Merry Christmas Decorating

Welcome to my primitive/colonial homestead. Grab your favorite beverage (ummmm spiked eggnog is permisable only if my pictures look better to you. LOL) This is my living room only. The dining room will follow after I get it cleaned up from doing my crafts. LOL. Enjoy!!!!!!

A Little Tantalizing Never Hurt...

Merry Christmas!!! Oops!!!! Wait. Happy Thanksgiving!!!!! Here at the Homestead I have decorated for Christmas. My son and daughter will be with their Dad's next week so my son pleaded with me to put the Christmas tree up this past weekend. He has been asking for about a week now. So after enlisting Steve's help I pulled my pre-lit tree out the basement and up it went. My son was so excited to help decorate it until he found out his friend was up and he had to go play. LOL. Needless to say I decorated the tree by myself except Steve put my garland on (I hate that part). My daughter was at my Mom and Dad's watching Ohio State stomp Michigan. Notice the stab. LOL. Really I don't care I'm not a football fan. Anyway, Steve had to go to the store for a bit. So I sat down and went through my ornaments. I threw away some that had my ex's name on with mine and the kids. I am getting rid of a Our First Christmas ornament. It was a little weird at first, but I am over it. I actually put two trees up this year, one in my living room and one in my dining room. Then of course I had to decorate the rest of the house too. I won't be posting all the pics until Thanksgiving is over. And in case you are wondering I don't have Thanksgiving here so no one will see the decorations while eating turkey. LOL. I only used less than half of my decorations this year and it is perfect. I LOVE it. My heart is singing louder!!!!

As promised a little tantalizing start to the Gettysburg Homestead Christmas 2009.











Alright not Christmasy, but I redid the top of my pie safe and pantry... No laughing I did not put the border up... it was already there when I rented the place. LOL.





Yea yea I was working on my swaps too, but I needed a break. I will be finishing them up this weekend as I have 4 days off. Yiippeee!!!!!

Oh and as for the car situation... I went this morning to drop off my car and they promised the rental to someone else so I had to reschedule my car. In the meantime, I asked Steve if he could do brakes and he said yes. So he will be doing my brakes this weekend. I just went and bought the parts and spent $126.00 labor free other than making cabbage rolls for him this weekend. LOL. I can always bribe him with food. It was going to cost $270.00. So I think I can handle that. The other thing that is leaking will need to be fixed by the shop. Other than that I feel badly about not posting, but I have had two sick kids and a sick Steve to take care of. I am hoping I won't get it before Thursday. Maybe my vitamins are helping.

When it Rains it Pours

I realize I haven't posted for a few days, but I have been both busy and lazy. LOL. Work work work is the theme since Christmas is around the corner. While at my second job yesterday I thought it would be a good idea to take my car for an oil change and get my tires rotated since it's been a year. It's nice the shop is just around the corner. I drop it off in the morning he fits me in and I pick it up before I go home. Anyway, the shop owner is awesome. He is always the bearer of bad news. LOL. I go in to pay for my car and he looks at me and says we have a problem. LOL I said you didn't try to put my window down did you? My passenger side window motor has been shot for a few months, but hey I driver window right? Last thing to fix on my list. He said no, but said did you know you have an oil leak??? What??? He proceeds to take me to my car lay on the ground wipe his hand underneath and sure enough we've struck oil. UGGGHHH... I need new oil cooler lines (whatever those are). Then he says AND you need new back brakes and rotors. WHAT????? So of course me I start bawling like a baby because I know I don't have the money to fix it. He's like it needs to be done next week and you can borrow my jeep while I fix it. OK but how am I going to pay for it??? He says he will let me do a payment plan since he knows my situation. He looks at me and says "your kids are what's important and I can wait on my money." What a great guy huh???? Too bad he's married LOL. To top it off he says and I can't believe you still have the original battery in this car (it's a 2004) come winter you probably won't be able to start it in the morning if it's cold. TOUCHDOWN I am officially depressed. Then of course I come home pick up my mail. Lo and behold there is my final bill from my attorney. Yep more money I don't have and he doesn't accept payment plans. So I decided I may have to donate a kidney just to pay my bills. LOL. Hey anyone want a hand painted sign???? LOL

So as not to end on a sour note my Mom stopped over the other night after church and brought me some of my old cross stitch things I had done way back in the day. She decided it was time to clean out her sewing room so she is bringing me all kinds of stuff. Anyway, I believe I was in high school when I did these... So yep I crafted way back then too.

I think I tried to wash this way back and some of the purple bled down on the left corner by the berries so I just put it away because I was mad. So Mom brought it to me wrinkled and all.



The next one isn't too bad I guess for a kit...



I know she brought me some other ones, but of course I can't remember what I did with them at the moment, but when I find them I'll show you. Other than that I've been working on my swaps here and there. I know not too exciting, but today I hope to go to the thrift store to find some goodies.

Do You Hear It?????

SSSHHHHH!!!!!! Do you hear my heart singing very softly???? It's still soft because I'm just at the beginning of redecorating. However, as promised I will show you some sneak peaks at what I did yesterday. I am really delcuttering and Steve says it looks bigger in my little place. I had to sign some last minute paperwork to put the original Gettysburg Homestead up for sale before I could start. It's kind of sad, but neither one of us can afford it without the other and since my EXs girlfriend that he left me for moved out on him he can't afford it by himself. (snicker snicker SORRY) Anyway, I am no where near done but here are some to start with. I still have a few fall things out, but for the most part they are back in their tubs and I have some Christmas signs and red berries out too. LOL. Steve and I were talking and he said "you should go ahead and decorate for Christmas since you didn't do much last year." So.... look closely for "fwinter" (fall/winter mix LOL)











While I was doing this, Steve was off too. His work is a bit slow these days. So of course he didn't want to get in my way, so he went out to cut more wood for more signs. I now have a total of 13 signs. He is getting better with each one. I told him that we need to prim a few up. But I'll show you my stacks. LOL. Now other than sell a few what am I suppose to do with all of these??? LOL





Almost forgot...

I am thankful for modern conveniences light electric and heat from furnaces. Though sometimes I do like living with the light of my candles for short periods of time. It makes me wonder what it really would of been like to live this way all the time. Hmmmmm no hair dryer, no electric washing machine and dryer, no stove, yeah I think I like my electric LOL.

New Beginnings...

As you all might remember today was my final divorce hearing. Yes it did happen and all papers were signed. I just have to wait on the courts to record them and send me copies. There were no tears shed and no animosity between us. We walked out of the court and he looked at me and said "Well, you're free now." You know he is right. I can now have a new beginning. With new beginnings come changes. No don't worry my decorating style and blogging won't change. LOL. Just other things in my life.

After the hearing I went to a Hospice thrift store and looked around for awhile. They had all their Christmas items up decorating the entire store. I bought a cross stitch book and two ornaments for my tree and that was it. I'll show pics later. Then I went to turn in the last paperwork to join my local fire department where I live. I have procrastinated long enough. I couldn't decide whether to turn it in or not for many reasons. I am suppose to have a physical agility test on Wednesday night in order to prove I can do my job. Duh I do it just about every day at work. LOL. Anyway, after turning that in I went across the street to one of my favorite shops here in town and looked around. Everything was decorated for Christmas here too. I had a few things in my hand but put them back because I know I have too much as it is. I just could not get in the mood to buy, but sure got in the mood to decorate. I asked Steve last night if he minded if I took down the fall stuff and put my Christmas stuff up. He laughed and asked if I could wait a few weeks. LOL. I told him first day after Thanksgiving it's going up!!!! Truthfully he doesn't care he just likes to get my goat. It's my house I'll do what I want anyway. Boy does that feel good to say. However, I did move a few furniture pieces around in preparation for the holidays last night. I am so in the mood to rearrange today but don't know where to start. LOL.

So instead I sat down and darkened up my candle holders with shoe polish. Before and after kinda.





I have decided that with new beginings comes decluttering. I have decided I have way too much stuff. I need to scale back and only keep the things that I LOVE or as many people put "make my heart sing." I work the next two days so it'll have to wait until Thursday to do anything else as for rearranging. By then I hope to have pictures for all to see. My promise will keep me motivated. LOL.

If you haven't noticed I opened up a selling site. Please check out the right side of by blog and click on the picture. For now all I have is Christmas signs, but will add more as I make it.

#3 What I'm thankful for...

I am thankful that I have food to eat, a roof over my head, and clothes on my back.

What I've Been Working On

This post is short and sweet. I'm pooped and have to be to work by 5:30am tomorrow so I need to get some things done.

I keep saying I'm working on my quilt. Well, that's all I've been working on. LOL. I have the top done and pinned to the batting and backing. Now comes the part I think I'm gonna hate. QUILTING!!!! You have to understand I have a very short attention span and jump from project to project. Sometimes I give up on them if they take to long to finish. But I'm hoping to finish this one by next fall. LOL. Seriously, it will take me awhile.

So here you go my first quilt... By the way can you tell I had to piece the green border. If so don't say it out loud LOL. I think it looks pretty good.



Yesterday I decided I needed to find fabric for my Christmas swap partner and send it out. Think I'll be able to find it in this mess? LOL. All those blue tubs have fabric in them. Hmmm.... what to choose... LOL. Hey Kim I sent yours out yesterday.



I got a package in the mail from Kim for my Christmas swap today after work. Isn't this fabric fabulous??? Though my camera has the coloring off a little. It's more of a brown. Oh the wheels are just turning Kim!!!!! This is the last time you will see this until the Christmas swap is complete.



Christmas swap ladies your fabric should be sent out by now. If someone does not receive their fabric by Saturday please email me right away.

#2 What I'm thankful for...

I'm thankful I have a full time job with health benefits that fell into my lap after my ex-hubby left. They may have cut my hours, but I know that if one of us gets sick we can go to the doctor.