the food.  Mini is definitely Wonder Hubby's child because they believe if you attend any event you simply must eat.  After we made the rounds through most of the booths we met up with my father who has chaired the festival for the past couple of years and was working it this year.

Dad

 Mini and I ate while we chatted with Dad.  We decided on a smoked turkey leg.  It was huge and awesome!  Sorry for the lack of photos but it smelled so good we dove into it immediately.  By the time I thought of taking a photo it was already in this state!

What is left of our Turkey Leg!

Post Turkey Leg - We look much happier.

 What a blessing it was to enjoy this day and event with Mini!

Pant Rant

The other day I stopped into our local Fred’s store to pick up a few things.  While waiting in the checkout line, I noticed the young guy in line ahead of me.  Something about him didn’t look just right, but I couldn’t put my finger on it.  After a few minutes, I realized it was the clothing.

This poor young man was attempting to pull off the “sagging” look.  For those of you that don’t know what I am talking about, sagging is the art of wearing your pants low and showing the world your underoos.   I do believe that the more successful you are as a “sagger”, the lower your pants are.  In fact, I think if your waistband meets the bottom of your boxers  you clearly excel in sagging. I don’t want to come across as intolerant of teens expressing themselves through hair and clothing.  Goodness knows I don’t want to stifle their creativity and force them to figure out a more beneficial way of expressing themselves.

Ya’ll, I’m conservative, so when my then Jr. High aged son announced he wanted to dye his bangs RED, I swooned!  What in the world was he thinking?  Had he not met me?  Shockingly, it was my father (who, by the way, thought I should wear bobby socks until high school) that finally convinced me to pick my battles and give on this issue.  His logic was is it will grow out and/or can be cut off.  Again, where was this man when I was growing up?  So Wonder Hubby and I relented and BDJ ended up with some lovely ORANGE bangs (hahaha, talk about Karma!).  Of course he acted like they were great, but we knew they were a boo boo. But he just couldn’t admit that, right? 

Then last year, as BDJ was preparing for his senior year of college and his final football season, he announced that he was going to get a Mohawk and dye it each week the opposing team’s colors.   Here we go again.  Of course, now he is a grown man. What am I gonna do?  So he headed off to the hairdressers and returned with a flaming red Mohawk.  Two days later, one of his best friends was to be married and we attended together.  I was so embarrassed!  I am not the kind of mom that has kids that dress crazy and have colored Mohawks!  I spent the whole wedding and reception explaining this was just a gimmick (he said it was for building team morale) for football season and secretly praying that he really meant it was only for football.

I was glad the season opener was an away game.  I wasn’t surprised that the team loved it, but I was completely shocked how many parents loved it.    You should have seen my face and gapping mouth when The Memphis Commercial Appeal printed an article about BDJ and how he had gone green (that week’s opponent’s team color was green) and then the university President came to chat him up after the game and said he loved the article and the hair!  What, am I a dinosaur or what?   Finally I relaxed   decided not to be such a prude and began to look forward to seeing the new color each Saturday.  Although, I must say that the rainbow Mohawk was a fashion don’t!    Now I’m not trying to be a snob, but BDJ pulled off this look well.  When he traveled with the team, he dressed in coat and tie and looked neat and clean,  even when sporting a Smurf blue hairdo.

So, having said all that, here is my point.  I am not against expressing yourself with whatever trend you choose, but please, if you are going to do it, do it well.  As I stood in line at Fred’s with the sad example of sagging in front of me, I realized what looked off with him.  Bless his heart, he was wearing nasty classic jeans, not the loose fits needed for sagging. But the most pitiful part was his boxers.  He wasn’t sporting the cool “Tommy” undies, or even clean undies.  He was wearing the most wrung out, sad looking, dirty, knit boxers I had ever seen.  I felt pretty bad for the guy.  So to all you “Sagger”   want-to-b’s…please visit a metropolitan area and take a good look at some examples of successful sagging.  You may find that this look just isn’t in your budget and doesn’t fit the rural country boy genre you live in!  

A Mom’s Bittersweet Football Story - 2

I originally posted this last fall but since it is football season, I felt it might help some moms that are on the fence about their sons playing the game.  The rewards of the game aren't necessarily reflected only on the scoreboard.  Enjoy!

 

I used to hate football.  I mean really, really hate it.  I hated football so much I didn’t even like to hear it on the tv in my house.  That was 12 seasons ago, and today, as college football season gets underway, I am mourning the loss of my personal connection to football. 

Last season marked the last football season that my son Chase (aka Big Dumb Jock) played.  It was and remains bittersweet.  This August, for the first time in 12 years, I didn’t have to worry about heat stroke, heat cramps, torn acl’s,  or concussions in preseason practices.  I suddenly have all my Saturdays to take weekend trips and enjoy fall festivals.  For the first time in 4 years we don’t have to worry about Wonder Hubby getting time off to travel to games.   Sounds good, huh…..not!  Like all good things it all went way too fast. 

 I would have bet the bank  12 years ago when BDJ announced the middle school coach wanted him to play football that I would never like football, much less mourn it’s passing in our lives.  I mean, really, how smart can these guys be to spend hours bashing heads over a little ball?  Live and learn as they say. 

I also would have never dreamed that football would be such a valuable asset in our lives and a huge factor in shaping BDJ into the man he is today.    What happens on the field on any given Thursday night, Friday night, or Saturday afternoon is really a tiny piece of what the game of football really is.  I watched as my son learned lesson after lesson through football that has and will continue to serve him well in life.  The game is truly what you make it.  BDJ decided at 12 years old that he would play football all the way through college.  To make that dream a reality took an incredible amount of physical and mental work.  I watched as football helped him learn to make and meet goals, doing the extra hard work on and off the field.  I watched on vacations as we slept in and ate “vacation” food as he rose early to run on the beach and turned down soft drinks and junk food.   Football taught him a strong work ethic and fierce determination.  I watched as he learned accountability to himself, his coach, and his team.  Through football he learned what it is to be a part of something bigger than yourself.  Football helped him learn responsibility, how to work out your frustrations, to win and lose, and to truly give your all. 

Headed to the end zone - High School



Senior Year High School

We lovingly call him BDJ but he is anything but dumb.  We always stressed grades first, football after that.  That guidance served him well as he was able to have the advantage of both playing football and having great grades to open the door to a very elite private college.  Football allowed a door to open that may not have on grades alone.    The opening the door to the college he attended opened another door allowing him to have an advantage going into his dream career.    For our family, football has been a great asset.

As a family, (immediate, grandparents, aunts, uncles and at times great-grandparents) football gave us a great family time opportunity.  We attended games together, followed the newspapers for pictures or mentions of BDJ, and enjoyed many after game dinners and visits.   It even was a great exercise tool at times…..for me anyways, as I had a tendency  to run in the stands as my son carried the ball toward the end zone.  

As a mom I spent many hours in parking lots waiting for practices to end and many hours worrying about the bumps and bruises .  The emotional toll of the ups and downs is sometimes overwhelming.  The picture below shows our son after his last home game in high school.  The raw emotion of this photo still brings tears to my eyes.  The emotion on that night was unbelievable, my heart truly broke for him as this chapter of his life closed. 

After Last High School Home Game

Ringing the Bell After a Win - Rhodes College Tradition



Action College Senior Year 2010



Rocking A Mohawk - I can't believe I liked it!  ONLY for Football Season.

 The below picture is of my son after his final college game.  The emotions I felt that day were not as sad as they were as high school ball finished, but more of joy.   Joy for him as this picture captures the day that was the culmination of 11 years of work to reach his goal. 



11 Seasons of Work for This Moment

As this season gets underway, I find I am missing the anticipation of what big play BDJ might make, the pride in seeing him take another step toward his goal, the excitement of traveling to games, and the commradierie football brings.    I will never again feel the excitement of game day where I am too nervous to eat.    I will never again feel the excitement of watching him dive into the end zone and listen to the crowd cheer.  Not as a mother anyway….but there is always the possibility of grandchildren, right?  On the upside, I will never again have to smell that special after game smell that he insisted on sharing with me through hugs!   So to the mothers of little boys……..football is far more than bashing heads on a football field once a week, it just could be some of the happiest moments of your life.