Time for a Makeover

I'm re-decorating today.  My Blog, that is.  As some of you know, I've had two blogs for almost a year and it's time to consolidate, re-do, update, simplify.  I don't need to have two.  It's hard enough to keep up with one and I don't feel organized about it.  My other blog is mostly pictures of my "things" that I make.   Since this is so much of who I am and what I'm about there is no reason that I see to keep them separate.  When I start a new project, complete a project, have questions on a project, you'll all know about it right here. 
Now with the new Pages Widget on the blogs, I have set up a page of "My Charming Creations".  The link to this can be found under my banner above. 
I'm leaving my other blog:  http://mycharmingcreations.blogspot.com/ up because I have 10 months worth of pictures on there that I don't want to lose, but I won't be posting anything new on there.  I also still have my Etsy site:  http://charmingbynina.etsy.com/  .  New things will go up there on a regular basis.

The other new addition to this blog is my Button.  You can see it on my sidebar.  I kept seeing these buttons on other blogs and they are so cute, but I had no idea how to get one of my own so that others can (hopefully) collect it.  So a big "Thank You" to Connie at Living Beautifully,  http://connie-livingbeautifully.blogspot.com/.  Connie made this one for me.  Isn't it cute?  It's Me!  Connie, you're a sweetheart!

Just like my home, my blog is a constant work in progress.  The goal is for it to change and grow for the better.  Also, as is the reason for re-decorating my home, I get bored easily.  I like to get new things sometimes,  or just re-arrange as in no cost decorating.  It's all just lipstick and rouge.  The heart and soul will remain the same.

O Happy Day!

Such an exciting day.  It's one of those feel good days.  You know, where everything just feel warm and fuzzy and cozy. 
First of all, this is my 100th post in this blog. 

I have two blogs, so it's actually my 137th, but I'm not counting that way.  It's the 100th for this one.  I see a lot of blogs where they have give aways for reaching certain goals, or whatever other reasons.  I just never got into that.  I just don't have that kind of blog, I guess.  Nor do I have the time.  I would just like to thank all of you that for one reason or another have followed along with me.  Many times I wonder why people follow what seems even to me to probably be boring and not real exciting to others.  This is just me and my life, but I know for me it is sometimes just interesting to be able to peek into someone else's window.  There's obviously a little bit of voyeurism in all of us.

Today's snow storm is also another bit of big news.  I know this is not necessarily a good thing for a lot of people and I feel so bad for those that have to be somewhere and can't get there, or even worse, people that have lost power or even been involved in accidents.  For many reasons this snow is not a good thing.  Believe me, I feel bad for anyone suffering due to this storm.  I am very fortunate to be able to say in my home today and thankfully we have power and heat.  I have a very good excuse to have to stay home.  For those that know me and follow along with me, you know I love to stay home.  It's beautiful outside. There is no prettier picture than fresh fallen snow on trees.  This picture was from our last snow storm and it looks the same today except the bushes you see that are in front of our driveway are today almost completely covered under snow.  My DIL was supposed to go to Pittsburgh last night to report for an Air Force Reserve weekend.  Thank goodness that got re-scheduled or she'd be stranded somewhere.  Pittsburgh has at least 20".  We have about 10" here.  So this is going to be a tomato soup, grilled cheese, and knitting/sewing day.  My favorite kind of day.

Another piece of good news is the award I received from Annette at So Many Memories, http://sewcrazed.blogspot.com/ Thank you Annette! 

She actually tagged me with this a few days ago, but I'm just now getting the chance to acknowledge.  With this award I'm to list 10 things that make me happy and try to do at least one today.  Tag 10 bloggers that brighten my day and they are to link back to my blog and make their own 'Makes Me Happy' list.

So here is my list:
 1) Fresh fallen snow
 2) My children and grandchildren
 3) Having a loving and caring family
 4) Knitting
 5) Sewing
 6) Ellie Mae, Fergie, and Callie - my pets
 7) My sons being happy and doing well
 8) A clean and organized home
 9) Being able to stay home a whole day and doing whatever I want
10) Being healthy

I could get a whole lot broader and politically correct with this list, such as Peace on Earch, Goodwill to Mankind, An end to Homelessness and Hunger, etc.  And all these things would truly make everyone happy and really go without saying.  I'm just citing my own little world in my own little list above.

I am passing this award on to all of you that I follow.   I know that's not really the rule of picking 10, but I can't and won't pick.  If you're on my list, there's a reason, so please post this award on your site and if you feel like it, make a list of your own 10 Happy Things.

Good Groundhog Day!

Nice, quiet, calm day at home.  Finally.  Got some paperwork and bookkeeping done.  One load of laundry.  Chicken and dumplings in the crock pot.  Raspberry bars made.  My March issue of "Country Living" magazine came in the mail.  And American Idol on TV tonight.  Perfect day for me.  I know it doesn't sound very exciting, but believe me, it was good.

It's also Groundhog Day. 
Punxsutawney Phil saw his shadow so there will be six more weeks of winter.  Now, I live about 25 miles from Punxsutawney, and there's ALWAYS at least six more weeks of winter around here.  We have a saying in these parts: We have two seasons, Winter and July.  That's a little exaggeration, but not by much.  It's pretty here, though.

I was going to go down to help Melissa today with more curtain hanging, but to get to their house you drive right through Punxsutawney.  It would take me an hour just to get through Punxy with all the people and activities going on today, so we decided on Thursday.  They're having a new entertainment unit delivered on Thursday anyway that I'm anxious to see and help arrange.

Tomorrow Melissa is coming up this way and I'm meeting her at the old house to clean.  Now that almost all the garbage is out of the way we can get down to shining and polishing floors, sinks and appliances to get ready to show.  In fact, just by word of mouth in this small town, two people called me to ask if they could see it tomorrow.  We're hoping that it will sell right away without even listing it.  We'll see what happens.  It's been a hard decision by all in the family to actually sell the house as it was Grandma and Grandpa's for 50 years.  We've all finally come to the realization that we can't hold onto it forever and we'll all be more relaxed in letting it go.  When I go through old pictures of Christmases and family reunions at that house I get sort of sad and emotional, but time to move on.

Speaking of Grandma and Grandpa, I went to see them yesterday.  I took Grandpa his every other day supply of Hershey kisses and jumbo marshmallows.  He's 94 and happy and doesn't have a thing wrong with him except his memory, so what the heck.  We figure it's not going to hurt him at this point.  Grandma just looks so pitiful.  She's down to about 53 pounds now and she didn't even open her eyes while I was there.  We just keep asking the question that no one can answer, "How can a human live at that weight?"  And it just keeps going down.  We're praying for her to move on, too.  We don't even feel bad about thinking that or saying that anymore.

All In a Day's Work

I seem to remember back in the recesses of my memory that when I was a young wife and mother of two small, very active boys, and I was the owner and manager of my own insurance agency, I feel like I had more quiet and free weekends than I do now.  How is that even possible?  Or is my old mind just playing tricks on me and I'm experiencing very selective memories and/or possible dreams?  I don't know.  All I know is that I have not had a weekend to myself where I could just do whatever I wanted to do, which would include doing maybe nothing at all, in a very long time.  
Early Saturday wasn't too bad.  I started the day freshening up the bathrooms and making sure sheets and blankets were clean in the guest rooms.  Austin and Melissa and the boys were coming in the afternoon and spending the night.  Sunday was going to be spent cleaning out the rest of the leftover debris from their old house here in town.  This consists of the small house where they lived with a detached garage, and guest house/office that they rented out.  To their credit, they are getting rid of everything that they no longer use, need or want.  So they had a dumpster brought to the house and we were all going to help clean out and throw away. 
Well, since Friday had been Melissa's 27th birthday, I told them I would have a nice dinner on Saturday evening and a birthday cake.  Mom and Dad were to have left for their drive to Florida on Saturday morning, but due to bad weather in Virginia and the Carolinas they postponed their departure by 24 hours.  So they also came for dinner.   The dinner, consisting of pot roast with vegetable and noodles and fresh Italian bread was very nice and the chocolate cake (from the bakery, I can't do everything) was so good.  The evening was very enjoyable and going very well, except that Logan, our 5 year old grandson, did not want to eat the main course.  He fussed and fussed about not liking it and only wanted the chocolate cake and ice cream.  His mother told him he had to eat some meat and potatoes before he could have the desert.  He finally forced it down very unwillingly and with a lot of drama and fuss. 

He doesn't look very excited yet does he?  He is so dramatic.  Notice the cake had to have a princess theme because the boys requested it saying that their mommy is a princess.  So that's what I did.

Both boys gave Mommy a kiss before we sang Happy Birthday.

Melissa modeling the hat and fingerless gloves I knit for her.  This yarn is a Baby Alpaca and is so soft.  I need to make some more.

We all went to bed fairly early since we wanted to get up early to get the operation clean sweep started and hopefully finished in one day.  Austin and Melissa went downstairs to the guest room for the night and the boys went upstairs to the kids' room and fell asleep watching a movie with their Grandpa Bobby.  Bob came down to bed and soon after that I hear crying upstairs.  Anyone that's a mother knows that sound that you don't lay there and think twice about it.  I ran upstairs just a little too late to get Logan to the bathroom and he had thrown up all the cake and ice cream all over the bed, comforter, his pajamas and all.  What a mess!  Didn't even wake up Landen, though, who was sound asleep in the other bed right next to him.  Thank goodness.  So I stripped the bed, changed his clothes, layed towels all over the bed for him to now sleep on and put the bucket (you mothers know what I'm talking about) next to the bed.  Logan, in this sweet little pitiful voice says, "I think I had too much sugar".  I couldn't help, even at that moment, but to laugh and agree with him.  He said he felt better, so I didn't bother anyone else in the house and went back to bed.  I was into a really good sleep when about an hour and a half later that same sickly cry could be heard from the upstairs bedroom again.  Up I jumped, and as I'm running up the stairs I'm thinking I hope he hits the bucket.  Nope!  All over the towels.  Same procedure as earlier.  I started a load of laundry now before I got back in bed.  Still no one else in the house hears this or at least they're all ignoring it.  And I really didn't want to wake up Austin and Melissa because I already thought that over and didn't want the next day's cleaning schedule to be disturbed.  This ended up going on every hour or so for the rest of the night.  I felt so bad for my little guy.  Neither one of us slept much at all, obviously.  

Then on top of all that mess and disturbance, at about 6:30 in the morning, I had just layed back down, and Bob says, "Why is the bed wet?"  Here, my little Fergie had peed in bed.  He's never done that.  I  must have disturbed him with my getting in and out of bed and he woke up and thought it was morning and time to pee.  Since I paid no attention to him he fell back to sleep.  I just figured I may as well give up on sleeping altogether and just kept the washer and dryer going from that point on for the rest of the day.

So Sunday morning went as planned for everyone else, thank goodness.  Landen went to an old neighbor's house to play for the day.  Austin, Melissa and Bob went to clean, in 2 degree weather, and Logan and I actually spent a nice quiet day at home.  I actually maybe ended up getting the better end of the deal.  I stayed warm, even though I was exhausted.  And Logan seemed to be fine by late Sunday morning.  We don't know whether it really was too much cake or a 12 hour bug, but he's fine now. 

I heated up leftovers for dinner after the three of them came back home cold, tired and hungry. 

The dumpster is filled and Wednesday Melissa is coming back to town and I'm going to go in and help clean the house with her.  Floors, bathrooms, stove, refrigerator, etc.  They need to get it ready to show for rent and/or to sell by the first of March. 

Sunday evening we got a call from Brandon telling us about his two week survival training mission in the woods.  He just got back home on Saturday.  He couldn't even communicate with Diana, his wife, while he was on this training.   I'll tell you about that next time.  It's 8:00 pm and time to get off the computer and go make something.

My World, My Style

Wow! It's cold outside.  I am staying inside all day.  I love when I can do that.  The sun is out, which is unusual around here, so it's really pretty.  We ended up getting a lot of snow yesterday.  This is what it looked like yesterday morning.

As of the day before yesterday, all the snow was almost gone due to all the rain we had.  Now this again.  I'm so lucky that I don't usually have to go out if I don't want to.  I can at least wait until the driveway gets shovelled. 

I was able to get my new white lights up on my mantel.  I'm so used to these lights that when they burn out it drives me crazy.  The room just feels so dark and cold without them.  Little lights just make a room feel so much cozier.  I have a small little passion for small little lamps.  My Bob calls it my light show when I start turning on all my little lamps at 5:00 in the evening. 

Here's my mantel with the lights out.

Just too dark, isn't it?

Now here it is with the lights on.

Isn't that better?  And this picture was taken during the day.  It's even prettier at night.   I also found these cute little wooden valentines at JoAnn's.  I like that they're subtle and muted and blend in better with my colors.  I'm not really a bright red person.

As you can see, I have an Old World theme to my home with wine, grapes, vines, etc.  At least this is what the HGTV web site told me.  That's a fun site if you're into decorating, crafts, gardening, etc.  You can take a little quiz on line that tells you your decorating style.  Mine is "Old World, New Way".  I was so excited to know my style had an actual name. 

 I may have shown this before, but this is my fireplace screen that we had a stained glass artist friend of ours make for us as per my design.

I didn't like the old ugly black cover that's on the fireplace so this is a pretty cover up.

So for today I told myself I was going to work on bookkeeping.  I'm still procrastinating on that job.  Maybe after lunch ---.