Pottery Barn rustic

My latest home improvement project has been refinishing our dining room table.

This farm house style table was in our house growing up. My parents had it made many, many moons ago and we ate dinner at this table.... as a family, every single night.

Fast forward 10 or so years and I am now the owner of this table. Farm house style is not exactly my thing, but Pottery Barn rustic is definitely my thing. (Let me back up and say, one of my brothers started to sand it a couple of years ago, and never finished. Hence the sanded top and unsanded benches.)

I spent a lot of time trying to decide how I wanted the table to look. Did I want to paint it black? Did I want to stain it? Did I want to distress it? I finally decided on a PB rustic type of look.

My first step was to sand the entire thing. Growing up I can remember my brothers and I would lay on these benches and do our homework. And if you looked close enough, you could see the intentions of years and years of math problems, spelling words and science equations. As much as I love this little memory, those little marks are now all gone.

After sanding everything, I primed the entire thing. By this point I knew I wanted to paint it white, so I had to make sure the dark red legs were nice and primed.

After the priming, I applied the first coat of white paint. The next step is the fun part. I painted all of the edges turquoise. At this point Mr. thought I was nuts. What? A white and turquoise table? Just wait and see.

After the turquoise, I rubbed a white taper candle all over the turquoise areas and then did 2 more coats of white paint.

After all of the white paint was nice and dry, I lightly sanded over the areas I had painted turquoise.... this gave the table the rustic look I was going for. But, now the rest of the table looked too new, so I went ahead and distressed the rest of the table with a fine grit sandpaper.

The last step was to apply 2 coats of satin polycrylic. We plan on using this table all the time, so I needed to protect the surface from water spots and cleaning products. I sanded in between coats to give it a smoother finish.

So... here is the finished product! I love the way it turned out. This was my first real venture in refinishing furniture, and since I have completed this I have already refinished another piece for our living room!

I am going to use one bench and store the other one. I have a set of 4 antique chairs that I am in the process of recovering, the 2 chairs that are currently there are from other rooms in the house. We needed additional seating for Christmas dinner.

Doggy Drugs

Almost 1 year ago we adopted this sweet little guy.

He was a loveable, cuddly, energetic pup.

And now, he has turned into this. (Jake at 11 months)

He is still sweet and loveable, but his energy level has gone through the roof. I know what it is like to have a puppy lab, but I think he may have been dropped on his head one too many times as a baby. Or, he has a mental illness. Either way, I think we need to get him drugged.

He will go ballistic a couple of times each day and when you let him outside, that is when the split personality really comes out.

Jumping, growling, barking, trying to attack your legs.... We keep spray bottles around to discipline him, but I am sick of the Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde stuff.

The positive is that he has never messed with Miss A. She can climb on him, scold him, chase him, pull his tail, kiss and love on him, and just be a wild toddler around him and he has never once been aggressive toward her.

So tell me - do you sedate your dog? Should I try to get him on film acting nutzo?

Hey Good Lookin.... Whatcha' Got Cookin

What exactly is it about truffles that make them so darn tasty? Seriously, these little mushroom type things cost as much as diamonds, yet make any dish taste perfect.

The other day I was watching my pal Ina and she whipped up this perfect white truffle pasta dish. I immediately made a trip to Whole Foods to pick up the magic ingredients and dinner was served.

All you have to do is heat up 1/2 c of heavy cream and the little container of liquid gold white truffle butter. Add a pinch of black pepper and stir until the butter melts. While this is going on, prepare some pasta. Ina used tagliatelle, but my Whole Foods did not have any, so I substituted linguine. Mix the cooked pasta into the truffle sauce and serve. Top with shaved cheese - parmesan, pecorino romano, etc and then devour.

And in the words of Ina, "how easy was that?"

Family Card - 2010

I know this is one day late, but Merry Christmas from our family to yours!

I ordered our cards from Shutterfly this year and absolutely loved them. The quality was great, the turnaround time was fast and they were a great price. I don't think I will every again try to pretend I am Martha and craft our cards ... this was super fast and easy.

The pictures we used were from our family pictures we had taken back in October with ee Photography. I am in love with every single picture she took. Can you believe this field of straw is in the middle of Dallas?

Updates

Hello friends! A lot sure has happened since I last had an update....



- My cousin's husband came home from Iraq. He had been gone for the past year..... I know he was sure excited to reunited with his family. And, just in time for Christmas.



- My Papa had to have emergency quadruple bypass surgery on Tuesday. My mom has been in Chicago helping take care of him while he has been in the hospital. He is on the road to recovery and he may even get to go home within the next day or two. Thank goodness she was able to fly up there and be with him.

- I had my gallbladder removed on Thursday. The surgery went well, and the surgeon said that I had HUNDREDS of gallstones. Yuck. With that many stones in my abdomen, I am surprised you could not hear me coming. I spent one night in the hospital and was able to come home yesterday. I am really trying to take it easy so I can recover quickly. The hardest part has been not lifting or picking up Miss A. My dad and Mr. have been taking care of Miss A and me, and I know my mom is ready to get back in town so she can also help out. One cool thing about spending the night in the hospital (besides the morphine and Italian ice) were the movies that were available. The TV's had an InDemand type movie setup, so instead of watching bad daytime TV, I was able to watch It's Complicated, Leap Year and Letters to Juliet. Not too shabby.

- And, to end on a much lighter note.... did you know that phones and tile floors do not agree? Miss A tossed my phone over the upstairs railing and it died a tragic death in our entryway. My new phone is basically inside a bullet proof case that should be able to handle dogs and toddlers.

Little Black Dress

We have a Christmas party this weekend I am stumped on what to wear.

I have changed my mind about a million times, but now I think I have at least decided on a dress.

But, other than that nothing has been decided.

I have these shoes:

and was planning on wearing black tights with the dress.

Pearls and sparkly earrings would always be an option, but I think that seems pretty boring.

How would you jazz up this dress?

Ho Ho Ho!

I had been worried that we were going to encounter some Santa anxiety with Miss A this Christmas. I mean, he is a big bearded fellow dressed in a red velvet suit that carries around a huge bag full of stuff and comes sneaking into your house in the middle of the night. You are then supposed to go sit on his lap, smile and talk to him. Most of the time toddlers end up screaming and trying to get away from him as fast as possible. All while the mom and dad are trying to document this wonderful occasion.

So, I purchased a bunch of Santa paraphernalia and we talk about the big guy all the time. Books, plates, socks, ornaments, stuffed Santa and even a metal garden stake..... we are on Santa overload at this house. She can now recognize Santa from a mile away. Every single time she sees a Santa, she greets him with a happy "ho ho ho!" I would say that I had been successful.

So successful that last night when we were at dinner Miss A thought that Santa had made an early visit to Dallas and was eating dinner at the table next to her. As soon as this gentleman and his family were seated, Miss A goes "oh, ho ho ho!!"

And I have to say, he did look an awful lot like Mr. Claus. So, if you are a big man with a white beard - beware..... My daughter will think you are Santa.

I hate carpet

Carpet is nasty.

There is no way around it.... you walk on it. You spill things on it. Animals pee on it. Toddlers do all sorts of things to it. It is full of dust and dirt. All sorts of stuff just seeps down into those fibers and lingers. And eventually it ends of looking like crap.

Our house is about half carpet. If it were up to me, we would rip that stuff out and replace it with polished concrete or something cool. I don't even want wood - too many things can mess up wood. Anyway, back to the disgusting carpet. Our master bedroom is carpeted as well as the entire upstairs.... including the bathroom - genius idea - right? I hate this carpet. It was brand new when we moved into the house 2 years ago, but I want it gone. I have horrible allergies and I don't even want to think about the amount of dust mites that are shacking up throughout my house.

The master bedroom is the baaad.... basically, Jake used our room as his puppy training area. I have tried zillions of cleaners and none of them really worked. So, the other day The Foundary had a Bissell sale. I snatched a Little Green Machine and it arrived on my front porch yesterday.

As soon as Miss A went down for her nap I went to town in that room.

I used ALL of the cleaning solution that came with the machine and that was not enough. I am pretty sure this is only supposed to be used to clean small areas, but I did the entire room. I won't go as far as to say that the carpet is as good as new, BUT it looks a heck of a lot better.

Want a glimpse as to what the crap looked like that came out of the carpet? Heck no will I show you what came out of MY carpet. But, I will show you a picture of someone elses nasty carpet water.

When you adopt a puppy or become a parent, you should automatically be given one of these. And, one of these just for good measure. I use our steam mop every couple of days and love it.

**I was NOT paid or compensated for this review.