Big-Eyed Bird

If you've gone to the Red Elephant Pizza Cafe, you have no doubt noticed their eccentric artwork.

It's all done by a man named Cornbread. One painting in particular caught my eye the few times I visited Red Elephant.

I decided I wanted that painting. Even though I've never ever painted before, I tried to duplicate the bird. It's pitiful.

I just about die laughing every time I walk past it. Between his huge eye and his massive gut, there's no way that poor bird could really stay in flight. The best part about this is its size.

This bird takes up a good chunk of the wall. It even looks large behind my beast of a dog.

I'm not leaving this on our wall forever; I'll eventually find something classier. But until then, I'll get a good kick out of seeing this creature loom over us.

Gallery Wall

We now have a gallery wall. It's only a small collection of photos and prints so far, but over time we will add to it.

We have a small gap on the left side, so I'm looking for something to put there to balance it out.

9/11

Ten years ago today, I was a freshman in high school. I was homeschooled, which meant I witnessed the events unfold on television in my own house with my family near me. At the time I didn't exactly understand the full significance of what a terrorist attack meant, but it forever changed our world.

My church is having a 9/11 memorial service this morning at 10:30. Visit www.fbcjax.com and click on live streaming to watch the message.

Fall Wreath

Although it's not technically fall, I am acting like it is. I'm a teacher, so in my mind, fall begins on the first day of school. I tried to be patient and waited until September came before I started decorating. The first order of business was to create a new wreath for the front door.

The four supplies used (brown yarn, mustard yarn, ribbon, and wreath form) were each purchased at the thrift store for $1.00 each, so the total cost was around $4.00. It took about an hour to wrap the whole thing with two layers of yarn. I tried watching "Less Than Perfect" because Hulu thought I would like it. Hulu doesn't know me. The show was weird.

But it wasn't a complete waste, because now I have this wonderful fall wreath hanging up.

Linked up here.

Pillow Parade

I'm excited. I've been wanting to fill our large sectional with tons of random pillows. It's like having accessories for the couch.

My mom called over the weekend to say she was stopping by to drop something off. She walked in the door and it was like Christmas. Really. She was lugging two huge garbage bags full of stuff. Much to my delight, the bags contained pillows. And it was amazing.

The one with the button is my absolute favorite.

Aren't these awesome?

Even Jake likes looking at them.

Linked up to these parties.

Monogrammed Pillow

So now that I have curtains up in the family room, I needed some matching pillows for the couch, right? I thought so, too.

I wanted a monogrammed pillow, so we picked up some white fabric from Joann's and started with this:

We just used thread that coordinated with the green fabric from the curtains and Mom put it through her fancy sewing machine.

Then we added some Wonder Under to the back of leftover green fabric and cut out an H.

Here is where the pictures stopped happening. Between Zaxby's, recorded episodes of The Glee Project, and someone bleeding massively due to a sharp needle, no more action shots were taken. The gist of it is that we ironed the H in place on the front of the pillow, then did a satin stitch around its perimeter to ensure that it lasts a long time. After that, we added cording and then attached it to another piece of white fabric to complete the pillow.

Isn't it lovely? It feels so Pottery Barn-ish to me.

Non-Shower Curtains

When I was growing up, my mom made sure that my sisters and I knew how to run a household. She taught us how to cook and the basics of sewing. Luckily for the hubs, I retained all of my cooking knowledge. But sewing? Not so much.

I needed some curtains ASAP for the family room to add some color to the otherwise bland room. We have an open floor plan and it's all painted builder's neutral.

Nice blinds, huh?

I found these shower curtains from Target and fell in love with the pattern. I thought maybe I could cheat the system and manipulate the curtains so that they could fit without me having to sew.

Sadly, that didn't happen. Windows are a lot longer than showers.

Duh.

I bought three curtains and some coordinating fabric and headed over to my parents' for a refresher course on sewing. I ended up ripping out the seams of the curtains and sewing all three of them together. We then added a two foot strip of the green fabric to the bottom. Hemming 18 feet of fabric was a chore! However, I must publicly admit that it wasn't nearly as bad as I thought it might be and I'm glad I didn't try to just staple the fabric together or anything.

Thanks, Mom.