Love is in the air...

Hello!

Welcome to our home...

I love decorating and I so enjoy having a place to make our own.

Since we have only been married 2 1/2 months everything is a first for us.

We are looking forward to celebrating our first Valentines as a married couple.

I wanted to bring some of that Valentine love right into our decor so that is what you will find in the pictures below.

Enjoy!

Jack found this milk can at the end of someone's drive.

It was rusted over but we both knew it had potential...:)

We spray painted it white and I painted some chipboard letters, gathered some twigs, bought some berry sprigs, and ta-da project complete!

I had a different ribbon around it at Christmas so this was quite easy to make look Valentinish.

For those of you who don't know me, I have a thing for twigs, mason jars, and chalkboards...

Here I used my cricut to cut out some hearts, punch a hole in them, and hang

from our Valentine tree which changes from season to season. 

Jack bought me the amaryllis and it is blooming just in time for the holiday.  

Flowers have a way of brightening any room they are in!

 This is my Valentine gift to Jack...

A 2 week countdown til the 14th.

Starting February 1st Jack will receive something every day.  It may be small or big, may not cost a thing...

I have a list that I plan on transferring to sticky notes and attaching to the back of these numbers so it can be reused.

This project was just made using an old frame, twine, and mini-clothespins.

I am excited to start our 14 days of Valentines! :)

This may be one of my favorite things about our house and something I use every day.

When Jack and I were dating we did this project together so it has some good memories tied up in it.

Our 6 foot chalkboard, contains our weekly menu, shopping list, and to do list.

I enjoy making it festive depending on the holiday.

I simply used my cricut to make some 5" circles then folded them in half and glued to some twine.

I love the look of this banner! :)

I like to use this frame for printable art.  I have a printables board on Pinterest where I collect them and then I print them at CVS.  By the end of this year I should have quite the collection! :)

I chose this saying because it was a phrase Jack would say to me when we were dating...

While I was taking pictures of the Valentine decor, I couldn't help but notice that our living room (which is black, tan, and red) seemed so very "Valentinesh" that I just had to share...:)

I love our wood sign that we also made we were dating.

The pillows are on the couch year round but go quite nicely for Valentines.

The two red pillows are actually recovered thrift store finds.

I learned this frugal method from my mother.

Fabric is so much cheaper and it does not take much to cover pillows, and adding buttons

and flowers just make them more unique!

I told you we like chalkboards...:)

This one stands on an easel in our hallway.

 As you leave our house please take note of the wreath on the front door.

This was my first attempt and probably last at a yarn wreath.

I underestimated the time it would take to wrap yarn around a foam wreath...

Hours and hours.

But, I was pleased with the results and plan on leaving it up and just making new flowers

and adding a new ribbon come spring and summer... :)

(The tutorial I used for the fabric flowers came from here I did improvise a little til I got the exact look I liked)

Thank you for visiting our home,

please come again! :)

New Year's Recap

On New Year's Eve we decided to try a new recipe from off one of my Pinterest boards.

We tried this one with a few variations and loved, loved, loved it!

On New Year's Day we took a walk at Deep River County Park and snapped a few pictures of course.

Later that afternoon we picked up my sisters and brought them home with us for the next two days.

We had so much fun cooking up new things and playing an entire game of Monopoly which lasted four hours and ended with ME winning!  (I knew I always liked that game) ;)

Of course with 3 girls in a house there was sure to be facial masks, manicures and lots of giggling.

We thoroughly enjoyed having them with us and look forward to their next visit!

Photography Outing

With the gorgeous sunshine we had,

Jack and I decided to take advantage of it and go for a drive.

That drive led us down country roads to some abandon barns;

perfect for photographing of course!

Such an enjoyable afternoon spent with my husband and camera! :)

Christmas Memories

We had such a wonderful Christmas holiday celebrating our Savior's birth.

We also enjoyed spending our first Christmas together as husband and wife!

Instead of buying each other gifts for under the tree we decided on an overnight stay in Chicago.

(Best gift ever!!!) :)

We enjoyed our time at the Millennium Knickerbocker which was located one block

away from the John Hancock building.

We had a wonderful time in the city and completed our stay by attending The Christmas Carol

which was a phenomenal production put on by the Goodman Theater.

Christmas Eve was spent with the McDonnell family.

We had a wonderful time of food, fellowship, and games...

so fun was it that we failed to  pull the camera out of the bag.

*Gasp*

I know we can't believe we let the night slip by without a single shot.

You can check out some pictures that the siblings captured though 

on the family blog.

We spent Christmas morning exchanging stockings and eating some delicious homemade

cinnamon rolls which Mom McDonnell made for us and then

we headed up to Chesterton for Christmas with the other side of the family. :)

We learned from our mistakes and were certain to pull out the camera 

for some pictures this time...

We enjoyed introducing them to two new games:

Farkle and Pictionary Cards.

Of course we had some delectable Christmas treats... :)

The day after Christmas Jack and I had the parents and Rick & Bethany

over for dinner, coffee, and a game of Scrabble.

(which us young'uns lost to the parents) :)

The best of all gifts around any Christmas tree:

the presence of a happy family all wrapped up in each other.