More Randomness

I watched the movie “The Last Time I saw Paris” with Elizabeth Taylor and Van Johnson on Netflix the other day.   Not a great movie but at least it was in color and  Elizabeth Taylor’s beauty is stunning. 

It’s amazing how happy a batch of Chocolate Chip Cookies  makes my husband and son.

I honestly don’t remember what movie I saw the last time I was in a theater.  I would be willing to bet it was over a year ago.  I much prefer to watch in the comfort of my own home.

Tomorrow I have to chauffeur 4 pieces of Parmesan Reggiano to four different stores.  That is almost $2000 worth of cheese riding shot gun with me in my minivan.  :)

I am looking forward to The Borgia’s which is debuting on Sunday night on Showtime.   I hope it’s as good and as absorbing as The Tudors was.

I started doing some of the guided meditations that I found on ITunes for free and downloaded to my Nano.  Soooo relaxing. 

We need a new grill.  The one we had which is only about 4 year old has rusted and crumbled.    Left the cover off of it one too many times in the rain. 

Is it Duck Tape or Duct Tape????

The birds in our yard are starting to build their nests by pulling stuffing out of the tops of the cushions  of the furniture on our deck.  They are making the little frays and tears bigger!   I don’t think Duck/Duct Tape is going to enhance their appearance.  I think it’s time to get a new set.    Home Depot here we come.

I like my Margaritas on the rocks with salt instead of frozen.

And another thing about Rachel Ray.  Why does she have to come up such cutsie words for things like “EVOO”, “Yum-o” ???  She’s a grown woman!  I think I get the most crazy when I hear her say “Sammies”. 

My dog has bad breath. 

Painting the Bead Board

 

Don’t you just love a weekend when you get a lot of things that have been sitting on your list finally done?  The weather here was not all that nice.  Kind of gloomy, cold, and rainy. But even still we were able to mulch two areas with pine needles… pine needles are very big down here in the South. We changed out the smoke detector batteries, light bulbs, cleaned the inside to the glass cover of the fireplace, watched mega amounts of March Madness Basketball (sorry Tarheels…it was a nice run while it lasted), and painted the bead board under the kitchen counter…Black. Yes, black!

    

When we moved in to this house about 10 years ago, we had the builder put bead board on the underside of the counter because I knew with kids it would take a beating there from their feet as they sat at the counter.  I was right.  It took a beating.  We painted it the same color as the wall and it was fine for many years but it was starting to really show wear and tear and starting to look grubby.  One weekend not too long ago my husband and I were out looking at some newly built homes in the area…peeking in the windows really…and I saw a counter area setup similar to what we had and it was painted black.  I loved it and knew that is what we needed to do.

I was also inspired by the FEARLESS use of the color black in my blog friend Melanie’s (From Southern Comfort in a Northern Life Blog) dining room. How gorgeous is this room? And look at that ceiling! And it’s only partially finished.  I can’t wait to see it when she is done.  When you get minute, stop by her blog and check it out.

   

Now back to the task at hand. I put my handsome husband to work.  We used a color called called “New Black” from Valspar in a semi-gloss finish that we found at Lowes.  It took two coats of paint to cover completely. 

We used a Latex paint.  I am hoping for the best as far as wear and tear.  But worst case if the paint starts to chip or scratch, we’ll just give it another coat of “New Black” in an oil based paint.  It was really a quick project. 

At first we did not paint the thin wood stain molding strip that is in place on the floor and when we removed the blue painter’s tape, it just didn’t look right.  So we re-taped and painted the thin strip of molding black so the black color went all the way to the floor. It made the counter look more substantial and finished looking and more like a piece of furniture if that makes any sense.  I really do love it. And now it’s time to recover the seats to the counter stools.  Did you see the fraying I’ve got going on in the first photo.  Embarrassing!!  :)

Mini Baby Bell Cheese

Have you laughed today???  While I don’t find these all that hilarious, I do find them rather cute.  :)

For someone who spends a lot of time looking at cheese, these made me smile.  Who thinks up such cute ideas? 

These lady bugs are my favorite and if you click here you can check out the blog Cutefoodforkids for more information on how they were made.  I would guess an Exacto Knife to cut away the red wax to expose the cheese would be the way I would go about it.  I also saw on the Cutefoodforkids blog post that Nori, the  paper thin, dried Seaweed can be used to get the dark colored details.  Check out their site and you can see how a scrapbooking paper punch  in the shape of  faces was used. 

 

I LOVE this Mushroom!  And little black sesame seeds were used for the eyes on the cute “Hairstyles for Girls” .  Poppy seed might work too. 

 

And how about these Mini Baby Bell Cheese  Elmo’s?  CUTE!

Randomness

I find the sound of Rachel Ray’s voice to be incredibly annoying.  Right up there with nails on a chalkboard.

My dog smells like a cross between dirty socks and popcorn. 

I rescued a $517.00 chunk of Parmesan Reggiano from certain doom today.

I have discovered the world of free podcasts on I-tunes.  And I love my Nano.

My son is in the 11th grade and I still have to bring “snacks” for the whole Tennis team tomorrow.    It never ends!

Two bags of grapes that were on sale still cost me $11.78.  Eating healthy is expensive. Period.

I love the Chicken Cobb salad at Panera.

I planted potatoes in my garden yesterday.

The cherry and crab apple trees are blooming right now.  Beautiful.

The news from Japan is overwhelming and yet I continue to watch.

I am convinced that Greensboro, NC has the worst radio stations in the entire country.

A Foot Stool Re-do

 

I have a box that I keep out in the garage that I like to put things that I find when I am out bargain hunting at places like Goodwill or Salvation Army that I want to work on later.  This very worn but very well made oak wood foot stool has been sitting in that box for a while now.  I finally got around to giving it the “number treatment”.    I thought about stenciling on the words “RELAX” and even writing “Rest your weary feet here” in French of course  (Reposez vos pieds fatigués ici), but in the end, I went the tried and true “number” route. 

I think this foot stool was was well used in it’s former life.  I wiped it down and applied a couple of coats of Rust-o-leum’s American Accents Black Canyon Spray Paint.

  

After it dried I lightly sanded all the edges to give it a nicely worn look.  I wiped it down with a clean dry cloth and then took out my number stencils (from Maison de Stencils) and with some white craft paint I stenciled on my numbers.

I get asked all the time if the numbers I choose have any meaning.  Most of the time I just put together numbers based on how they look.  But today I went with the number “85” because it’s the year we got married.

 

After the numbers dried I gave the foot stool a coat of a clear sealer spray to help protect it.  It gave the foot stool a nice finish but I noticed as it was drying that in some areas it was getting a “crackle-like” effect.   Can you see it?  A happy accident.  Not sure why it was doing that.  Good think I like that kind of look. :)

Pansies From The Bargain Bin

Here are the Pansies that I found on the “Distressed” Cart  for $1.40 at Lowe’s a couple of weeks ago.    They don’t look so distressed to me anymore.  

I should get another full month out of them before I have to rip them out and use the pots for my geraniums. 

 

Sounds so cruel and I hate when I have to do that but it starts to get so warm down here in late April and the Pansies don’t like the heat.  So I’ll just enjoy them until then.    Their days are numbered.  (Even if their pots are not….yet.)  :)

The House in Something’s Gotta Give

The movie Something’s Gotta Give was recently on TV and I forgot how much I LOVED the house in that movie.   Of course, who wouldn’t love a beach house in the Hamptons but really the house in the movie was so stylish  that I think it influenced the way a lot of people decorated their homes after seeing it. 

I would be happy just being able to vacation here for one week in the summertime let alone live here.

It’s a very entertaining movie on top of the great scenery.

   

I think the reason Jack Nicholson was so good in this move was because he was basically playing himself.  Not too much of a stretch here.   :)

A simple and beautiful dining room.

 

What a great reading area.  Ahhh…to someday have built-ins like these…….

 

An absolutely gorgeous kitchen will the white cabinets and the black countertops. 

And an absolutely gorgeous Keanu Reeves buying strawberries at the roadside fruit and vegetable stand.  :)

 

 

Such a funny movie and sweet at the same time.

And the scenes in Paris made me want to dine at the Le Grande Colbert Restaurant someday.  Someday….

Trader Joe’s Cinnamon Crumb Coffee Cake

Shopping at Trader Joe’s is a big treat around here especially since we don’t have one around here!  I spent the day in Chapel Hill yesterday visiting our daughter and while I was there we did some shopping.    The choices of food in her apartment were rather pitiful so we got her stocked up and I stocked up on some of our favorites and a few bottles of wine.  Their prices are sometimes unbelievable!

A friend of mine told me about the Trader Joe’s Cinnamon Crumb Coffee Cake a short while ago and gave me a couple of pieces to taste.  My husband has been bugging me about it ever since.   (Thanks Becky!)  So, when I saw it in the store yesterday…I bought four boxes. 

Yep, four boxes.  I should have bought eight. :)

It’s really delicious.  The mix made 16 squares.   I have a happy family this morning. 

Stenciled French Tray

I had some fun with this one!  I have been on a roll with stenciling lately.  When you are in the mood you’ve got to go with it.  Right?  And if it can be painted…it can be stenciled too! :)

I found a hard plastic tray at Goodwill not too long ago at Goodwill and only paid .99 cents for it. 

   

And just as I started to spray paint it with some Rust-o-leum American Accents Black Spray Paint, I realized that I hadn’t taken a photo of it yet.  Painting came to a screeching halt as I ran for the camera.  But there it is.  I always seem to have good luck finding trays at Goodwill in different shapes, sizes and some made of wood and some not.  Surprisingly, the black paint adhered to this hard plastic tray just fine.  It took about 2 coats and I let it dry in between coats.  Then I used bits and pieces of some of my French stencils.  I took the Paris address part off of the custom stencil that I have been using lately on some of my most recent projects.

   

I’ve had the Fleur de Lis stencil for a long time and I’m quite sure I found it at Michael’s Crafts.  And the number stencils came from Maison de Stencils.  And I used some white craft paint and a stencil brush and it was done.

Can’t wait to use this to serve drinks out on the deck as soon as the weather gets warmer.  :)