Some decorating progress pics.

The living room is pretty sparse (luckily right now the Christmas tree is helping with that), but I love my red couch so much, I could not resist sharing. We actually got a new coffee table since this pic was taken. I also want to put some floating shelves on the blank wall to the side of the couch.


The kitchen is probably my favorite spot so far. Still working on building out my accessories above the cabinets. I absolutely love the plates over the pantries. They both have a little bird sitting on a branch.

The guestroom was cobbled together with a furniture set that my parents really wanted to get rid of (yay, free!). We gave the set a fresh coat of white paint, and will be adding new hardware as soon as I decide on some. My mom had this brand new comforter set on the bed that she asked me to take (free again!). I am going with the coastal/seaside look in this room, with light blues, whites, and sand colors. The print over the bed is of a lighthouse and some grassy sand dunes and the lamp is a Goodwill find that I painted white & added a sandy-colored shade. Since this pic was taken, I have already added a round seagrass mat under the lamp on the nightstand, and a silver lantern tealight holder on the short dresser. This room needs some serious accessorizing, but I am buying a little here and there as I go. The furniture set came with a mirror that is supposed to go over the short dresser, but I think I want to find an oval mirror instead...maybe one with a light wood wicker/woven frame.

Need more holiday spirit!

Whew! Tennessee relatives are gone, and Thanksgiving went off without a hitch. Now we can move on to Christmas!

I didn't realize how little I had in the way of Christmas decor until I started trying to decorate my new house. I have decorations that made less than 1000 square feet of our apartment look quite festive. But now that I have almost 3000 square feet, I need a LOT more. So I went to Jo Anne's & the dollar store this morning and spent about $35 on:

- 2 small star-shaped wreaths
- 4 PVC candy canes for our walkway
- 2 small trees for our front door area
- 10 small berry/beady things to decorate the 2 small doorstep trees
- 1 tiny tree with burlap wrapped around the base.
- 2 tubes of ornaments to fill a huge glass apothecary jar
- a wreath hanger

I am still no where near close to done. We still need to do outdoor lights, hang some greenery garland, find a spot for a few more wreaths, I and I really want to do those white electric candles in all our windows. And I still need more! We haven't done anything at all upstairs. So overwhelming. I'm sure I will gather more decorations as time goes by, but I just really want our first holiday season in our new house to be special & festive. Especially since we are hosting 2 parties!

Pics to come soon, I promise...

My blank slate.

I thought I would post some pics of the house from the night that we closed. It is a TOTAL blank slate. White walls & builder-grade everything. I absolutely HATE every single light fixture. But it has SO much potential. I love it more and more everyday.

Here is my husband opening our front door for the very first time as a homeowner.

This is our foyer & dining room taken from the entrance to the kitchen.

The kitchen...Again, very basic, but I LOVE the dual pantries!

This is the other end of the foyer, standing near the front door, looking into the entry to the kitchen & family room. The center is one of two entry closets, and to the left is the stairwell. Just to the right of this pic is the laundry room.
This is the U-shaped upstairs hall, taken from the loft. The doorway on the right is to the master suite. To the left are 3 guestrooms & a guest bath.

Master bedroom.

Master bath...

I think you get the idea...it's a pretty builder-basic house. Needs lots of pizazz! Pretty soon, I will post some "after" pics to show you what we've done with the place! We are still working on it (I'm sure we will never stop!), but it's starting to come together.

Soooooooo tired. Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz...

Well, we FINALLY moved into our new house. Due to delay after delay, we did not actually close on the house until last Monday night! Long story. We painted a few rooms on Tuesday, then the movers brought our stuff on Wednesday, we got appliances on Thursday, and have been unpacking and fixing everything up ever since. I am EXHAUSTED!!!!!!!

Very soon I should have some pics to share. I need to finish straightening up and adding a few items here and there. Everything HAS to be ready (or as close as possible) soon because we have relatives coming for Thanksgiving on Tuesday! Eeek! In the meantime, here is a teaser pic taken while we were painting the kitchen:

Home stretch!

Just a quick post to say I have not forgotten about my blog. We have just been BUSY packing! We close on the house this Friday!!!

ANNNNNNDDDD...I got a new laptop!!! Yay!

Things should start to pick up in here very soon. Bear with me! Things are quite hectic right now, as you can see from the following pictures of our dining room & den in our apartment. I am currently living in a sea of boxes!