A Little Bling In The Bathroom, Holly Cat, and A Patio Pic

Hi everyone! I recently added a little bling in my bathroom and wanted to share it with you. :)

It's this new knob! It was on sale 50% off, so it was only $4!

I decided to put it on my vanity drawer in the bathroom. Here's what it looked like before...

Kind of plain. I think it was begging for a little sparkle. :)

And here it is after!

Here's a closer look...

I love it! Best $4 I've spent in a long time. :)

Could Holly BE any more girly? (said in my best Chandler Bing voice) :) She totally prefers her PINK toys. Lol!

I shared this pic of my patio on Instagram the other day. I had all the pillows out and the flowers were blooming, so I thought I better take a pic before the heat gets to my flowers (or I stop remembering to water them, which happens in the summer) 

I love zinnias on the patio! So far, they've been very easy to care for. 

Well, that's it for now. I'll be back Monday sharing my new plate wall in the dining room. Hopefully hubby will get all the hardware installed on the kitchen cabinets this weekend and I can start photographing it for a post sometime next week. Stay tuned!

I hope you all have a wonderful weekend!!

~Lisa

More Changes In The Dining Room

Hello there! Today I wanted to share a few more changes in the dining room. 

You can see I took your advice and painted the scroll thing above the window oil rubbed bronze. :) I think it stands out much more now. I love when y'all help me decide what to do. :)

Next up, I want to share this beautiful burlap runner that my friend Selene from restoration beauty made for me. Isn't it darling? I love it, Selene! Thank you again for making it for me! I love burlap anything and it adds so much to my dining room. I've wanted a burlap runner for a long time and I think it gives the room a nice finishing touch. :)

Here's a close up. Isn't the ribbon perfect? 

Here's a close up of the scroll, newly painted with ORB.

I think it looks so much better now. It even makes the new pictures on either side of the window stand out. 

Here's a new mirror in the foyer. Well, technically it's not new. My hubby made it about 20 years ago. We haven't been using it since we moved to this house. I'll show you in another post where the previous mirror ended up. :) 

Isn't it pretty? I love the color of the stain. 

One more pic of the pretty runner. :)

And for the most exciting news of the day...my cabinet knobs arrived yesterday...a whole day EARLY!!! I was very anxious to set them next to the pulls (that we've had for about a month) to see if they matched. And they did! I thought it was an almost perfect match. They were from different vendors, so I was concerned about using them together, but I love how they look. 

Well, obviously my hubby is going to be very busy this weekend installing lots and lots of hardware! I also finished painting the cabinet feet yesterday, so he'll need to install those too. Oh, and I ordered a chalkboard print from Dear Lillie when they had their big Memorial Day sale (I used some early birthday money) and it's supposed to come Friday and he said he'd make me a custom frame for it. But don't worry, he loves doing things like that. Any time he gets to be out in the garage working with tools, he's a happy camper. :)

Y'all have a great day!

Lisa

Printing Out Waterlogue Photos

Hello there! I'm sure by now you've all heard about the neat Waterlogue app. It turns any pic into a watercolor. Did y'all know you can even print them out? Well, lately I've been thinking of switching up the pictures that are on either side of the window in my dining room.

Here's a quick "before" pic...

See those little pictures on either side of the window? The frames didn't match and it just seemed like I needed something a little more substantial on that wall because the ceilings are so tall.

So, I stepped outside and took a few pics of my backyard. Then I uploaded them to the waterlogue app and changed them into a watercolor. I followed Richella's tutorial HERE for printing out waterlogue pics. It worked like a charm! 

I just uploaded the pics to Walgreens.com and picked up my prints an hour later. It was only $2.50 for an 8x10. Then I went to Hobby Lobby and picked out some matching frames (on sale, of course) :)

Here's what it looks like now...

So much better, don't you think?

I like it a lot better with the bigger (matching) frames. Looking at this pic above, I think I need to spray paint the scrolly thing above the window oil rubbed bronze. It was originally ORB, but I spray painted it heirloom white back when our walls were dark brown so it would show up. Now that we've painted the walls a lot lighter, I think it needs to go back to the original ORB. What do you think?

Here are some close ups of the waterlogue pics I printed out.

I think the one below is my favorite. 

And I love that for $2.50, I can print more out and switch them up any time I want.

Do y'all have the waterlogue app? Have you ever printed out any of them? Most of the time I love technology, but sometimes, I just want to scream "STOP INVENTING STUFF!!" Lol! It's really frustrating when you JUST get a new cell phone, tv, etc. and then, what seems like only weeks later, they invent a "newer" "better" version. Ugh. Does that bother anyone else as much as it bothers me? :)

I have lots of good stuff coming up for y'all. I've been busy making little changes here and there around the house. I added a little bling to my bathroom, finally got the plate wall up in the dining room, we just got new living room furniture (bye-bye leather!) and the new hardware for the kitchen cabinets is supposed to come Wednesday. 

I know it's been forever since I teased y'all with the kitchen cabinet sneak peek. We ran into a problem with the cabinet knobs we ordered. They were on back order, then they were on back order AGAIN, then they told me it would be ANOTHER 6-8 weeks before they MIGHT come in. Ugh. Well, I couldn't wait that much longer, so I picked out new ones and ordered them, and they're supposed to get here Wednesday, so hopefully I can get the big kitchen reveal post up soon. The hardware is a pretty big part of the reveal and makes such a difference in how they look, that I didn't want to do the reveal before we install it. :)

While we've been waiting on the cabinet knobs, I've been keeping busy with other projects and even decided (last minute) to add some furniture legs to the kitchen cabinets. So, you'll have lots of good things to see in the final reveal. :)

So, stay tuned...I have lots to share in the coming weeks!

~Lisa

The Detective That's Been Following Me, New Flowers, and More Chocolate Cake

Did that title get your attention? Ha! I'll explain, but first I need to share this pic from Instagram...

You see, I have naturally curly hair, but lately I've been blow drying it straight and the other morning I actually took the time to straighten it AND curl it with the curling iron, so I thought I better document it on Instagram. ;) Here's the pic from IG...

Now, y'all just humor me for a minute and please excuse my excitement...Do y'all see where it shows the "likers" right under my pic? Now, do you see the name "alimiballard?" Y'all...he's an actor who plays "Detective Crawford" on CSI (my favorite show!! I literally have 43 episodes on my DVR just so I have plenty to choose from) I was grinning ear to ear when he "liked" my pic. :) And as if that wasn't enough...he's also following me on Instagram!!! His name is Alimi Ballard and some of you may remember him from "Numb3rs" or even "Sabrina The Teenage Witch." So, that's the "detective" that's been following me lately. ;) Sorry for the giddy-ness, but I have the tendency to revert back to my 16 year old self at times. Lol! You can always find me on Instagram at "texasdecor"

So...on to the new flowers... My snapdragons on the patio finally succumbed to the heat, so it was time to replace them. I really wanted to try some kalanchoes, but couldn't find any.

Then I came across these pretty purple ones at the garden center...

They're called Gomphrena and have the prettiest little purple blooms. I only bought one because I'd never had them before. I looked them up when I got home and my garden book says they're supposed to bloom (here in the Houston area) from May until October. It also said they can take a lot of heat and don't need too much water. 

I was still skeptical, so I asked my fellow Texan and blogging friend Stacey if she'd ever tried growing them. She said she buys a flat of them every year!! She said hers will bloom from about May until the first frost and she has them in full sun. Well, that's all I needed to hear. I high tailed it down to the garden center and bought three more right then. :) I get pretty excited when I find a flower that can take our brutal Texas heat. :)

I planned on pulling up this juniper on the left and putting the gomphrena in its place. The juniper never really recovered from our drought years ago, and keeps getting brown sections all over it. 

Below is a closer look at the brown spots.

Well, let me tell you...this juniper was not going anywhere! It's about 10 years old and very big. My hubby suggested we just cut off the brown spots and plant the gomphrena in front of it, so that's what we did. It actually worked out well, because now we'll still have the greenery of the juniper all winter long after the gomphrena dies down. 

Below is a pic after we pruned off all the dead parts... 

And here it is with the three new gomphrena flowers!

Here's a close up look at the blooms. This was taken with my iPhone and I didn't even use a filter or anything. The color is just that pretty!

While we're in the backyard, I thought I'd show you a few more pics...

This is one of the esperanza plants. It just started blooming with the pretty yellow flowers.

Here's a close up of the cluster of blooms. These will bloom all summer and into the Fall.

I can't believe I didn't even notice the vitex had started blooming! I've walked right past it several times lately and just noticed the purple blooms starting to show. :)

I also planted some zinnias in place of the snapdragons on the patio...

More zinnias in the window box.

There's still a few snaps hanging on in there too. :)

My begonias come back year after year. I think this one is about 7 or 8 years old.

Here's a closer look at the begonia. I have much better luck with the "green leaf" ones vs. the "copper leaf." The copper leaf ones don't seem to be able to take our heat (even in the shade)

I put this on Instagram the other morning. These are the gomphrena flowers sitting on the patio coffee table right before I planted them. The sun was just coming up and I thought it made for a pretty pic. :)

And just because I never show y'all yummy chocolate treats (ha ha) here's yet ANOTHER chocolate cake I made the other day. It's called the Hershey's "Perfectly Chocolate" Chocolate Cake. It's really fudgy and delicious and the icing is divine!! You can find a link to the recipe HERE

Well, I guess that's enough excitement for one day. :) Y'all take care!

~Lisa

Kanberg Photography and Designs

Hi everyone! A few of you have noticed the ad on my sidebar for Kanberg Photography and Designs. Well, I wanted to do a little post about it. You see, it's my son's business. He's a sophomore in college and in addition to Kanberg, he also has a part time job. I'm extremely proud of him. :) 

Kanberg Photography and Designs specializes in photographic art. He sells all kinds of photographs and poster prints on his site and you can also find him on Etsy under the name "Kanberg Designs" You can visit his Etsy shop HERE. All pics are taken and edited by him. 

One of his biggest sellers are the "Keep Calm and Carry On" prints. Here are a couple of them.

He can make them in pretty much any color combination you'd like. He can change the background color and/or the text color. I personally like the grey one. :) The 8x10 size is only $10!! All his prices are very reasonable.

Here's another one of his prints...

This is a print of the entrance to Chinatown in San Francisco. I have a 5x7 in an 8x10 frame with some scrap paper acting as a mat. 

They're all printed on high quality photographic paper. He has a lot of prints available and also offers a few downloads. He does canvas prints too and is constantly adding new photos to his site. 

If you know anyone looking for these kinds of prints, feel free to tell them about Kanberg Photography and Designs. Thanks for letting me brag on him a little. :) Hope y'all enjoy your day!

~Lisa