Halloween Wishes

WISHING YOU A

SPOOKTACULAR HALLOWEEN
AND A
WONDERFUL WEEKEND!

I Want My Mummy

I try to give my family a little holiday inspired dinner
every Halloween.
This stuffed bread mummy is one of their favorites.
It's really quite easy to make.
First, you'll need two loaves of frozen bread dough,
thawed & risen. Flatten the dough.Cream 8 ounces of cream cheese with
enough milk to make it easy to spread.

Add fresh chopped or dehydrated onion to the mixture to taste.
With a sharp knife cut the edges of the flattened dough
into 1" strips, leaving 3" down the center of the dough.
Spread the cream cheese mixture down the center of the dough.Add your choice of sliced meat. We like ham &/or turkey.Pull the edges of the dough across the filling,
crisscrossing the strips.You can bake the two braided loaves
or cut the loaves into sections and

assemble the pieces to look like a mummy.Bake at 350 degrees for 20-25 minutes or until golden brown.

Add olives for eyes, and enjoy your spooky treat.

Edited to add:
I've been boo-ed by Tidymom and Mrs. B.

THANKS SO MUCH, LADIES!!!

Bon Appetit!

On a rare occasion I will purchase home accessories at other stores than the thrift store. Last year I bought a little tin sign at a high end furniture store. They gave me a coupon for a percentage off of one accessory. I wandered the store picking up piece after piece looking for something I could afford, even with the discount. Finally I found this: I probably would have bought it without the discount because I really liked it. I've enjoyed displaying it on a wire easel in my kitchen.

Last week I decided that I wanted to make it a bit more substantial, as well as give it a more permanent home. I bought some molding and asked my supportive husband to make me a frame.

I then spray painted the frame black.

After it was dry, I spray painted it white.
I didn't do this because I changed my mind.
I gave it the two coat treatment because
I knew I wanted to sand it and distress it.
Sanding the white paint made the black show through. Then I glazed it with a dark brown stain.
I used a hot glue to adhere the sign
on top of the frame.I added heavy duty hook and loop tape
to the back of the frame and stuck it
to the granite back splash above my stove.Now that's a substantial accessory
that looks like it came from a high end furniture store!

A Quick One

This little door shelf was our very first piece of door furniture---even though it was actually our second. We were in the middle of building our entertainment unit and things were going very slow. I was frustrated, so I brought out another old door, and various wood pieces. I told my husband that I needed a project with immediate gratification. I drew up a design plan and then left for a meeting. While I was gone, the sweet man I married started building. When I came home, a couple of hours later, the project was ready for me to paint. It was just what we needed. I had a project that I could work on while waiting for the completion of the entertainment unit, and since this project came together so quickly, it gave my hubby the excitement and confidence and to finish the next.
For years I used this piece in a corner of my kitchen to display antiques and other pretties. About a year ago I decided that I needed a change and the door shelf was moved to the basement. I walked past it last week and it caught my attention. It looked unloved and neglected. I knew, that with a little paint makeover, it could be a cherished piece again. So now it stands in it's glory, ready to live in my son's room (as soon as I paint the walls).

Let me tell you a little about it.
The back is an old door.
The legs are two stair balusters. The top piece was a part of a crib headboard
I found at the thrift store.We used fencing material to build the shelves.
It's rough and gives it a more rustic quality.
We added an old hinge above the door knob
to hide the hole left from a deadbolt. I painted it satin black,
then heavily distressed it with the sander.
I finished it off with a coat of maple stain.
I wanted it to look like it's been stored for years
out in grandpa's barn.
It's going to look great in my youngest son's room
and I won't have to worry about
the extra distressing it will get.

A Little Bit of Not Much

Today I'll be trying to catch up on a few projects. I'll be applying a paste wax to my new table. I used regular brush on latex paint so to help give it a hard finish, I like to rub in some wax. It will help protect it from cars being driven across it and shoes and bottoms being plopped on it.Many of you asked me the color. It was an oops paint. Saturday, I ran to the H Depot to see if I could find a close match. I am sorry to say that there wasn't one. The closest thing I could tell you is that it's a muddied version of Lemon Grass.

When it gets a little warmer, this afternoon, I'll be spray painting this:Yes, it's also made from an old door. I'll be changing the color to a nice satin black (big surprise!). It will be going in my youngest son's room along with some other pieces of furniture that I'll be painting this week. Hopefully the weather will stay in the sixties so I can get a lot accomplished!

TA DA DA DAaaAaa!!!

I've been doing some changing and rearranging.

I moved the old cedar chest
from in front of the couch to behind.That way it hides the cord mess and
helps protect the couch from the sun
that streams through the windows.Moving the chest also makes room for
my newest project.I added a bit of aging with stain
to honor the pieces that make up this project.
Both the door and the balusters are
over one hundred years old.In my opinion, it's the bumps and scrapes
that you get in life that give you true character.
So, as a reminder,
I like to highlight those in my furniture pieces. It's also in the small details where true beauty is found.I think this one is a real beauty.Many of you want to know where I find my old doors.
I find them at thrift stores, on the roadside, and
at businesses that sell new doors
and haul off the old ones.

I want to give a special thanks to Sandy for this award:

and Wendy for this one:

Have a delightful weekend everyone!

Hooray for Me!

Hooray for me!

I won Dave Ramsey's book
that Christian gave away at her blog.
Thanks again Christian!
I also received a cute tag from JuJu.
Isn't it wonderful? She created it herself.

Now, you all know how weird I can be about tags and awards. But, I thought this one would be great for EVERYONE to do. So I'm passing this along to everyone who is willing to try. I think it is hard for women to compliment themselves. Well, I suppose some women find it easy, but I'm not one of them.
So here it goes:
1-I love that I'm able to make people smile and laugh.
2-I love that I know how to do a little bit of a lot of things (painting, gardening, decorating, designing, building, crafting, thrifting, etc.)
3-I love that I can find beauty in almost anything.

Now it's your turn! What do you love about yourself?

Oh before you go, Kasey and Blessed Mama gave me this:

I'm supposed to list 6 things I love. I thought it would be fun to show you six things around my house that I love. But before I do, please know that I have my priorities straight. First and foremost, I love my Father in Heaven and my Savior Jesus Christ. I love my husband and my family. I love my friends, in real life and blog world.
Now on to the materialistic things that I love.

I love chocolate!
What girl doesn't?
My favorite candy bar is Snickers Almond.
I love picture frames.
I'm not sure if it's because they're made from wood,
Or if it's just the beauty in the simplicity.
I love a good quote!
When I was a teenager, I spent a summer
handwriting a book of my favorite quotes.
Now I just clip them on a rack in my bathroom.
I LOVE blogging!!!
I cannot express to you the MANY ways
blogging has blessed my life.
Please know, though, that if you have ever
left me a comment or even just lurked
on my blog, I count you as a blessing!!!
I love decorating magazines, catalogs,
blogs, websites, t.v. shows, etc.I love being able to take someone's trash
and make it into a treasure.Did you notice that those last two photos
were actually sneak peeks of my week long project?
I'll show you the final reveal tomorrow.
(Now I just need to clean the paint off my kitchen floor)

A Bit More Color

I've decided that my living room needs a punch of color. That's one thing about blogging, when you post pictures of a room you start to notice where you can make improvements. Since my newest project is going in that room, it is the perfect place to add color. I like the paint color that I used on this project.

Speaking of this project,
it's now sitting on my front porch. I was able to harvest all of these
delightful fall goodies from my garden. I piled a bunch of the smaller ones into
some antique bowls
that I found years ago at the thrift store.And the larger ones look great outside.Since we're outside, I'll show you
some more of my Halloween decorations.

Some of you showed a real interest in my old PB light fixture.

I suppose I could sell it.
But I'm warning you, it's pretty heavy and would cost a bit to ship.

Go Big or Go Home

Okay, first I'll give you a project update, the item has been assembled! However, I'm not sure how much I'll be able to do today because the weather has turned COLD and I'm feeling a bit crummy because of some dental work I had done.

In the meantime, I'll show you one of the projects we completed on Saturday. See this little light in my stairwell. It came from the PB outlet years ago. I liked it when I bought it. But it sat for about two years waiting to be put up (I'm not kidding). Once it was up, I really didn't like it. It was too small for the space and after two years, it wasn't really my style any more. So I began my search for a replacement. Luckily, a year or so later, I found one at the thrift store. Don't laugh, but this one took about a year before it was finally put into place. Can you tell that my husband isn't fond of heights? Fortunately, for my husband, I still like this one. Actually, now that it's finally hung, I like it even more. This beauty is an antique brass, even though the picture makes it look like a shiny brass. It's huge and fits the space perfectly.

You know what they say, "go big or go home."

Five Miles, Five Minutes

I have time management issues. It's frustrating for my husband. Years ago we heard a comedian talking about his wife. He said something like "She's always late because she thinks if someplace is five miles away, it will only take five minutes to get there." Both my husband and I laughed because the comedian could have just as easily been talking about me. At least now when my husband is frustrated with my poor time management he'll say, "five miles, five minutes" as a way to understand my way of thinking.
So it wouldn't surprise you that when I plan to get projects done, I usually plan on accomplishing several things in a limited amount of time. Saturday's list had six (or maybe even eight) major projects on it, plus other activities like: make sure my boys mow the lawns, go grocery shopping and go to a church dinner. And then there was the unexpected; a trip to the home improvement store and a trip to my mom's for a quick fix-it.
Sunday was spent at church and with family. We don't work on projects on Sundays. So needless to say, I don't have my project finished that I was planning to reveal today. Part of that may be due to the fact that it took around THREE hours to strip the old paint off of the balusters. These babies are a hundred years old and the paint is peeling. I'm pretty sure that some of that paint contains lead, so for safety sake, I needed to take off all of the paint.

I did manage to paint my last project
a nice Heirloom white.We were able to replace our old kitchen sink
with a pretty new one.

And we were able to complete another project that I'll show you in tomorrow's post.
As for the reveal of the item I teased you about of Friday, it will take another day...or so. I'll have my husband help me assemble it tonight, and then I'll begin to paint it tomorrow.
I am so sorry to disappoint you all. But, if you haven't figured it out by now...I'm not superwoman, because if I were, I could definitely go five miles in five minutes!