I'll try not to cough on you...

Who's tired of hearing about the flu?!

Oh? You are? Eh. Oh well.

I have more exciting flu news. The flu of 2011 has claimed it's fourth victim in our household now, Jonah. I keep looking at Peyton, "Was that a sniffle? A cough? You feel a little warm..." I'm just waiting. I know it's coming.

We (the kids at least) always get the flu shot, but this year it sneaked up on me, and I completely forgot. I'm seriously writing it down on the calender NOW for NEXT flu season.

I have all sorts of projects that I want to do, but with the kids being sick, Blythe has dental surgery next week, and everything else going on, it just doesn't seem like a good idea to start anything. I have plans that involve paint on the wall, sewing machines, ruffles, and pillows, and to do some flea market hopping... but these all must wait.

ok.

maaaaybe I can manage to paint my bedroom, even with everything else going on... it's really needing it with the new bedding in there.

And oh boy! Let me tell you, I'm having some problems with the curtains in that room. I bought these curtains when I bought the new bedding. They look great with it, it's just lovely... except for with all the sicknesses, I just want to crawl into my bed sometimes in the middle of the day, and NOT be able to tell it's the middle of the day. Well, duh, these are sheers, what do you expect, Jenna? 

While at Target that day, I started to buy some white black-out curtains, but decided to wait and see what I thought after I got the sheers up. Ok, that wasn't really the reason. It was because I had already spent $400 in Target, I needed to get out of there, and quick. I looked at Walmart, and they have black-out curtains, just not in white, and Target does. (Nearest Target is an hour away.) 

So I thought I would buy some plain white canvas-like curtains? Surely they'll block out some light, right?

No. Plain white curtains do not block out light.

At all.

So I now need to order some white black-out curtains. Because during this sickness, I have found myself in Blythe's room on her crappy twin size bed, just to be in the dark in the middle of the day.

Lesson learned: it doesn't matter how pretty it is, if it doesn't function the way you need it to.

(And, yes, still no pictures. The camera is still MIA, and I'm a cheap-o, I just know it'll turn up!)

Send food!

The flu of 2011 has claimed it's third victim in our house (he hasn't even been home in a month, but it found him too) -- my husband. I had to go get him from work. I was starting to feel better before I had to make the drive to go get him, but today I feel like poo again. Blythe still sounds like a seal coughing, but she seems to be feeling fine. The teachers at school keep feeling the need to tell me she's still coughing -- I know this, and I hate it for her, but in the last two weeks she has missed 4 days of school, she has to go. I mean, they say it like I'm the worse mother in the world for sending my poor child to school with a cough. It doesn't help my case any that she's telling them that I'm not giving her her medicine, which is a total lie. 

I have decided that child has one goal in life -- to make me look like a bad parent.

I'm guessing that I'm just going to have to give up hope that my camera will show up, because it's not, and break down and buy a new one. I would love to have a fancy smancy one, but I know that I would just loose it also, or the children would break it. So I do believe I'll just be getting a new cheaper one again. How do you ladies with small children protect those expensive cameras?

Here's to hoping that tomorrow is a better day. I need to go get my sewing machine from my mom's house (she borrowed it about 2 years ago, was going to make a dress for Blythe... that never happened), so I can get started on thinking about this slip cover for the wing back chair. I'm kinda scared of this project.

I just may survive the flu of 2011 after all

The flu hit us hard, and I just now think we're all going to survive it, but you never know, it could come back.

I'm praying it's over, because my poor house... it's been neglected. I have so many projects around the house that are only half finished (and there are clean clothes piled every where. At least they're clean, right?!). I still haven't finished all the derned doors and replacing of the door knobs. I pray that the hardware store will have the rest when I go back to get them, because if not, I will be taking these off and returning them. I don't know why I do business with this small local hardware store, they always let me down.

My bedroom is still slowly coming together. I bought some lovely shabby chic curtains, but I discovered they're not quite right. They're pretty much sheer, which is beautiful and goes great with the style I'm going for, but when you're sick and want to stay in the bed in a dark room all day, they don't work so well. I have two options: 1.) Keep these, because I really do love them, and go buy white black-out curtains (that's like an oxymoron isn't it? white black-out?) I'm just not sure how that's going to look. or 2.) Take the current ones back, and get something heavier. I kept the packages these came in, because I wasn't sure if I could live with them. Yes, I want the house to be pretty, but at the same time, it has to be livable. 

I moved some of the existing furniture in the bedroom around today, even though it will not be with us much longer (I hope.) I moved it because I had a great idea (ok, honestly, the idea came to me while reading over at Nesting Place), our bedroom needs some type of seating! I mean, duh?! Why hadn't I thought of this sooner? And I know exactly what needs to go in there. (This is where I would normally share a picture, BUT, the camera is still MIA.) I have a wonderful wing back chair in my living room. No one ever sits in it because of where it's at, which is the only place it will fit in my crazy little living room, and it would actually get used if I move it to my bedroom. Have you ever tried to take boots off standing up? Hope you have good balance, I don't, I must sit down. Plus it will be a great little reading area. The only problem is that I don't like the fabric. At all. I was planning on have the chair reupholstered, even if I left it in the living room. Then I got to thinking to myself, "Self, you know how to sew, you're fairly decent at it, why don't you just make a slipcover for it?" Low and behold, while looking around at Nesting Place, I found the link to Pink and Polka Dot. It's like the heavens opened up and the angels started singing. I can do this! 

I'm going to have to make a trip to find fabric soon. I need to find whatever I plan to make the slip cover with, and I found three throw pillows in the closet today that I need to make some cute shabby chic covers for. They went with an old bedding set and do not go with what I'm going for. I also need some type of ruffle stuff to add onto the plain white bed skirt. The shabby chic bed skirt was about $60 for a king size. I just couldn't spend that. So I bought a plain white one with the plans of fixin' it up. Now I have to go repossess my sewing machine from my mom, I've got big plans for it.

Really, I'm not making up excuses...

Oh, my, it's been one of those weeks. Anything that could go wrong, has. Both trucks have needed repairs (costly repairs at that), sick children, fighting with insurance... Thank goodness it's Friday, I just might survive.

I didn't fall off the organizing bandwagon with Toni at a bowl full of lemons. I've still been doing them, and was taking the pictures, but last night, my camera magically disappeared. The children swear they haven't seen it, and I've turned the house upside down looking for it, with no luck.

I have so much that I would love to show you, but the camera being MIA is causing problems. I needed a new one anyway, but didn't want to buy one right now. Maybe it'll turn up today. 

A girl can hope.

21 days to getting organized: Day Fifteen

Whew, a little late getting today's challenge from a bowl full of lemons completed. It's been a wild and crazy day, everything is breaking around here and everyone seems to need some type of medical attention (both trucks have decided to go stupid, which has lead to the decision to get  rid of mine and buy something brand new, so I had to test drive things today, the dryer has gone stupid also, and Jonah and Blythe have both decided to cost us a few thousand each in medical stuff. AND the hubby still has to get his snip snip done.)

So, today we were to organize our medicines. Oh geez. I was hoping that I wouldn't have to enter our master bathroom during this challenge. Calling it a master bathroom is a joke. One day I will measure it, but just trust me when I tell you it's tiny. And our closet is in there too, also, tiny. Over all, I really do love our house, but this so called master bathroom... ugh. Since I don't like it, do you know what I do? I store stuff in there. Yup. That's right. We have three children and two bathrooms, and we don't even use one of them. If I get sick in the middle of the night, I jump out of bed and run to the other bathroom. In my crazy head, the "master bathroom" does not even exists. It never even crosses my mind while I'm waiting on one of the kids to get out of the bathroom, that, hey, dummy, there is another bathroom in the house! Ya'll, there ain't even a bathtub in there. How is that a master bathroom?! There's a (tiny) shower. That's it. 

This is what we started with:

To the left of the shower stall is my closet, it's about half the size of the bathroom you see here. It's sad. Very, very sad. My husband and I both dream of a huge, grand closet. One day.

So, this bathroom was a mess, and I can't even blame this on the kids, I've just been dumping things in here that I didn't know where else to put during this challenge. Yeh, that came back and bit me in the butt.

Stockings and the kids' TVs' stands on the counter. Why? Well, why not? I don't use this bathroom.

The medicines are in that blue container thingy. Doesn't match the room, but I had it so I used it. PLUS, I don't use this bathroom, remember? No one see it. Seriously, I have a friend who I've known for 3 years, and she's never seen this bathroom.

The problem I have with both my bathrooms: no natural light, whatsoever. Drives me crazy. Makes me feel trapped. 

That last picture? That's exactly what the bathroom still looks like. I swear.

(Plus or minus a few clothes baskets......)

21 days to getting organized: Day Fourteen

Time for another challenge from a bowl full of lemons! I did today's challenge on Saturday, day thirteen, when I went on my organizing spree. I'll post just the under the bathroom sink picture here, or you can see the whole cleaning spree here.

Before

After

The bedroom makeover is coming along. I'm now trying to decide on a color for the walls, and to see if I can talk my husband into letting me put a small chandelier to replace our ceiling fan (that's pretty much been broke for the past year. If we've been able to live with out it this long, why don't we just do away with it and put something pretty??) We'll see how that goes. I also have a great art project idea to go on the wall above our bed. I wish we lived closer to a bigger town, because all we have is Walmart here. And they've done away with most of the craft department, so it's kinda putting my idea on hold until I can make it back to "The City."

Blythe Anne's birthday was today, and she got lots of stuff for her bedroom. It's supper cute, I may get some pictures up later if I finish painting her door (it's the last one I have left, I'm so proud!)

21 days to getting organized: Day Thirteen

Toady's challenge over at a bowl full of lemons started an organizing spree (ok, it was also because I went to target and got some great containers. Wish I would have bought more.)

All we had to do was organize the medicine cabinet.

That container on the top shelf has the kids most commonly used medicine. Allergy, pain relief, and Jonah's asthma medicines. I already had them in this container before this challenge. Because he has to take some of his asthma medicines every day, when he goes to spend the night somewhere, all I have to do is grab the box and he's ready.

This is just random medicines of mine and my husband. Behind the medicines are the coffee cups. I rearranged the kitchen cabinets a few months ago, and just kinda stopped here. Good time to fix it.

Much better, huh? That's one of my awesome new containers from Target, $2.50. We're running low on coffee cups, my husband has a habit of breaking them.

Well. That was too easy. And I have all those awesome new containers, might as well tackle the bathroom drawers too.

The "Hair Stuff" drawer in the main bathroom. Geez.

Tooth brushes and stuff drawer in the main bathroom. Don't ask why my razor is in there, I'm not sure why my kids do the things they do.

Four different tooth pastes. Why? There was also one empty tube that I threw away.

Hair stuff drawer after. The container doesn't fill the whole drawer, so I put my travel size stuff behind it. I'm going to get a small container it put them in later.

Tooth brush drawer. I put a wash cloth to lay the tooth brushes on so the container doesn't get funky.

I figured while I was at it, I might as well clean out my make up bag, because I only use about 10% of what's in there.

100% full. And I hate make up, hardly ever wear the stuff. Who has the time with three wild kids running around?!

Yup. That's it. Thinking about going and getting a smaller makeup bag now.

Well... while I'm in the bathroom, might as well do the cabinets too, right?

Is it that hard to throw away the toilet paper bags? For real?

More great containers from Target. The first one in the middle cabinet I already had and had the first aid stuff in. Just added the other two for cleaning supplies and the other for extra soaps and lotions.

I also painted the hall closet, they closet that was known as "The Dirty Clothes Closet" (we had this  because we have a laundry closet, not a laundry room.) But everyone has a hamper in their bedrooms, and I thought we could use this closet for something better. Linen closet? Another pantry? Both? Haven't quite decided what it's going to be, but it's gonna be great!

It now has one coat of white paint, but I'm thinking of doing something like House of Smith's did with their pantry. Awesome things are going to be happening around here, stick around to see!

21 days to getting organized: Day Twelve

Alright, here's a quickie post for 21 days to getting organized over at a bowl full of lemons. I had a very busy day today, buying my new bedding, the bedding that I've been drooling over for 6 years (there will be a post all about soon... maybe Monday?), and still dealing with a sick child.

Before

A mess.

 

During

 

After

 

 

Not too much of an improvement. I bought some things to organize this small cabinet... and they didn't fit. Stupid little cabinet. I had that one container just laying around the house and used it, and I'm going to go get another one for the top shelf. Maybe tomorrow's challenge will be something more do-able for me :)

makin' plans...

I'm becoming obsessive about the master bedroom. I was going to go white, black, and red in there. But then realized that's not what I really want, I was doing that because I thought it would make my husband happier, but he has announced he doesn't care what I do, as long as he has some where to sleep and I keep the amount of pink down to 25%. I can do this.

I've been dreaming of a shabby chic bedroom for years... about 5 or 6 years. And I'm going to go for it. That's really the look I'm wanting to go for in the whole house, minus the kids' rooms.

The other thing I'm not allowed to do...

(The Nester)

Our current bed looks just.like.this.one. But not painted white. It's a cherry color, and in my mind I can't picture a dark cherry sleigh bed with shabby chic bedding. The husband says I'm not allowed to paint the bed, if I want a white bed to sell the bed we have and go buy a new one. He is such a kill joy, just sucking the life out of all my fun ;)

I absolutely love this bed. loooooove. But I've been looking, and these beds cost thousands of dollars... I'm not comfortable bringing something that cost that much into my house with my destructive sweet angelic children. I'm going to keep searching and maybe I'll find something soon.

I will most likely be purchasing the bedding this weekend (omg. I've waited 5 years for this) and I will then be able to judge what I think of shabby chic with the dark wood. But I'm telling you, in my head, I'm just not loving it. Other furniture in the room could be a darker wood (maybe), but not the bed. In my head, I'm seeing a white bed... and I'm going to find it.

But then there's another problem. I see white and think peaceful and relaxing and shabby chic. My husband sees white as LOUD! and STRESSFUL! Oh what will we do?? Right now this is my game plan: Buy the shabby chic bedding, decide what I think of it on the dark sleigh bed (maybe I will love it, who knows?!)  then picking a new wall color. Hurry up Saturday so I can go shopping!!

21 days to getting organized: Day Eleven

Alright, here we go again! I'm enjoying these challenges so much from a bowl full of lemons! I've been staying up until 11 every night, because that's what time the new post show up for me. I stayed up a little longer last night messuring the freezer and deep freezer, and the cabinet that she gave a hint about for tomorrow's challenge, because I wanted to make sure I got the right size containers and wouldn't have to make several trips to Walmart. I then went to bed, ready for the next day and to clean the freezers!

And then my daughter woke up this morning all sick. My mom came over and sat with her while I took the boys to school, and then I came right back home. So no containers for me :( All I could really do today was toss the old food.

Fridge Freezer -- Before

Fridge Freezer -- After

Deep Freezer -- Before

Deep Freezer -- After

I needed to defrost the deep freezer, but since I plan on pulling everything back out in a few days (tomorrow maybe?) when I get the containers, I didn't worry with it today.

Now to go eat some of the southwestern rolls!

21 days to getting organized: Day Ten

Today of 21 days to getting organized at a bowl full of lemons is cleaning the laundry room. I have a laundry closet, not a laundry room. That's also on my list of things I want in a new house/addition if we choose to add on to this house. I have visions of a huge laundry room, but for now I have the closet, which I guess is better than nothing!

I've been looking forward to this challenge, because my laundry closet needed some serious love. And during the last nine days of organizing, this is one of the places I've been stashing things I didn't know where else to put (the other place is... this is embarrassing to admit... but the shower stall. That's where all the things to be donated are going for now. I will probably take some of it tomorrow. We don't use the shower and no one sees it, so it seemed like a good idea at the time...)

Now to show you all my baby, the most beautiful machine ever made...

*Angels singing*

Electrolux front loading washing machine.

oooook, that's the tour, move along, nothing else to see here...

What? You want me to open the other door? No, really, it's nothing to see... ugh. Fine. Have it your way.

There! Are you happy now? 

My husband is one of these "if it ain't broke, don't go buy a new one" people. I was so happy when the repair man told me my old washer had gone to washing machine heaven (even though it was only 4 years old, grr.) I did a little dance, which confused the repair man for a minute, because most people aren't happy when you tell them they have to buy a new washer, then he realized what was going on, "You want one of those front loaders, don't you?" Yuuuup.

So now I have mismatching washer and dryer, it kinda drives me crazy. I keep threatening to beat the dryer with a big hammer, so I can get a new one. My luck, I wouldn't be able to break it and then end up with an ugly(er) dented up dryer. I think I'm getting closer to talking my dear sweet husband into letting me buy the matching dryer. Because he's also one of those "I like anything that saves me money" poeple and the Electrolux dryer uses less energy. 

All the crap on top of the dryer. Detergent, carpet pet cleaner thingy (I don't have any carpet in my house, I use it on the couches. Love.), pads for the steam mop, old dust pan, iron, change that has come out of the washer...

Top shelf. Crawfish boiling pot, detergent I can't use now because it's not HE (giving that to my mother in law), bathroom rugs and rugs there were in my bedroom (bedroom rugs went in the donate pile (aka: the shower) and the bathroom rugs went back to the bathrooms.), box of painting supplies and other crap, in the blue container is summer stuff (bubbles, floaties, ect.) and also some Halloween buckets. And a bunch of hangers for reasons I don't even know why they're in here... I don't put the clothes on hangers until I get them to the room they go on. I'm blaming this on my husband. Because I can.

Seriously. 4 mops. Why? Just why?

The drawer of the pedestal. Bleach, attachments to the pet stain cleaner thingy, fabric sheets, and a downy ball that I don't need anymore, more pads to the steam mop...

This pedestal proved to be a problem... actually the whole washing machine did. When the Lowe's guys brought it and put it in, I couldn't open the pedestal drawer, or open the detergent/bleach dispenser all the way (I could get to the detergent part, not the bleach part). I refused to admit to my husband that I may have been wrong about buying the washing machine, so I didn't say anything for a few weeks.

Then I started having bleach withdraws. I have white towels! And white blankets! And white mattress covers! These things need bleach!

So I broke down and told my husband the problem. He went and looked and realized the dryer could be moved over to allow room to move the washer over, and ta-da! I can open the drawer and the dispenser all the way now! Now the question is, what about when I get the dryer. I won't be able to open drawer on that pedestal... but I'm not sweating it, I'm hoping one day soon to have a wash ROOM.

All the crap that came out of the laundry closet. I've been amazed at how much junk I can fit in a space. 

Everything pulled out. Except for the crawfish pot. (look at that Electrolux shinning.)

This was the box of painting supplies and stuff for home improvement... it proved to mostly be a box of junk.

Look at what was in the bottom of the box! The old ugly brass hardware from my kitchen cabinets... that I replaced TWO YEARS AGO! Why did I (really, my husband made me) keep these? 

When my husband first started working in the oil field, I found this little sign and had to buy it. We were so broke, and the guys out there are called roughnecks. It just fit. Even though we're not "Roughin' It" any more, it's nice to look at this and remember where we've been and where we came from. And boy have we come a long ways :)

Now it's time for the big reveal!

Wait a minute. Something's not right. I'm not loving it...

Let's try again!

OK, maybe I was a little dramatic, and I'm sure most can't even tell the difference in the last two pictures :) But to me it was a big deal, and I'm so happy with this space now :) I grabbed my white paint that I still have out because I'm still working on painting all these (stupid) doors, and painted the wood braces under the shelves. See? I know, not a big deal :)

This has been my favorite challenge yet!