22 November 2009

Feeling Festive

This weekend was busy, busy, busy with household projects:

  • Finally removing the 70's blinds from the sun room
  • Then lovingly and artfully applying joint compound to the walls in the sun room (thinking about painting the walls a glittery color, perhaps silver)
  • Rigging new lamp shade spiders to work with our current swag lamp fixtures (hooray for hubby's new soldering skills!)
  • "Touch up" painting the walls in the Gathering Room (from 3 years ago)
  • And this...

Yes, we put our tree up!

And we watched a Christmas show (Fred Clause) while we decorated our home...


We also got to meet up with my brother (who I get to see maybe once or twice a year) for dinner as he was passing through town back from a hunting trip.

Lamp Shade Shuffle

Last year I bought 2 cool swag lamps from Lamps Plus.

They were nice for a couple of weeks, then I decided to redo them.

It was a frustrating experience with spray adhesive, thin fraying material and "bubbling". So we put up with my lamp shades for the last year and then I happened upon some shades on sale at PBTeen.com.


Scott had to cut out the spiders from the old shades and solder them into the new ones to make them fit the swag chandeliers and I think they look great in our living room. Our living room feels more loungey now.





18 November 2009

Ozzie's and Scary Moments...

Today I finally got to see my good friend, Tamara, for lunch at Ozzie's at the airport. Ozzie's is known for their coffee, breakfasts and steak dinners. Many people forget about this place because it's tucked away on North Campus at the small commuter airport, so it was nice to rediscover it with a great friend... they keep your coffee mug full and everyone calls you "Hon". I could have spent the rest of the afternoon there with my friend, having pie and coffee and watching the small planes take off and land...but I opted to go back to my office...



Later this afternoon when I rounded the corner to Emi's school, an ambulance was parked in the street and a fire engine blocked the drive, both with their lights flashing. I saw a fireman carrying an immobilization board to the playground and my heart pounded as I called Scott. A few emergency workers and teachers were grouped around the Big Toy and one of the teacher's was heading my way. I asked if Emi was ok and she said she was...~~~re-lief~~~

Inside I grabbed Emi and squeezed her and she immediately starting giving me the play by play of the boy falling off of the Big Toy onto his arm and then passing out after screaming for a minute. She got upset when we saw EMSA loading the boy into the ambulance, and while I assured her that he'd be alright, my watering eyes showed her that I was still upset.

Warms the Heart

Warming up the Heart
Warming up the Heart,
originally uploaded by nolitamorgan.
Last Friday I tagged along with Emi's Girl Scout Troop to a Build-A-Bear Workshop where the girls made bears for the children of the women living in our local women's shelter. It was cute to watch the girls pick out their bears, warm their hearts, name them, clean them and dress them for their new owners. While they were given permission to "foster" the bears and return them before Christmas, we opted to let "Allison" go home with the Scout Leader so we wouldn't get too attached. The girls had a nice time hanging out at the mall and working on their community badges...

17 November 2009

My BlackBerry is Mocking Me!


So I had just finished wolfing down the rest of that blissfully smooth and decadent dark chocolate bar (gluten and dairy free) and was texting my hubby about it when my BlackBerry called me OUT! It was actually after my gluttonous confession when I was trying to text that I had "brought" a whole cut up pineapple to nosh on and my BB asked me if I meant 'bepiggy'..
Maybe it's time to switch to an iPhone?

16 November 2009

Dreading vs. Dredding

I have been anxiously awaiting the arrival of the Dread Crew: Pirates of the Backwoods since July when I pre-ordered it and it finally arrived TODAY! I found a link to Sweet Salty from Better Now earlier this year and was excited to hear that Kate was writing her first novel, a children's book. If it's anywhere near as good writing as her blog entries are, we are in for a real treat. That woman can tell a story. Because of Kate and her beautiful writing, I have put Nova Scotia on my list of places to travel. May not get to crack open the book until the end of the week because my evenings are booked with Emi hair appointments. I am painstakingly combing out the braids and dividing them into smaller braids, one section at a time to keep all of our sanity...it's barely working because her hair has loc'd a little, but her hair is slowly looking cute and cared for again. And we stop before either one of us is in too much pain and sleep it off...Book review and braid pics to come...

15 November 2009

Bravery

A few weeks ago at church, after a talk about animals in the Bible, some nice people had rabbits and snakes for the children to pet and handle. There was NO WAY I was going to handle that snake...but I was proud of Emi for feeling the fear and still picking the snake up.... give me the heebie jeebies still thinking about it..

11 November 2009

Well Red


Think I will sleep out here tonight, thank you very much!

The New Deal

Freshly Shorn
Freshly Shorn,
originally uploaded by nolitamorgan.
Ok, so here's the new deal. The nice clean doggies were allowed to hang out on the old couch for its last evening here. The new red section(s)als were delivered this evening and the pups will not be allowed on these.


10 November 2009

Seeing Red

So last night we decided to finally bite the bullet and go shopping for replacement couches or a sectional so that we can transform our living room from its current frat house rec room feel into something more sophisticated, yet cozy. We drove to the city and checked out 3 furniture stores and luckily for us, the experience got progressively better with each store we visited. Either that or we got worn down...

The first place we visited is the "go to" place for furniture in Oklahoma it seems. We've gotten most of our furniture over the years from Mathis Brothers, so it's the default place for us. [Did I mention we have no IKEA here?] After fueling up on leftovers at home, we trekked up to Mathis Brothers and upon entering the store were immediately stopped by the nice sales lady in waiting. We told her what we were looking for and then we made a break for the leather sectionals. We learned the difference between genuine leather (the real deal) and bonded leather (bologna equivalent). We looked high and low and were met with sales people galore and a whiny 7 year old who didn't like any of the couches we showed interest in.... she kept trying to get us to buy furniture that looked like it belonged in Alice in Wonderland or in an old folk's home.

On the way upstairs we witnessed a sales lady on her cell phone at the bottom of the escalator shouting at some shoppers on the up escalator "Are you okay?" with annoyance in her voice. They nodded their heads like they were ok (not sure they spoke English) and she yelled for them to get her if they needed anything (in a sort of threatening tone). We walked passed her and saw that her face matched her tone. She didn't try to sound or look happy to help the patrons...she seemed bothered that she had to take time away from her phone call. Wonder how that technique works for her...

Most of the brown leather couches looked on the cheap side and the one sectional that Scott and I liked (was specially tied 8 ways or something like that according to the salesman) was black and in the wrong configuration. We wanted red (raspberry) leather in the reverse configuration and THAT would have to be special ordered...and there would be additional fees applied...as well as they would need 40% down. Okee. We took the nice salesman's card and proceeded to the next store.

At Bob Mills we were met with a friendly sales guy who immediately took us to the most expensive Italian leather sectional (made in China) which was not hand tied 8 ways (according to him not the best). We admired it for a bit then looked at the sectional next to it which was cheaper, came with a free ottoman and 27" inch flat screen TV. Guess which one Emi wanted? While we muddled over the decision, the nice salesguy whisked our child away to retrieve some BALLOONS for her and give us some peace and quiet. After imagining what each sectional would actually look like in our living room, we decided that neither would work. We left for the next store hoping for some free snack food or coffee.

At Galleria Furniture we smelled baking bread in the parking lot. Interesting marketing technique...I like it! We went inside and were not immediately accosted by sales people....and Christmas music was playing...Oh Galleria, you sly dogs! What a way to get shoppers in the mood! We flitted around looking at gorgeous sectional after another when an older unassuming salesman came by to check in with us and offer himself up for questions. I liked how he let me do most of the talking...showed he knows how to handle a 40 year old female customer (that or he's been married for a long time). I enjoy the hang back sales technique...practically lets the customers sell the product to themselves... (And I excel at THAT!)

We found a configurable "sectional" that really peaked our interest - it's actually a bunch of pieces (corner, armless and ottoman) that we can configure however we want (no special order or special pricing) to fit our space and needs. The 3 of us seemed to be settling on the modular brown leather pieces (we love options!) until Emi pointed out same deal in red! The brown leather option was yesterday's news. So, we ordered 3 corner pieces, 4 armless pieces and 2 ottomans....all without measurements just guestimates of how many pieces will fit nicely into our living room. Half of the pieces were in stock and will be delivered tomorrow and the rest will come in from Dallas next week. We are so excited about getting rid of the green leather sleeper sofa and moving the futon up to the guest room. Will post pics later....