the Beachy Bunch

Here are few pictures of my precious nieces and nephews from the beach last week...

Here's the Brady Bunch themselves...

Liz's Kids...

Emily's kids...

Exterior Gratification!

We finally got our shutters hung, so I can show the fruit of my labor over the past few weeks!

As always, I love to go back to the beginning and track the progress. 

Here's the house when we bought it.

Add a little greenery...

(ferns, shrubs, and monkey grass walkway)

I painted my railings white and painted my door white in preparation for staining.  Since I'm working with the existing lavender grey paint for now, I thought a lighter "beachier" look would compliment the pastel house color better.  I'm really not a fan of these railings and columns at all, and so I also felt like white would make them blend and disappear a little more.

And finally...

I painted the shutters white as well, and then stained and layered paint onto both.  I think it gives the house more of a "shabby chic" look.  The turquoise mailbox was just a little fun hit of color.    

So here's the recap.

Before:

After / For Now:

Although, this is the way I see our house in my head...

Until we have the change to make that happen, I think it's looking better in real life too.  

All the little improvements I have made so far have been basically free.  My mom gave me some ferns on sale and two shrubs she had decided not to use.  I dug up the brick walkway liner myself, and transplanted some monkey grass.  I painted the door, shutters, and railings white with some leftover trim color paint we inherited in the basement.  I stained our door and shutters with leftover stain from our floors and leftover paint from our interior (I'll give more details on that in another post).  The mailbox is painted with leftover paint from our kitchen cabinets.

So although, it's still not looking like the house in my dreams, I think for $0 spent, it works for now!   

Thanks for reading!   

hubby's hot hipsters (i.e. pants)

Well, I'm down at the beach with my family.  Chris stayed home to work and snuggle with BeiBei.
Yes, you got that right.  He's using my absence as an excuse to break all the rules of dog training and let BeiBei snuggle in the bed with him ALL NIGHT LONG.  Cue Music.

But, can I blame him?  Nope.  I've sort of been wondering when he would be out of town next so I could do the same.  Hmmm.

chris and beibei makeout session photo when bei was a wee lil pup

This is actually the first time Chris and I have been a part for more than a night since we were married two years ago.  It was a little weird driving off into the sunset without him!

And some how...this brings me to the topic of pants.

My husband has...hot pants.

He is a hotty-pants.

Hmm...a hipster wearing "hipsters", if you will.  (You can find the word "hipster" in the thesaurus as a synonym for pants, so bear with me).

Chris heard about these cool pants company from a good friend, Lindsey Boney (you can find his wife Sara's blog here.)

Anyway, I'm letting the cat out of the bag.  The company is Bonobos.

They are a super cool company with an awesome referral program, & rad pants.  The ninjas are cool too.  (You see "ninjas" is code for...ummm, people who work there.)  If you get referred by a friend, and/or refer a friend you get like $50 bucks off your pants or something.  They started as a pants company but now they cover the whole spectrum of men's clothing.

I'm pretty sure Chris checks their site and blog daily.  He is constantly trying to leverage his allowance to get another pair of pants.

Here are the pants that, I think, look best on Chris:

(The Corps bootcut)

Many of the pockets of their pants are this way, featuring different funky fabrics.  

They are a great departure from the straight laced average-joe "chinos" he's been known to wear.  

Based on Chris and his friend Lindsey, we know these pants look great on your slim-legged-fellas...but the verdict is out on the fit for other physiques.  Any feedback out there?

Anyway, all that to say, my hubby looks hot in these hipsters.  Shockingly, I don't have a picture of him in them...but I'll be sure to snap one on Sunday, after we run in slow motion back into each other's arms (cue music below for full effect).  (I can be 95% sure he'll be wearing a pair...at any given moment.)

I only have this one pic of him in his Bonobos shorts from our weekend in the Mtns.

(that's BeiBei's leash around his waist, not a drawstring, btw)

Anyway, check them out.

And if you order the following pants, I'll give you free access to my blog for life.

Seriously though, if you heard about the pants from me, and you wanna order some pants...throw my buddy a bone and email us so we can get your referral!

My boy needs wants some more pants hipsters!

Rock N' Roll Doggie Do

As BeiBei continues to grow bigger and her hair gets longer and shaggier, I'm realizing that I really do have to brush her coat a few times a week.  I have been brushing it 1-2 times a week, and I have been pretty successful at preventing mats, up until lately.  I'm beginning to find small mats here and there.  So I think as her hair gets longer, she's starting to need it more like 2-3 times a week.
She is basically a non-shedding dog, which is very low maintenance, but I guess the trade off is that I have to brush her.  She's fairly cooperative, but still resists me a little bit.

A friend send me a link to a blog called "Simply Seleta" where they gave their goldendoodle, Pippi, a hilarious haircut!  They live near a creek and so their dog was always getting so muddy, which caused her to get very matted.  When they took the dog to the groomer, the groomer said she would have to be shaved basically to the skin.  They came up with this compromise:

She reminds me of an 80s hair band.  

This family was sad to shave their goldendoodle down, but they had a great sense of humor about it!

For now, I hope to keep my little furball..."fluffed"...so I guess I'll bump up my brushing regimen.

   

A Weekend's Visit & A Weekend's Work

Chris's family came to town this weekend to visit and pick up a new car for his little brother, Reynolds.
Reynold's was pumped about his new car and a good time was had by all!  It was fun to have the Walkers in town and have them stay with us, even though I'm sure they were a little crowded in our little house.

Have fun with your new car at UA Reynolds!  Roll Tide!

Chris's dad helped him install a garbage disposal in our sink!  It was my belated b'day present, and I am so excited.  Our kitchen did not previously have one, and it drove me crazy.  I know plenty of people survive without them...but they must be better housekeepers than me....because our sink was always yuck!

While the men worked on the disposal, I was busy working on stage 2 of my house painting project.  It's still not finished and perfect, but here's another sneak peek.

Before:

 Stage 1:

 Stage 2:

There's still a little more touching up to do, and then I'll rehang the shutters and post the full pics!

So far, I think it's definitely an improvement for $0!

Mountain Getaway

We had a blast this past weekend with some old friends.  We went up to Chris's grandmother's mountain house near Ashville, NC.  It was great to relax and be with friends.  As much as I love the beach, when I'm at the beach I feel pressure to be by the water and in the sun.  And sometimes sitting in 90 degree weather, remembering to flip and reapply sunscreen...can feel like a lot of work, when I'd rather be inside in my pjs.  It was nice to be in the mountains, and not really have pressure to do...anything at all.  We slept in, lazied around the house, rode around on the golf cart, and did some afternoon trail/creek walking.  The boys played golf one day, and we went into town one night for dinner.  It was fun...thanks Gannons and Clintons for joining us!

Of course, we took BeiBei with us, and she had a blast!  She frolicked in the creeks, hiked up the waterfall, and generally just LOVED being around 6 people at once...even though one of them is a dawg-hater.    

 The girls stayed behind and watched while the guys and dog hiked the falls.  

The mountain house is basically right on the golf course, and so it was fun for the girls to catch up with the guys for a golf cart ride on the last few holes.  

Thanks for reading!

Made-em-myself Curtains

After getting a great deal on some great printed fabrics from Premier Fabrics in Madison, MS ($9.99 per/yard)....I got to work making some cafe curtains for our living room and dining room.

Here are my fun fabrics.  

Here are the before and afters for the living room...

the LIVING ROOM

Before:

(curtain panels from ikea, white faux wood blinds, jumbled tv wire situation)

After:

I removed all the faux wood blinds, and put bamboo blinds on the large window.  (Woop woop for the bamboo blinds garage sale steal!)  I added the chevron print cafe curtains to the large window, which are hung on a oil rubbed bronze metal cafe curtain rod, with clip-on cafe rings.  So far I haven't been hugely happy with the metal rings, because the curtains move around a little TOO much, and it's hard to ever spread them evenly.  The metal also doesn't have the homeyness that I want in our living room.   I may go back later and try to figure out a different treatment at the top of these panels.  For my little window, I used a floral print that matches the cafe curtains I made for the the dining room.  I think this is a good way of relating the two conjoining rooms, and not letting the living room get too matchy-matchy.  

Before:

After:

Before:

After:

Dressing up this window really brought some color to the mantle, which is much needed since we chose to put our tv over the mantle instead of artwork.  I want this window to draw the eye, instead of the tv.  

There have been a few other improvements as well...

Before:

(one pretty lamp)

After:

(two is bettah)

Before:

(jumbly tv mess)

After:

(wireless wonder)

Way to Go, Chris!  He worked so hard on this.  All the wiring goes through the wall, up through the ceiling, and down into a hall closet where all of our components live, i.e. W.C.C. (Walker Command Center, figure A).  We use a radio frequency remote to control everything.  

figure A

So that's the living room.

As for our dining room...

Our Dining room really needs some help.  I'm just not happy with it lately.  I'm brainstorming completely re-arranging it.  But here are the curtains at least.

Before:

(Again, curtain panels are cheapo from IKEA)

After:

I opted for no blinds instead the white faux wood blinds.  I'm hoping to stumble upon another set of bamboo blinds for cheap!  I used pinch pleat hooks and tape to make these pinch pleat curtains, which was an awesome cheater move!  I left the cafe curtains a little long for a more luxurious feel, since there is nothing below them.  

  ************************

I'm very pleased with the results from my little curtain project.  I went ULTRA cheap, with my IKEA curtain panels, and so I think adding interest with cafe curtains is a great way to get a big effect on a budget.  

So, if you're on a budget, use your cheaper fabric on your panels (more yardage required), and then you can go back later and use your nicer fabric to spice things up with some accent curtains (less yardage required).  Then later, as another thought, I hope to add some trim to my panels for more interest.  

I have loved having these cafe curtains because it allows us to not use our blinds at all.  So we can look out our windows and see the outdoors, yet we have enough privacy that anyone outside our house could only see us from the neck up.  So that's right, Chris...you CAN walk around in your boxers now without me jumping up to shut all the blinds!  

Thanks for reading.