Lately...

Lately I feel like I haven't had time to even breath- I know get out your violin and play me a sad song, ha!  My second half semester class started and that just means double the work.  But after this semester I only have 1 class left, woohooo!

 

Anyway, here are some things I've been up to and loving lately...

 

The Decorista posted these on Instagram the other day and I fell in love- how awesome are those??

Walking through the Boston Public Garden never gets old.  No matter what time of year, it always makes me stop and really appreciate where I get to live!

Yes, I have had a fireplace in my apartment and never once used it.  I was always afraid of smoking myself out or something worse happening.  But I finally decided people pay big bucks for fireplaces, so I need to take advantage of it while we are living here.  It finally just got cold enough for a fire this week, and I cant WAIT to light it up this weekend!

Don't you love it when you score a good deal at TJ Maxx?  I stopped in the other day and these Cole Haan beauties were calling my name.  Since most of my wardrobe is plain, solid colors- I love spicing it up with some bling on my feet.

 

The Home Depot Holiday Challenge is in full swing, I'm up to my eyeballs in Christmas decor around my apartment and loving every second of it.  I love that I had an excuse to get out the Christmas stuff early this year!  Here is a sneak peek at what I have going on.

That's it for now- off to go catch up on some of my favorite blogs.  Tell me, have I missed out on anything good this week...give me the good blog / interior design / DIY scoop going around!

Lady Crush

I've got myself a serious lady crush on Ashley Whittaker and whoever lives in this Manhattan apartment.  This is what my dreams are made of.  Seriously though, when I imagine the backdrop to my past single life, this is what is in my head. Or when I imagine a movie being made about me, this is the kind of apartment they will film it in.

 

 

 

I decided I wanted to add a few of the elements of this space into my own and came up with a list of pieces I needed, here they are

 

*all photos from House Beautiful by Thomas Loof

If it works in nature

After over a week of tinkering with my blog I think I am finally done.  I say that now, but guaranteed tomorrow I'll want to change something else about it.  So, no promises that there wont be more tinkering later.

If you'll notice I'm now using the domain I bought over 3 years ago.  woohoo!  So this blog can be found at www.everythingleb.com from now on.  With the google reader issue I figured it will be much easier to find me here after its kapoot.  Oh, and I have a new logo.  Still the same idea just updated a bit- I'm in love with it an I hope you like it too!

So enough of that, on to the pretty.

Not counting this past week Boston has had some pretty great weather.  It has been the perfect for walking and I love nothing more than walking around my city when it nice out.  One of my favorite places to walk through is the Public Garden.  There is just something magical about it.  The statues, swan boats, ducks, and the gardens.  Oh the gardens!  They remind me of my Memes gardens when I was little.  Now she had a green thumb.

The past few times I've walked through the garden I realized that Mother Nature really has a way with color.  She really knows what colors work together and I think if they work in nature they can work in a home as well.  Actually I dont think, I know.  If it works in nature, it will make for the perfect color pallet.  Just take a look at these examples from the Boston Public Garden

So tell me, what cues do you take from nature for your own home?

Construction Zone

With the impending google reader shut down (WHY Google, WHY?) I decided it was time to give the blog a little makeover. 

It needed a bit of a refresher.  A nip and a tuck if you so please.

 Please bear with me while I finish up the changes!

Weekend Recap

I love it when my Monday morning is really a Tuesday morning, dont you?  Thank you Mr. Washington for the day off!

So it snowed again over the weekend, something new and different aorund here.  Not wanting to brave the snow and slush on Saturday morning I made muffins.

First time I had used my muffin tins that I got for my shower over 2 years ago!?! I had to pull off the packaging and stickers, guess thats how often I bake. Except for last weekend when I made cookies, two weekends in a row, woah!! Watch out, next week I might just make something real fancy.

Speaking of making something, I also made blue cheese stuffed olives for my dirty martinis- which to me are the best.  But then Joan reminded me that jalapeno stuffed olives are really the best.  I have to say it's a tie- they both are pretty awesome

And in other news I finally crossed over to the Apple dark side and got myself a MacBook!  It is taking some getting used to, but so far so good. 

I'm really loving the simplicity of everything.  But I am a total tech idiot- tell me oh wise ones, what do I need to know about my new laptop?

How was your weekend?

Weekend recap

I'm snowed in. 
Well actually today I got out, so I'm not technically snowed in anymore. But this is the view from the end of my driveway yesterday.

 

Yup, that's a wall of about 12 feet of snow.  Even the plow man said he could not tackle.  Needless to say I was a little stir crazy all weekend.

Here's another shot of the snow

 

And this was one of the short piles that I could actually get close to.

 

Being stuck inside for 3 days makes you do crazy things. Like bake for the first time in years and drink copious amounts of this pink bubbly stuff I had.

 

 

I'm so excited to be back in the real world today! 

 

Nemo, I loved you on Friday when I could work from home but today I want you to take your snow and go away. kthanksbyebye.

 

 

3 in 2013

I'm not so big on New Years, in fact it's probably my least favorite holiday.  To me it marks the end of the Christmas season, the most wonderful time of the year.  All the beautiful lights and Christmas decorations get put away and it's back to the loooongggg, cold New England winter. No more lights and Christmas spirit to make all the white stuff on the ground seem fun.  I know, boohoo, you can all get out your violins and play me a sad song. 

Anyway, no more Debbie Downer here.  I'm putting on my big girl undies and looking at the bright side of things.  I usually never make New Years resolutions, I think I'd rather not be let down at the end of the year when I don't accomplish the 101 things, including flying to the moon on my list. But this year I decided to keep it simple with 3 things I know I can accomplish. 

The 3 things are kinda vague. It will let me accomplish a lot, plus being focused on 3 things rather than 101 (plus flying to the moon)is a much better goal for myself.  So here is a go at my first list:

1. I'm halfway through school.  Taking 1 class at a time is killing me, I just want it to be over already!  This year I'm focusing on taking on as much as I can with school.  I am determined to learn Auto CAD so that I can be useful to all those designers out there who might need an assistant this year (hint, hint)

2. I have a really great camera, with a brand new lens that I got for my birthday, I need to learn how to work the thing and take better photos for myself and this blog.

3. I've got all these grand ideas for projects and crafts- and then things like my  full time job, school, homework, and life get in the way. This year I really want to make an effort to paint more, sew more, create more.  If not for anyone else, but for me.  Its a large stress relief and who doesn't need stress relief these days. 

I think putting this out there and making it public will be the motivation I need.  I now get why other bloggers do this every year, it makes total sense.  It was stressful to think about, but now that it's out there its like a big weight off my shoulders.

I can't wait to check off those boxes... 2013 bring it on!

out of the office

I'm off today and tomorrow enjoying time up at my lake.  Ok, so it's not really mine, but it's the lake I grew up going to so I call it mine.  It might just be my favorite place in the whole world.

Oh and cross your fingers the weather cooperates so I can get a little of this in

via

(that's not me, but I like to pretend I'm that good)

 Don't get into trouble while I'm gone.

Catch ya on the flip side.

Special Day

Saturday was a special day on this blog as it marked 4 years of blogging.

A BIG thank you to all my loyal readers who inspire me everyday! I still find it amazing that something I started for fun has turned into so much more.  It has given me so much happiness, joy and the motivation to go back to school so I can follow my dreams.

PS-To mark my 4th anniversary I gave my blog a little makeover, hope you like the new look around here!

Scrapbook Wall

Part of my updated gallery wall was peaking out in my post on Monday, so I thought I'd share pictures with you all on how it stands today.

As a refresher, this is what it looked like for the LONGEST time because someone I live with hated the idea of a gallery wall.  I won't name names.

And here is where it stands today

It is close to impossible to get a good photo of this wall.  It's in a hallway, there is zero natural light , and the fact that I don't have a go go Gadget camera to get the right shot makes things difficult.

I think of this wall as evolving, because it's constantly changing.  I'm always taking something down and tweaking it, or adding something new.  Each piece in this wall is meaningful and that's what I love about it.  Here are some of my favorites:

You can see more detail about certain pieces in the following links: PVE elephant art, Blue Boy, quote from my Grampy, Ork Poster, and the Handfasting cord

I guess you could call my gallery wall a scrapbook of sorts.  That's my new name for it, the Scrapbook Wall.

Tell me, do you have a Scrapbook wall or even a piece of art that brings back wonderful memories?

channeling my inner artist

When people move out of my apartment building often times all those "cleaning house" items get left in the front hall, free for the taking.  Sometimes its really annoying, but other times I've found some fun scores.  A few weeks ago a generic painted canvas was left.  I passed by it once thinking it was pretty ugly.  But when I passed by it again a light bulb went off and I decided to grab it.

Normally I think of myself as a pretty creative person.  I grabbed that canvas thinking I could make my own DIY art, I mean it can't be that hard, right?  I've seen other people do their own versions of art, and I could always channel my inner Jackson Pollack and splatter some paint all over it. 

Just for giggles I'll show you my painting process.  This is what I started with

I started my DIY project by covering the whole canvas with Zinsser primer.  Because I had no clue what I was capable of I wanted to keep this project within my $0 budget, so I used everything that I had at home already.

I forgot to take a photo of the plain white canvas I started with so just imagine it looked something like this

At this point it's where things got a little fuzzy.  I must have painted close to 50 different layers on this canvas.  I kept it propped up on my family room for about a week and every night I would come home from work and paint something different.

I guess you could think of it as pretty cheap therapy.  On days where I was tired or cranky my art was pretty dark with a lot of navy blues and on days where it was sunny and I was happy there were lots of whites and pastels.

I was so into painting I totally forgot to take photos of all the different versions I came up with, but here are a few

After the above version I must have had 20 more, but was lost in what I was doing and totally spaced on photos.

Here is what I ended up settling with

In hindsight I probably should have stopped a few versions back, because I did like some of the other paintings I had done.  But that's what happens when you don't step away from the paintbrush.

In the end I'm pretty sure I should leave the art to the pros and put my painting skills to use on some craigslist furniture.  But for now, I have this to look at...

...till I decide to paint over it again.

Time Flies

This weekend marks a year since I walked down the aisle.  I still can't believe its been a whole year?!?  To celebrate we are headed up to Maine for a little weekend getaway.  I'm crossing my fingers this nice weather holds out for us too!

Anyway, I didn't post too many wedding photos the first time around- so here is some wedding overload to celebrate my 1st anniversary

The amazing illustration that Patricia from PVE did for us made many appearances at our wedding.  From the hotel welcome boxes, welcome notes to the programs it was a very special detail for sure!

(PS if you are getting married she does amazing work, I HIGHLY recommend her!!)

When we were first planning our ceremony my husband and I knew that we wanted to make both our siblings a big part.  Along with my best friends Mom, my sister-in-law and my brother preformed our ceremony.  We chose meaningful vows as well as a wedding tradition from both of our cultures.  The cord above is from the handfasting tradition that my brother lead us through.

Our programs with Patricia's beautiful work

Our escort cards were made with little wood elephants from Sri Lanka.  My in-laws friends carried 200 of these little guys home on the plane with them from Sri Lanka.  To make them look like a decorated celebration elephant I added a flag with guest names and their table.

My Husband has a little obsession with Chinese food.  The take out boxes were kind of an inside joke to those who know him best. Inside were mini elephant sugar cookies and these were put out just in time for guests to take home.

I'm off Monday, since that's the actual day and all, so I'll be back Tuesday.  Have a good weekend everyone!