It’s a Family Tradition

These are my brothers and sister on my mom’s side of the family.  Weren’t they precious?? This picture was taken in 2003 or 2004.  They were so sweet and jubilant.

Although we don’t have the same traditions that Hank Jr. does, my family definitely has certain things that we do every year during the holidays.  So, with all of this talk about holidays and what-not in the air, it has made me start to think about what kind of traditions I want to start with my little family.  I know that since JL is small this year, we might not get to do AALLLLL of these, but others we will be able to go ahead and start right away!  So I’ll split these traditions up into two catagories: To Do Now & To Do Later:

TO DO NOW

• Get a yearly Christmas ornament for JL so that when she gets married or moves out (let’s hope she moves out first, lol) she will have at least 18 ornaments that have sentimental value to her that she can put on her own Christmas tree
• Make ornaments every year for MY tree And possibly the grandparents, too
• My family always had this tradition growing up — new PJs for Christmas night.  I think I will wrap hers up and let her always open that present on Christmas Eve (already washed of course so she can wear them that night)
• Pictures to take – with Santa, with her in her PJs in front of the tree & with the family in front of the house
• Christmas Cards
• I really like the idea of opening a book and reading it every night from December 1st until December 25th. But books these days are expensive! Plus I don’t like getting them from the thrift store (it gives me the heebie jeebies). So we might start small with this one (like on the 15th) and work our way up to 25 books
• One of my all time favorite things to do during the holiday season is to go and look at Christmas lights! Bobby isn’t as thrilled about it as I am, but he humors me just the same.  Hopefully JL will enjoy it just as much as her momma
• Decorating the tree as a family.  My brother-in-law and his family took a video and did a time lapse last Christmas of the decking of their halls (check out the holidayness here).  I really like that idea, but we will see what we can come up with
• Speaking of Christmas trees, I like LIVE trees.  The kind that you go out to a farm and cut down yourself, not the kind that you get out of a box and open like an umbrella or the kind that you go and get from Lowes or Home Depot.  A trip to the Christmas Tree Farm is definitely in order. Now, to find a car to bring it home with…
• When I was little, my mom always had an advent calendar hanging in our home.  Ours had a little elf that we got to move from day to day, counting down the hours to Christmas and SANTA.  I definitely want to do this, but am thinking about having a more DIY approach.  I will post on here once I figure out what that approach is going to be
• Not all of our family lives in the US, so I am planning on having a very special video Christmas with our family across the pond every year that we are unable to be together
• Speaking of family, for as far back as I can remember I have had Christmas Eve dinner at my grandmother’s house in Opelika.  I would love to continue that tradition with Junah Leigh on board

TO DO LATER

• As my little girl grows up, I want her to think more of others than of herself.  So we will be doing at least one of these things:  Random Acts of Kindness (you can find examples here), adopting a family from the Angel Tree at Salvation Army, or something along those lines.  Last year, a lady that I was working with needed help with her children’s Christmas.  I was lucky enough to have such wonderful friends and family! We were able to provide those kids with new beds and a ROOM FULL of toys She took pictures of Christmas day and the best part were the smiles on their faces.  Nothing could have been sweeter!
• We are lucky enough to live near an awesome railroad museum, the Heart of Dixie Railroad Museum.  It is a pretty short drive from our house and every year they do a lot of different events for families.  During October, they do a Pumpkin Patch Express where you can ride on the train to a pumpkin patch that has a moonwalk, face painting, refreshments and of course, lots of pumpkins for you to choose from.  During December, they run The Polar Express! They serve hot chocolate and chocolate milk (for the kiddos) and cookies to all of the passengers. They also have story time and a visit from the big man in red himself!  How fun would that be?
• I am the oldest of 6 children.  I have 4 brothers and a sister.  When I was growing up we always had so much fun baking cookies for Santa and making reindeer food to put out on Christmas Eve (good example here). The way that their eyes lit up with excitement made the entire sleepless night worth it…well, almost.
• Popcorn garland!

I am sure that there is a ton more that I will continue to add.  What are some of your favorite family traditions during the holiday season?

Our Humble Abode…

I know that I promised pictures of the casa once I figured out how to get the pictures off of the camera.  It seemed like a pretty easy task until you consider who’s doing it…me.  So it took me how long? about 7 months.  That’s ok.  Better late than never right?  But don’t worry.  You haven’t missed anything.  A little pruning and grass cutting has happened since we moved in on March 24th.  So get ready for the truth and nothing but the truth, so help me God.

First, here is a pretty far back shot (in my neighbor’s yard) of the front of the house:

All in all, she looks pretty good.  What Cher from Clueless would call a Monet.  Looks great from far away but when you get closer…eek!  There are a lot of things that we are ready to take care of now.  Most of which include manual labor and a price tag of FREE.  Other things that will be taken care of in the future are a bit more costly (i.e. replacing doors, windows and adding porticos and pavers).  So here we go!

We might as well start from the street.  Here is our mailbox, AKA scary box of death, which I hate. It is so old and there are bugs that crawl into it from the rusted hole in the back and try to eat my hand when I get the mail out. There is a newspaper slot which some wonderful neighborhood kid has so lovingly placed a can in that is also home to a few species of spiders that I have yet to identify. Let’s just say, I’m glad that we don’t get the paper and that can will remain in there until I knock this thing down with a sledgehammer.  It will most likely be replaced by a post mailbox and a natural area instead of the brick, since the brick version is so much more expensive and I don’t want to go through the headache of matching the brick again. We will replace it with something, preferably like this:

Isn’t it BEAUTIFUL?!?  I can’t wait to have it up so I don’t have an anxiety attack every time I need to check the mail.

Next we start with the natural areas in the yard.  Here is the first one:

This is one of the natural areas that has become over grown in our front yard. The tree to the right used to have several low hanging branches that would scrape the top of any car larger than a Honda Civic or VW Golf when it entered the driveway. The ONLY bit of yard work that we have done other than cutting the grass, is cutting those branches down. The tree to the left is dead/dying. and there is some random boxwood in the middle. All surrounded by monkey grass. There is also some low lying juniper and random weeds in the middle. I want it ALL to go. Start from scratch. Any ideas?

You can also see the holly bush/tree on the side of the house really well in this picture.  It is growing like cray-cray and really blocks the natural light from coming into the dining room.  I am ready for her to have a hair cut.

Next, the other side of the yard:

It has one tree that has a few rocks around it to contain it from the rest of the yard. Also, to the left of this tree there is a crepe myrtle that is also on our property that needs to be pruned next year. It is a monster.  We won’t even get into the mess that is the side-yard over there.  I haven’t even been over there since we bought the house.  So, get the rocks up and find some other kind of border.  Maybe some day lilies.  My mother-in-law has them around the tree in her front yard and I really like it.  It keeps the pine bark in order while adding some nice color during the summer.

Now, let’s get a little more up close and personal…

This is a closer look at our front door. I am sure to some that the jasmine climbing on the railings is charming, but to people who are terrified of flying, stinging bugs (namely, me) this is like an inevitable death trap during the spring and summer. Not to mention that about 20 different species of birds have created an aviary in part of the plant that happened to fall behind the completely overgrown sticker bushes when we were trimming the monster this spring. They love it there and as glad as I am that my cats have something to keep them entertained in the morning, I just can’t stand the constant squaking while I am trying to sleep.  I think they like to come and sit on the window right beside my bed and “sing” at 3 am.  Not that I’m not already awake.  What? Haven’t you met this bundle of joy yet?

Isn’t she the cutest??!?  Love her…

Here is a little closer on the left side of the house:

Now, that is one massive holly bush. I want that to be trimmed up and all of the rest of the bushes and plants to be ripped out.  Those sticker bushes are seriously intruding on the walkway and I think they have been there since 1992 when the house was built.  Along with a few other things that we will get to in another post.  So, who is good at ripping up bushes?

Second verse, same as the first:

Now, we get to what I think will be my favorite part and what we will most likely be doing first:

The front door!! All of the hardware will be ORB (oil rubbed bronze) and I think the door is going to be apple green, but I am still working on the hubs for that one. We will see. I also want to frost the windows next to the door so creepers can’t look in. And the lights will be changed out to ORB as well. We are also playing with the idea of eventually adding a portico…you know, to keep the rain off.

Sidewalk leading up to the front door. Can you see the sticker bush intruding on the walkway up there? That is why I want them gone. Along with the random piece of lawn in between the bushes and the sidewalk. I know that has to get on Bobby’s nerves when he is cutting the grass. Eventually, I want the whole sidewalk gone and replace with pavers in a different path maybe.

Last but not least…

This is our garage (pardon the mess). I want to paint the garage doors and the door to the garage black, add some cute lights above both garage doors and add an awning over the door.  I also want some sort of pad on the back side of the house to put the trash can and recycling can that isn’t in front of the garage door.  If you are wondering why our cars aren’t INSIDE the garage that we probably paid more for, it is because there is a TON of recycling that still needs to be put out (the recycling truck comes every two weeks here) from when we moved in and put together Junah Leigh’s nursery.  So we are taking our time.

Well, peeps, that is it!  Keep a look out for another post about the inside of the house.  I just want to get it decently clean before photographing it for you (not that I don’t want to keep it real…just not THAT real).  Peace out!

It’s a PIN PARTY!

Hey everyone! I know you are just as much in love with Pinterest as I am and lately I have begun planning for the holiday season.  I know it seems crazy early to start holiday planning, but I have two excuses valid reasons to start NOW (like yesterday).

#1:  I have a large family.  One year, my husband and I attended 7 different family Christmas celebrations.  Not that we don’t absolutely LOVE seeing all of our family and being able to celebrate with them, but it doesn’t leave much time to rebound in between them so we have to have everything organized and ready to go!

#2: I have a brand new baby girl as you found out in the last post.  We are totally in love which makes it hard to put her down and get stuff done, so I figured a few extra months of planning would help.

So for anyone else looking to plan ahead, this is for you!

This week I am pinning all Fall and Halloween related items.  So far I have some really awesome DIY decor, pumpkin carving ideas and costumes for the bug.  Like what you see? Follow me here!

Need something to spice up your foyer?  Try these easy to follow DIY projects!  (compliments of  Thrifty Decor Chick)

Here are some front door ideas for you

Easy peasy door mat.  You could also do a witch’s hat, ghost in white, or a Frankenstein face if you’re feeling crafty. (compliments of BHG)

Fun door hanger instead of a wreath -compliments of Nap Time Crafters (love that)

How fun is this idea?  Cut eyes out of toilet paper rolls, insert glow sticks and put them in the bushes or shrubbery in your front yard to scare the kiddos on Halloween!  (compliments of Thrifty Crafty Girl)

Now for your pumpkin ideas!  I always love what John and Sherry Petersik come up with for their pumpkins over on Young House Love:

Puffy Paint Pumpkins

Getting the bug involved with “Pumpkin Fingers” pumpkin

And as you know, we tried this design ourselves a couple of years ago

But how about something else fun and most likely a little messy! (compliments of HGTV)

Glitter pumpkins

Or, my personal favorite, a chevron painted pumpkin??? (compliments of Feeling lovesome)

I’ll be back tomorrow with the rest!

A Brand New Addition…

Hello! I hope everyone has been having a grand life since I wrote on here last.  I must apologize again for the delay  long wait  absolute neglect of this blog for the last year.  I will TRY to be better.  Now I actually have more time at home to blog, create & organize all because of one little thing…

My sweet, precious little girl!  Junah Leigh joined us on May 29th of this year and we couldn’t be more happy!  Obviously, she is over the moon as well  Not only has our world been turned upside down with this precious blessing, but we have also purchased our first home!  After moving out of our apartment in June 2011 when I accepted another job, we moved in with Bobby’s mom.  After looking at over 60 (YES, that is a zero after that six) houses, we found our perfect little place in Alabaster, Al.  Pictures will be coming as soon as I figure out how to work this fancy schmancy camera that Bobb-O got for Christmas.  Let me just warn you, there is A LOT of work to do.  Specifically in the kitchen, although some of my family members would argue that it was “just fine” or “that wallpaper is actually really nice”.  Right.  I will let you decide for yourselves!  Keep an eye out later this week (hopefully) for a little tour of our new little nest!

Much love and thanks for hanging in there!

Time FLIES when you’re…working?

The title of this post is absolutely true.  Since when did it become April?  When did people start dying eggs for hunting and bleaching their best white pants (not that I believe in that foolishness…white looks good anytime)?  I don’t think that I have even looked at this site since the last time that I posted on here on March 15th.  That is a good long time if you ask me!  I know that I haven’t  WORKED that much since March 15th, but for some reason, I have found some reason to be extremely busy and without a moment to look at my blog!  So for this, I apologize and all I can say is I will try NOT to let it happen again.  So now, here we go…

Waiting & Wishing

So here I am, sitting at work home, hoping, wishing and wanting a home of my own.  I know that it is a little ways down the road for us, but I am so excited and ready to make a place of our own that I am addicted to constantly reading other home improvement blogs.  Maybe I will draw something from these blogs that will inspire my own true decorating style?  Maybe some of these blogs actually mirror my dreams for my home?  I don’t know.  All I can say is that, my name is Lindsey Colvin and I am addicted to things that I can’t possibly have at this moment. 

It certainly doesn’t help that I have friends and family getting houses of their own to personalize and cuddle up into.  I have house envy.  I have DIY envy.  Can I please come and decorate your home?  It will only take me a little while!  Please!!!

I sound pathetic.  So, in the mean time, I have decided to take on a few other projects at the mini-nest (also known as the apartamento).  Get ready for these lovely little bits of DIYdom in the near future.  While I am working on those though, I will be posting about my favorite things!  These are things that I absolutely couldn’t live without.  Especially in such a small place, organization is KEY.  So get ready to be organized!!!

If you haven’t been reading long, let me remind you of a few of my favorite blogs (and some new ones that I have found!  I know exciting right? I’m pathetic…):

Young House Love

 

Centsational Girl

 

7th House on the Left

 

 Everything LEB

Our Little Beehive

 

So that about does it for me today!  Let me know what you guys think about all of the AH-MAZE-ING blogs!!  I hope you all have a fantastic weekend!

Stocking Stuffers…under $10?? YES PLEASE!

So I know that it has been a while since I have posted anything, so I thought that I would come back with a vengeance!  Here are some great stocking stuffers for you that are all less than $10!!!  I know that stocking stuffers, as my rule, should really be more in the $1-$2 range, but if you stick even just one nicer item in there, the recipient is sure to be super grateful and surprised!!  So here are a few of my favorites that I have found on the world wide web!

For the kids:

Spitball Dart Pad–$9.95

Kids Tattoo Box–$10.00

Coal Gum (for the naughty kids!)–$5.00

For the Teenagers:

Ticket Stub Diary–$10.00

Guitar String Bracelet–$10.00

 

Bejeweled Magnets–$5.99

For Mom:

Reusable Shopping Bag–$8.99

Takeout Menu Book–$10.00

Parenting Flashcards–$10.00

For Dad:

Desktop Dodgeball–$9.75

Bike Chain Bottle Opener–$9.00

Frank and Beans Gum–$8.00

 

For the Traveler:

Pocket Posh Game Books–$7.99

 

Luggage Tags–$10.00

 

Touch Lighted Magnifier–$7.99

 

Well, there you have it!! My favorite stocking stuffers this year!  I know that it can be hard finding the perfect gift for some people on your list, but keep on looking and I am sure that you will find something that fits them to a tee!

The Current Nest…Currently.

As most of you know, if you have been reading along with us, we have recently picked up and moved into a new little place of our own.  I get to walk to work now, because I actually work at the same complex, and Bobby doesn’t have to fight me to drive the “good” car to work anymore.  So, we have been settling into this new little nest of ours and I wanted to show you the progress that we have made

 

After getting all of the furniture into the apartment, I decided that I wanted to cover the entire wall with curtains…ok, so maybe that wasn’t my initial thought process, but it ended up being that way and I really love it!  The curtains add a certain softness that was missing from that side of the room and having the floor lamp in front of it gives the whole area a nice glow (CFL’s please!).  That hurricane with the candle and rocks doesn’t have a permanent home on the side table, but it is still too hot to leave it on our patio in the sun without having the candle melt all into the rocks…I know, the South right?   You will have to excuse the bottle of spray cleaner on the dining room table as this was an impromptu photo shoot, as you can tell by the fact that Bella was right in the middle of her favorite show, Cats 101…  Here is another view:

 

Bella is not impressed with my mad photographer skills.  Don’t you love my little Christmas plants??

 

I would like to thank WalMart for their very reasonable priced, glittery christmas plants!  Only $5.00!  Oh and those cute little pots are from non other than Ikea!  Speaking of glitter, I do believe that I promised a certain someone a peek at my new glittery pillar candles that I purchased from Target last week!

Well, I hope you guys like it so far!  I am getting pretty used to it!  Have a Happy Thanksgiving!!!!

Great Gifts for Under $25

As you know, the name of my blog is “The Frugal Nest”.  So I thought that I would give you nice people out there some cheap gift ideas for the holiday season (I know I can’t believe that it is here already either)!

Let’s start off with one of my favorite stores, West Elm!  They have this gorgeous white ceramic owl for only $9!  You can even get the larger one for just $16!  That makes it $25 (my limit) for both!

(PS…that is fake snow, not salt or sugar.  This is a figurine not a container for some sort of table seasoning.)

My number two rings close to my heart for a few reasons:  #1: I am from the South and when there is nothing to do, which is most of the time, we grab a bottle of wine and talk college football and politics & #2:  Every time I drink red wine it takes me back to when my husband and I took a trip to Paris and got a carafe full at every meal.  With all of that aside, this is a great hostess gift that you can pick up on your way to a party and pop it in a cheapo wine bag and no one will be the wiser!

This particular red wine is actually one of my favorite wines to grab on a weeknight because it is a blend and is smoother (IMO) than a single grape wine.  You can pick Hey Mambo up at Whole Foods for around $10 but I have seen it get as high as $12 at other stores.

Who likes coffee?  I think that you would be hard pressed to find someone in this modern age who doesn’t enjoy at least a cup a day.  Many of these coffee lovers get said coffee from either a franchised coffee shop or a local shop many of which carry the white paper cups with plastic lids.  The problem with this?  It burns my little hands!  But fear not fellow readers for I have found a solution!  This cute little sleeve for your paper coffee cup from The Container Store will leave your hand unscathed against the nice hot coffee that you seek.  Plus, for $4.99 each, you could get one in each color and still have some cash left over for other gifts!

So, this is just the beginning of a series of posts about reasonably priced gifts for the holidays because if your family is anything like mine…you have a lot of gifts to buy. HA!  Enjoy!

Something’s missing…

I can’t quite put my finger on it, but something is missing from this wall:

Here is another view:

And one more:

So what do you think?  I am thinking either some sort of gallery cluster or some floating shelves on either side for more storage.  This is definitely one of my weaknesses; indecision.  I just can’t seem to decide!

Well, here is one thing that I did decide to do this week:

This wall, like the other, I felt was just missing that little something extra.  Luckily for me, I knew exactly what I wanted to do with it!  By installing a few of these floating shelves from Ikea, I was able to fill the space and still keep a very open feeling.  Not only were they very easy to install, but they were only $19.99/each!  I think that is a very reasonable price for style  I’ll bet you are wondering why those shelves are so high in relation to the TV.  Well, if you had two very curious cats wanting to jump on anything that they can reach, then you would probably put them up that high as well.  In fact, I actually measured 50 inches from the top of the TV bench just to make that they most likely couldn’t jump up there…we will see how that goes.

Here is a closer look at the arrangement of items on the shelves:

Most of these items I am going to talk about in a couple of future posts involving collections, so you will have to wait until then to learn about the majority of the items.  The books are just hardcover books that I don’t read anymore, covered in brown craft paper, used to create some height among the items since most of them are about the same size.  I love the cute little candle holders, which will have candles in them soon, that I actually got from Walgreens for $5.00 for the set of 3!  Not too bad, I think.

So please let me know your thoughts on the blank wall situation so I can move on!!!!  Look for another post coming soon!