welcome to the world, little c!

i thought i'd share a few photos i took of my new little nephew.  he was born on june 15 of this year, and i got to take some special pictures of him when he was only three days old!  he was completely calm throughout taking these pictures - he didn't make the littlest peep!













i hope you enjoyed them!

crafts i've been eyeing

i've been admiring so many things over on pinterest this week.  honestly, pinterest gets me in the mood to do so many things.  the problem is, i usually hop over to pinterest at some point during the work day, and then by the time i get home i've forgotten all of the cool projects i'm supposed to be working on.  in an effort to actually get out there and do some crafting this weekend, i decided to actually print out pictures and stick them up as inspiration.  as further motivation to start on some of these projects, i thought i'd list them here so i can come back to check them off (i love checking things off of lists).

in no particular order...

this looks like fun:

Source: theidearoom.net via Liz on Pinterest

(i bought a butterfly hole punch two weeks ago at michael's and it was a dud.  i'm hoping to take it back/exchange it this weekend.)  instead of using paper for the butterflies, i thought it might be cute to use fabric from the bunting we used at our wedding.  that way it would be crafty and sentimental.


i'm pretty sure you can just buy the wire and little clips at ikea, but i am also contemplating making something from stuff i already own (i had to buy a lot of twine and bailing wire for my wedding, and i know i'll never use it for anything else:

Source: suziebeezie.tumblr.com via Liz on Pinterest

this is cute, and looks super easy:

Source: marthastewart.com via Liz on Pinterest

i'd like to do this with street names in dc or maybe andy's and my favorite places to eat/things to do:

Source: tatertotsandjello.blogspot.com via Liz on Pinterest

a week or two ago i came across scrabble-like letters at michael's and grabbed them off the shelf.  i knew i saw a project that involved scrabble letters, but i forgot about it until i revisited my "diy" pinboard today:

Source: rockettstgeorge.co.uk via Liz on Pinterest

this isn't really a craft, but it is something i should do this weekend to clean up from the painting weekend we had last weekend:

Source: thisoldhouse.com via Liz on Pinterest

also not a craft, but something i have been wanting to do:

Source: marthastewart.com via Liz on Pinterest

i know i always let my weekends get away from me, but this weekend i want to actually accomplish some of this stuff, and maybe one or two things off of my to do list i posted earlier this month.  here's to using a blog as a false source of accountability!

a fun, productive, and hot weekend

since we started our house hunt a few years ago (it was on an off for a couple of years), andy has been talking about his big plans for the basement.  he had grand plans for an ultimate "man cave" complete with a bar, Virginia Tech themed paint, football memorabilia, and a shuffle board table.  all along, i have agreed to let him have his "man cave" and even agreed to help him with any of the projects he was working on.  in the back of my head, i kind of knew that it would either 1) take such a long time for andy to get around to doing any of it that he would forget or 2) not happen because of our laziness.  i know us well enough to know that we kind of procrastinate on pretty much everything and end up taking the easy way out a lot of the time (we both drive cars we hate because we covet our weekends and don't want to give one up for car shopping, so will most likely drive our cars until we are no longer physically able...the AC in andy's car is showing some signs of weakness, so maybe it will be sooner rather than later).

this weekend we finally got around to crossing off one of the big milestones toward having the dream man cave.  we painted!  and it took a really long time!

here is a photo pre-painting / post-taping:


(notice all of my measuring tools on the footstool: level, old school ruler, tape measurer, pencil and painter's tape)

and some post-painting pictures:








sorry for the iphone quality...my battery on my other camera was dead and i didn't want to wait to take pictures...again, i'm lazy.


the process of taping and measuring and taping over again took the largest chunk of our time.  we started working at about 11 am on saturday and ended for the day at 4:30 am on sunday.  after six hours or so of sleep, we went to the big McD's and stopped at home depot to pick up some more paint.  we painted on sunday from about noon until 4:30.  we finished up with some white paint details after work on monday and finished up at about 11:30 pm.

since i enjoy doing arts & crafts type things, i had a great time.  i was singing along to the music blaring out of my iphone dock and was humming along at 4 in the morning.  andy was not as amused at the whole painting thing and was pretty much grumpy all day sunday, but appreciative of all of the help i was giving him.
now that the pain in our backs has started to die down and the blisters have popped, we are both thrilled with the way it came out.  it definitely gives us a lot more confidence as home owners and aspiring diy-ers.
this project has definitely whet my appetite for painting and decorating.

i hope to start on the office/guest room this weekend or sooner, but know that sometimes teen mom gets in the way of even the best of intentions.

it's pretty awesome, i think, that i still stop almost every night and wonder if all of this could truly be my life.  it's usually after we're done watching tv or doing other stuff in the basement and i'm making my way upstairs to the bedroom.  i usually stop and stare at the stairs and think "holy crap.  i have stairs.  and i have a house.  and it's awesome."  and when i'm out doing errands with andy on the weekends, i still stop and think "holy crap.  i have a boyfriend. and he loves me".  (he is no longer my boyfriend but is, in fact, my husband...i am still not used to that yet). 
yes, it is amazing to me that i have the life that i'd always thought was out of my reach.  but that's not really what i'm impressed with.  what i am most impressed with is that i am in the moment & mindful enough to actually stop and think and be grateful.  i can honestly say that this is one of the first times in my entire life when i've been able to do that.  usually i'm complaining about how annoying things are and how many curve balls life has thrown my way.  it was a rough few years back at the beginning of my adulthood, but all of the hard work and patience has finally paid off.  and lately life has been pretty darn good to me.  i'm recognizing it now, and i hope that i will remember this feeling when the next wave of stress/anxiety/negativity comes my way. 
now that life has settled down a bit for me (yippee! the wedding is over!), i'm thinking more about house projects i'd like to do.  i'm definitely not going to be doing any major renovations any time soon since the house is in pretty good shape and i'm not exactly "handy". 
i've been working on a photo wall for a while now.  i bought a ton of frames from ikea when i first moved into my house, and i just went back to supplement my collection a couple of weeks ago.  so far i'm loving my choices - all white frames with some pictures from the wedding (we will haven't gotten back our professional photos yet...), a couple of pictures of my niece/nephews, and a few different pieces of art work that i created (inspired by finds on pinterest).  i haven't put anything on the walls yet, partly because i have to buy the hanging wire stuff (the placement of the hook by ikea is a bit awkward) and partly because i'm not sure if i want to paint my lower level first. 
because i always love when they do lists over on younghouselove, here is my list of different things i am hoping to accomplish around the house this summer:
- paint red "accent wall" in the living room.  i'm thinking subtle greyish blue.
- paint entire downstairs (main level is my territory, basement is andy's)
- paint stair railing?
- hang photo wall
- find or build bookcases/storage for huge empty wall in living room
- clean out "office"/extra bedroom.  take some stuff up to the attic, donate everything else to gw
- find another bedside table for upstairs guest bedroom at gw and give it a makeover
- find another bedside table for downstairs guest bedroom
- find or make a desk for an "office". i'm sort of considering using the upstairs guest bedroom closet as a small, makeshift office
- organize all of my crafting supplies
- purge all of my old clothing and send it to gw
- go through basement closet and get rid of old stuff that we never use any more

okay, that list is long enough for now.  i'm not sure how much i'll get done this weekend - my mom is in town and i'll feel guilty if i'm dragging her to home depot thirty times in one day (why is it that i never get everything i need when i go to home depot?  i always forget at least one thing...so ridiculous).

i'm off to see wicked tonight with some friends.  i'm not usually the going-out-in-the-middle-of-the-week type, but i'm trying to come out of my shell more and take advantage of living in an awesome city at an awesome time in my life.  anyway, it should be fun.  and a little bit of culture never killed anyone.