Feeling Patriotic

A couple months after we moved in, I thought a flag would look great with this house.  We looked at an old bungalow when we were looking for a house, that had a flag flying out front which I adored.

This house was built during the post WWII housing boom, and seemed to want a flag.  I'm not sure if it was the recent trip to Washington DC, or the impending Memorial Day holiday, but I decided to finally put the flag up.

Before:

After:

The flag really makes the house look like it's age.  As much as we have modernized the house, I feel like we need to pay homage to its past, and this does the job perfectly.

During the football season, I promised Nick that we can put up a Razorback flag. 

Anything you've done lately that makes you feel patriotic?

Thirty!!

Today is my 30th birthday.  While I usually don't get worked up about aging, I realized a couple weeks ago, that I am only half way to 60, which is when I hope to retire.  It made me realize that's a lot of time left to work, and that I'm not really that old.  For my 30th birthday, I thought I'd some things about my birthday!

Ronald Reagan was President of the United States
George Bush was Vice President of the United States

Minimum Wage was $3.35/hour

Gallon of milk cost about $1.89

Dozen egg cost about $1.43

First Class Stamp was $0.20

Gallon of gas cost about $1.23


This is what the magazine stand looked like when I was born:

 

(Time Magazine)

(Sports Illustrated)

(People)

(source)

The #1 Box Office Movie:  Spacehunter: Adventures in the Forbidden Zone (Return of the Jedi opened May 25)

The Billboard Hot 100 #1 Single: Let's Dance by David Bowie

A new episode of Joanie loves Chachi aired, along with reruns of Happy Days, Three's Company, and The A Team on my birthday.

The Little Drummer Girl and In Search of Excellence were on the top of the New York Times Bestseller List.

The Brooklyn Bridge celebrated 100 years!

I share my birthday with:

Queen Victoria (d.1901)

Tommy Chong

Bob Dylan

Patti Labelle

and others

 Happy Birthday!

Laundry Update

Sorry, this post is late.  Enjoy anyway!
Many, many months ago I moved my "office" from the laundry room to the spare bedroom.  That left a blank laundry room, which I have hid from you since.  Naughty, I know.  I worked on it a little, and it's coming along, but there are a couple more updates planned, including a screen around the water heater, and potentially crown molding.

Here's what the laundry room looks like now:

Here are some progression photos to remind you of what it used to look like:

What do you think? 

Pinning and Pining: May 2013

So last month's Pinning and Pining went alright.  Since this is my birthday month, I think I should be selfish and choose things just for me.

Pinning:

 

I have wanted a tattoo for years, but I have always reconsidered for various reasons.  But I think a big sister/lil sister tattoo with my sister would be fun.  Not sure about the feather though.

I love this picture! It cheers me up, every time I see it.  lol.

I think BBQ chicken pizza with bacon could be my favorite pizza.  I love non-traditional pizzas.  This recipe looks fantastic.

All above photos from pinterest

Pining:

(Marquee Candles)

I saw these and thought it was awesome.  They put jewelry inside your candle, and you can get a value of it through their website.  I think it's a pretty cool idea.

(Brevity)

Everyone hates my signature because you can't even tell its my name, but I like my signature.  If I had $200 to throw around, I think I would get one of these.

(Englady)

I have been collecting fortune cookie fortunes for as long as I can remember.  I love this silver fortune cookie necklace because it opens up to add (or read) a fortune inside.

  

Do you like Pinning and Pining?  What would you change?

Master Bedroom Artwork

When I was in elementary school, I would do reports on countries around the world.  I remember doing one on France when I was in 4th grade.  I also remember doing reports on Peru, Zaire, and Thailand also.  I have always loved geography, and maps.
Nick and I often stroll around our local Home Goods looking at things, and globes always seem to catch our eyes.   I think we have 5 globes, and now at least 5 maps.  Here are the newest cartographic items:

 

This is a map of my hometown.  Those of you not familiar with maps, my map says I grew up in a rural region with both wooded and treeless areas, and with some hills.

This is Nick's hometown.  His map says he grew up in a small town, that is almost entirely flat and treeless.  I think this photo of Nick's nightstand describes him perfectly.  Two remotes, a magazine (Lucky Peach, it's awesome), a thick book (The Emperor and the Wolf), and a fan.  So, he likes electronics and technology, he's a foodie, enjoys reading, and movies, and is always hot.  Yea, that's about right.

I got these maps from My Topo.  I originally wanted USGS prints, but they were out of both of ours, and Nick's hometown is split in half.  My Topo allows you to choose size of your map, scale (we chose 1:24,000 for both of ours), and center of map.  They also have aerial maps as well.  

As with all of our prints, we got the frames from IKEA, and custom mats from Michael's.  I think each framed map was about $50.  Not too bad.

Anyone else love maps or globes as much as us?

AFI Top 100 Update: We watched #60, Duck Soup, and #45, Shane. 16 down, 84 to go.

Kitchen Reno: Future Kitchen Design?

Last month was landscaping month, and this month is cleaning month.  This leads to very little to show you of what's going on here.  We do have plans though.
We have a kitchen reno planned for early 2014, if I can talk my dad into visiting for too long, and nothing goes wrong until then.  I have been thinking about this reno since our first walk-through.  My first thought was to blow open a large opening, and add an island.  I think it's exactly what the house needs to modernize it, creating a more open floor plan.

This is an Ikea rendering of our plan.  I plan on using Ikea cabinets, most likely Ramsjo in black-brown, but white is still an option.  We are open to moving the stove/range, and fridge, but I like the idea of an large blank island.  We are also open to removing the beverage fridge (silver appliance on right side), and replace it with a cabinet.
This plan will probably change about a half dozen times before we start the reno.

AFI Top 100 Update: We watched #15, 2001: A Space Odyssey.  14 down, 86 to go.  At this rate we will be done in about 2 years.  A movie marathon may be in our future.

April Landscaping: Back Yard

Surprise!  It seems as though the last day of April would be the perfect day to finish up our landscaping.  In this case, the back yard.

Before:

 

This is directly behind the master bedroom.  It has never looked any better than this, and seemed like a blank canvas for plants.  I decided on plants that are already around the house, Hawaiian Ti, purple fountain grass, and Azaleas.  

After:

 

So there it is, landscaping month is over.  I'm sure next year we will have more landscaping to do, but for 2013 we are done. 

AFI Top 100 Update: We watched #62, American Graffiti.  13 down, 87 to go.

April Landscaping: North Front Yard

Yep, we're still landscaping.  Probably until the last day of April.  This weekend was a lazy weekend, because we watched the NFL draft (Go Pack!) on Saturday, which left only Sunday to plant.  I quickly planted the north front yard.

Before:

 

 

As you can see, it's pretty boring.  I had plans though.  I needed to move the Hawaiian Ti plant from around the air conditioner because they were getting sun burnt.  Too much sun on the south side of the house.  I also love Mexican Petunias which were outside our apartment when we first moved here.  I love the purple color of the flowers, that will match the purple in the Bird of Paradise flowers.

 

 After:

 

The Mexican Petunias will get to be 4 feet tall, or about the height of the fence.  I have heard the these can spread as they grow, so I left some room for growth.  If they don't spread, I will be able to add different plants between them in the future. 

So the air conditioner looks different now.  Take a look:

 This wasn't my first option, but the plants will handle the full sun that this side of the house gets.

There is one more spot for landscaping this month, which will be done in the next couple days.  You may see this transformation as a mid-week post.

AFI Top 100 Update: We watched #66, Raiders of the Lost Ark.  12 down, 88 to go.

April Landscaping: North Side Yard

As part of landscaping month, we decided that the north side yard need some attention.  It is a shady spot with the sun blocked by the house and a large tree.  It leads to a difficult time for me to find the right plants.  I believe I have figured it out with a lot of research.

BEFORE:

The front half of the north side yard:

The back half of the north side yard:

 

AFTER: 

The front half of the north side yard:

 

The back half of the north side yard:

Details:

I don't know if it was The Masters Championship, but I had to have Azaleas.  Happy Days Azaleas, to be exact.  

I love the texture of these foxtail ferns.  They are simple, delicate, beautiful.

The color of the Persian shield is fantastic.  The purple is great against the green of all the other plants. 

The California Elephant Ear has beautiful, big leaves.  I'm looking forward to watching this grow.

Azalea's pretty flowers ready to open. 

Next weekend is the NFL draft, so I will have to sneak in the last landscaping projects when the draft isn't on.

Pinning and Pining: April 2013

This is the inaugural "Pinning and Pining" post.  In this series (the first series at ZVH), I will show some of the things I have been pinning at Pinterest, and things I have been pining after.

Pinning:

 

Pinterest

 A little research one night, and I found out this was in a Martha Stewart Magazine.  I should have known this was from Martha.  I think this would be nice for Nick and I.

 Pinterest

The recipe looks so flavorful.  This may be a future side dish with chicken tacos, or something for the NFL  Draft later this month. 

Pinterest

This is inspiration for our future kitchen.  We love dark, chocolate cabinets, and stainless steel tiles for the backsplash.  We are also considering putting up shelves, but at this point it's on the optional list.

Pining:

The Champions Ring

I ran into these prints a couple weeks ago.  There are championship prints for the 4 major leagues (MLB, NBA, NFL, NHL) and NCAA Men's Basketball, Olympic, MLS, World Cup, EURO, and UEFA CL.  Nick loves the Arkansas NCAA BB championship from 1994, and I love the most recent Packers Superbowl Championship.

Tweak

I have loved this necklace and dozens of other pieces of jewelry from Tweak, for years now.  I check out this website a couple times a year, but I have never pulled the trigger, and bought any of the pieces I adore.

I have been thinking about making a quilt, which I haven't done since I was in high school.  I need a large lap quilt to cuddle under and watch TV.  This is my idea right now.  Need some motivation to get going and finish this project, though.

So there you go, the first of the Pinning and Pining series.  I hope you enjoy it.