{confessional}

I have a confession....well other than the fact that I haven't 'blogged, blogged' in awhile that's a different story...I have never been to Williams Sonoma. There I said it. It's true... I don't know if you frequent there a lot, a little, or a none, but I absolutely loved it! A little overwhelming since I am in no way a chef, but taken in small, quick doses, I'm sure one could certainly become a chef! The poor best walked through listening to me "oohing & awing" the whole entire time, all the while I yell out "LOOK AT THIS, OH I LIKE THAT all over the store!" Bless her heart, she thought she was just going in to grab a mother's day gift (I should take notes from her & not put things off like I do!), browse a little, & be done. Little did she know, I had never been.


So while on my mini tour de Sonoma, I stumbled across the baby cook section. When I was expecting Miss Busy A, I had HUGE aspirations of buying the baby beaba cooker & making ALL of her baby food. Well since I've never been to Williams Sonoma, you can probably also gather that, that did not happen. (although I did make sure she only ate organic baby food & read all ingredients!) It's like I was this Super Nanny/Pretend Mom/Amazing Housewife before I had my own child & then I became a mother for the first time! Easy-peasy until she hit 3months old, then I just became consumed with trying to entertain her, soothe her teething pains, & just trying to take a shower every other day! Anyways, back to admiring the baby food cooking machine & reminiscing about my dreams of making all of her food, I saw a cookbook, the baby&toddler cookbook; fresh, homemade foods for a healthy start. I flipped back to the 12+mos. section & LOVED what I saw. Then it hit me, it's not too late to make her food! The recipes were right up my ally (quick, easy, & healthy) PLUS I thought, hmm all these recipes are things that the Mr & I like too! Everything from pastas, fritters, soups, pizza, etc! So there I was waiting to checkout with my very first WS purchase.




Which brings us to the WHOLE point of this post...This little recipe was so amazing, I thought while we ate it, "this is worth blogging about", then I thought "is there enough left for a photo-opp?" So here it is:


Cheesy Pasta Wheels 
(Totally used mini bow-tie because WholeFoods unfortunately did NOT have wheels! Yes I was beyond bummed, but luckily Miss Busy A has no clue yet!)


1 cup dried pasta
1 cup chopped broccoli
3 tbsp. heavy cream
1 tbsp. butter
1/2 cup grated parmesan cheese
(makes about 2 cups cooked!)


step 1: Bring lightly salted water to a boil. Add pasta & cook for 8mins, then add broccoli (I used frozen florets!) continue to cook 2-3mins. longer. Drain well in a colander.
step 2: Leaving pasta/broccoli in the colander, return the saucepan to the stove. Add cream & butter,simmer over medium heat until the butter is melted & the cream is bubbling. Remove from heat & stir in the cheese. Return the pasta & broccoli to the pan & stir gently to mix well.
step 3:Bon Appetit! (And mommy's please share with your child! I know you'll want to eat it all for yourself, but this is a children's recipe after all ;D)

Until next blog....

beautiful quote...

Sometimes when I am pinning away on pinterest, I come across a quote that seems to fit exactly how I feel or what I think. This quote I stumbled upon does just that. I made it into this chic little print! I plan on "pinning" this in our home for all to see & to remind myself just how I feel when I start to feel discouraged. Enjoy!!!

Until next blog...

...words to live by in the bathroom!

Our playroom bathroom has been in a stand-off with me for almost a year now! I had a few decor items, but nothing that said, "welcome to our bathroom, we aren't boring people I promise!" So finally I got the motivation to spruce it up & finally give in & add some stuff! Which brought me to make this little printable... I have been seeing some really cute printables out there & wanted to make one to fit ours...so here it is, enjoy!!!

Until next blog...

count them 1 by 1...

Being an avid pinner on pinterest, I am almost inspired on a daily basis! Sometimes I just wish I could stop life & recreate all the things I want to recreate! But I have to do things as time allows...Here's a little something I made! I plan on printing it out on some card-stock & framing it for the playroom..or playroom bathroom. You can too! Sorry I am not a savvy upload file, yada-yada-ya person, but you could just right click & save image as & print from home! Enjoy!!! And if you do print it out, put in a frame, & place it in your beautiful home, email me a pic & I'll post it in the blog! {outofthetiffanyblue@gmail.com}


Until next blog... 

honey water with lemon..

It's crazy to think that today marks nine years since I said I love you & good bye to my Memaw. Most times when I think about her I'd give anything to just have a phone call with her. To visit her is a given, but going on nine years without her, I would take a phone call if that's all I could get. I know she watches over me and for that I am extremely lucky..grateful...and blessed! A few weeks ago I even got the luxury of getting to visit her home. Some people don't get that chance, but her house was on the market again from the people who bought it nine years ago and with my husband being a realtor, I told him I wanted to go see it. Walking through the front door was like getting a piece of her back for a moment in time.


Even though it wasn't the exact same, she was still everywhere in that home. Most of my memories with her can be found behind those walls. Standing in the kitchen I could imagine her boiling her water, pouring it in her coffee cup...squeezing in the lemon & stirring in the honey. She did it every morning...Being in that house one more time help ease the pain of the last memory I had with her. Although a special memory, also very difficult & painful all at the same time. That house helped me to think of the countless other ones though. Playing the piano...making tacos out of her coffee table decor...riding countlessly up & down her driveway...spending many nights there & going to church with her the next morning. I love those memories...that house...and I love her. 


If heaven wasn't so far away, I'd go every single day! 


Until next blog...

focal point

When we got married and moved into our first house, I came up with this arrangement for our pictures and it just kind of stuck with me from that house to our current home. I loved the mixture of frames/prints and that it gave it a different look...than say, just hanging them up "normally". Over the years I have received many compliments on it and it has become a sort of focal point in our living room. 


Always remember when you are hanging things on the wall that you can: a) use different frames [shape, color/finishes, size, etc...] b) use a different mixture of photo finishes [b&w, sepia, color...] and/ mix in artwork, quotes, etc...and c) have fun! there are no rules on what you can do because it's YOUR space, be creative and just go with it! 

something old into something {tiffany} blue

A few months ago some friends called my husband to see if he could come help load and haul away their china cabinet. They had decided they didn't want it anymore and were going to send it to goodwill. So off he went to help. I remember thinking after he left, "hmm I can't remember what it looks like? I wonder if it's something we could use?" Literally in the next few minutes I got a text from my hubby, "are you interested in this?" (I had been saying on this blank wall across from the dining table, I either wanted to find a china cabinet or have a built-in that kind of looked like one.) So he sent me two pictures of it and I told him, just bring it home, we could paint it and if we still don't like it, we can just continue it on to its destination.

He got it home and we decided we could paint it....yes, tiffany blue. I took my recipe box lid with me to lowes to match the paint. We lightly sanded it (nothing too serious), dusted it off and then just started painting it. Now I don't know for sure, but I think because we didn't heavily sand it, the paint didn't go on very "solid" at all. We took a step back and it looked like it was done on purpose, kind of distressed. So we ran with it...we painted the whole thing, one coat, let it dry and that was it. We loved the finished product. I do still wrestle with do I want to switch the knobs, change out the bottom cabinet doors & line the inside with fabric/paper, but for the most part I am very pleased with it!

You never know what something can look like unless you just go for it! What's the worst that can happen? a) You either have to redo it and keep trying until you get it to look how you want or b) you send it on to someone else who will like it and/or do something else with it. You have nothing to lose!
So always oblige to help move something away, look on craigslist, or stop by that garage sale, you never know what you can end up with and re-create! You just might be able to turn something old into something {tiffany} blue! (or white, black, pink, green...whatever color your little heart desires!)


Until next blog...

[pley-room]

When we bought our home, we were expecting our first baby and we knew that a baby does not stay a baby long therefore she was going to need somewhere to play! We envisioned doing an addition. Phase 1:remodeling the original house. Phase 2:the addition. Phase 3:the deck. Phase 1 was complete before we moved in. Phase 2 started (& almost completed!) a few months ago. Phase (end of 2) and 3 are going to be started soon. When you are the owners of a roofing/construction company, your things are always the a)last to be completed and b)almost always done in the fall/winter months.. So we patiently wait to complete our master bath & closet and the laundry room. As well as our deck out the back door...But the good news is our home is almost all complete and is at least 100% livable. One of the spaces, other than the laundry, that I have started decorating is our playroom...

play·room [pley-room] n. a room set aside for children's play.

When I think of a playroom, I think of toys, books, a child's size table & chairs...tv, movies, art supplies, pretend area...you know a playroom! So I knew right away that I wanted it to be colorful, happy and bright. I wanted to have plenty of children's things but I also wanted the adults to be able to utilize the space. At first when we put our furniture in there, it screamed boring...brown...and just plan blah. (wood floors, tan walls, tan couch, brown chair, wood buffet, you get the idea, Brownsville!) It did not feel like a playroom at all. Then I decided, well I could add colorful pillows, some shelves with colorful accents on them and toys.

It kind of started when I found this little teal vase at michael's...then I found these glass bottles at hobby lobby and I thought well I will buy them, all else fails I will return it if I don't start to find fabric and such to go with it. Then I found some fabrics at hobby lobby and decided they would be the pillows. I just ran with this teal, pinks, multicolored setting. By now, you might start to gather that I am drawn to pinks, tiffany blue, teals, pastels, etc...and I have to say you are right. I can't help it...these tend to be my "colors". It hasn't always been this way though! Our first home when we got married was actually a grey sectional & black accented furniture, with black & white pictures and Marilyn Monroe everywhere...then I soon discovered that black furniture and 2 little dogs that shed white hair, do not mix. It wasn't exactly my plan to dust e v e r y single day!! So I decided after we moved, our next home would not have black furniture. I decided to take my love of creams, whites & tans with splashes of color, outside of the bedroom and into the "main" parts of the house.

So here we are today! The playroom is in the middle of its finishing (decor) touches. You'll see that I lack storage for the toys (I have been on the hunt for the perfect baskets or containers to put on the buffet to hold them) as well as, we need some more trinkets (or something!) for the shelves on the wall and on top of the buffet. I also want to do some abc artwork or something for the other wall (the one with the large picture on it) and/or we are considering some built-ins and a desk...but for the most part you can see which direction it is going. Oh and that would be my little assistant sneaking in some of the pics... :D

{fabric details}

front pillow fabric (multi): brother sister designs fabric

pillow in the back: leopard print

{fabric details cont'd}

teal fabric: solid teal fabric

multi fabric: brother sister designs fabric

{bottle details}

short pink bottle

tall teal bottle

So there you have it, our playroom. Hope you enjoy it, find some inspiration or spark a new creative idea for your own home or space!

Until next blog!

dirty laundry

We have a couple of rooms in the house left to finish on our list: 1)being the laundry room 2)being the master bath & closet.

I've started adding some decor to the laundry room because all it lacks are the cabinets and the sink..Now for a laundry room you can really go for whatever look you want. It's one of those spaces in your home where not everyone is going to see it, but it is where you will be spending a lot of time. So you might as well have a fun, enjoyable space to work in!

For me, my inspiration came from my washer & dryer. I fell in love with them the very first time I laid my eyes on them. That's right, love at first sight does exist! Now I realize not everyone is going to have a colorful teal W&D that can set the decor in motion, and that's okay! If your W&D are a neutral color, you can really go in any direction you wish. But for me, I went for a look that involved jewel tones because of the teal...

I will do a followup when it is complete because I have it all envisioned and planned. I just have to wait for the cabinet and sink to be able to complete my look! But here is what I have so far...

{the details}

1) curtain- multi pattern stripe fabric: sewn by none other than little o' me! ((sewing is a new adventure/hobby I am currently learning and enjoying I might add!))

2) vintage laundry prints- frames from: a)pink 5X7 baroque style frames and b) teal 5X7 recatangles

3) chandelier-((the key to making laundry time more enjoyable, I promise!!)) If you haven't tried placing chandeliers anywhere other than above a dining room table, I challenge you to give it a try...they spark a little happiness and a touch of glamour to any space! Other places you will find them in our house: over the kitchen sink, dining table, master closet, entry, laundry, & nursery..I would probably put them in every single space in the house but I realize it might be a little much :D And don't let a chandelier intimidate you, not all of them are expensive. Shop around, check places like lowes, home depot or garbe's...or even online. You can find fabulous chandeliers that aren't too gaudy or expensive, so don't let that discourage you either. I know some people think chandelier=gaudy or expensive but it really doesn't!

So that's where our laundry room stands right now! I can not wait to finish the look and have it all complete. But for now you can find me washing our dirty laundry under the glow of a chandelier darling!

Until next blog!