Childhood Home

While in San Antonio this past weekend, we stopped by the house where I grew up and knocked on the door. A beautiful blonde woman answered the door with a look on her face that said, “Do I know you?”

“Hi. I lived in this house when I was a little girl until I was 13 years old. Do you mind if I come inside and see my old house? I want to show my husband the room I grew up in.” She graciously obliged, even though the look on her face showed that she was a little nervous with us strangers traipsing through her house.

It was pretty amazing. Nearly every room had undergone some kind of a significant facelift. It looked the same 1940s ranch style house on the outside, but the inside was totally modern and updated.

I’m glad for the new family that is enjoying the gleaming granite countertops and the newly installed Jacuzzi bathtub, but my favorite parts of the house were the ones that had gone unchanged: the old windows that you have to crank open by hand, the old-fashioned telephone stand carved into the wall of the hallway, and of course the tree house my Dad built for us kids that is still in the backyard over 20 years later!

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A couple of weeks ago, Hubs and I had dinner with the couple from which we bought our new house. They moved less than a mile away, and they have three little boys. I wonder if they will want to come visit the place they first called home. If they do, their swing set is still here for them to enjoy!

A Night in Old San Antonio

The past week was San Antonio's annual Fiesta Week!  I grew up in SA, living there until I was 13 years old, so when I think of my childhood, I think of San Antonio. It has been 18 years since the last time I went to Fiesta there, but thanks to an old friend who invited my mom, Hubs and I for a visit, I got to experience it all over again.  This is my mom (on the left) with her dear friend Pat, who invited us to SA for the weekend.

Fiesta week culminates on Friday night with a big celebration in the streets of downtown called "A Night in Old San Antonio" (NIOSA). Droves of people came out to celebrate (including us)! 

NIOSA celebrates the culture of San Antonio--especially the Mexican culture that is such a big part of the texture of the city. Besides being packed with people, the streets are lined with booths decorated with bright, beautiful colors, selling everything kind of food you can imagine...

...including fajitas, burritos, and (yummmmm) churros!

One of the most fun parts of the fiesta celebration are cascarones!

Cascarones are empty egg shells filled with confetti. If you want to celebrate with someone, you crack one of those babies right on his head! I thought I'd be sneaky and indoctrinate Hubs with a cascaron to the head, but at the same time I was getting him covered with confetti, our friend Pat got me!

It was great fun, as you can see by the way I threw my head back laughing.

Yep, that would be me trying to get the confetti out my mouth that fell squarely in it when I threw my head back laughing.  :)

"Consider yourself indoctrinated!"

Here's another random shot of some girls who got an egg-full of confetti in their hair!

We had a great time. Many thanks to Pat for treating us to such a fun weekend!

Gameroom/Office

The one room in our new house that still had white walls when we moved in was our gameroom.  We decided to make it a sort of tv room/home office. Since the rest of our house has a more traditional feel, I decided that I wanted to make this room the one contemporary room in the house. I decided to leave the walls white and decorate with color in the room.

The red lacquer-finish cabinets are from IKEA.  So is the desk, which is actually a kitchen table. I wanted us to have a desk that was long enough for us both to be sitting at the same time. I also wanted it to have multi-functionality (ie. craft table, sewing table, etc.)

The one missing furniture element has been some kind of a sofa to sit on to watch TV. When I saw this love seat and ottoman, I couldn't get it out of my head. I thought it would be good to bring a tertiary into the room, and I love how it plays with my big sunflower photo!  In fact, the color of the sofa is called "sunflower" (which, incidentally, is my favorite flower!). The love seat arrived yesterday, and I'm still getting used to it. It's definitely a bold color choice, so now my goal is to bring a couple of other design elements into the room that will pull it all together. I'll keep you posted, but this is what it looks like now.

Our New Home

Several of you asked me to post some photos of our new house here in Texas.  I wanted to wait until we had most of the unpacking done and been able to hang some things up on the walls.  Anyway, this is our house!  I love the dwarf Magnolia tree in our front yard. The blossoms are just starting to bud!

This is our living room:

...which opens up to the kitchen (no wall between them). It's my fave part of the house:

We sold our bedroom furniture before we left California, so if this looks a little minimalist, it's because our box springs are sitting on the floor, and our bedside tables are tv trays!  I'll show some "after" pictures once this room is set up a little more:

Our guest bedroom, waiting for our friends to come for a visit:

Okay, California friends, now that you have seen your room...time to schedule a trip to Texas!

Baby E

One of my oldest and dearest friends came over with her family for a visit last week. This is their adorable little girl.

Don't you just love those cheeks?!

Easter Photo Shoot of some Old Friends

One of my long-term goals now that I have my Canon Rebel is to start my own photography business. In an effort to gain experience and to build a portfolio for a website, I'm photographing pretty much anyone who wants their pictures taken.

I have know the B's since 1992 and watched their family grow through the years. They now have 5 kids, and they asked me to take their family Easter picture. Here are a few of my favorite images:

If you live in the Houston area, and want your family or your kids photographed, let me know!

It's a VERY good place to start...a dance revolution!

Imagine walking through the central train station of Antwerp, Belguim on your way home from work and finding yourself the recipient of a massive act of kindness (through art). I'm not entirely sure why, but I can't watch this without crying big tears of joy...this is what happens when someone gets a creative idea and shares it with several others and they all decide to make it happen. Enjoy!

Guess who's 1...

Yes, my nephew Sam is a big boy now! (Actually, he's still an adorable, squeezable baby, and I'm happy for him to stay that way as he'd like!  I love him so much!)

Happy Easter!

I love Easter Sunday!  It is a beautiful reminder that the Light is victorious over darkness, that Jesus is alive, and His love for me is so expansive that He took the punishment for my sins just so that I could know God and live my life with Him and in Him...forever and ever!

Thank You, Jesus, for the sacrifice You made for me.

Amen!

Art Project Prototype

On a recent trip to Z Gallery, I saw a framed work of art that gave me the inspiration to create something of my own for our new home. I haven't made the final piece yet, but these are a couple of prototypes I made.

I like the idea of laying in a clipping from a magazine or a catalogue here and there to give the piece some extra texture and interest.

Can you tell I was needing a little colour?

I'm Bringing Curly Back!

It's true...I got a wild hair yesterday and got a perm. The last perm I had was in 1989. It had been 20 years, people...it was time.

Funny thing:  after 20 years, perms still stink to high heaven, and you still have to wait 48 hours to wash your hair.  I so can't wait for 48 hours to be here!

Kisses for a great weekend!

A little bit of California right in my own backyard!

Some of you have asked me to post photos of our house. I haven't been inspired to snap any of the inside yet, because most of the rooms are still a work in progress. However, I couldn't resist snapping these shots in my backyard the other evening. Although the palms are in our neighbor's backyard, we get to enjoy them every day! They are lovely and nostalgic reminders of the place we just left that will always hold a special place in our hearts.

The previous owners asked us if we'd like them to leave us their swing set, and we said "Yes!". Sammy can enjoy it now, and we hope that one day we'll have little ones of our own who can play on it, too!

Texan Right of Passage

Every spring, Texans are delighted when the grassy areas along our highways become seas of blue.  The bluebonnet is our state flower, and it is basically a right of passage for every Texan child to be plunked down in a patch of bluebonnets for a photo session.

My nephew Sam is no exception, and he is now one step closer to wearing a ten gallon hat! 

We went to a local park on Monday for a little photo shoot of our own!

Well done, cowboy!