Bye-Bye Spring Break--We Had Fun!

Our spring break was fast, furious, and fun. We had a major home improvement project, but I'll get to that in a minute. First, I have to brag on myself. The first Saturday, I completed a 5K, my first one since college. I checked my results online, and I found that I was in the first 1/3 of my age group. I was excited about that especially since the weather was nasty, and the course was extremely hilly. Thankfully, I have been running on a big hill. If you've ever been to my house, you know the major hill I'm talking about. So I was prepared, and I actually passed about 20 people up on the last hill.

I love holidays, so I couldn't resist some fun for St. Patrick's Day. Since our kitchen was a construction zone, and the kids had nowhere to eat breakfast, the leprechauns set up a special breakfast surprise on the kids' little table. Those pesky dudes even turned our milk green. Em and Ty got a kick out of it!



These pictures turned out noisy (Canon Rebel owners, do not set ISO over 400 unless you want this problem, too), so I added some vintage and some grain to them to try to make it work.





This shows you what color we painted our wall. I thought it made a nice background for a photo of my green-wearin' girl!





The laminate floor was something we've been wanting for a while. But the problem I had was this--our furniture is dark, and our walls were beige. So with a dark brown floor, I was afraid that we'd look like a big, brown poopy cave. I knew we needed color on the walls, but it took me forever to figure out what color. I am so pleased with the "pollen grain" shade that we chose because it looks so nice with our dark furniture, and it compliments the accents I already have. And it doesn't clash with the green dining room either.



My hubby is super-talented, and I have to blush and say how stinkin' hot I think he is whenever he does projects involving power tools.



Is anyone else's TV constantly on basketball lately? I am also currently on a quest to hide the sub-woofer. Surround-sound wiring is nice for the small speakers, but why don't they rig a way to hide the biggest eyesore speaker?



I have also been playing with this niche, trying to get the right display. I have experimented with different colors, but I think I hit the nail on the head this time. I love the way the dark frames stand out against the blue. And the blue doesn't clash with anything in the pictures. I have to say I am really proud of how it turned out.



I finally got brave enough to sign one of my photos. I don't know why I felt so silly about doing this before!



Since moving into this house (where I have a formal dining room), I have always set a table for Thanksgiving and Christmas. This year, I decided to set the table for spring. Instead of using my china, I decided to use my Fiestaware, and it's probably my favorite tablescape I've done. Dee had to make so many crazy cuts to get this floor to flow into the dining room, but he did a beautiful job!





I have been trying to figure out a unique way to decorate my centerpiece, and thank you, Amanda, for inspiring me with your Dollar Tree flowers and jellybean arrangements.



My favorite thing about this tablescape is the bold colors of the Fiestaware along with the bold colors of the jellybeans. They are not your typical spring colors (and I usually LOVE spring decorating b/c it gives me an excuse to decorate with pink), but I wanted to try something different this year.



Emily loves these place cards. I just grabbed some of my neglected scrapbooking supplies and stuck them together in about 5 minutes. She goes around the table naming the person to whom the initial belongs!



Just when I thought I was done being impressed with the skills of my husband, he impressed me some more. He took the kids outside to plant our vegetable garden. It was so adorable to watch him show Ty how to plant seeds and water the garden. Be still my heart!




Wow! Was that long enough for you? We are totally exhausted, but we sure loved every minute of our break. Now it's time to focus our big AP exams in early May, and then we can count down to summer and our cruise (no kids, this time)!