Not Enough Hours in the Day!

Whew! Do you ever just feel like there aren't enough hours in the day? Or enough energy in your body?

I think I usually feel like that. There is always a long "To Do" list for tomorrow that never gets all the way done and keeps getting rolled over to the next day. It just seems like it's been particularly bad lately.

This time last year we had just moved into our new home and were so busy getting it put together and then getting our land cleared in a panic (I swear I'll tell you that story someday!) and then with drill and my best friend's wedding, the whole summer just disappeared and the yard, with all of it's flower beds and overgrown gravel, was sorely neglected. We're paying for it this year. It's been a lot of work to get it back under control. We're still not there, but we're getting close.

Trouble is, we're also trying to get fencing done, pastures cleared, cleaned up, graded and seeded, arena-to-be's done, the barn fixed and stalls put in. We also need to get piping ran from the well house to the barn and various pastures for water. Most of the inside of the house still needs painting and we're planning to pressure wash and re-stain the exterior and the decks, after we fix a few boards. All while we're doing a cutting show series and practicing on buffalo once a week, along with my drill practice once a week, on top of full time jobs and all the other fun stuff that comes with being a responsible adult and home and animal owner.

Geez, no wonder I'm tired all the time. Just looking at that list makes me want to take a nap!

Problem is, I also like having atleast a little bit of a social life. And riding my horse in the arena. And going for trail rides. And spending the day at the lake. And laying out in the sun. And I love, love, love reading. And taking pictures. And blogging. And reading other blogs. I would also like to have barebeque's with friends and family and get togethers and do fun stuff like that. There just hasn't been much time for any of that stuff lately though. Yard work has been consuming my life!

Another "Someday" project is to rip up our entire front yard and redo it. It's not level, which drives the boyfriend insane. It's got lots of humps and bumps and a couple pretty good holes that I swear I hit and roll my ankle on every single time I pass them. I also want to get rid of about two-thirds of the insanely huge flower bed in the front, make it part of the lawn. I figure if we bring it in tighter to the house and just have a few azalea bushes or something it should be pretty low maintenance. And another hundred square feet or so of grass to mow will be nothing. I like low maintenance. Low Maintenance is my best friend when it comes to yard work!

Until we get to that Someday though, I have a crazy big flower bed to take care of. It's currently growing more grass then our pastures. And some black berry bushes. And clover. Have you ever tried to get rid of clover in a flower bed?!? We have the stuff that has the dark leaves and the root system on those suckers is freakin amazing! Drives me insane. And since I didn't weed much last year everything is reseeding itself like crazy this year. Grrr!

And then, silly us, we decided to plant a veggie garden this year. What were we thinking?!? It was fun to put it in! I'm sure it will be fun when it starts producing edible veggies (assuming it survives me and my "Black Thumb of Death"), but until then, can you say high maintenance?!

We also have raspberries that got completely out of control last year. Of course since it was the longest, grossest winter ever this year and still frosting in May (!!!) we didn't get anything done with them to get them back in order before they started their season. Oops! I'm currently chipping away at the very tall grass and weeds that is trying to completely over take them, but it's a lot of work and there are new shoots every where and I have to crawl around in between them to get everything cleared out. Did you know raspberry bushes have thorns? Not big ones like blackberries, but little needly ones. My arms were toast after Round 1. I looked like I had been in a fight with a bunch of cats. Seriously. It's been a lot of work to get them freed up. Almost done though.

I have tons of before pictures of projects we've been working on, but it seems like every time I really start making some progress on one, another more urgent one comes up and off I go! One of these days I'll get them finished up so I can do some after pics.

I'm also dying to read thru the Twilight series again. And I have a crafty projects that I owe people. And I have Lover Avenged to read. And, since I'm a dope on a rope, I started yet another series that I'm totally diggin'. And I have lots of DVR'd shows to catch up on. And lots of other things that I'd absolutely love to be doing.

But I know the satisfaction of having my yard under control will be worth it. If it ever gets there.

Someday.

B&A - The Office!

Yay! I was finally able to get the after pictures of the office yesterday! WOHOO!

I know you guys have been waiting on the edges of your chairs for this, just biting your nails. Sorry for the wait! The nice weather was calling my name with outdoor projects aplenty. Luckily (for the office project) the weather this past week has been rather crappy and I had time to finish it up.


Unfortunately, when I went looking for before pictures I realized, yet again, that I'm totally fired because I don't really have any good ones. Doh!


This was the room when we first bought the house. It's not the greatest angle, but it's all I've got. The walls actually look white in these pictures, but I assure you they were not. My mom pointed out that they were a nice flesh tone. She pretty much nailed it. I'm sure everyone wants skin colored walls, but I just had to paint over it.

I did a B&A of the closet here. It looks just a tad bit different. The door on the left goes into the master bath. You can walk thru the bathroom to the master bedroom on the other side.

This is that corner now...

I still need to actually pot the palms in their pots instead of just setting their plastic pots in their permanent pots, but you get the idea.

Then you may remember this wall from the closet B&A. Sadly, minus the pile of crap in the middle of the floor that I had pulled out of the closet, that's the way the room looked on any given day. Messy desk, boxes piled along the wall, blobs of blankets...

This is that wall now...

Slight improvement, eh?

Want to see my favorite part of those shelves?

Let's take a look...

My hard back Twilight series, along with the Host (also by Stephenie Meyer) were the first things to go on the shelves, top left. In case you're new to FFLK, I'm a Twihard. I have OCD, Obsessive Cullen Disorder. I'm a Twilight addict. Luckily, I've been able to keep my obsession under control for a while now, but it does come back to visit every once in a while. Next to the books is a trophy from one of the most fun drill rides I've had. It was the first time riding our Jungle Girls quad of the year, we had only practiced our new drill a couple times, but went in, hauled booty and totally rocked it! I rememer running out of that arena with HUGE smiles on all of our faces. It was a blast! That's the kind of drilling I like to do! Next to that is my favorite frame that I found to decorate with. It's squares of shiny, iridescenty shell. Very pretty! And above that are some pretty green hurricane candle holder thingy majigers. I love them! Not sure what to put in them, but I love them.

Ok, back to B&A...

Next we have my craft table. It's a beautiful wood pub height table that I totally scored on at Macy's scratch and dent furniture store that I happened to end up at on a day that they had all their tables 50% off with an additional 15% off if you used your card. $100. SCORE! I love my craft table!

This is when I first got it. I had just tried out this little shelf and pictures on it. It was better then nothing!

Eventually I filled up all that empty space underneath it with boxes. Lots of boxes! Most of those boxes were unpacked to the super, duper organized closet or put on the book shelves. Yay!


Here is my craft table now...



I know, I know...still with the boxes underneath. But those are packed up, ready to go up to the barn loft for storage. They just haven't made it yet. Honest!


Now on the shelf is pictures of family and friends, a zen water fountain thingy, a lamp and a bromeliad plant. There is also a Citrus Cilantro reed diffuser that I found at Pier 1. Have you smelled the Citrus Cilantro reed diffuser from Pier 1?!? Oh. My. Goodness! It smells like limes and cilantro and makes me want a margarita, guacamole and pico de gallo all at the same time. On the beach. Not sure how exactly it manages all of that, but it smells positively delightful and I had to have it for my office.


I also found these throw pillows at Pier 1 and I think they very appropriately perked up the black recliner. Oh, they were on clearance too. I love clearance!






There is also this computer desk in the corner to the left of the door...




And I have a whole little project planned out for the wall between the door and the desk that involves some little shelves and lots of picture frames. But that'll have to wait for another day.



So this is my office. I am totally in love with it!





It's definately got a nice tropical, airy feel to it. The color on the walls is Teal Ice, the ceiling is Waterfall Mist and the closet is Tropical Dream. The tie breakers on all those colors was their names. The walls really are a lot more teal then they look in the pictures too.

It turned out beautifully! I still have some little things to get, like floor pillows (I still like being able to stretch out on the floor for scrapbooking) and some larger investments, like an area rug, but those things will just have to wait. I love the way it came together! I couldn't be happier with it!

Before and After - Office Closet

I just couldn't wait. I was way too excited and motivated to get going on the office closet project so I finished it up last night. I grabbed a coffee after work, hit Target and Michaels, my two very favorite stores for decorating/organizing and headed home to get started.

This was the very naked closet after I stripped it all down. Of course I was excited to start tearing into it and forgot, once again, to take before pictures. You'll just have to trust me when I tell you that it wasn't pretty. It had one shelf, supported by boards nailed into the wall (where you now see the line in there). There was also a clothing rod that was seriously stuck in there with one rod hanger/shelf support in the middle, held up by another board (where the pink square is in the middle)(and yes, this closet apparently used to be Pepto Bismol pink). I had to have the boyfriend help me with some muscle to get it all out.

When all was said and done I counted 42 nails and screws holding 3 small boards and a rod in. 42 nails and screws! And the best part...see the nail that is top right? The one that looks like a screw? It's a nail, a ribbed nail for extra grab. There were a few of them. They weren't planning on that stuff going anywhere at all when they put it all in. Totally ridiculous!

This was the office while I was painting the closet and getting the shelving set up. The circled stuff in the middle is all of the crap that I took OUT of the closet. It was just piled haphazardly on the floor because I just had the one shelf. I'm really not joking, everything in that circle was piled in there.

Also in the picture at the top middle is a desk that we've had in there that will be headed some where else in the house. I'm not sure where yet.

Under that desk are some boxes that are hiding.

Next to the desk is a rather large and sloppy pile of blankets.

In front of the blankets leaning against my pub height craft table are the bookshelves. They are in boxes until I finish painting and can assemble them. They will be against the wall that the small desk is currently holding up.

I have to thank The Wife for recommending Picnik for free photo editing in her Sunday Stills post last week. I've been having fun playing with it!

This is what it looks like underneath my craft table. There are lots of boxes hiding under there. They are mostly waiting for the bookshelves to be assembled, but I did get 2 or 3 of them unpacked into the cool new super-organized closet last night.

This is the closet now. The green on the walls doesn't stand out as much in the picture, but I promise it's green! Actually, the color is called Tropical Dream. The name was the tie breaker. It just seemed fitting. And I was happy to see green was a trendy color when I went to Target to get all of the tubs (which were also on sale, SCORE!) They have nice lime green accents on them, pretty much the color I want to accent the room with. I got this nice black wire shelving unit at Target also a month or so ago. I have the shorter 3 shelf version in the kitchen and love it.

Currently contained in this closet are the large pile of blankets, neatly stacked in the space not taken up by the shelving unit. All of the crap that I pulled out of the closet originally, neatly organized into tubs. The board games that originally resided on the one shelf of the closet. And most of my stamping and scrapbooking stuff which already takes up most of the upper 3 shelves. I was surprised by how much stuff I had once I got it all in one general area and I think there is more floating around in some of the other boxes. Yikes!

I had so much fun organizing all of that last night! I'm a total nerd. I think I'm going to put the closet doors back on, atleast for now, and see how they work out. I may still go with the curtain idea, but for now I think the doors will serve me better while I'm painting.

Oh, and you see the wall to the right of the closet? The one that changes color half way up? The top peach-ish looking color is the current color of the room. Ick. The bottom color is my test strip for the teal I am going with. It's called Teal Ice. I can't wait to get the room painted!

This and That

Well, I think I'm over my little tantrum from the other day. I still love drill and my team, but at this point, I think it's best for me to continue on as an associate member for the year, filling in spots where I need to and competing at just one big competition this year. I guess I'll just have to wait and see how it all goes and then decide what I want to do for next year.

On to the next subject: my next painting project, the office. I mentioned it here and here. I think I finally decided on a color/theme for it and it's not much like any of my ideas in those posts. Go figure.

Nothing was inspiring me for the office. It has a computer desk in it, but the main focus is my craft table. I wanted it to be a place where I can spread out to do my scrapbooking, stamping and crafty-stuff. I wanted it to inspire me, be a cheery place to go in the winter when it's dreary outside and a place that was a like a haven and really reflected me. Not that the rest of the house isn't a reflection of me, but I really wanted this room to be mine. I was searching every where I went for one little piece of anything that might inspire me to decorate the room around, but nothing was catching my eye.

I planned to get curtains for the four windows in the room and browsed some sites hoping to find some that would inspire me, to no avail. When I mentioned that to my friend she offered up some of her extensive collection of white sheer curtains that she amassed for her wedding last summer. So now I had sheer white curtains, black bookshelves, a dark wood table and a mostly black computer desk (which was free and I'm not fond of so I'm hardly considering it in my decorating fantasies). The curtains made me think light and breezy and made me lean towards teal for the walls. For some reason Bahama Breeze kept popping into my head. I know it's a pretty darn good restaurant, but I decided to try it on for size in the decorating department.

I'm not sure what other people picture when they hear bahama breeze, but I'm going with a nice bright teal color for the walls and then I'm going to accent with dark wood and a nice green. I would also like to find some sort of palm tree or palm frond accents. I want it all light and breezy, sort of tropical feeling. I'm going to paint the closet lime green (my first project) and get that organized and then start on the room. I'm hoping I can fit most of the boxes that are hiding throughout the room in the closet after it is painted so the rest of my house doesn't have to suffer too much while I'm painting the office.

I'm hoping I can paint the insides of the black book shelves green and maybe line the shelves with some sort of bamboo look liner paper or something along those lines. I have a lot of ideas swirling around in my head right now, but they will just have to wait for a while because painting has to come first.

At this moment I'm off to my very favorite store, Home Depot, to get some paint for the closet. Hope to have a Before and After post by the end of the weekend!

Ideas!

First off I have to say that I think my sister is brilliant! While I may look at her like she has a third eye when I hear some of her ideas, when I see the finish product, it is always fabulous. She has tons of very bright and bold colors in her house and while I had my doubts when I heard what she wanted to do with each room, everything turned out great and it all flows together amazingly well. She is really good at thinking "outside the box".

So after she read my blog about painting my office she emailed me with her thoughts on the subject. I had a forehead smack moment(also known as a duh moment). She suggested painting the dark color half way up the wall with another color on top, using some sort of border in the middle (or no border, my choice). That way I could still use my blue that I love, but it would help with the dark hole issue.

Now, I know I had this idea at some point, the thought had crossed my mind, I swear. But for one reason or another I had disqualified it as an option, or just didn't want to think hard enough to figure out a border option and forgotten all about it. Now that she brought it up again, I'm totally digging it.

The only problem is...what do I do for a border?!? I'm not a huge fan of the no border idea. I'm also not a huge fan of doing a wallpaper border, though I am not counting it out completely. I would love to do a wood chair bumper type border, but I'm just not so sure that will work out so great with all of the furniture I'm going to have in there pushed up against the wall. I could just do a plain 4"-6" stripe of navy blue, but that is a little blah. Red or purple or kelly green wouldn't be as blah, bit it's still not all that exciting

Naturally I've been googling and haven't had much luck finding new ideas, other than decoupage. That could be fun. Maybe. I have a feeling it would turn into a massive project because I'm incredibly particular about stuff like that. I can envision how I might want it to look, but it would probably take me hours and days and weeks to get it looking like that. I kind of like that direction though. I'm picturing black and white photos of different things, possibly pictures that I've taken, but more likely pictures of the eiffel tower, flowers, horses, Chey...different things that I love and inspire me. It could be fun to have in my craft room. I dunno. I'll have to think on that idea a while longer.

The other part of this is what color do I do on top? It would have to be something light to offset the dark bottom. I would rather not do anything too white. I could do the mustard/dijon color that Horse Crazed Mind suggested in the last post, but I think that would end up looking a little manly and like it should be a den, not girly for my craft room. I do love that color though and it will end up some where in my house! Do I go with a lighter, creamy yellow? More like the one in the kitchen (or the stand mixer that inspired the kitchen)? Do I go with a light blue? Teal? Pick some other random color of the rainbow just for shits and giggles? I dunno. I suppose the top color is kind of dependent on my border decision also.

So that is where I'm at with the office right now. I still, basically, have no idea what I want to do in there. Who knows, maybe I'll go home and look in the office and decide this half wall idea just won't work at all or sleep on it and wake up tomorrow morning wondering what the heck kind of crack I was on to even entertain the idea. I do that every once in a while.

Basically, I need to think on it and love your input in the meantime! Maybe I'll get a picture of the room up here one of these days too so those of you that haven't seen my house can see what the heck I'm talking about! :o)

Painting projects, here I come! Maybe.

Well, I'm trying to work up some motivation to get going on atleast one of my indoor projects while the weather is all nasty and unpredictable. I'm having problems actually getting going though.

I really want to get my bathroom painted, but that is going to be a huge, massive, painstaking process. There are a ton of screw and nail holes that need to be patched and wall paper that needs to be removed and everything needs to be washed very thoroughly and primed and then painted, probably with two coats. There is a ton of taping off and edging to do and I really hate edging. It's annoying and time consuming and tedious. There isn't a ton of wall space, but lots of corners and edges and things to work around so I'm just not really wanting to start that project just yet.

The office, on the other hand, just has four windows, two doors and a closet to work around. There is way more wall space, but I think it will be much less labor intensive. There are just a few small nail holes to patch up and it doesn't need to be primered. For those reasons, as well as the piles of boxes of books and things waiting to be unpacked and put on the shelves that are not going to be assembled until the room is painted, I am more inclined to paint the office first.

My problem is that I cannot decide on colors for the walls. I want to do something bold and bright and colorful in there. It's my office and craft room so I want it to be a nice, fun color. I had planned to go with this really nice blue.

It's a beatiful color that I absolutely love. That is a picture of a picture and it's actually a little deeper and brighter then that looks. I'm afraid to do it though. It looks great in the picture, but all of the accents are a very bright white and I think it needs that. The room I'm working with has a beige carpet, no lighting fixtures at the moment and four windows that don't really let much light in. Besides that, my craft table is huge and a dark espresso brown, the computer desk is mostly black and all of the shelves that I have for the room are black. I think between the dark accents, the lack of lighting in the room and the beige carpet the room would turn into a dark hole with that deep blue on the walls.

I could be wrong, and I may still end up going with that color, but at this point I'm trying to steer away from it.

I have no idea what direction to go though. I still want a bold color in there, but I can't come up with anything bold that doesn't have the same dark hole issue. All the bright colors that I like for it aren't exactly the bold statement I want to make in there.

I'm not sure if I want to stick to blues, teals and greens (purple flags are the colors I really like)...

Or go with something bright and different with yellows, golds, reds and oranges...

So that is where my head is at this week. I would really like to get both the bathroom and office painted before it gets nice out and I don't want to be inside any more. Hopefully I can make it happen! I think I just need to pick a color and go for it. I can change it later if I don't like it, right? Of course when I realize that that means painting again I might decide to like it, but hey, whatever works, right? :-)

The kitchen...again

I found a theme for my kitchen! It doesn't quite incorporate everything that I wanted it to, but a towel and potholder that I've had for 5 years or so is a small sacrifice in the grand scheme of things. Plus there isn't any rule that says I can't use the towel and pot holder, I'm just a bit particular about details like that.

The new theme is coc...I mean...Roosters! I found this great pattern at Macy's and got a STEAL of a deal on them to boot! (I have mentioned that I like bargains, right?)

I was on a mission to get a new platter and serving bowl(s) before Thanksgiving since the ones that I got last year were cheap pieces of poop. The platter shattered while being hand washed after dinner and the bowl cracked in the dishwasher (yes, it was marked as dishwasher safe!) I wasn't too upset since I didn't like them all that much to begin with, but it was still irritating.

I also wanted something to hang on my walls, so that maybe I could feel like my kitchen was really finished. I was thinking of decorative plates, but hadn't found any that I really liked.

So after much hunting and fretting, I came across this set, "Ricamo" by Fitz and Floyd. It had the same yellow as my mixer. It isn't the main yellow, but there is enough of it to tie in nicely. It also ties in all of the blue that I have in my kitchen, as well as the wire rooster that I already had. It's modern, but a bit country.

The best part...it totally POPS on my wall and makes the white-ish walls not so blah! I am still considering painting the wall with the door yellow though. I just think it would be fun. To have it yellow that is, not the painting part so much.

So I'm getting closer to being completely sassified with my kitchen. Still not 100% there, but 99.7% ain't bad! :)

The kitchen - B&A

Well, one out of a million ain't bad! ha!

I feel like I really have about a million projects that I need to do around the house and property. I've decided that my flower bed area by the garage isn't finished after all. And I didn't get very far on the other flower bed area by the gate. I did, however, finish my kitchen. I think. I'm still not 100% satisfied with it, but in order to get there I need to spend money on decorative things, new hardware and new lighting fixtures that I just don't want to spend on right now. So, for all intensive purposes, I'm going to consider the kitchen "finished".

My goal was to paint/finish the kitchen and my master bath before I host Turkey day for my family. I thought it was a very reasonable goal since, at the time I decided on it, I had over a month to do it. I was not anticipating my current addiction that has sucked the last week and a half from my life. Not that I mind too much, I have totally enjoyed the ride. But I'm a little disappointed in myself that it's not looking so promising to actually reach my goal. I don't like not accomplishing goals. Especially when they are so reasonable! I know I still have a week and a half which should be plenty of time to paint a bathroom, but there are several reasons that I don't see this happening. 1. I still haven't finished the whole series. I have about 400 pages left in the last book, which comes out to probably the next two evenings being mostly committed to reading. 2. The bathroom requires a lot of prep work. I'll post the before pictures when I've got it finished, but this bathroom was, umm...cluttered. To say the least. 3. I still haven't even picked what color I want to paint in there! I'm having a really hard time with that because the counter is burgundy. The bathroom used to be Pepto Bismol pink. No joke. They changed it to a decent off-white/beige color, that I actually kind of like, but it is a little dark and dingy and after everything was taken off the walls, I just need to paint. There is no two ways about it. I'm also having a hard time with choosing a color because we want to change basically everything in there. Soon. The counter, sinks, mirrors, hardware, fixtures, flooring...everything. It's all got to go! But it can't right now. 4. I'm kinda sick of painting. There is just as much edging and crap to work around in this bathroom as there was in the kitchen and I just don't wanna!

So that's my story of the bathroom thus far. Now, back to the kitchen. The kitchen is nice. A little quirky, but totally do-able. The appliances were all fairly new and matched. Wohoo! I wasn't exactly thrilled with the brown and mauve color scheme, but it wasn't awful. The floor definately needs to go, but that's a big, expensive project for another day. The cabinets are real wood, but had these weird top cabinets that served absolutely no purpose since they were wedged into the ceiling and didn't really open and close. I planned to paint, had picked out my colors and was thinking about my plan of attack for prepping one day. I was wondering about the top cabinets because they were wedged against the ceiling and thinking about just taking them off to paint, since that would probably be easiest. Then it occured to me. I could take them off and...LEAVE them off. *gasp* As soon as the thought occured to me, I knew it was fabulous. I hadn't ever really had an issue with them, but they were kinda weird and didn't serve any purpose whatsoever. Plus, that would give me some room to decorate above the cabinets. Granted it is only about 10 inches, but it's enough room to give the kitchen some character. That night a girlfriend came over for our weekly date night and helped me tear my kitchen apart. We could not believe the difference just taking those top cabinets off made! It was huge! Even with the mauve paint still there, it totally opened the kitchen up, made it so much lighter and brighter! We were all grins looking at our handy work!

In the picture to the left you can see the color the kitchen was. They didn't paint behind the top cabinets. There is also the little phone shelf, which was kinda handy, but once it was down for painting, I couldn't bring myself to put it back up. You can also see the yellow stand mixer that inspired the color.

Over the weekend I got it painted with the help of my mom for most of it and then the boyfriend on the second day. It was a lot of work, but we got it finished. It took me a couple more days to get all of the touching up done and pull the edging tape off and then a few more days after that to properly clean and scrub everything and get it all put back together. And then, as is the nature of a kitchen, it got dirty and it's taken me a while to get it really cleaned up nice again so I could get the "after" pics.

We painted it "Candlelight Ivory". It's basically white, but with a touch of yellow. I have a KitchenAid Stand mixer that is a beautiful light yellow color, so that was the inspiration for that. Pretty much everything I have for my kitchen is yellow or blue. I also wanted something that was clean and bright looking and would maybe reflect a bit nicer tone in the cabinets. They looked kind of yellow and weird with the mauve. I think I accomplished those missions. I like it! Though now it seems a little blah to me. I would like to find a cutesy theme for it, something to brighten it up and have some points of interest, instead of just the white walls. I am having trouble finding things that go with yellow and blue, and brown, and black, and allows me to keep the wire rooster that I love and is currently the only thing on the wall though. It's a lot to coordinate! But I'm still considering it finished, since all the "hard labor" is done. Now it's just details left.

So one down...a million or so to go! :-)

Finally, some therapy!

As I've mentioned before, riding horses is amazing therapy. For me. Most of the time. Every once in a while, you just have a darn frustrating ride, I guess you can't win 'em all! Most of the time though, it is very therapeutic. Last night was one of those incredibly therapeutic nights. I have been more than a little crabby and stressed this week. Our last drill practice was cancelled because there was a long show at the arena, so it had been a week and a half since I last rode my horse. I think it was going on three weeks since I rode my horse on my own, not at drill practice. How sad is that?!?

The weather here has been absolutely miserable lately. Gray, windy, cold and rainy. Very, very rainy. Besides the weather absolutely sucking any motivation to ride my horse out of me, and the depressingly short days, I've been really busy with other things. Trying to take advantage of the last bit of nice weather to get some yard work done and I have been working on getting my kitchen painted. The kitchen is taking way more time then I thought it would. I spent most of last week picking colors and prepping it for the painting, then I spent most of the weekend painting it. Monday I touched it up and pulled all the tape off. I still want to give the counters and floor a good scrubbing before I move everything back into it. Because of that, the whole rest of my house looks like the kitchen barfed all over it. Or has just plain been neglected because I've been so consumed by the kitchen. I have also decided that I'm really not such a big fan of painting. It kinda, sorta, really sucks. I love the end result, but there are so many things that I would rather be doing then actually painting.

I know, I know...excuses. They are like...ummm...noses, everybody has one. We have another show in the winter reining series coming up this weekend though so getting on my horse this week is just not optional! Last night there was a flag clinic at the arena. I love flag clinics! They are fun, a good workout and a fabulous tool in reminding my horse to use her damn butt again! After our stop at the last show, this clinic couldn't have come at a better time! The boyfriend definately needed the saddle time to. He's been so busy hunting that poor Sugar has just been hanging out getting fat for a month now! She has always been very athletic looking and a little harder to keep weight on then the other two, but she has actually put some weight on and looked like I think a horse sitting in the pasture should going into winter. Of course, as soon as she started working last night, she sucked that gut right in and looked her ideal working weight again. Not sure how she managed that.

Both of the girls were a little snorty and spicy when we first got there, but it didn't take them long to warm up out of it. By the time the clinic got going, they were both working really well. Midori and I totally hit our groove, which is always fun! I could tell I hadn't ridden in a while though. I felt like I kept dropping my shoulder or leaning to the inside and I kept catching myself looking down more then up. Since I felt like I was doing that, I couldn't hardly blame Midori when she dropped her shoulder or stumbled thru something. I really had to think hard about keeping myself straight and balanced. It's amazing what just a week and a half off from riding will do to your body! I felt like Gumby up there for the first couple laps, trying to figure out where my legs and arms and body were. Probably didn't help that Midori was a bit of a wiggle worm during that to, but again, I blame myself. It's a lot more productive then blaming the horse! That's usually when you get one of those darn frustrating rides!

Anyways, when it came time to work the flag, which Midori had been watching intently during the other riders turns, she decided to ignore the stupid thing and run right past it. We had a quick little conversation that went something along the lines of "Um, HELLO! That flag thing over there? Ya, you're supposed to stop and turn with it! Remember?!? It hasn't been that long since you did this on buffalo!" Luckily, she's a good listener and it only took two little conversations for her to catch on. But then she started anticipating the turn, instead of waiting for the flag ("cow") to turn her. It was fun and good experience to work her thru those issues though. We worked on shaping and getting her to really use her butt to stop, which is never all that hard with her. She just needs a little reminder sometimes and it's always easier when more then just my butt and maybe the rail are involved. Overall I was very pleased with how she worked and how quickly we were able to correct our little issues. The trainer said he really liked the basics we have, that we did really good. I didn't listen in to see if he told everyone that, but I like to think we were a little impressive for how little we really do with cutting. The first time I ever worked the flag with Midori, the trainer that did that clinic said she was amazed that that was our first time ever and that Midori has the kind of natural talent she looks for when she's picking young cutting horses. Again, I like to think she wasn't just blowing smoke, but I try not to let it go to my head.

So after a good almost two hours on my horse I had all but forgotten all of my worries and crabiness and stress. None of it even crossed my mind the rest of the night. Not even when I got home and had to wander thru the maze of kitchen crap in the living room or shove the mountain of laundry waiting to be folded aside so I could snag a spot on the couch to sit down for a minute. I was totally, completely relaxed and I'm sure if it hadn't been past my bedtime already I would have been chipper. I sure woke up in a pretty good mood this morning. I love it that riding horses does that for me.

I love fall!

I really love fall! I think it is my favorite season. The weather isn't always ideal, but it is just so gosh darn pretty! How can you not love fall?! I do love summer to, definately prefer summer weather. I'm very much a warm weather kinda gal, but the summers just seem to evaporate. I'm always so busy with horse shows and various other activities that seem to only happen during the summer that before I know it, it's all over and I didn't really get to enjoy it much at all. Because of that, fall is my favorite season. It is beautiful and I actually get time to enjoy it! I can relax a bit and take the time to observe and appreciate all of the pretty colors and the cool, crisp weather and the wonderful sunny days, crunching thru the fallen leaves on my horse. I could do without the frosty mornings and the 6 pm (or earlier) sunsets, but other then that, it's glorious.

I also love Halloween and pumpkins and Thanksgiving and hot (usually hard) apple cider and all the other fun things that come with fall. I still love carving pumpkins and it's just not fall for me without that tradition. I wasn't terribly impressed with my carving abilities this year though. My winking pumpkin ended up looking quite a bit retarded and lop-sided. Oh well, you can't win 'em all.

I'm a huge fan of just about anything pumpkin flavored. Sadly, I moved away from my very favorite espresso stand that served up different pumpkin flavored latte's in the fall. They used real pumpkin SAUCE, not pumpkin flavored syrups, and let me tell you, you just don't get any closer to heaven in a cup! I made the Pioneer Woman's Pumpkin Cake, though I left out the whiskey, and it is officially one of my new favorite fall recipes! I'm sure it would be really tasty with the whiskey to, and I'll probably try that soon, but the venue it was going to didn't really scream whiskey whipped cream to me.

This year in particular I'm really enjoying fall in my new house. I have been really interested to see what our property looks like in the fall and I have to find joy where ever I can in my loooong commute to and from work. The fall colors certainly have not disappointed me. They are rather spectacular on my 30 mile commute. Most of the trees around our house are evergreens, so nothing terribly interesting, but there is still enough color around the property to get me out there with my camera. I am also trying to squeeze as much yard work and garden reconfiguring in as I can before the weather turns and I'm stuck inside. I've been trying to pick small projects that I can finish up easily and quickly (and for free!) that actually make an impact. I've been doing pretty good so far, but I'll talk more about that in another post. I think.

Also, I've offered to host Thanksgiving dinner for my family again this year. I'm really excited to have everyone out to my new-ish house (how long is it really new? We've lived there for 6 months now, does it still qualify???). With the expectation of hosting turkey day though comes sooo many indoor projects that I want to finish before I have everyone over. We plan to paint the whole entire interior of the house sooner or later and because of that (mostly), I have not really decorated much at all yet. We have nothing hanging on the walls. The living room is bare and boring. The kitchen is an awful mauve color that just doesn't really go with the cupboards or floor. Or any of my kitchen stuff. I swear the people that built the house must have had a million and three things hanging on the walls. I think I have pulled out no less then 50 nails/screws. FROM EACH ROOM! Good lord, don't people realize that sometimes less is more?! So it is a huge project to get the walls ready to paint. I have prioritized my list of projects to get done before the fam comes out though. Painting my kitchen and my master bathroom needs to be done. Everything else isn't horrible, just not my choice of colors, but the kitchen and my bathroom just can't wait. I have 4 1/2 weeks to do that. I think it's reasonable. I did paint the main bathroom just after we moved in and it turned out really nice! I was very pleased with it.

While I'm anxious to get going on my painting and indoor projects, I really can't bring myself to go inside just yet. I want to soak up every last minute of sun and blue skies that I can before winter. Sometimes that means just running around with my camera, that I have been unusually inspired by lately (bordering on obsessive with the photo taking actually), and taking pictures of all the pretty fall colors. I'm sure I'll appreciate them when I'm stuck inside getting stir crazy in February.