Sweet dreams.

This is the twin bed we purchased two months ago for the small guest bedroom. It has a white-washed finish that's polished without being too formal. If you recall, this is the bed we purchased at a barn sale where I found the arm chair for the other guest room, the Swedish chair, if you will. This bed was tucked away in the chicken coop, and I have to give Dave all the credit for finding it. It has come in handy several times since then, and I'm so glad we picked it up.

The walls actually don't look so bad in this picture, but this room clearly belonged to a child, as there are hand and fingerprints everywhere. It needs to be painted, soon. I have the paint, one of my favorite colors of all time, Benjamin Moore's Covington Gray. Now all I need is a free day. Easier said than done.

I have no ideas for this room, other than I don't want it to get too prissy. I think a cool, clean gray will help with that. I want some crisp white curtains, nothing too fussy. This little bedroom may be great for a few plants, as it has three windows, and gets sunlight from the North and West. Now if I can remember to water them, it could work out nicely.

I saw Santa!

And it made me as giddy as a five year old on Christmas morning. Driving through town Friday evening on my way to run a few errands, I saw a man dressed as Santa standing in his front yard. I yelled out, Santa! (to myself), and quickly tooted the horn to say hello. Santa waved back, and I was immediately struck by a wave of what could only be Christmas spirit. That translated into a stop to pick up a few bottles of Prosecco. Nothing says holidays like some bubbly, right?

Saturday we got right into Christmas mode. We drove up to a nearby garden center, recommended by a friend of ours, to get our tree. Maybe came with us, in one of her holiday sweaters, to help find the perfect one. Instead she ended up bullying Lilly, the black lab that lived there, so back to the car she went. She occupied herself with figuring out how to get out of her sweater while we checked out the nursery store. They had an amazing collection of Christmas trees, all decked out with different ornaments for sale. They also had some gorgeous wreaths for sale, all real, in a variety of sizes. Beautiful as they were, they cost almost as much as the tree, so I held off. Somewhere I have a pretty decent fake I have to put out for the season. So we picked out some ornaments, and also grabbed some clearance bulbs to plant when spring rolls around.

We settled on a 7' Fraser fir for our Christmas tree. We took it home and then headed back out to do some Christmas shopping. At Target we found a new star for the top, along with some new gold bulbs, icicles, and a stocking for Maybe. The only thing I couldn't find was lights for the tree. There was a whole row of lights, but none of them were what we were looking for. LED lights, colored lights, globe lights...but regular white lights were no where to be found.

Thankfully, Christmas Tree Shops saved the day on Sunday, and we were able to stock up on lights. It took forever to get the tree trimmed enough to stay up straight in the stand, but finally we got it up. The Fraser is a pretty tree, and quite tough, but weaving the lights in and out was a bit of a challenge. It's nearly finished, we have some more ornaments to sort through and put up.

As you can see, Maybe has been gearing up for the holidays as well. So far her and Andre have been careful to slow down when they chase each other around the tree. My tuckered out little reindeer is curled up in my lap as we speak ,which is making it really hard to type. On that note, goodnight!

Sick day, my new obsessions, and other miscellaneous news.

I think the only way for me to get anything posted these days is to be on my death bed. I can't remember the last time I was this sick, it's been a few years. I'm not usually one for sick days either. I can usually take a DayQuil and be fine, but not this time. Such a waste of a day to be home but not able to be productive. The dust bunnies are safe for a few more days.

My clumsy self broke the camera this weekend, well, one of them. Of course it's the one we use the most because it has a great rechargeable battery. I dropped it, with the lens open, so now all I get is an error message and can't even get to the photos on the memory card. Hopefully the lovely people at Canon can help us out, and keep it on the cheap side. I did the same thing to my own camera last year, but it was less than a year old and still under warranty. I may have fibbed a little as to how the damage actually occurred in order to get it fixed for free.

I am hooked on a new website; http://www.fabric.com/ I arrived home yesterday to find a box of goodies I'd ordered online on Black Friday, all at great prices. Most of what I found was $5.58 per yard, with free shipping, and I also found a coupon code for 15% off my total order. I'm not sure what most of the fabric is going to be used for yet, but I didn't want to miss out on some of these prints.

This grayish-blue and white cotton print is going to be used to recover the seats on the pair of dining chairs for my sister.










I'm obsessed with this fabric. If I could, I'd buy every yard they have in stock. For now I purchased it in a few colors, including charcoal (seen here), candy pink, chartreuse, and corn yellow. I would have gotten more but it was sold out in a few colors at the time. It is a medium weight cotton duck, and it would be perfect for drapes or throw pillows. It's like a grown up, ethnic version of polka dots.





I also purchased a few yards of this zig zag print in several colors, including the chartreuse/ivory seen here, corn yellow/natural, titan blue/ivory, and a light blue/natural. You could go in a lot of different directions with this fabric. It has this timeless vintage-modern vibe that could go with just about anything.







This pretty print also came in a variety of color patterns, but I settled on this gray and ice blue combo. It's got a classic feel, but is hip and trendy at the same time.







So there's a sample of my new stockpile. Now I just need to get sewing and recovering. My mom brought me this great little bench that needs some love, choosing which fabric to use will not be an easy task.

Gobble! Gobble!

Thanksgiving dinner went off almost without a hitch. We were pretty close to being on schedule, and of course had more than enough food. Two turkeys, four kinds of stuffing, three cranberry sauces, and many bottles of wine. I somehow ended up in charge of basting the turkey, every fifteen minutes, according to our recipe. I was quite proud of our beautifully browned bird.

(Ok, this isn't actually my turkey, but it's pretty close)

We used a Bobby Flay recipe, Black Pepper - Pomegranate Molasses Glazed Turkey, with a few tweaks of our own. I knew that not having stuffing from the bird would not fly with the family, so we ignored Bobby's instructions to leave the bird unstuffed. Also it turns out that even the great Wegman's does not carry Pomegranate Molasses, and there was no time to order online, so we improvised. We ended up finding a jar of pomegranate jam, which we reduced with some POM juice until we got the consistency we wanted. Lots of garlic and onion went into the bottom of the roasting pan, along with some organic chicken broth for basting. The pomegranate glaze didn't go on until the very end. Speaking of the inside the bird stuffing, we used a loaf of Wegman's Rosemary & Olive Oil bread, basically the most amazing bread in the whole world. It's seriously addicting. Warm and fluffy, and full of oil and spices, I knew it would be perfect for keeping the bird moist.

Somehow I miscounted our guests for the day, and ended up one setting (and chair) short. My poor brother got stuck with a mismatched plate and napkin. My table was ruined! But at that point, it was time to eat, not worry about my decor. I managed to have my table set before everyone arrived, which is usually a challenge for me. I picked up an extra long white cotton table cloth from Target to match my Crate and Barrel one, since we'd have two tables to cover. I had the perfect number of red napkins and cut acrylic napkin rings to go around.

Sadly, my table cloths did not survive the day. I've always marveled at how stains seemed to jump right off my pristine white table cloth. But alas, even with pre-treater, and some bleach in the wash water, this year was just too much. I may try some Oxi Clean, and if that doesn't work I think I will tie or tea them to give them new life. As karma would have it, I received a coupon in the mail on Saturday for $5 off a new Target brand table cloth. I may not give up on white after all.