Oh Crap....{literally}

Hi friends!  I've been busy taking doors off the hinges in my house and painting them...2 coats on each side.  I'm sure you can imagine how torturous fun this process is!  When we bought our house we were fortunate enough to inherit 3different trim colors throughout the house.  My favorite trim color happened to be the color that they painted in our room (can you feel the sarcasm dripping from that comment???).  Honestly, from the looks of it, it's as if they painted a polyurethane coat over top the trim and it yellowed.  So nasty.  The color we decided to paint our trim ("White Umber" by Porter Paints) is very white compared to the 3 other trim colors going on in these parts...especially in our bedroom where it looks like someone peed all over the doors (apparently this post has a lot of bathroom references).  I've been quite busy trying to unify everything.

I decided to take a break and share a story with you that is only funny to me now because I've lived through it and will {hopefully} never have to live through it again......

The number one thing that everyone comments on when they come over to our house is our toilets.  I know, I know, what a random thing to get people talking.  The reason they get so much attention is because they have a dual flush button because they're supposed to be high efficiency...everyone's two-cents is that it's very "European"!

This is a picture of the top of our toilets...see the European flair?!

When we first moved in, I thought they were pretty awesome.  We can control how much water we used depending on which button we pushed - what a great way to save water and put a little extra moolah into our pockets.  It wasn't long before our master bath toilet quickly began to drive me and Stephen crazy.  It would randomly decide to run and we never could figure out the rhyme behind the reason.  We had lived in the house a little over a year when last October, it was literally 2am in the morning on a Friday morning (report cards+principal observation for me; studying for a test for Stephen) when we decided to go to bed.  We did our usual routine and both thought it was random that our toilet did an unusual gurgle noise before we left the bathroom.  It wasn't long before I could tell by Stephen's breathing that he had fallen asleep.  Quickly thereafter I began to smell a horrible smell that I can only describe as "dog fart".  I placed the blame on Stephen, assuming he was smelling up the room (of course he doesn't appreciate this part of the story).  That's when the toilet did another *gurgle gurgle* and it woke Stephen up.

***NOTE: it's not a good sign if your toilet gurgles.  Not a good sign AT ALL.***

Stephen wakes up and wonders what the noise is.  I'm quick to inform him of his dog fart problem only to quickly remember a horrible sewage story that my friend Mandy told me about a house she lived in during college.  Oh my gosh...what if the dog fart smell wasn't Stephen after all???????  Stephen gets up to check out what's wrong with the toilet.  What comes next can send me into a fit of laughter if I think enough about the different reactions that occurred.

First, let me tell you that Stephen was blessed with a wonderful sense of smell.  I love the man with all my heart, but he's sometimes a little bit dramatic about smells that don't appeal to him.  If he's helping me clean out the refrigerator, he'll hold his nose, sometimes even turn his head in disgust over the very smallest smells.  Imagine this blessing of smell as he enters our bathroom to discover....

...a bathtub and toilet filling up with sewage.  Yup - you just read that correctly.  Sewage.  That's old crap, people.  Picture it: Stephen, screaming from the bathroom while gagging and dry heaving.  There were a lot of senses being over stimulated: smells, sights, sounds.  It was cRaZy.  He asks me where our plunger is and I honestly can't remember...at this point in time, we haven't used it since Chicago - a year and a half earlier...it must be in the basement.  He leaves our bedroom to go to the basement only to be greeted by a gurgling toilet in the hall bathroom.  Do you remember my note from earlier?  A gurgling toilet is NOT a happy toilet.  Imagine the blessing of Stephen's sense of smell as he enters the hall bathroom to discover...

...a bathtub and toilet filling up with sewage.  Yup. Sewage - old crap, people.  AHHHHHH!!!!  Now, I know some of you are thinking, "How does sewage fill up your bathtub? Where is it coming from?".  Let me explain - you know that circular metal cover that is screwed onto your tub underneath your faucet?  Sewage was seeping from behind this contraption and filling our bathtubs - that's a plural "s" - more than one.

This isn't our bathtub, but I figured it could work to show you that circular metal piece underneath the faucet - that's where all the action was taking place!

Stephen ran to the basement to discover that our plunger had never made it to our new house but was still hanging out at my parents from when we were living there before we got our house.  Awesome. I, of course, got on my phone.  Stephen was super annoyed with me, thinking I was updating my Facebook status, "What are you doing?!  Don't put this on Facebook!!!" What was he thinking?!  Of course I wasn't on a social media while sewage is taking over our upstairs - I was googling, "sewage is filling my bathtubs and toilets".  I knew for a fact we couldn't be the only people in the world that this had ever happened to.  While I quickly learned that we, indeed, were not alone in having this problem, nothing was really helpful to me at 2am in the morning.

Thankfully, after a few minutes of the sewage filling the tub and the toilet, the levels seemed to stop rising.  Stephen and I stood there contemplating what we should do when all of a sudden we heard some more gurgling and then a "whoosh" as the sewage began to descend back down the drains.  With disbelief and relief on our faces we watched our poop problems disappear before our eyes.  What the?! Don't get me wrong - we were grateful, but what now?!?!  My wonderful husband scrubbed the tubs with bleach and bleached the toilets and we both decided to go to bed and deal with it the next day.

On Friday, Stephen called plumber after plumber only to be received with a, "We don't deal with that kind of stuff."  Really?  You're a plumber.  It's like me saying that I don't teach kids that are really difficult to teach.  Isn't that your job???  Finally he lined up a plumber to come on Monday and take a look at everything.  In the meantime, we were afraid that something might be up with the main drain in our house (after googling the night before at 2am in the morning we read many warnings about this) and so we decided to not use any plumbing at our house.  Thankfully we live across the street from my parents (have I shared that with you, blogworld???) and so anytime a flush or shower was necessary, we walked across the street.

Fast forward to Monday when the plumber came to our house and seemed to find NOTHING WRONG.  What?!  You mean that sewage can just randomly decide to start gurgling its way into my life whenever it pleases?!  I was scarred - scarred for life and there was nothing wrong to lead to this poopy problem?!

I'm going to leave you there for now.  Of course, there's more to this story, but you're a champ and you've already read a lot.  If you're a homeowner, you know that as much of a blessing that it is to own your own home, sometimes it stinks.  Literally.

Do you have any traumatizing plumping stories or am I the only one???

Mantel Make-Over

I knew my mantel was a snoozer....

But I just didn't know what to do about it.  Until I saw this on Pinterest...

I had some store credit at Home Goods and so I went there and found most of what I needed for a great price.  I purchased a mirror and some knick-knacks and I got this:

The mirror, ivory decorative piece and picture frame (once white, now green) are from Home Goods, the flower picture on the front, right is from JoAnns and the green vase in the back, left is from Wal-Mart.  The flowers in the vase are from Pier One (gift card baby!).  I think in total, I spent about $20 of my own money on this makeover and I couldn't be happier!

Here is the full thing (don't mind the step ladder and resolve...).

Thanks, Pinterest!  Have you redecorated a space of yours using Pinterest as inspiration?  How'd it go???  I'd love to see it!

Dining Room Help!

Hi, my name is Kari, and I'm a fall-aholic.  As a result my house is busting at the seems with shades of oranges, yellows, reds, greens and browns.  Ever since our Chicago days, I've been trying to find a way to incorporate some cool hues into the mix of all things autumn.  A few weeks ago, while perusing Overstock.com, I found a rug that I really love and would like to incorporate it into our dining room.  

Our Dining Room (we are going to pull up the carpet and put down hardwood)

"The" Rug :)

I'm so pumped about this rug because it does exactly what I've been trying to do for these past couple of years: bring in some shades of blue. 

Now, here's where I need your opinion.  My mom and dad got new dining room furniture last year and graciously gave Stephen and I their old set.  We inherited a table, 6 chairs, a buffet, and a china cabinet from them.  Since they gave it to us, all but the table and chairs have been stacked up in our garage.  You see, the problem is is that I'm not feeling the current state of the furniture.  It needs some help...

The buffet and the bottom of the china cabinet, stacked on top of one another.

This past summer, Family Handyman magazine had an article on how to refinish furniture like a pro (specifically on how to stain your pieces darker).  After reading the article, I felt empowered and just knew that I wanted to darken the current stain and give the pieces more of a walnut look.  But then, I would see pictures of different two-toned furniture and I would fall in love with the way it looked...

(photo from here)

My Chicago friend posted on instagram a beautiful buffet that her friend found at the Salvation Army and refinished it by painting the bottom of it a grey and staining the top of it a dark stain.  I immediately fell in love with it was won over by this two toned look.  My new idea is to paint the bottom of my table and buffet a heathered blue to go with the blue in the rug, and then stain the tops of both pieces a dark, walnut stain.  Buuuuuuuuuuttttttt, there's a catch....

If I do try to accomplish the two-toned look, what can I do with my china cabinet to keep it from looking like a stuck out sore thumb?  Do I paint the whole thing or stain the whole thing?  Here's where you come in....

(photo from here)

What do you think of this two-toned china cabinet?  What if I painted the bottom the same heathered blue as I want to paint the rest of my furniture, and stain (just like in the picture above) a darker stain to match the top of my table and buffet?

If you have an opinion, I would love to hear it, as I don't know what I should do to refinish my furniture.  Should I stain it a darker stain and just keep things moving?  Should I do a two-toned finish using the clue from the rug on the bottom?  If I do that, what should I do with my china cabinet?  

Decisions, decisions!  What's a girl to do?! :)  Leave a comment and give me your opinion - I would love to hear it!

Bathroom Re-Do

You know the drill: you buy a house and you instantly inherit the style/design of the previous owners until you get the chance to make your house your house.  This was exactly the case with my half-bath/powder room on the first floor of our house.  The problem with this room is that nothing about it is what I would choose to put in my half-bath...nothing.  When we first looked at the house, I had already started thinking about what I could do to this room to update it and make it more of my own. Before I start breaking down my thoughts, let me share with you the actual room:

 

 Personal Problem #1 with this room: it's wallpapered.  Now, obviously these ferns are somewhat "in" right now (see PB and their fern towels) however, they're just NOT for me.  Unfortunately, Stephen says he likes these ferns...that caused a lot of need for discussion/begging/reasoning :-)

Personal Problem #2 with this room: the cabinet that eats up a ton of this tiny room and the 1980s faucet that adorns this vanity.  Both must go.  

Personal Problem #3 with this room: the ceiling is painted green.  Ugh. Thanks!  I'm not saying that you shouldn't paint your ceiling - I realize that a lot of designers will tell you that this is a great way to add color or points of interest to your room.  My problem with it is that this room is just so small - I'd prefer a white ceiling (again, personal preference).

Personal Problem #4 with this room: I do not like the chandelier in this bathroom.  Maybe it's the wrong design to go with light, maybe it's the fact that it's in the bathroom - I'm not quite sure what it is, but I'm just not feeling the chandelier.  Perhaps if it were in a different room with different design around it I could like the chandelier, but not in this context. 

Now let me introduce you to the new look I'm shooting for in this room:

I am giddy with excitement at the possibility that this room holds!  So excited that I went on ahead and got a little big for my britches...

I got the itch to remove the ferns and they came down super easily - almost too easily!  I'm fairly certain there's no going back now!

Any of you seasoned DIYers out there that have already updated a bathroom in your house and would like to share some good tips for a newbie like myself?  I'd love to hear your advice!

My Hunting Dog

My dog, Princeton is a hunting dog.  He spends a ton of his time "hunting" in the backyard.  We get the biggest kick out of watching him find his prey, point, and then tip-toe to catch it.  Very rarely does he actually catch anything (I guess that makes him a wanna be hunting dog), but nonetheless, it's still fun to watch!  If you don't recall, a little less than a month ago, my dog brought my attention to a nasty snake chillin' in my backyard.  He got my attention by having a very angry and repetitive bark.  At first, I wrote it off to him being a "dumb dog" and then had my hand quickly slapped when I opened the door and was greeted by the reptile from hell.

About a week ago, I was alarmed when I heard the same bark coming from him in our backyard.  I was nervous to go out and take a peek at his latest find, assuming there was another satan serpent snake in my backyard.  As I walked out to the backyard, I braced myself for what I was about to find...

Until I found this harmless turtle being tortured by my dog...

(Check out Princeton's hind legs as he "ferociously" attacks this turtle)

Once Princeton saw my reaction and how un-phased I was by this harmless turtle, he got a little braver. That's when he picked it up in his mouth (poor turtle) and pranced around the driveway with it.  It's a good thing we've been working on the command "Leave it!" and I was able to get him to stop terrorizing the poor fella' while I worked out a plan.  That plan involved me holding Princeton while I called my mom over to help me remove the turtle from our yard and relocate it to the woods near our house.

Here he (or she???) is, enjoying their ride to safety.

Free at last!

And, once again, to prove that Princeton is a hunter at heart, here he is preying on a fly.  My blinds didn't really appreciate the attention he showed them (and neither did I!)!
He is currently sleeping next to me on the couch, hunting something in his dreams (there's an occasionally growl, muffled bark and movement of his legs)!
Oh Princeton!  Our life was so boring before you came into it! :)

Christmas Ornaments 2011

Yeah, I know, it's January 22...I get it, Christmas is over.  My tree is still up in my family room (pathetic, I know), which I believe constitutes me being able to share with you our Christmas ornaments that adorned our tree this year :).  You can check out our 2010 ornaments here.

Introducing our 2011 Christmas tree!  

I'm all for pretty, color coordinated trees that look elegant and really bright up a room, but I'm even more for a tree that has fun, multicolored lights adorning it and filled with ornaments that hold special memories from loved ones or fun occasions.  Maybe one day, when I can convince Stephen that it's not frivolous, I can have both types of trees - until then, the one multicolored light tree is what we'll have!  Here are our special, 2011 ornaments that called our tree "home" for the first time this year:

In March, Stephen and I had a wonderful trip visiting friends and hitting the slopes in Salt Lake City, Utah.  The awesome ornament on the left is made out of salt from the great Salt Lake, and the ornament on the right is in honor of Stephen trying out his hand at Snowboarding and not dying - way to go Stephen! 

This ornament made it's way back from Alaska this year from when my mom and dad ventured there in July and August of this year.  It also reminds us of our great trip there back in 2010.  

 I picked up this great ornament to help me remember a FANTASTIC trip that I took to New York City last December with the besties and Steph-O.  I searched the city high and low for a more authentic New York ornament, only to be stuck buying this sucker at an ornament tent in Central Park...oh well, it does its job!

 Last Christmas I decided that I was going to make Salt Dough Ornaments to act as Gift Tags for friends and family.  This little guy was from my salt dough batch last Christmas. 

 Stephen and I have a Chicago ornament from our first two years of living in Chicago.  This Christmas marked our first year not in our beloved city, but I couldn't bring myself not to get a new Chicago ornament.  When we ventured back "home" in November, I made sure to pick one of these 'beauts up at Holiday Lane in Macys.  

"Santa" brought me this awesome UK ornament in my stocking last Christmas.  Evidently, I have an obsession with Christmas trees and hope to have ANOTHER tree one day in our basement that is adorned with all our sports themed ornaments.

"Santa" brought Stephen this IU ornament last year in his stocking.  The Troy Polamalu ornament was a gift to him from our sister-in-law in honor of his love for Troy.  These ornament would also find it's way onto our future said sports-themed tree that could potentially end up in my basement one day :).

Two years ago I picked up this ornament for my sister and brother-in-law in honor of their first year in their new house.  Since then, I couldn't wait to get my grubs on it!  As soon as I could I had one made for us in honor of our new home.  It has our new address written on the bottom of it.

Just like we picked up a Chicago ornament every Christmas we lived in Chicago, I thought it would be fun to do the same here in Louisville.  This year, I found this fun Flur de Leis at a local store and thought it was perfect to represent our first Christmas back in Kentucky!

So that's it, those are the ornaments that made their way on our tree this year...I know what you're thinking, it's time to go and take that tree down!  I think my tree would agree with you.  In fact, I believe that it's begun to protest that it is still working overtime at the end of January.  So much though, that about 1/3 of our lights have gone out on our tree leaving it to look even more pathetic than a regular tree would look still standing in January.  Here's a peek at our sad, sad tree:

What about you?  When did you get around to taking your tree down?  Anybody still rocking their tree like I am in the end of January?  Come on, speak up!  I know there's someone out there that's still in the same boat as myself!!!

Deck the Halls!!!

It's so funny how decorating for Christmas can make you feel like a kid again!  The anticipation of such a fun holiday, with an important meaning and a time to spend with those you love - it's almost too much to handle!  Stephen and I are both very excited to celebrate our first Christmas back in Kentucky!  With our move, decorating proved to be both fun and tiring all at the same time.  We spent a lot of time trying to find the boxes of decorations, and are still coming up empty handed with some things that we can't seem to find.  Until then, take a look at our Christmas, 2011 decorations:

Our Mantle - I bought an amaryllis to put in the lefthand corner...it's not proving to be exactly what I was looking for.  More to come on that later...

 Our Decked out and Fa-La-La-La-La-ed Family Room

 We decided to park our tree right in front of the french doors leading into the Office.  Our reasoning behind this was that then the tree could be seen from the front of the house, and we don't really go in and out of those doors often, anyways.  So far, we haven't regretted that decision one bit..minus not having a good spot to hide put the ugly much loved ornaments...

 A view of our Family Room with me standing in the corner looking onto the Kitchen.  I made our Christmas pillows last year (ribbon pillow, stenciled pillows, button pillow) and have some other pillow projects up my sleeves!

A view of the bookcase to the left of the fireplace.  I put leftover ornaments all over the shelf, as well as pine cones that I crazily collected on UICs campus in the middle of July :)

A view of the bookcase to the right of the fireplace - again, ornaments and pinecones wherever I could find room

Do you remember our Christmas Card display from our Chicago Apartment?  I found a perfect spot for this in our Kitchen on our Basement door.  It was crazy to put the ribbon on this door and see how much shorter it is than our door in Chicago - our ceilings and doorways aren't quite as high as they were there!

That's all the halls I'll be decking tonight.  I've got to get some sleep so that I have some form of patience for the kiddies tomorrow.  Are you all geared and reared up for this wonderful holiday season???

Take a look at our Christmas, 2010 decorations here.

Wreaths for the Windows

I've been itching to decorate our house for Christmas for the past 3-4 weeks now.  I knew that we had tons of Christmas decorations for the inside of our house, but when it came to the outside, we were coming up short.  I was trying to think of ways to decorate that would be good on the budget and I knew that my love of wreaths would be a great way to make a costly compromise.

I headed off to Wal-Mart and snagged four 24 inch plain wreaths for $4 a wreath.  I knew I wanted pops of color on each wreath so I whisked away with 26 red, shatterproof ornaments for $5 and 26 silver shatterproof ornaments for $5.  I also got me some red, sparkly ribbon (100 feet) from Target for $10 to make me some bows for these said-wreaths.  Total cost spent (with ribbon and ornaments left over: $36).  I immediately got to work, pulling and twisting on the wreaths to open them up and make them more full.  I then strategically attached 6 ornaments on the front of the tree and then called my mom over for reinforcement.  I have one of these handy-dandy EZ Bow makers:

that I needed some help maneuvering.  We immediately got to work and she whipped out 4 great wreath bows for me while I attached them to the wreaths.  When it was all said and done, we had 4 great looking wreaths (if I do say so myself) to attach to our windows:

Here it is in all it's glory, hanging by way of a jumbo suction cup (it still hasn't fallen yet - praying they hold all season!) on our window:

So....what do you think?!

Thanksgiving

Yeah, I know - it's December 12 - why am I posting about Thanksgiving?  Well, because my body still thinks it's November despite what I keep telling it!  As a result, I'm just now getting around to sharing my Fall decorations with you :).
This year, Stephen and I had the pleasure of hosting my families' Thanksgiving at our new house.  I was so excited to have everyone come over and hang out - I knew that this was what was going to make our house feel more like home (I know, gang me, but it's true!).  Thankfully, I've been loving fall for a long time now and so I had plenty of fall decorations and table linens already.  However, in our Chicago Apartment, we only had a dining room table.  In our new house, we have been blessed with the room for a kitchen table and a dining room for a dining room table (which we inherited from my parents).  So, when I knew that Thanksgiving was going to be over here, my mom and I trucked it to Kohls and we got some good deals on linens to adorn our dining room table.  I was also excited because this would be the first time we used our wedding "china".  I say "china" because Stephen and I didn't actually register for china because we know that eventually, one day far, far away, my mom is going to give us her china.  However, we did register for what I call our "fancy dishes" from PB (the emma dishes) to use whenever our Fiestaware was just too much for the occasion.  This was an occasion that the Fiestaware needed to tone it down a bit!
We were hosting my immediate family (mom, dad, sisters and their husbands - and also Little Elliott of course) as well as my Aunt and Uncle from Bowling Green.  With that being said, there were 10 of us total so 4 would sit at the kitchen table and 6 at the dining room table.

Our kitchen table all decked up for Fall, wearing her reversible fall table runner and place mats that I made last year.  I wanted needed some burnt orange napkins to go with the whole she-bang and scored big time when I found a set of 6 pumpkin fabric napkins at JoAnns for $2 a pack - yes, please!

 A close-up of the table all set.

Here's a close-up of a place setting.

In the dining room, I reeeeaaaalllly wanted this table runner from Crate and Barrel, but just couldn't bring myself to spend the $50 on it.

I was pretty pumped when I found one at Kohls that looked pretty similar only with olive branches on it for a MUCH better cost (I think it was like $15) than the one at Crate and Barrel.  You might also notice that we've painted our dining room....more to come on that, later!

 Our dining room table wearing her new table cloth, runner and wine colored napkins, all ready for Thanksgiving!

A close-up of the set table.

One of our emma place settings - sorry for the turned picture!

I loved decorating for the season, but I also loved baking and preparing just as much!  My sisters, mom and I tagged team the efforts for our big Thanksgiving Feast and it was a success (if I do say so myself!)!  My mom bought the turkey and I had the honor of preparing it and roasting it.  If you've never done this, please know that it is incredibly disgusting!  I immediately got on the phone with my mom and my mother-in-law and thanked them for graciously doing this every year!  My mom also made a beef dish (for all those none turkey goers out there) and pecan squares for dessert.  My sister Melissa made a killer goat cheese and beet salad, as well as an amazing pumpkin, gingerbread trifle - a true pinterest success!  My sister Laurel made my mom's famous cheese grits, as well as her spinach casserole.  I made (with the help of all listed above) mashed potatoes, Southern Living's cornbread stuffing (to-die-for) as well as a tasty brie appetizer (recipe compliments of Melissa).  My Aunt brought her sweet potato soufflé as well as her cherry fluff.  Needless to say, we were all holding our bellies and wallowing around for a bit after the meal :).  

If I had to pick, my favorite Thanksgiving dish is my mom's cheese grits.  I know that may not sound Thanksgiving-ish to you, but boy does it scream Thanksgiving to me!  What about you - what's your favorite dish?  Anybody else out there from the south and enjoy some good grits on T-day?