NumberNineteen

Blooming

I'm  breaking out of my winter dormancy, slowly branching out and experiencing beauty again.   I'm planting and moving and relishing the happy side of things.  These have appeared in our front yard in the past week.

 

Hope calls them bluebells...they are grape hyacinths and were in my bridal bouquet.   Every year, they propagate and more of them appear.

Last Saturday, I finally overcame my fear of having a brown thumb and planted my first vegetable garden.  Tomatoes, yellow & red sweet peppers, broccoli, lettuce and thyme.  I love looking out the kitchen window and seeing these growing things.

 
We've babied them through the sudden freeze of the past few nights and they seem to have emerged unscathed.  I can't wait to see them grow.

 

I just discovered this song a few weeks ago (I know, I've been living under a rock) & it has been on my mental soundtrack ever since.  I've been playing it while cooking and stopping to dance with Hope (who has declared "Now THIS is a good song!"), while running, while doing work, pretty much all of the time.  My 4 year old nephew sings it in his little boy voice, "like a woom without a woof!"

The time has come to put up this spring banner, probably my favorite paper craft project of all time.

 
We are getting ready for an Easter celebration with friends.  Candy has been purchased to tuck into eggs for the hunt, a menu has been planned and I'm working on treat bags for the kids.

I hope that your spring is just as lovely.

 

Our IKEA Rast Hack

Remember how I said that we were working on an IKEA hack?  We finally finished it this weekend!  I say "we" loosely.  We as in "it was my great idea & Glenn did all of the work" we.  :)  He loves a project, though, so he did it willingly.

Hope was badly in need of a new nightstand -- her old one was a little side table that I bought for her nursery that was completely inadequate for the needs (i.e. junk) of an 8 year old and past its prime.  That kid needed storage badly.  The nightstand that goes with her bed & dresser is no longer made and I didn't really see anything that I liked, at any price. 

Old nightstand:

 

 Then I came across this on Pinterest:

source: The Turquoise Home

And this:

Source: Take the Side Street

Gorgeous!  Custom!  Cheap!  What is there not to love?  We combined ideas from both of the hacks that I found and here is the result:

 

Love it!  More importantly, Hope loves it.  She choose the purple knobs herself and has arranged her things in the drawers.  It wasn't hard to do (or so I hear from Glenn) but we were slowed down by the cold weather which made it impossible to paint anything in the garage, aka our paint booth, for weeks.  Now it is done & you can add furniture builder to our (ahem, Glenn's) resume.