Jack's Bookshelves.

Jackson's nursery is coming together. Don't worry, he'll only be a year old in less than a month.

I knew that I wanted to have bookshelves in Jackson's room. I wanted him to love books as much as his parents do and to be able to pick out the ones that he wanted to read. I found this awesome plan for bookshelves on Ana White's website (only the coolest DIY furniture site known to man). I purchased 2 1x4's in order to make two 2 1/2 foot shelves. We had some 1 x 2 furring strips for another project lying around and used those for the lip on the front. It was a simple project, especially for our fist wood-working project!

I followed Ana's instructions completely, so I'd check out her plan. But, I'll go ahead and give you a play-by-play here.

Time Commitment: 1 hour

Cost: around $10 (enough material for three 2 1/2 foot shelves)

Tools: (I got all of mine at Lowe's)

2 1x4's at 8 feet long
1 1x2 furring strip
2 in finishing nails
2 in wood screws
Stain or paint
Drill
Square
Pencil
Sander
Circular saw
Old cloth

1. Measure out how long you want your shelves to be on the 1x4s. I chose 2 1/2 foot shelves, so I marked it with a square and cut. I'd recommend marking and cutting separately for each piece. As you won't cut exactly on the line every time, this will make sure all the pieces are as close to 2 1/2 feet as possible.

Note: Wear safety googles! (Or sunglasses if you don't have safety goggles...) Unless, you want wood shavings in your eyes, of course. (Really not fun)

 2. Sand down your pieces with a finishing sander with 150 grit sandpaper. You could use coarser or finer if you'd like, but I stuck right in the middle, since I'll be sanding again when they are finished.

 3. Use wood screws and a square to attach the 1x4s. You should probably use some wood glue, but I forgot. Whoops!

 4. Use finishing nails, wood glue and a hammer to attach the 1x2 to the front of the shelf.

 5. Sand again with 220 grit sandpaper.

 Woo Hoo! You just built a shelf! I stained mine, so I just slapped some good ole' Rustoleum American Walnut stain on there, let it sit for 20 minutes and wiped it down with an old cloth. I repeated that a second time to make the stain a little bit darker, but it didn't quite work as expected.

Then we just screwed them into the wall! (Do not try to use anything but screws directly into the wall. It will not work. Not like we tried...duh.)

The little man loves them :) And so do I. So everyone's happy :)

And Happy Halloween!

South Carolina in the fall.

Chuck and I went road tripping again on October 19th to visit Mom and Sarah and Perryn. We had tons of fun just hanging out with family, checking out some local antique stores, hitting up the salvage yard, playing around in the backyard and eating delicious food!

We found some AWESOME shutters here for our master bedroom :)

Thanks for talking us into coming here, Sarah!

Only in Anderson, SC. :)

Playing with S and P in Grandma's backyard.

Lovin' the wind chime!

I'm sad we didn't take more pictures, but we had a blast visiting. Until next time!

Entry way Reveal!

I finally got our entry way put together! I still looks a little bare to me, but it will do for right now :)

I am in love with our antique trunk from Apple Dumpling Antique Mall in S.C.

We got this old window from the Habitat for Humanity Restore for $4!

I got this cute knobs from Hobby Lobby!

I made my own chalkboard paint using this recipe

Happy Fall!

So happy with how things have turned out. Slowly our little house is turning into a home :)

11 months.

Jackson is almost a year! How awesome. I know I always say it, but he just keeps getting more fun.

I don't have any new photos that aren't already on the blog. So, I thought  I'd use one from our "cooking" day :)

Some awesome things he is doing:

1. He eats mostly regular food, minus some pureed foods that he won't eat regularly. Like peas and green beans :)
2. He knows what it means to dance. Every time I ask him if he wants to dance he waves his arms frantically (his way of dancing) and then looks at the TV (we play Pandora through the TV).
3. He has started to climb. He tries to climb on top of the couch when we are sitting on it, on top of the turned over laundry basket or into his toy bin.
4.
5. He can climb up stairs, but thinks he can just walk down them.
6. He loves to bounce balls.
7. He likes to put things into containers and then take them out again.
8. Peek-a-boo continues to be his favorite game. Now, he covers his own face with his hands or a blanket or sometimes even his shirt :)
9. He has started standing on his head and peeking through his legs. He thinks it's hilarious when I peek  back at him through his legs.
10. He LOVES cheese and yogurt. Just like his daddy.
11. He loves to be chased. It cracks him up. Which cracks me up :)
12. He has started to play more with his stuffed animals. He used to never reach for them in his toy basket, but now he pulls them out and brings them to me.
13. Whenever he wakes up from his nap he starts to play with his blanket and teddy bear. When I come in he stands up and hands me one of them very enthusiastically. I love it.
14. He stills loves to put things on his head.
15. He points at things. When I'm reading books to him, he'll point at different things on the pages and make his "excited" noise. He also points at other things he wants me to see (mostly food and the fan).
16.  He is a huge fan of pots and pans. He loves to play with them while we are in the kitchen.
17. He likes to play with other kids. Just recently he has started hugging other kids. It is absolutely adorable.


We love our little man so stinkin' much.

Halloween mantle.

Halloween isn't one of my favorite holidays. I love pumpkins. I love candy. I love little kids in costumes. But scary movies, giant spiders, skeletons and snakes aren't really my cup of cocoa. I'm guessing that as our family grows I'll have to get used to it (Halloween is a big deal for the little guys. Free candy! Duh.) Which is why I debated back and forth whether I wanted to even decorate for Halloween or just stick to an all-inclusive "fall" decorating scheme. Ah, decisions, decisions. About halfway through October I decided to cave and decorate for Halloween. Which gives me about a week and a half to enjoy the decorations before it's time to decorate for Thanksgiving. Oh well :)

I found some cute pumpkins and painted "Boo" onto them and threw them up onto the mantle. They looked lonely, so I found some orange and black felt and made a banner. It still looked pretty sad so I looked around for some cute Halloween printables. Megan, at balancing home made these cute printables. So I had Chuck print it at school and I put it in one of my yard sale frames. 

I also found these cute printables:

source

source

I thanked my lucky stars that my wine-drinking family gives me their old bottles for my decorating purposes, then slapped on those printables!

I scrounged around for some black and orange books and ta-da. Finished. A whole 8 days before Halloween.

Happy Halloween!

Being a mom rocks.

What the heck did I do all day before Jackson got here? Life has gotten infinitely more interesting/fulfilling/crazy/exhausting/happy with the little man around. It is seriously so much fun. Making the shift from working and diving and going to school to stay-at-home mom wasn't all cake and   I am still adjusting. BUT. I could not trade my awesome play time with Jackson. We have so much fun together. What a fabulous little blessing he is :)

We have some crazy fun together.

1. Like making faces at each other through windows.

Getting excited to see his Aunt Leah!

 2. Eat delicious pumpkin chocolate chip cookies!

3. Sit on top of cars :)

4. Cook with mom

5. Play outside :)

I love that we can play all day together. It's pretty much the best :)