September Acres

Or how I made a dent in my office mess in an afternoon. This was my hallway at the end of the day (one of the bags also had some of the clothes that LM had outgrown). My husband joked that I only got about 6 feet into the room but I pitched a lot in that 6 feet! Below is my craft cabinet. Please don't call the producers of Hoarders, I know it's bad. Desk that houses my Cricut and fax machine. Along with a bunch of other JUNK! I am thinking about painting that desk after it's cleaned off. It belonged to my great grandmother & I have had it for a long time. I think it could stand a little makeover. The craft cabinet all straightened up. What a change. I still have a long way to go but what a difference a few hours makes. I am sure I'll go through quite a few more trash bags before it's all said and done. I sure hope this makes someone out there feel a little better about their space that may not be perfect. Please excuse the horrible quality photos. I really

When we moved to Arizona I told my husband that if we were going to live here we needed a pool. He said that I had better find a house with a pool because he didn't want to have to put one in later. No problem, pools here are a dime a dozen. Boy am I glad we have one. It's not uncommon to have a week or two of temps that are 120+ each summer and the majority of the summer days are 110+ so a pool is a must have. Worth every penny and then some. It's nothing fancy here at September Acres though. We are in the pool just about everyday and while there is plenty of seating it's pretty basic. One reason is that it's super windy here. Alot. Plastic chairs are easy to move out of the wind's path and stack in corners for safe keeping. While I would love to have one of the beautiful spreads you see in Pottery Barn or Coastal Living it's not really feasible for a busy family with lots of little children visitors and wind. These Adirondack chairs (Lowes)are the best.

I have to share this story... Today I took LM with me to the grocery store. She made sure she brought along HER coupon book. It's a binder she made with 'her' coupons, which are ones I don't cut out. Ones for things I rarely buy like chips and candy. And dog food - lots of dog food. I cut out a few dog food coupons but we only have one dog who eats dry dog food and the occasional biscuit. So we cruise through the store getting what's on our list. We get to the register and she helps me unload everything on to the belt. I pay. The receipt comes out and the cashier hands it to me and then says 'oh, here's a coupon'. I take it and don't ' think anything of it. LM asks to see it and says 'yea, my first catalina '. ???? Now I am not sure if the coupons that come out of the register are technically catalinas but clearly we have been watching too much 'Extreme Couponing ' here at September Acres...

My parents treated LM to a trip to Disneyland for her 9 th birthday. My husband and I went as well as LM's friend S. It was a really fun time and the weather couldn't have been better. The last time we went to Disneyland LM was only 4 so there were a lot of rides should couldn't ride. This time was very different. She is pretty adventurous so she is usually game for anything. Thankfully, so is her dad. Me? Not so much, although I would go on a ride with her if she really wanted. I would just close my eyes! We stayed on property at the Paradise Pier hotel. I liked it. It's clean and close to the park. They have a great pool. And is anything cuter than these beach ball pillows? Yes, I took pictures of the decor! I got to see the parade twice. Such a fun time. Loved this Donald Duck float. Across from Soarin ' over California - which is a must see - there was a little aviation related gift shop. The nicest 'cast member' insisted we all try on the hats and

A while back I came across LM's very first ballet shoes. She took her first class when she was 4 1/2; she turned 5 during the 'season' (which runs from August through June). It was a struggle to get through the year. She was just too young. The next few years she didn't want to dance so I didn't push it. This past August she decided to pick it up again and this time she loves it. When I found the old shoes I thought it would be neat to do something with them. Here's what I came up with: I picked up a shadow box at Michaels a few weeks ago on clearance. I went through my scrapbook paper and found one I liked for the background and a coordinating one for inside the shoes. I cut the background paper to 8X10 (the size of the frame) and pulled out the lining in the shoes and traced it for the striped paper. All the paper was adhered with glue dots. I pinned the shoes to the backing with the straight pins that came with the frame. And voila! I debated painting the

By the name you may have thought this post was about drinks but it's about tables. Coffee or cocktail tables. I always thought a coffee table was rectangular and a cocktail table was square but apparently the name is used interchangeably . Any low, long table can be considered a coffee, or cocktail table. Our new'ish coffee/cocktail table is a huge square one. I thought it was a cocktail table but I guess I can call it what I want. It is very large, a bit more than twice the size of our old one. When my husband brought it in the house I almost fell over. We got it from my friend J and it didn't look nearly as big in her house. I was really unsure if we would be able to make it work in our room. After much moving and rearranging of the furniture we found just the right space for it and it looks great. Before LM was born my coffee table was always 'staged'. When she was born I cleared it off in order to make room for all the baby books I needed to reference every m

After we painted our hallway light blue I decided to change all the frames out to one color. The big decision was what color I wanted. My first idea was white because I love white. But white seemed too, well, white. It made the blue look kind of juvenile (think a baby's nursery) - not quite the feeling I wanted for a hallway. Then I thought about black - and thought and thought. I didn't want it to feel too 'heavy'. I had a few pieces already framed in black so I started there. Then I spray painted some wood frames I already had using a black gloss spray paint by Valspar. The frames were all different but I don't mind that as long as the color is uniform. I like the way the black almost 'toughens up' this pale blue. After I spent many nights painting the hallway I wasn't really too sure about the blue paint. But once I got the black frames on the wall it all kind of came together. As with most things I do, I tried to use what I have already. All of thes

Summer is in full swing here. We are finishing up our 2 nd week of summer vacation - it's already blowing by. I have done very little (read:nothing) in the way of decorating projects. I have almost caught up on all my Tivo'd Nate Berkus Shows and started 'tweeting'. Productive, right? I always thought that Twitter was kind of weird - the whole 140 characters or less thing and all - but I signed up a while back and figured if I didn't like it I'd just stop. It's actually kind of fun and I often have short thoughts that aren't worthy of a blog post but perfect for a 'tweet'. I have all but abandoned Facebook but like Twitter for now. You can find me there -@SeptemberAcres -pretty easy to remember. :) LM has her ballet recital this weekend. I am looking forward to seeing the routine - it's been super secret until now. The recital is a Disney theme which is a great way to get us in the mood for a trip to Disneyland later this summer. I have