Here I Go Again......

Hi friends,
Thanks for joining me today. Can you tell how much I've enjoyed being home lately getting my bucket filled decorating, organizing, and crafting? I even managed to get in some much needed heavy duty spring cleaning- I cloroxed our baseboards and floorboards yesterday on our main level. I had to stop after a little while because I was getting loopy off of the Clorox fumes! What a difference it makes though! I've got to make sure I do that job more than every two years!!!! Seriously!

We were hosting our last small group bible study last night at our house so I decided it was time to rearrange our furniture in there. You know it's funny, some people (like my mom) arrange their furniture in a room and will keep it that way as long as they live in that home. I am not saying that there is one thing wrong with that. Nope! Nothing wrong with that at all! But, that my friends, is not me. Nope! No way! I feel so refreshed when I spice it up. So, let's take a walk down memory  lane, over the last two years that we've lived in our current home in the outskirts of Raleigh, North Carolina and see how we've arranged the furniture in that room:

Before

 

That takes us to today. I wanted to focus on the flow being better in the room. I wanted to be able to walk easily through the room as this is the room we usually walk through to get to the stairs to go upstairs. See, what you think now......(of course, it'll probably be changed by tomorrow!).......

Now

 

 

 

 

Oops! I already added a new piece from the living room:

Thanks again for stopping by my little decorating blog today friends. Just to share, I updated my 'books and reading' tab and my 'joy rising' tab, check them out if you're interested.

A couple of new little tweaks.....

Artwork by Bryce, I love the bright colors she used, don't you?-

 

 

Daily inspiration on our chalkboard. I'm still thinking a lot about gratitude lately:

 

 

 



Back to life at the Brew Crew household. Since my two kids have had birthdays recently, they both got new bikes. So, we've been taking daily afternoon bike rides. It's hilarious to me how different my two kids are. One child has to always be in the front of the bike ride parade, leading the way. He is my daredevil, racing off. The other child will get off of her bike if there is any kind of incline or decline, as she isn't quite certain that her brakes will work effectively, so she will walk her bike to an appropriately flat surface then get on it again. Needless to say, the speed demon and I end up waiting for the slow child at each and every stop sign. They are who they are. Gotta love their little spirits!!!!!

You guessed it right.....the daredevil-

Take care friends. I hope you're having a wonderfully blessed week.
Happy decorating & living,
Megan

A few little updates

HI friends,
Boy, do I feel blessed this week! I've had the last two weeks off of work and it's been so lovely to be at home getting some of those 'to do' things off of my list. Somehow, I haven't crossed off everything from my 'to do' list. On some of these beautiful days, I'd rather sit on the deck in an Adirondack chair with the sun on my face and the breeze across my legs listening to the birds reading rather than tackle some of those jobs. I have not cleaned the baseboards and the hardwood floors yet- somehow those less glamorous jobs don't seem as exciting. I have gathered up items from the attic for Goodwill and done some good cleaning.

I wanted to share two fun creative projects that I had a great time working on last week. I dusted off my middle school sewing skills and designed a pillow. I also spiced up our eat in kitchen and added a few new items.

First, in honor of Teacher Appreciation Week, last week I used some of my very basic sewing skills- thank you Home Economics Middle School teachers for teaching me to sew. I had some plain white pillows that came with our two Crate and Barrell slipcovered sofas that we bought on sale two years ago when we moved from Virginia to North Carolina. I decided it would be fun to add some decorative elements to the plain white sofa pillows. I checked out the Pottery Barn website and found my inspiration (I kinda have a thing for starfish and pillows):



I used the left over tan duck fabric from the ugly bench in our bedroom that I covered recently to try to improve it's appearance. You can read about the bench project here:
http://cottagebluedesigns.blogspot.com/2013/05/newest-project-redo-ugly-bench.html

First, I made a template on paper of the starfish cutout and traced it with pencil on the tan duck fabric. Then I sewed it on the pillows. I kept one starfish pillow plain and added buttons and beads to the other one. Which one do you like best (plain one on the left, snazzy one on the right):

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I also wanted to share with you how I spiced up our eat-in kitchen. I added two green slipcovers to our chairs (found on sale at Pier One) and a new green pottery lamp found in my favorite home décor store in downtown Columbia, South Carolina (I also found the driftwood bowl at this new favorite store of mine that is on the buffet). By the way, sorry that these pictures are so dark. The paint color on the walls/ceiling is not conducive for picture taking. We hope to change it to a soft cool gray/blue sometime in the near future and a white ceiling:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Here's where I have been spending quite a bit of time lately outside reading:

 

 

 

 

 





Friends, another reason that I am feeling so blessed is that this weekend my parents came to visit to celebrate Mother's Day. My mom has been battling cancer for the past year and she now has six months off of chemo because her cancer is shrinking- Praise God! Here are some pictures from the weekend. By the way, we were also celebrating my husband and daughter's joint birthday a week early. I treated my mom to a night out- we went out to eat and saw a musical together. She and my dad look great, don't they? 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Here we are before church on Mother's Day:

 

 

 

 

 

Thanks so much for joining me today friends! I had fun sharing Brew Crew updates with you. I hope you are feeling blessed this week. I think I'm feeling especially full of gratitude because I have been reading a book on gratitude which is helping me to focus on all of life's blessings.

 

Take care.

Happy decorating & living,

Megan