Teen Girl's Bedroom Makeover

I finally (finally!) put the finishing touches on Monkey's teen room. I am pleased to announce it's pretty much done! And I'm happy to say she loves it (as do I!).

Remember when I posted the hideousness of before:

Run-down, tired, and pathetic (and that's just ME---take a look at how bad that room is too!).

So, it was time to paint, paint, and paint some more. Everything got stripped down and moved out to start over. Anyhow, enough talk. Let's look at pictures!

Like I said, we really love the way it turned out. Aside from the fact that her dresser is on it's last leg. My mother is giving me an old dresser that I will probably use for her room eventually and get rid of this one. You can see in the pic it's peeling. But I used what I had. No big upgrades for this makeover.

On to the breakdown:

-Paint on walls (Valspar paint and primer in one -a paint brand I wouldn't recommend- it was very thin and coverage wasn't great IMO- color was: Silver Birch)- $30.00
-Paint for bed (SW color matched in Behr-Sea Salt)- $3.00
- Paint for dresser (SW color matched in Behr-All ablaze)- $12.00
-Turquoise Quilt (Home Goods)- $40.00
-White blanket (Ralph Lauren-Goodwill thrift find)- $4.00
-Coral blanket (Old Time Pottery)- $12.00
- Coral pillow (Ralph Lauren-Marshalls)-$16.00
-Turquoise Chevron (cover-Hobby Lobby)-$3.50
-Curtains (Ikea AS-IS section-1 panel made into 2)-$4.00
-Dragonfly art (Xmas gift from family-dipped in coral paint to pop on wall)-$0.00
-Dressing room sign (old from when I worked at Ross in college!!! Blast from my past and love that I can use in my teens room!)-$0.00

Total spent: $124.50!!

Sweets for the Sweet

Okay, not really. Sweets for me (who's not so sweet but really more sour). If we're talking sweet I have to say that Luhvah takes the cupcake on that one. I'm more of an acquired taste (if you're into  bitchiness stubborn women who like to talk back and never shut up).

So, I worked a long day yesterday and didn't get home until 1115pm last night. Then had to be back to work today at 700am. Yeesh. And if you remember, I'm one of those people who needs their 9 10 14 hours of beauty sleep. So, the 6 hours I got wasn't really cuttin' it.

Cue my knight in shining armor on his white stallion (aka Luhvah in a polo and shorts pulling up in his compact car).To hand deliver me this at work:

Just a little summin' summin' to get me through my day. I mean, helloooo SUGGGGGARRRRRRRRR!

Aren't they so pretty too?

He gets big big BIG points for this one. Inventive and surprising plus CHOCOLATE it was a wonderful little gift that I will forever remember in my hips heart. He said he passed this cupcake shop while running errands on a side of town that we don't typically traverse and thought about stopping in. So, he went the extra mile and instead of getting one for him he got 4 for me! YAY!
 
Off to eat my lovely lil' cupcakes.

A Whole New Year...2013

I've been pretty much MIA since November. On one hand, this makes perfect sense- the holidays are always hectic and it really makes it difficult to blog. On the other hand, it's when I decorate the most, as well as craft, so it seems like I would have more to post. I do (did) but I just couldn't be bothered with the actual posting so, of course, it fell by the wayside (it seems a moot point to post 50 pictures of Thanksgiving decor, then Christmas happenings after the new year doesn't it?).

So, we're just moving on to something else (pun intended) [you'll get the pun in a minute]. And that brings me to The Lettered Cottage (one of my favorite blogs). Layla talked about having a word of the year. She mentioned this about a week or two ago and I thought of what my word would be back then. Today she's having a linky party to celebrate words of the year and it reminded me of my word again.

 MOVE. {please refer to pun above}

Almost instantly it came to me so it had to be God - it was so quick. I'm never quick with deciding words- I have too many choices, too many words to play with that I love, so I would have pondered for awhile forever on the exact right word to fit me for 2013 and still be eloquent. If it had been me I'm sure it would have taken much longer to decide.

Move can mean so much. It's an action word (something the sloth in me hates). I know right now it means a lot to me because of this:

Since I'm training for a half marathon it's really meant to motivate me. Seeing her linky party reminded me of the word and it brings a whole new meaning to me today.

See, 2.5 weeks ago I hurt my foot. Something that I thought was a little thing has turned into a big thing and now I can't run at all right now. I went in last week for Xrays. I can't run a mile without pain shooting up my foot and I can't walk more than 2 miles without it starting to throb. (We're thinking stress fracture-which takes 6-8 weeks to recover). This is  very disheartening to me (which is the polite way to say it--really I've cried about it more than once and been a big baby all in all).

When I hurt my foot I was up to 10 miles. 10 MILES. I would never have believed that I could be capable of that before. My time was steadily at a 12min. mile. This may be slow for runners out there (average for real runners is 9min miles) but sheesh. The fact that I can keep it up for 10 miles is amazing to me.

See? Here's the proof:

The first one is for my 8 mile. Both have me averaging 12min miles.

For someone who started out running with a program called "Couch to 5k" you can understand why this is such an accomplishment.

Especially when I'm getting up on my weekends at 615am and running in the likes of this:

Okay, so it's no blizzard or below freezing weather but all that fog drenches me by the time I'm done.

Anyhow. How did this post get turned into a running post?? Oh, right. My word of the day. MOVE.

Suffice it to say, I'm not moving too much right now and I'm feeling very defeated. And the jury is still out on whether I will be able to run the half marathon in February. With no running I feel lethargic and unaccomplished.

So, my word of the year is move. This not only applies to running but also in doing. I am a procrastinator and I tend to be quite lazy so this word-move-should motivate me.

 Some days it will be something as simple as, "Move to the bathroom and brush your teeth."

Other days it may be "Move your body and run!" (hopefully)

"Move" can also be used in the terms of something that moves me- aka find more intention in my life. Significance.Find those things that make me have a more meaningful life. Move me. More specifically, get rid of those things that don't.

So, that's it. Move. move. move. This is the year of Moving.
Now, if only I could figure out how to work the musical "Moving on Up" into this year it'd be perfect.

(okay, now it's sounding like those funny wrong words when you say it too much).

Before-The Teen Tornado

We have gotten to the point in my thirteen year old's life that she needs a change. I don't mean plastic surgery change, I mean room re-do change. Much less invasive.

Now, I'm putting it out there and showing you the before pictures as-is. My daughter is a typical 13 year old and her room is awful! So, try not to judge too much.

She hasn't had a room re-vamp since she was a young kid-probably 4-5 years ago. At that time, she wanted a jungle theme so we went all crazy with jungle. Doesn't look too great now but it was sooo cool in the eyes of an 8 year old.

Her room is really rather difficult to take pictures of. The bedrooms are small in our house and hers is a weird shape. It's not a typical square. Her bedroom door is on an angle and it makes it difficult to get a full pic with my crappy camera phone. Here's a basic mock-up of her room.

And her jungle theme is looking a little worse for wear. Plus, she added in all the One Direction posters (she's obsessed with that band) and it's official-she's outgrown her "kids" room.

So, we started hunting for a new look. Her favorite color is turquoise blue and it seemed a logical place to start. And since she only halfway cares about decorating I figured I could pretty much have free reign over it as long as I didn't make it too girly=aka PINK (Monkey's a bit of a tomboy).

Since summer I have been obsessed with turquoise and coral so that's what I decided to go with (not too pink!!!). And she okayed the color pallet. I started pulling pics for inspiration.

Here are the pinterest pics I found. Some have pink but can easily be adjusted:

via etsy

via simply-designgirl (for bedding)

via migonishome

VIA houseofturquoise

As you can see I started veering toward that light blue/green seafoam-y color. But my bedding choice brings back the true turquoise for her (which I've failed to take a pic of).

My plans are to paint her twin bed a color similar to the twin beds above and her dresser that awesome pop of coral. I hope to start her room re-do this weekend (but it won't be done for several weeks). I wanted to show you before pics and inspiration pics. Hopefully the final result will be awesome!

Cross your fingers for me! :)

Opinions on voting and whiskers on minions...

Lines at the polls and the lies of politicians...These are a few of my least favorite things.
::::sung to the tune of My Favorite Things from Sound of Music::::

Okay, well, Julie Andrews would be appalled by my rendition but it's all I've got.

I certainly wished that I was frolicking through the hills instead of waiting in line for an hour this morning. LOL!

Just wanted to put in a quick word to say I hope everyone voted today. I'm not the least bit political but I do my part when necessary. I got in line at 630 am and there was already a line out to the road (thank goodness I got a coffee and danish beforehand!).

And the line behind me got longer very quickly!

 

 



It was a pretty dreary day here as well. Which was no bueno when it came to waiting in a line without an umbrella.

The helper at the door passed out umbrellas though. He was very helpful.

Although it took me awhile I felt extraordinarily patriotic filling out my ballot. And luckily, I got the prize at the end of the rainbow:

It's really all about the sticker for me anyway.

Halloween...scare tactics 2012

This year for Halloween Luhvah decided to go scary. Our neighborhood kids are getting to the age where little scares them so he decided a creepy clown would be the ticket. We love making homemade costumes. Of course, for me, it's to see how cheap I can possibly make something. For Luhvah's costume we gathered everything from the dollar store and thrift stores. The most expensive thing we got was the bald cap at a Halloween store for 10.00 (ouch!). We made the hair with spider webbing and red spraypaint. His costume came in total to about 20.00. And most of that was the cap. Anyhow. After the whole night was over Luhvah realized he forgot his red nose! Oh NOES! It would have been so much better with it (we bought it but he forgot to put it on in the chaos of the night). Here are the results:

 I edited to show a red nose. Look how much better it woulda been!

I decided to scare it up a bit myself by painting my face. Also, I made a skeleton shirt copying one I found on Pinterest (what the heck did I ever do before pinterest?). Total was only 1.50 for the shirt to rip up (bought at thrift store).

What does it say that I no longer take pictures of my daughter in her costume for Halloween? That she's a teenager, that's what it says. She's too busy running out the door with her friends for me to grab a pic and by the time I remember she's long gone!
This year she was Katniss Everdeen (Hunger Games). Easy and cheap. I only had to buy her a jacket (thrift store-7.00). She had everything else (including bow/arrow).



Oh, and on a side note...Pinterest fail=

Water balloons with glow stick inside hanging in a stocking. I only spent 4.50 on this project so luckily it wasn't a lot out of pocket. But the glow sticks weren't bright enough to see through the balloon (which were white). Maybe I need clear balloons-and more glow sticks in 'em. I still like the idea. Maybe I'll play with it next year.

Hope you had a Happy Halloween- I'm off to eat some candy!

Breast Cancer Awareness-Winner!!!!

We won! If ya don't know, we had a contest at work for decorating a pumpkin for Breast Cancer Awareness month.

Our lovely lady won the contest! What did we win? A pizza party for the whole dept. Which, of course, all the guys will love up here.

Now, time for my acceptance speech. ::::clearing throat:::: Ahem,

              "Thank you, Thank you. I would first like to say that this is not something that I could do on my own (oh yes I could). Many, many people contributed to the success of our hooker cop. I'd like to thank my wonderful friend Rachael, without which I could not have come up with such a great idea (heck, half the idea was hers peeps!). And my husband, who mostly always supports my cocamamie decisions even when they are insane a little out there. My boss, who did not dissuade us when we set her up at the front desk for all to see as they came into the station. And last, but certainly not least, our Chief of Police for not having a heart attack when he laid eyes on his "new employee" (Chief can be quite, ahem, conservative and a bit taciturn so the number one question each and every officer asked when they saw the pumpkin cop was, "Has Chief seen it yet?!!!"). But really, little people my lovelies, it was a pleasure just being nominated (no it wasn't, I was in it to win it!). I mean, you like me, you really like me!"

I promise this win will not go to my head. I am still the down-to-earth loveable (sorta) person I was yesterday. Now, excuse me while I go call my entourage. I need someone to pour me another drink.