Finally!

It really feels as though I've been neglecting my blog. I've wanted to sit down and write a couple of times but life has been very busy around here. Heck, I haven't even read any blogs in almost a week. I've got a lot of catching up to do.

First, I want to say thanks to Lisa from Confessions of an Apron Queen. I won a contest on her site a couple of weeks ago and received a FABULOUS apron & a big, huge World Atlas! Both came in the last week or so and I've thoroughly enjoyed them already!! She rocks- be sure to check out her blog and also her apron store at Rickrackattack.com. She has the best selection of vintage aprons anywhere!

My Apron:


My Atlas:



In other news, the husband was off for a couple of days last week and we made some progress outside. We planted some flowers in our naked little flower beds and did some stuff around the house too. I still need him to pressure wash the rockers so I can get those painted. Our porch looks so sad right now. It's a big ol' wrap around porch but it's really naked. I need more flowers and plants and just to spruce it up some.

This past weekend was very busy also. We've been trying to empty the basement and sort through all of the boxes and put aside things for donation or a yard sale and taking the rest of our stuff up to the attic. It's a slow process but we're almost done. The husband is going to try to get the basement empty so he can waterproof down there and then finish it off. We could use the room down there for exercise equipment or maybe put a bar down there. I also want the office moved out of my scrap/craft room so I'll have more room for MY stuff!

Our yard sale pile is huge. Bags and bags of clothing and misc stuff that we've just been hanging on to. You would've thought I would've gone through all of this stuff before we moved from SC to MD 2 years ago but evidently I was convinced that I would shrink back into some of those old clothes. I've finally realized I'm not 18 anymore, I'm never going to be that size again unless my jaws are wired shut for 6 months and even if some miracle occurred and I was that skinny again, well, the clothes aren't really my style anymore. SO, I'm freeing myself of the clutter and I'm getting rid of it all! I'm going to try to have the yard sale in the next couple of weeks. Hopefully I'll do well because I'm going to use the money I get from the sale to drive out to Wyoming later this summer.

Speaking of yard sales, I went to two fabulous estate sales on Saturday. I got up a little later than I had planned so I didn't make it to one until about 30 minutes after it started and the stuff had already been picked through. I did manage to snag this great little cabinet for $5. I didn't even realize it was light green until yesterday when the husband brought it inside for me. I thought it was white, but green is even better! I love the chippy paint and the wire on the doors. So, so cute. It's perfect for storing all of my card making supplies.

The cabinet:


The other estate sale I went to was much larger and I seriously thought I had died & gone to Heaven. The entire basement was filled, FILLED with bookshelves. Know what was on the bookshelves? Cookbooks. I'm talking literally thousands of cookbooks. There were more cookbooks in the boxes on the floor, every room in the basement had cookbooks. I was in.love. But it was also overwhelming. There were just so many to choose from. I spent a good hour down in that basement looking for books. The lighting down there was horrible though and it was hot and humid and really hard to see. I managed to pick up 8 that I just couldn't live without. I had picked up a really old Betty Crocker 3-ring cookbook that I really wanted but another lady had mentioned she needed one so I gave it to her. Still kicking myself over that one! It wasn't in very good condition though so that made it easier to part with. The cookbooks were only 50 cents and I really should have bought more. I hope they have another sale this coming weekend. I'll go armed with boxes to put the books into because carrying them the way I did was very heavy!

Yesterday I spent pretty much the entire day cleaning out my scrap room. It looks about a million percent better but I still need some more storage in here. Like a good bookshelf to put all my magazines on. Right now they are just sitting in files on the floor. And I need to figure out what I'm going to use as my ribbon storage because what I'm using now isn't going to work once I start actually crafting again. Right now they are in these big blue boxes from Ikea but I need to be able to see my ribbons while I'm working. The last couple of houses we've been in, I've used cafe rods and put the ribbons on that. It works really well except I don't have very much wall space in this room. Lots of windows which is really nice, but not a lot of room on the walls. Not sure what to do with the ribbons. I don't want to use jars because that would annoy the heck out of me each time I had to go through the jar to get to a specific ribbon. I may be able to use the back of the door though. I have to look into that.

Anyhow, here are some more pictures of my little scrap/craft room:




12 x 12 paper storage:


Ribbon Storage in blue boxes, pictures in the others:


Some of my vintage books, a train case filled with misc craft stuff and a cute cabinet I bought at the Salvation Army for $15:


Some of my favorite aprons. This little cabinet had one cup hook on the side and I added a few more. A great way to get my aprons out of a storage box so I can enjoy them:


My work table. It's never this clean so I had to take a picture so I could remember it:


And finally, my wall of embellishments- sorted by season, event, categories and completely full. I actually need another one for some of the overflow!


Now that I've caught up my blog, I'm gonna spend some time reading what everyone else has been up to this past week!! Thanks for stopping by.