thank you mother

this is a fairy jar i made for my mom today.  it's to thank her for watching caroline so much and for helping me move.  she's the best and she appreciates my craftiness.  i apologize for the picture quality, i took it on my cell.  p.s. my back room at the salon is a craft room, so while i had no appointments this morning i got to craft it up!  woo hoo!  look for more fairy jars to come on etheledith.etsy.com

the heart of MY home

so this is my new living room.  the couch used to be my parents, but my mom is a sucker for us girls.  she is always willing to give us her things so she gets new.  i have the brown couch and annie has the red one.  abbie didn't get a hand-me-down so mom just bought her a new couch.  she was in college and poor, plus we're all spoiled.  the coffee table/trunk is a jewel i picked up at the last 3rd sunday market.  i forgot i bought this because it was in the storage shed at my parent's house.  i went down to put something in the shed and discovered my diamond!  this is one of my favorite pieces in the room.  p.s. i love my turqouise curtains.  at $5 a panel, you can't afford not to buy these gems!

this is the north side of my living room.  my tv cabinet is huge and takes TWO grown men to move it. it's antique and is apparently from some sort of military base.  i really love this piece.  in this picture is also our red leather chair.  this is the first piece of furniture that kylie and i bought together.  i believe it was our combined 1st christmas present.  it's a recliner and it's wonderful.  we got it at weekends only in fairview heights.  i saw it and was in love!  p.s. that is a glass head filled with mini pumpkins.  i heart that head.  and yes that is a silver glittery Jesus.  i love Him in more ways than one :)

ok, this is the other side(across from couch). this little cabinet is one of my absolute favorite pieces in my house.  abbie bought it for me a couple years ago at 3rd sunday market.  i loved it so much, but had ran out of money, so she got it for me for i think my birthday or christmas or something like that.  i have loved it since i laid my eyes on it.  i think because it's little and of course because the different colored drawers.  that little pop of red just spices it up perfectly.  oh, notice that lampshade? got it on sale at target.  it didn't have a price and i was excpecting something high because of how great it is, but it was only $10.  i couldn't afford not too!  the chair, kylie surprised me with last year for my birthday.  i was so excited.  we were trying to have a baby and i knew a rocker was a must and i loved this one at big lots.  he's such a great man, he snagged it up and totally surprised me.  he bought it and hid it at his parents house.  the night he gave it to me, we came home and took a pregnancy test.  9 months later, caroline joann arrived.  it was the best birthday ever :)

 

this last cabinet is placed just behind the brown rocker.   i really really like this piece too.  i love old pieces with old paint, it's really in our blood i think.  i love that this has that random smudge of blue paint.  it's like they wanted to paint it and got lazy.  it's also very large and hold a TON of my junk.  in my old trailer (abbie's new home)  it house all of our food.  i mean everything but the fridge.  we had little to no cabinet space over there and this saved the day!  i picked this up at a sale in the little little little town of clarksburg...just down the road from my childhood home.  love it!

last but not least is our little shoe cabinet. moving to this trailer eliminated a coat closet/shoe storage.  luckily i had purchased this little cabinet at 3rd sunday market earlier in the summer.  it was a trip annie and i took together and found some great buys!  this gem was only $35.  i love, again, the old paint.  it's blue and green and fabulous!  also that mirror i snagged at hobby lobby for only $20.  i totally thought it was $40, but got to the register and discovered mirrors were 50% off! awesome right?! oh my mom got me that little army m.d. bucket because my salon is HAIR, m.d.  oh and i love my little bull dog too.  oh and that stained glass pumpkin.  that was a gift from my mom as well.  she has a double one that i adored.  i really do have a great mom.

i love my house and i hope you enjoyed it too.  some people don't get my style or understand why my sisters and i love "junk" furniture, but we just do.  it's got more character than store bought pieces and we just love it.  it truly is passed down from our mother and i love that she passed it on to us and that we are going into business like she did.  having a business with my sisters like this has always been a dream of mine and i'm so glad that i get to do it and also have my passion for doing hair at the same time.

more pictures of the rest of the trailer to come :)

2nd move in 09!

that's right, 2 moves in one year!  if you read my wonderful sister annie's blog you know that me and my other sister abbie both moved this weekend.  it was totally crazy!  it was 3pm sunday and we said, we're moving to the big trailer(which is two doors away from our old trailer)  and we loaded up laundry baskets and went to town.  then abbie and her husband, zac, decided to move to our old trailer.  so in 2009, kylie and i moved from small #55 to bigger #18, to the biggest #16.  we are here for awhile now.  our plan is to save and build in 2011.  but since we will do the work ourselves, our house will be finished in 2012.  so we are set in this trailer because it's big enough for 2 kids-which is not in the plans anytime soon, considering our daughter is only 11 weeks old, but in 3 years for sure!  my mom is totally jealous of me and abbie.  she says it was her and her twin sister jackie's dream to live next door to eachother and be like lucy and ethel.  it is pretty convient to just walk one door over when we need something.  tonight they had us over for pizza and it was delicious.  we laughed about how kylie runs and i made a horrible joke that almost made me pee myself.  they laughed too, b/c it was so bad but great at the same time!  pictures to come!

Caroline's First Halloween

As I get older I like Halloween more.  This year we went crazy at the salon with spider webs across the ceiling, bats flying out of registers, and ghosts galore!  It was so much fun decorating and I really liked hearing the reactions from our clients. Really wish I took a picture, but I totally forgot. 

This was my little bean's first Halloween, and believe or not, I didn't know what she was going to be until the 31st!  First a ladybug, but the costume was too tight on her little chubby booty.  But luckily, my wonderful Aunt Jackie had just bought her an adorable pink kitty outfit.  So she was the cutest little cat ever!  My mom told me to draw whiskers on her and it made the outfit. 

Ethel Edith

My sisters & I have started a new side business.  We love to go junking & repurpose furniture into new treasures for our own homes, and have been doing it for years.  We have recently decided that we have so much fun that we should do it together as a business.  Our mom, Janie, used to do this exact same thing and has passed the gene onto us!

Our store is proudly named Ethel Edith in honor of our Grandma, Ethel Edith "Toots".  Please check out and follow our blog & etsy shop.  We're very excited to share with you as we find new treasures!  We expect to have a spring show in 2010 so stay tuned!

http://www.etheledith.blogspot.com/

http://www.etheledith.etsy.com/

love love love

it's that time of year again. time for jeans and sweatshirts, pumpkins and mums. i love fall so much. it's, what i believe, as the most beautiful time of year. the trees are gorgeous, the weather is wonderful, and the smells are delicious. yum, hot apple pie. i'm making some for our after dinner treat, aka: dessert. i hate to bake though, so i have store bought crusts and a jar of apples that my grandma toots prepared. you can't argue that an 85 year old woman can't make some great apples for pie! i have her recipe for crusts, but i feel like have a huge vat of crisco to make pies once in awhile is pointless. once caroline is old enough to help, then i'll make crusts. i love that memory with my mom. we always got to make the extra crust in to a mini pies inside a jar lid. it was awesome. i have so many crafty memories with my mom, i can't wait to make them with caroline.

speaking of crafty-ness. i am missing it badly. i am surrounded by so many artsy and crafty people, it's bringing me down. not really, but i do really miss it. i wish i had an extra room where i could set everything out all the time. that is the only thing that holds me back. i don't want to drag everything out, to put it all up in a hour once the baby needs attention. caroline is not the reason for my lack of crafting, i mean my friend jillian is rocking out headbands left and right with a 2 month old. maybe it's lack of space and time, but mostly space. i am inspired by numerous things, but just can't seem to express them through art. casey is making beautiful necklaces and jillian amazing headbands. i just can't craft like that. i'm more of a paper person, not scrapbooking(though i do love that), but more of layering and mod-podge and glitter and ribbons. i like weird things like, fairy jars and cigar box houses. i guess i need to stick to that craft. the things i love vs. things i could sell for money. i just need time and space. anyone have any to spare?

Meet Miss Caroline JoAnn

Born August 20th, 2009 at 1:19am. She was 8lbs 8oz and 21 3/4 in long.

She's absolutely perfect. She looks like her daddy from the nose up and mommy from the nose down. She is beautiful and we're so blessed to have such a precious baby girl.

She is doing wonderful at night. She sleeps 2 1/2 to 3 hours. She eats, poops, and goes right back to sleep in her crib.

Kylie went back to work today, we are both sad, but so far so good.

Well time to feed her and get her ready for her day of company.