Summer time: Part 1

I cannot believe it is already the middle of the summer, it has flown by! We have stayed busy with working and traveling some.

 In May we ventured to Florida for Chris's best friend's wedding near Jacksonville..
a few things we learned from that trip:
-fill the gas tank up at 1/2 a tank ( we almost ran out of gas twice)
-directions are not my strongest suit even though sometimes I am confident that they are (we travelled a good distance to find a BBQ restaurant and when we got to the destination it was an open field which almost led us to running out of gas)
-in the future we will be flying to Florida, not driving

In June we took a trip to Bristol to celebrate our anniversary and visit with family. Chris and I thoroughly enjoyed our anniversary dinner at The Tavern in Abingdon, Va. We had some great conversation about the past year and the future (we highly recommend doing this on your anniversary, its important to reflect and see how you have grown and what you want for your marriage in the future). Also, we were able to spend some time with Chris's parents.

At the end of June and beginning of July, I took two trips to the Chesapeake Bay to spend some time with my family. These pictures are four years old and taken by my best friend Laura, we have shared some fun memories over the years.

My Grandpa's tractor

The view

Had to throw it in there

The rest of the summer we have two vacations planned to South Carolina in August, but until then we will be working hard in the daily grind.

A few fun things we have done thus far:

Summer spruce up

Favorite piece: framed piece of one of my favorite fabrics

Color time

Frame to Chris's outdoor table

Finished product, plans from Ana-white.com
Now we just need some chairs

Our love story

In celebration of our one year anniversary, I decided to share the sweet and sloppy  details of Chris and I's story leading up to today.

The story begins eight years ago at the YADAPP conference where Chris and I first met. We exchanged brief hellos with no inclination that we would be married years later. We stayed in contact over the following three summers as we were both staff at the conference. 

At Yadapp

Occasionally throughout the year we would catch up over the phone, Chris was always so good about calling when he was near Richmond, but it wasn't until the summer of 2007 that we met for coffee. Chris was preparing for a month long trip to Africa and I was trying to sort through life changes. As Chris was in Africa I couldn't help to think about what a strong Christian man he was and how I wanted that in my life, so I did what any crazy young girl would do and surprised him at the airport when he came back.

Day that we "offically started dating"

The rest is basically history... (don't want to bore you anymore) we had a long distance relationship for about two years as I was studying at the University of Virginia. Chris proposed on top of the mountain at Wintergreen surrounded by beautiful views and a yummy picnic.

 I moved to Lynchburg about two months later to be near my sweetie. We bought our first house six months later and got our miniature pony then six months after that we tied the knot in Winridge Manor in Amherst County.

Our wedding day was slightly toasty, but I was so wrapped up in the day that I barely noticed.. as for my guests well they shed about 10 lbs soaking up the sun. 

One of my favorite wedding details was our invitations made by my dear friend Kathleen who owns Leen Jean Studios, she makes custom invitations and offers calligraphy at an affordable price--check her out!

So.. thats us in a nut shell...

No ifs ands or buts

Over a month..are you kidding me..I think about blogworld a lot and different posts I could write but life gets in the way and I dont take the time to type it out. So instead of making this post perfect, this will just be some word vomit.

The past month or so I have been staying busy with keeping people alive, traveling, gardening, and eating.

TRAVEL:
At the end of April I took a trip to Northern VA and DC to see my good ole friend Melissa. We spent a day walking around Georgetown, got a yummy cupcake at Georgetown Cupcake and some great coffee at Baked and Wired. We enjoyed dinner and drinks at Circa in Dupont Circle with some of her friends and danced with the DJ at Public Bar. Another day was spent shopping at the Leesburg outlets and finished up the evening with dinning in Old Town Alexandria at Mai Thai (very yummy) and getting our groove on at Nick's Nightclub where we perfected our two step. My last day we explored a little farmers market and enjoyed brunch at Bustboys and Poets. I thoroughly enjoyed my long awaited visit to see my Melissa.

I highly recommend Baked and Wired for coffee, Mai Thai for fresh spring rolls, and Nick's nightclub for some country dancing in the city.

The husband and I just got back from a wedding near Jacksonville, FL. Oh an adventure it was...we got lost multiple times (sad part is that we had three GPS's) and came way too close to running out of gas twice. We did enjoy a day in Amelia Island hitting local eateries and laying at beach. The rehearsal dinner Friday and the wedding on Saturday were beautiful ! We decided to hit the big city of Jacksonville and boy were we disappointed...not too much in that city. On our way home we made a pit stop in Savannah where we ate some yummy baked brie and crab cakes at Belford's. We also made a stop at a Krispy Kreme in SC.

Lesson learned: 10 hour drive = long road trip// we will be flying next time

We have made a few day trips, one of which we went to Roanoke and visited Black Dog Salvage which we highly recommend for home goods and DIY projects and had some grub at Fork in the City.


Our flower beds are sprouting up and our herb pots have taken off!

Well sorry for the straight forward and slightly bland post, but will talk soon.

And we're painting..

Front door time: If you haven't heard...we painted our front door... green!! Originally it was black which matched the other four houses around us and I felt like we needed some curb appeal not too mention a pop of color. Over the past few months, I was going between green and red, but when we went to Home Depot, we ended up trying to decide between tourquoise and green (red seemed too traditional). We chose to go with Grape Leaf by Behr, I loved the tourquoise the hubs picked out, but I was slightly over it due to our island adventure. Because we didn't take the swatch home before we bought the paint we grabbed swatches that were similar to the siding and shutters to get the full effect.

Before

We decided to get the paint and primer in one, which I was quite leery about due to a previous not priming situation, but it actually worked out well. Looking back I still would have primed it with normal primer, but all in all it looks pretty good. We were so excited about the new color that we painted our mailbox to match and the hubs added a special touch.

After

After- looks better in person

Bottom line: We are one of five houses on our road that looks the exact the same, so we wanted to mix it up and be different. Also, we wanted people to look at our house and say, we know the people that live there aren't old and traditional. So there you have it Grape Leaf green.

Centerpiecing it: For our springtime kitchen table centerpiece I decided to take my TJmaxx 'FLEURS' wooden box and put a variety of glass jars, the fun part is that the jars have multiple purposes so I can use them year around, which is what I have been doing since I have snagged them from other places around the house. I am in search of a few more to make it complete, but it is coming along. 

Hook it up: While I was in Richmond I got a chance to take back our broken island handle from Anthro and got some yellow and *on sale* hooks for the end of the island. 

Junk Finder:  Do you have friends that every time they go to a thrift or antique store they always come out with awesome finds and then turn it into more awesomeness? Do you feel like when you go all you see is junk? You are not alone my sister (or brother..)...I feel your pain. I decided to give my local Goodwill another try and as I was on my way out, I stumbled upon an ugly, plastic, old faux wood tray with a lovely geometric border. With this gem being only $1 I had to get it and promptly when to Walmart to get some white spray paint. Unfortunately, I forgot to snag a before picture, but it was ugly, trust. We still need to do a few more coats on the bottom and we are thinking about modpodging the middle, just can't help ourselves ModPodge is fun!

White tray

The geometric border is the best part of the entire piece, but I am not sure exactly where I will put it because our house is not modern at all, but do love fun geometric patterns and want to display this beaut, where do you think? We are thinking we will choose a fabric or scrapbook pattern that will match our space.

Other odds and ends: 

I had another good trip to Asheville this past weekend with the family to celebrate B's big boy birthday. 

Foster had her first overnight without her parents. Because Chris and I were both out of town, our loverly friends offered to watch her, she was in doggie heaven as they took her on multiple walks. Reality hit her on Saturday when Chris picked her and she went back to hating her life, just kidding. But her time with the W's spurred me to work on taking her on more walks and we are 4 for 5 this week, pretty good I think. 

Next weekend, heading to NOVA for a long awaited trip to see my Melissa.

Hope yall have a lovely weekend.

i am a..Maxxinista

It has been a while friends, sorry for my absence..hopefully my fun finds will perk you up.


We've been looking for matching laps for our bedroom ever since we purchased our duvet last July and finally found the perfect pair at TJ's

They are a pretty good size and for $29 each, I was sold. The base is brushed white metal.

 

Next on our list is to paint the master bedroom and get curtains...

...speaking of curtains...last night I had the pleasure of attending a boutique home sale held by AmandaCarver Designs . 

I purchased some Pottery Barn panels, 2 for $24!  as well as a vintage Virginia plate, silver candle holder and an AmandaCarver babygirl hair clip. All for a grand total of $36.

I wish all home sales were that fun! 

Other maxxinista fun:

Found this fun flower box and rustic frame..currently I am using the box as a centerpiece on the kitchen table, but haven't quite figured out what to put in it yet.

I am really into garden stools, but not quite sure if they fit into our style; Ballard designs has some cute, but pricy ones and their pictures show how these can work with different styles. During my shopping rampage, I stopped by Ross and found these, only $30 ! I am still trying to get the husband on board, but was soo excited when I spotted them and all of these colors are so fun!

...and for an update:

the ladder from covesville

the mirror Braden made,
in the reflection you see our covesville shutter

Productivity

We have yet to hang the EAT letters yet...we keep playing around with placement but haven't settled on the perfect spot yet.

We did get some baskets for the kitchen island-we settled on some brown baskets from Michael's that have a linen liner. I am not crazy about liners, but Chris likes the country feel about them. The best part is that we got 4 for $11 each and if we want to change the color we could always spray paint them and I could either take the liners out or make new ones. I like having something on the shelves that makes it look more organized.
Below is a picture, but the color of the island is slightly more turquoise and less blue blue (my phone distorts color sometimes-you get the idea).

Brunswick stew time:

Monday I made my family's recipe for homemade Brunswick stew for community group. After going back and forth with what I should make for dinner I bit the bullet. It ended up turning out pretty good and for the most part it wasn't too difficult to make. I must say the worst part is boiling the chicken--NASTY. You have to take it out of the plastic wrap with all the juices and pull out the insides-SICK. And if that wasn't fun enough I had the joy of de-boning that bird, talk about tedious-I felt like I was performing surgery, I had two tongs one in each hand. Fortunately, it was worth it and it is safe to say that I would do it again, except next time I am getting Chris to handle the bird part. 

One thing I am surprised about is that some people don't know what Brunswick stew is, which is outlandish. But for those of you who don't, Brunswick stew can vary depending on your recipe. Our family uses chicken, tomatoes, carrots, celery, onion, potatoes, S&P, tomato soup, white corn and butterbeans (lima beans). YUM. We serve it with either biscuits or corn bread and cottage cheese, yes cottage cheese, can't knock it til you try it-It's a Russell thing. 

There is chicken little taking a bath

Chicken little and carrot top

The Brunswick Stew

You might ask is that Paula Deen's Stock Pot, why yes it is. We have the rest of her collection in green.  

In other news:

I still haven't made time to sew, its a bummer I know.  I did finish our taxes! Yesterday I went lap pool swimming for the first time in at least 6 years and finished the night off with some yummy SweetFrog (rasberry and granola= my favorite) with some sweet friends.

E*A*T

MOD PODGE...
 I have been wanting to buy some cute fabric letters from Anthro to hang in the kitchen but for $14 a pop which then would equal $42 for three, I decided to make my own.

anthro letters

 I found multiple tutorials explaining how to make your own letters,  specifically this video. So the hubs and I made a trip to the local Michael's and got us some white wooden letters and cute scrapbook paper and some mod podge of course. We chose the gloss finish Mod Podge because well we didn't know any better because this was our first time with the Podge.
Here it is:

Finished product

We thought they turned out pretty well especially for our first ModPodge project. We haven't settled fully on where to hang them yet, but we will post when we figure it out (we are thinking above our cabinets near our wishing tree).