Adoilable Doilies!!

I found all these adorable doily projects at Country Living online.

I am just in love with them, especially the lampshade and vase.

(Whoever styled these photos is brilliant!!)

If you'd like to make any of these yourself you can go here for instructions.

I'll make you a deal, I'll let you know if I make anyof the doily projects; if you let me know if you make any!

Edited to add: I found a blog, Ashley Ann Under the Sycamore who made the doily tablerunner check it out here.

Pink Saturday Turns Two!

I want to wish a very happy 2nd birthday to

Pink Saturday!!!

Thank-you to Beverly from How Sweet The Sound for hosting each Saturday.

Now what would all girly girls enjoy receiving on their birthday?

Pink Flowers!!

Please enjoy.......and have a lovely week-end! 

I'm learning how to use Picassa's photo editing software and am having lots of issues. Please bear with the quality of my photos while I am figuring this out. For some reason the crop is showing differently on blogger than it is on Picassa.  

Meg Ryan's Beach House.

Elle Decor is showing photos of Meg Ryan's beach house.

 Boy is it stunning! Who wouldn't want to soak in that tub?!

I love the contrast in the kitchen of the white wood ceiling and the dark wood island.

The living room. So open and airy. Wow!

I wish blogger would decide wether photos are loading first to last -or- last to first. It seems to change from day to day. Very fustrating. Is anyone else having this problem?

Apple Bread with Streusal Topping

So do ya wanna know what I did with all these apples?

 Well I guess if you've read my title you have already figured it out. :)

I made some apple bread, yum! I modified a recipe from here.

It's a fairly healthy recipe and it actually tastes good, even though it has nutritional value.

Shocking I know!

Apple Bread with Streusal Topping

2 c. apples, peeled, cut into 1" chunks

2 eggs

1/8 c. oil

3/8 c. (or slightly less than 1/2 c.) applesauce

1 ts. vanilla

1 ts. baking soda

1 ts. salt

1 ts. cinnamon

 a bit of freshly grated nutmeg

1 c. flour

1/2 c. whole wheat flour

1 c. sugar

1/2 c. walnut pieces

Streusal topping: 3/8 c. flour, 1/8 c. sugar, 1 ts. cinnamon, 3 tb. butter.

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Spray your loaf pan. In a large bowl, beat eggs in a mixer. Add oil and beat until combined. Add vanilla, baking soda, salt, cinnamon, nutmeg, and applesauce. Beat until throughly mixed.

Next add flours and sugar and beat on low until combined and smooth. Fold in apples and walnuts. Place in pan.

For streuasal topping: Cut butter into flour, sugar and cinnamon. Sprinkle on top of loaf batter.

Bake 1 hour. Remove from oven and cool on a wire rack 5 minutes before removing from pan.

Edited to add: I made this again in one bowl and mixed it by hand and it still turned out wonderful and was much easier and faster than getting out the mixer.

All four people in my family liked this and it is very rare that we all like the same food.

 Trust me, it fustrates me to no end!

But we all enjoyed the apple bread so I'm singing a little song of joy!

Tra....la,la,la la.....

I'm linked up to Foodie Friday @ Designs by Gollum &

Vegetarian Foodie Friday @ Breastfeeding Moms Unite

Our 17th Wedding Anniversary

We celebrated our 17th wedding anniversary this week-end. In case you are wondering, we got married when I was 14 years old (no, not really!).

Our anniversaries are usually very low key. This year hubby went all out. He arranged for a babysitter and planned this whole great day for us. It was (and he is) wonderful!!

We started out at Jimmy Buffet's Margaritaville restaurant for lunch. The decor was really fun. You could eat sitting at one of these boats. I had my first Cuban sandwich. I've been wanting to try one and it sure was yummy!

After lunch we saw this little place on the strip selling deep fried Twinkies. I told Tom I've been dying to try one. Boy was it gooood!! Way better than I expected. Now I want to go back and try the deep fried Oreo's!

Next stop was the Venetian hotel. It was beautiful!

Look at this painting on the ceiling. Amazing!

I thought this was adorable.

Ooooh, what do we have here? Romantic gondola rides?

Yeah, we did that!

Tom scored major romance points for this idea!

The gondoliers sing romantic songs while you glide along in the water.

"when the moon hits your eye like a big pizza pie...that's amore!"

(they actually sang much prettier songs than that)

It was a rare cold day in Las Vegas so we could only ride inside. But it was easy to imagine you were outdoors with the pretty sky ceiling.

So nice.

Next stop was the Bellagio's conservatory. Just because my hubby knows I love it there. I'll show you more pictures of this later in the week.

Oh ya, we saw this guy. Only in Vegas!!

(Remember I mentioned it was cold outside!)

Then a limo took us home! So cool!

When we got home Grant was dying to take a ride.

So the whole family and our babysitter took a 5 minute ride. Both of the boys just loved it.

What a wonderful day, all thanks to my sweet hubby! I think I'd marry him all over again. :)

Decorating Disasters

Sometimes when I'm crafting things just come together so easily........and other times they are a disaster. See the berries in the apothecary jars. This was a "brilliant" idea I had. Take dried fruit off my tree, place in apothecary jars, and have beautiful decoration for FREE! I kept these in my kichen and admired them everyday.

One day a friend was about to arrive and have lunch at my house. At the last minute I noticed the apothecary jar lids were a little dusty and went to clean them off in the sink. Next thing I know the kitchen is starting to stink....BAD! "What is that smell?" I wondered. Then I realized the fruit in my jars was rotting. Yikes! I put the lids back on and quickly lit some scented candles. My friend had a good laugh about it when I told her. Later that day I threw my "brilliant" idea in the garbage.

Here is my lame attempt at stenciling. Not quite spaced evenly. :) But I will try this project again.

"You hear that stenciling?" "I will master you!!!"

Early this Spring I attempted to make a topiary out of malted candy Easter eggs.

Hot glue and candy do not mix. Duh!

What kind of decorating disasters have you had?

Gray Baskets

I wanted to let you know I saw these gray baskets on clearance today for only $2.97 at JoAnne fabrics. I didn't get any though. "Why?" you ask. Because I already own two of them.

I keep one on my kitchen counter full of fruits and veggies. If I don't keep them out I forget about them and they go bad.

These baskets have great wood handles.

I also like how thickly woven they are. So this is what I do with one basket, what do I do with the other? Well it has been sitting in my garage.....until today!

I bought this cardboard "S" at the craft store.

I dry brushed on some white paint.

Placed it in the basket with some lavender and hung it on the wall.

It is part of a laundry room make-over I'm doing. It is moving extremly slow so don't hold your breath to see pictures anytime soon.