Antique Alley

Antique Alley Texas spans the historic communities of Cleburne, Grandview and Maypearl via FM 4 (S) to FM 916. This show is unique because of the miles and miles of shows and sales organized by independent landowners, small businesses and individual entrepreneurs. You may stumble upon a beautiful ranch or quaint farm where the landowner is hosting an antique show with specialty dealers coming from all over the United States to sell their wares, or you may find a place where they've just cleaned out Grandpa's barn! There are fundraisers for local churches and schools, live entertainment and something fun for the entire family! Be sure to stop by the smaller historic downtowns of Grandview and Maypearl where the streets will be lined with vendors, musical entertainment and festival style foods. On the other end of the trail is Cleburne, the county seat of Johnson County. There you will find various sales scattered through out the community.
(Above taken from Antique Alley Texas )

According to my husband its considered...

Our community lives for Antique Alley! With land owners up and down Hwy.4 opening up their pastures to allow vendors to set up and sell anything and everything. It can be a lot of walking and tricky parking but well worth it. I'm so excited that its this weekend! Another plus is that I live right by and can load up the Tahoe, go home unload and go back for more! Almost 20 miles of garage/yard sales and rows of vendors selling antiques to corn dogs. Its awesome! If your near by you should come check it out! There are also vendors selling Texas BBQ among other foods such as ..

MMmmm funnel cakes

And there is a difference in corn dogs here too...

I will post pics once I'm done :) Hope everyone enjoys the weekend

Master bedroom bedding

After finally getting vacation and school clothes/supplies done and over with the master bedroom remodel is in full swing! The thing is I'm having a really hard time finding bedding I love. Last year I bought black and red and with Miss Chyanne's fur it has been a nightmare. Even tho we have taught her no more getting in bed with us since we downsized from a king to queen mattress all this white fur is still everywhere! And seriously what was I thinking, black and red, ugh! Which I don't have before pictures I was just ready to toss it!

First off we don't like duvet covers at all, they move around and have been a pain in the past. Then hubby likes to keep the bedroom like a freezer so it needs to keep me warm but him cool. And I have no idea what to pick..

Then like it always happens "poof" after all the searching it basically lands in my lap. Wal-Mart of all places.. the place I shop at the most. It was like I had a V-8 moment lol! Instead of a thick comforter or duvet cover how about a quilt. I look and there it is saying "Here I am, been here all along!" As I sigh and roll my eyes. Anyways... I love it! Clean, crisp lines and it matches the handmade decor I did and the oldtime romantic notions I had for our bedroom remodel.

Isn't she beautiful!

I love the pattern!

The furniture belonged to my grandmother and I will not be painting it. I want to leave it the way I have always remembered it. Once I put all the final touches to everything I will take more pictures to share. I have a few projects up my sleeve and I haven't even started those yet! But I will share the decorative pillows project today and here is how you will get a peek at the old bedding.. yikes!

So here is what I used..

Two decor pillows from old bedding, left over painters drop cloth, scissors, heat bond tape, buttons, thread, needle and an iron.

For the long round pillow I measured out enough material to wrap around and over lap it.

Using the iron I folded over the ends a little over an inch or so to make a stiff line. Then cut a strip of heat bond to length and placed it and laid the end over. Use the iron and go slowly along this seam to activate the heat bond. (no sew seam.. love it)

From here I kinda winged it. Several trial and error attempts to get this to fold and tuck right. Finally using a part burrito and present wrapping method it worked ! 

I then used some thread and a needle made a few stitches to hold it together. Secured a few buttons with some more stitches for an added touch. 

The square pillow is basically the same. Measure out enough material in a rectangle shape I then decided only to use heat bond on two sides. To form a pocket where the pillow would go..

I left it a lot longer on one side so I could fold it over like this..sorta like a homemade envelope

Placed a few stitches to hold the point in place and embellished with buttons also..

And here they are with another pillow I made with an embroidered "S". Recycled and repurposed!

I'm linking up at:

Master bedroom flooring

Ok if you seen the post I did of the living room carpet you won't be as shocked about the state of the carpets in this house. I may haven't mentioned we own a 1976 single wide mobile home. And we are slowly remodeling each room and the outside. First was the kitchen which is still not 100% completed is why I haven't done a post covering it yet. We have also completed the living room. On the list is still master bedroom, teenage sons bedroom, bathroom and guest/craft room. But this weekend we got started on the master bedroom and I'm so flippin' happy!

There was a leak from the bathroom faucet and I didn't know this for awhile obviously. And hubby was going across country driving a big rig so I replaced the faucet alone... which was a big accomplishment for me! lol The leak went into our bedroom unfortunately...

The dark circles are where I had metal popcorn tins sitting and they rusted from the leaking water.

Stained and nasty I didn't care about getting paint on the carpet since I knew we would replace it at some point. Needless to say we had to rip up the entire wood floor underneath and lay new plywood. 

After that it was the foam liner and laying the hardwood.. here is loving hubby doing just that! This is what we bought from Home Depot.. $21 with tax per box and we used 6 1/2 boxes. Plus 2 rolls of the foam liner and about 7 sticks of trim. Oh and the doorway wood plate.

Now for the finale.... 

Here is the nasty corner that had water damage

You can see our makeshift closet because we ripped out the closet that ran the length of the room. The extra door leading to the bathroom was replaced with a wall as well which was behind the clothes. We plan on building just a simple corner closet. Eventually the TV will be replaced with a wall mounted flat screen :)

I'm so glad to have this project done and checked off the list! Today I'm working on bedside lamps going to repurpose our old ones. Until next time...   :)

Linking up at:

Fall Cleaning...

Today the heat is gone! Winds are whipping in that northern breeze and it feels awesome! But here in Texas we haven't seen a drop of rain in so long the winds are a bad thing. Yesterday so many fires happened across our state and they say today will be worse due to humidity levels dropping. I pray for everyone who suffered from the fires of yesterday and ones today that their families are safe.

Now on to what I've been up to this last week. The yucky carpet is gone from the master bedroom and new hardwood floor takes its place. (post with pictures coming soon)  Today I've been slowly going through everything we took out of the room and stowed in the spare room. Ugh! I'm throwing things away and reorganizing the rest trying to not let things creep back into our bedroom. We will see how that goes!

I then sat and thought of a list of chores that needs to be done... I'll call this my fall cleaning list!
After hibernating under the air conditioners all summer there is a lot to do.
1- remove all blinds and wash with soap and water
2- remove all curtains to wash
3-all bedding removed, washed and vacuum the mattresses
4-move furniture and actually sweep then mop the area (instead of just around)
5-vacuum entire couches and under cushions
6-clean the tv stand in living room, dust and wipe with damp cloth
7-clear out old DVD's (ones we don't watch) and reorganize games and controllers
8-reorganize kitchen cabinets
9-clean out and wipe down fridge
10-go through and clean out bathroom cabinet
11-tackle son's bedroom (have lots of trash bags at the ready and maybe a face mask with gloves) :)
12-guest room/ craft room... remove everything that can be stored in the shop outside, throw things away that should have been thrown away long ago and reorganize everything. Figure out what to do for a twin bed frame for this room.

So much to do but I have one foot in the door by getting started today. Wouldn't it be great if it was as fun as this................

source

Is it Fall yet???

Oh how I long for fall!! I'm so sick of 40+ days of temps over 100 degrees! Well even tho its hot outside I'm searching for crafting projects relating to fall and yes Christmas, already. I came across this blog who has the cutest printables! You really should check this out and go thru older posts to get ideas on how to use her printables for different seasons and holidays. It is what it is has so cute and simple ideas for gift bags and special moments that you want to embelish with your own personal touch. So SWEET!

Back from our South Padre Island vacation! It was beautiful there and everything was green!!! With this drought the grass back home is yellow, dry and crackling but in Padre lush green lawns awaited us. I just had to walk barefoot in the grass!

We arrived at our condo to this view from the balcony

We parasailed

Rode the pirate ship and went further down the island where there wasn't any tourist and parked the cars up on the beach. Spent the day skim boarding, knee boarding and playing in the sand.

We drove back north to San Antonio ended up staying at the same hotel as the Dallas Cowboys along the riverwalk. Met up with our cousin got to visit and have dinner with her. The next day walked around seeing the Alamo and Buckhorn Saloon. We had a wonderful vacation and can't wait to plan for next year.. possibly Cancun!

Now to get back to business, buy school clothes, dentist and eye doctor appointments done before school starts in 3 weeks. And maybe I'll have time for projects again!

Now showing! Movie Themed Birthday Party

 Whew! I have been a busy little bee this past week. I was asked by my father-in-law to do a surprise birthday party for my mother-in-law. She turned 67 this year and let me tell you it is VERY HARD to keep a secret from her! I love her to pieces! And I hope I did her justice by this party, she deserves it!
 First thing was secretively handing out invites to all the church members then calling all her children. I used the cricut and cut out small envelopes and glued a print out of when and where etc. I decided to do a movie/theater theme since there were men attending I didn't think a pink lady party would do! We decided to use the church to hold the party, the pastor was very nice in letting us do this. And allowing me to transform things atleast for a few hours!
Here was her welcome sign..

I did a concession stand with  nachos, hot dogs, popcorn, cotton candy, chips, fruit and assorted candies..

Here is the cake table. I used the cricut to cut out the shapes and letters for the happy birthday sign.. dressed up the cake and cupcakes with some themed tooth picks. Basically spiffed the table up with some decorations and gave it some height using a glass plate and my glass cake stand to hold the cupcakes..

Closer view

I snuck some old photos from her albums and scanned them with my printer. Then transfer to a SD card took it up to Wal-mart and had them blown up to 8x10.. Glammed up the pictures and placed them around the party room to showcase her as the "Star" (this was her in high school)

She was very surprised!

Such a good sport she sang along with us "Happy Birthday to MEEEE!"

Now for the photo booth which was alot of fun for everyone and a huge hit! I bought the back drop from the party store, simple and easy. Got the dress up items from the party store, dollar tree and dollar general.

Her great niece, niece and sister

Two grandsons.. one on right is my son :)

Two church members and close friends. She is pretending to be the rock groupie!

One of her sons and his family

My gang

Look at her smile!

She absolutely loved it! She cried, then laughed and cried some more!  Happy Birthday Jody!