Hope everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving weekend! Ours was great- we had a big family dinner on Thursday (sans Turkey because Hale forgot to buy oil for the deep fryer!). My uncle and his wife drove in from Wilmington with their 2 adorable kids. Marc & Sara were there with Jake, Jon and I brought…

winter update…pardon the mess…

I hope everyone has a wonderful Thanksgiving! We’ll be spending it at my Mom’s with my family coming into town. Lots of aunts, uncles, cousins, etc. Ike’s very excited for his first big family holiday!

I found this cute bench at Ikea last time I was there. I thought it would look great on our front porch. I can’t wait to get the front door painted- a nice holly berry red we’ve picked out. Our house is starting to really look like home.

Today we finally got around to hanging curtains in the formals. They’d been sitting in their Ikea bags since September. Shameful. But with all the painting in those rooms mostly complete we could finally hang them. Dining room– there are 2 of these windows. Living room– this is the side window. Main window in living…

Isn’t that loverly? That’s the faux panting the prev. homeowner did on the slate tiles around the fireplace. Here’s the whole thing: Blech! So today I was removing scuff marks on the mantle with my Mr. Clean magic eraser and thought I’d try it on the painting. It worked! So I grabbed a bottle of…

Ok, I’m going to sound really nerdy for a minute, but I have to share this. I love the new Mr. Clean Magic Erasers! They are miracles in a box I tell you! We thought we’d have to paint the baseboards along the stairs where the movers scuffed them up so badly, but the eraser…

Today I had a dentist appointment (excruciating with the metal stick thing and the scraping! but no new cavities) then Ike and I ran some errands. I tried to zip him up in a tote bag but he’d have none of that. So I just carried him on my arm. I’m trying to see how…

Today Sara and I took Jake to see Santa at the Southern Christmas Show. He looked so cute in his Santa hat. As far as the show goes… you’re paying to shop. That’s it. Not much “show” about it. We didn’t buy anything really, I only spent about $5 on merchandise. Much less than the…

I meant to post a pic or two so you’d get an idea of how successful our Ikea shopping trip was last weekend. Jade loved it and suggested we go back with a semi. She agrees that you have to actually go to the store to get the full experience- the catalog and website, while…