Grandma's Hats

Recently, Steve's grandma Nona moved from Sacramento to live with Steve's parents. She broke her back and is needing full time care. But don't let her age of 87, and her 72 pounds fool you. She is full of sunshine and fun. She can really make you laugh. We have had so much fun with her. She saved these hats for my girls. She actually used to wear these. They are precious, and I can tell you that they are not going to end up at the bottom of the "dress up" toy box. What a memory these will hold for my girls and family.

Kellie (Steve's Sister)

Grandma and Steve

the Catholic mourning hat...
Hilary

Me and Grams, is blue and silver my color?

Steve's mom, I think she could pull this off...:)

Addison and Grandma

Me and Michaela, I am in the "mourning Catholic hat", if I die tomorrow, I for one would not be offended if you wore this to my funeral. It reeks of sadness...

The bunch - wow, what is the "Muslim" piece that Hilary has on? I thought you were Mexican?

Finally!

I finally finished my bathroom tile. Why I thought that this would be an "easy" job, I don't know.

2" tiles all around? While it is not perfect, I am happy with the outcome. I still want to frame out the mirrors and get a bamboo roman shade for the block window, but all in sweet time. I think that I would have done this in glass mosaics had I started it today. My taste has changed, and does change daily. Just part of being in the business. But this tile is pretty timeless and should not be too outdated anytime soon. This will have to do pig!

Check out some other great tile designs on my design blog here.

BEFORE:

AFTER:

Decorating Blog

I have been needing to do this for ever! - my decorating blog. I started it a long time ago, and just got too busy. But, I am back and am going to updating it with cool ideas all of the time! Plus I will give some specifics on color and design in my posts that I don't normally do on this blog. Come visit me. I love your comments and ideas!

http://www.fullerinterior.blogspot.com/

Why do I like this?

So I am NOT a "musical" lover at ALL! Infact I am completely annoyed by them. You would think since I love music and dancing, that pairing them up would be a hit with me; but no one ever just breaks out in song and dance in the middle of their day! If I can't relate, then I don't like it. So why in the crapo do I love this show? Seriously, I am going to be so outraged if they cancel it. I love it with all my heart. My new fav for 2009 - for the reals. Check it out. Glee...on Fox Wednesday nights

All Striped OUT! - Part Duex?

If stripes are not your thing, you may want to steer clear of me this month! This is the 3rd room that I have done in 2 weeks that has them. I just think that they are timeless, although they are a major pain in the butt to paint. But so worth it! We turned this from a boys room, to a girls room really quick just with some paint. It really is amazing. We didn't buy accessories or anything, just used what we had. Don't try this at home unless you have lot of tape and even more patience. Holy Cow...btw - PURPLE is back. Its true. I saw it on HGTV; so it is fact...

BEFORE:

AFTER:

All Striped OUT!

Stripes seems to be the theme lately for me. I love the simplicity of them, but I have never done this before-a 6 color stripe. It was intense. Good thing it was just under the railing, cuz it would have taken me all week. 8 rolls of tape later, this is what we ended up with. I can't blame the client, because these are always my crazy ideas.

Before:

After:

Don't stop in the playroom. I wanted to carry the color theme into the bedroom, since it was right next to it and I thought we could make it flow and make sense. We did a "surfer girl" themed striped around the room. It looks simple, but actually one mess up on this guy can throw the whole thing off. I know this because I messed it up, not once, but twice! Those dang textured walls don't help either. But when a little girl says that it is the room she has always dreamed of, that makes you feel pretty good.

Before:

After:

Wolf

The Wolf...Oh yeah. Steve found the notorious wolf spider in our garage, by my paint bag a couple nights ago. A bite from one of these guys can hospitalize you. One might wonder, "why is its back glistening?" Well my fellow bloggers, those glistens are the eyes of his 400 babies on his back. UCK! shiver shiver... Steve tried to squish it, but I think the spider was bigger than his foot. It ended up, that instead of 1 mama spider, we had 401 to kill, because the babies went everywhere! Mama spider was PO'd.

After completely taking apart our garage looking for this beast, we decided to just bug bomb the whole garage. Mama ended up in the back of the fridge. All I could envision is me getting my diet coke at 6:30 in the morning and her coming out for her morning feast on me! See how her back isn't so big now? She made it about 4 feet away from the fridge before the poison finally killed her.

In times of Crisis

Some may have heard, although is hasn't been a complete broadcast, that as of the end of September, Steve does not have a job. He has been with Archstone now for 10 1/2 years, most of our married life. The Archstone ride has been a good one, but it may be time to move on. They recently sold the last property here in Austin, and it happened to be the one that Steve was working at. So as of the end of the month, well, I don't know exactly to be honest. He does have some good leads, so we will just have to have faith and see.

But until then, it is to Krispie Kreme for us! No fine wine or liquor can do your worried heart better than a Krispie Kreme, right? Or 3? I have found that through this job situation, that I am usually too stressed and worried to eat, but when I do, there is usually a large amount of chocolate or sugar involved. We all do what we need to do to cope. I just wish my coping mech could be at the gym.

Catching Fire

Okay, so I read all the time, and rarely post a book, but this one deserves a word or two. It is a series that will not disappoint, other than when you are done you have to wait another year for the next one. Good news if you haven't already started though, 2 of them are already out! The first installment was called Hunger Games. It is a action packed love story that makes you think out of the box a bit. Catching Fire just came out September 1st, and now I am just waiting for Steve to finish so that I have someone else to talk to about it. It was awesome! I was thinking how cool it would be if they made a movie. Well apparently, they are going to! It is set to come out in 2011. I am going to try and block it out until then. But for a sneak peak, there is a fan made trailer that I picked up on youtube. Seriously, there are some people in this universe with crazy time and talent.

Michaelas 10th Birthday Party

Michaela and her buddies - Ava and Sara (lunchtime at school)

She is like my premature twin, right?

The teacher that every 5th grade girl "swoons" over. Oh yeah, he's hot!

My cupcake creations. Popcorn and spaghetti. What more can you ask for, right?

Yes, they are cupcakes...it just looks wrong!

I know I am lagging on my posts. Mainly, because I don't have a lot of people who really care; and I know that I will eventually get to it. So her it goes... August 29th was Michaela's big 10th Birthday. Double digits man. Braces, bras, you know the scoop. I can't believe it is happening. It really puts in perspective that Steve and I are no longer teenagers that get to make out in the back of his car. Well, I guess we could, but I have a ton of crap to do and not a lot of time for that.
Anyways...Our sweet Michaela. She is such a good girl with such a good spirit, and old spirit at that. She is way beyond her years. I love her much. I love to hang out with her as a friend too. She is very witty and compassionate. What a good one to get on your first go, you know? I mean she was a good baby too! Had I had, perhaps, Dylan first - I am not sure that I would have kept going. At least not without fervent prayer, cuz dang. That kids didn't know what a nap was or how to swallow food and keep it down. Not to mention the big ol' spot on his poor little noggin that he had when he was born. Took 5 rather painful surgeries for that poor boy to get rid of that.
Back to Michaela - sweet Michaela. We love you much and hope you had a great birthday celebration. We went swimming and came back to watch movies on the projector and have some treats and pedis. Good times.

She got 10 gifts from her dad and I. She had to unwrap them in the order of years 1-10 according to the picture. Then we told a favorite memory of her at each age. It was fun.

Who needs Regal or AMC?

Man...

Boy, last week was a bad one. I am tellin' ya, I can't remember a worse one in a long time. It just felt like we got hit with everything. My friend Natalie sent me this today, and it made me laugh, and cry a little. So for those who don't have the privilege of living in Texas; I should probably explain...

We here in Texas think that Property Tax is a fun way to bill our residence, instead of the usual income tax. Many might say, "that is awesome, no income tax!" Well, based on what we make, I figured that if they just taxed us on our income, we might have to pay 1,000 a year or something. But with the blessing of property tax, I can donate almost 10 grand a year to my wonderful state.

In fact, they even make you feel like you have some say in finding the appropriate "value" of your home so that they can stamp their 2.15% per year on it. This is a sly, considering it is purely a blanket to make you feel cozy, because when all is said and done, they don't give a crap what you think, or what the market thinks of your value. I would know this, why? Because last week, I went in front of an appeals court to detest, I mean protest, the value of my home in which I am being taxed. According to my comps in my neighborhood and an appraisal in which I sunk $350 to, we are overvalued by around $50,000! I had all my pretty paperwork all neatly piled in a Manila folder. It even made sense. So when they asked if I "rested" on my case, I thought I had proved that I was being over taxed.

Then what happened was astounding. I am not sure if it happened in real life, but looking back on the situation, I think that it did. They took my pretty papers out of my file, crunched them up individually, barfed on them, made a copy, then threw them away. THEN - considered raising my taxes, at which point a little poop came out. Then decided that they were fair in their assessment and they didn't want to hear another word for me. Well there gonna! I guess not til next year, but I am really MAD. Even madder in fact when I came to realize that we are the highest taxed people in our neighborhood. Come on now. We all love our own home, but even I don't value mine at that.

Our house as seen by: MYSELF

Our house as seen by: A BUYER

Our house as seen by: A LENDER

Our house as seen by: AN APPRAISER

Our house as seen by: AUSTIN COUNTY TAX ASSESSOR (i hate you!)

Back to School Day...

Well, you wouldn't know it by our 65th day of 100 degree + temperatures, but its back to school day. I am a little late on the post, everyone went back August 24th. They were all very excited. So its back to PB and J sandwiches and hours of homework, but I am glad glad glad...Addison got glasses and is completely stoked, which is good, because they made me look like ugly Betty. It is strange how genetics work out...Steve has perfect eyes and all our kids ended up with my vision. Poor dumb things. At least there is lasik. What an answered prayer that was.

Addison - 1st Grade

Michaela (w/her bff Ava) 5th Grade

Dylan 3rd Grade