The Blogging Hiatus Continues...

I know I said I was going to catch up the blog over my winter break from school, but I have been spending time with family, cleaning out the pantry and closets, and getting other things done! So, here is a recap in pictures of some Summer/Fall happenings...

Katie, Lauren, and I reunited for Katie's birthday in Huntersville. It was fun spending the weekend with these two...just like old times!

Cristin and Ryan stopped in for a visit...

Becca, Ruthie, and Amy visited Knoxville for a weekend...

We spent time on Mom and Dad's boat and learned to paddle board...

We went camping with friends...

I took classes for grad school...

And we went to see Beauty and the Beast!

And we can't forget some cute pictures of Alice....

Catching Up

The last time I posted on the blog, I was smack in the middle of summer classes...over FIVE MONTHS ago! Yikes...

Time flies when you're having fun when you're in grad school. Needless to say, I am super behind on the blog and everything else in my life so I am trying to take advantage of my 5 week break from class. I have lots to catch up on here, so I will try to update this a lot before Spring semester begins! Once these five weeks are up, you might not hear from me until next summer, but I'll try not to let that happen!!

Instead of doing 1 post to recap the last 5 months, I am just going to start working my way through the photos on my camera and post things separately. So, here we go....

Jake and I had two awesome visits with family over the summer. Grant, Jessica and the kids came down and then later, Grandma Kissel, Aunt Kandy, Josiah and Lillian came to visit.

Cora and Lillian playing in my costume jewelry.

Josiah playing the Wii

Getting ready to head back to Indiana!

Girl's Weekend in NC

I got to spend time with two of my best friends from childhood for the first time in a LONG time! Katie, Lauren and I grew up playing together from a young age and have stayed close over the years. Lauren drove to Knoxville (from Lexington) and we met Katie in Huntersville to spend a weekend in our hometown celebrating Katie's 25th birthday!

Of course, we spent Saturday on Lake Norman like old times.

Being the sentimentalist that I am, I had to drive by the house I grew up in...

Celebrating Katie's 25th birthday at Mickey & Mooch and then out in Charlotte

Lunch & shopping in Birkdale before heading home

It's weird to go back "home" and makes me miss old times!

Wall Stenciling

I really wanted to paint our master bathroom because there was not a single ounce of color with the white cabinets, white marble counter tops, khaki walls and stone tile.

I love the circle window over the bathtub and I wanted to breakup things up a little bit, so I decided to take a stab at stenciling that wall. I read several blogs to get other's "do's & don'ts" on stenciling, found a cute stencil, bought some paint and I was ready to go!

It really wasn't difficult at all, but it required a lot of patience!

Notice through the window that it was day light when I started the top row of the wall...

And it was well after dark before I finished!

Almost done! The edges were the most difficult part....

Before & after, or, more like in progress. There is still a lot that I want to do...just have to remember it is one thing at a time!

 

Wall Art Makeover

I have had a set of three wall hangings that I have tried to sell on Craigslist a couple different times (tried once in Nebraska and once again in Pennsylvania). Since I have never gotten any bites, I thought that was a sign that I should use my craft skills to update them.

I really wish I could sit here and tell you how much I enjoyed this project and how fun it was, but if I knew how frustrating it was going to be, I probably wouldn't have done it. I think everything that could have gone wrong, did indeed go wrong.

First, I disassembled the frames. Easy peasy.

Then I wrapped the matting in burlap (to match the burlap lamp shades on my buffet lamps). Easy.

Don't mind the crazy tape-job. (I used tape incase I ever want to switch out fabrics or something)

Lovely lamp shades.

And taped the fabric over the old art. This was a sinch!

Then I spray painted the little boarder piece. I think this little boarder adds a lot to the frame, so I really like it! This was also very easy.

It's all coming together! I put the almost-finished product together to make sure I still wanted to paint the frames white. The answer was yes.

I took the frames outside to spray paint and Alice guarded the burlap...

While I was spray painting it started to rain, so I pulled the sheet that the frames were laying on into the garage until it passed over. I went back inside to do something around the house and about an hour later, I heard a cracking noise in the garage. I opened to door only to find the sweet hubs had accidentally ran over the frames. Whoops! I'm glad I can laugh about this now...

We back our cars into the garage, and you really can't see anything on the garage floor when you are backing in. In the grand scheme of things, I'm really glad we figured this out by running over measly frames rather than something more important! Now we know.

After calling around to Hobby Lobby and other craft stores, I learned that these are custom size frames and will be a minimum of $50/frame to get new ones. I new at that point that we HAD to fix the ones we have. Jake did an amazing job of gluing and sanding and making the frames look like new!

The next issue was the spray paint...it wasn't adhering well to the surface of the frame. And then it would chip off really easily. And then it got scratched. And then I realized I didn't like the bright white frame and I wanted more of an off-white. So we tried to re-spraypaint. And then one frame broke. And then the glass shattered in one frame when I was trying to put it all together. And then the fabric on one was bunched up instead of laying flat.

Until FINALLY, it all came together...