Bathroom Update

The wheel of progress move slowly. My bathroom is coming along but red tape and weather have been slowing things down. The inspector broke his ribs and so back up incurred in the inspection process apparently all around this small town of ours. Sadly my closet that looked like this.... 

....now only looks like this. Still much left to do. But I'm loving the pocket door. Tile has been picked out. I could not go with the same tile as the colors had changed slightly. But I think it will blend okay. I went with a slightly smaller 16x16 tile too instead of the 18x18 that's in the laundry. Otherwise there wouldn't be many whole tiles in that small space. I have a transition piece picked out to blend the two tiles.

Johnny is still outside gracing my yard. So my son helped me give him a little holiday flare. Who knows how long he'll be around so why not spruce him up with a little Fall decor? Hopefully he won't be around long enough to be strung up with Christmas lights.

Guacamole 101

I was making guacamole the other day. Oh gosh, I could just live on this stuff. When I remembered how my oldest sister did not know how to get the pit out of the avocado. Hmmm, I knew something that she didn't. So, I thought I would show you too. In case there were others who did not know how and didn't realize how easy it is to make. You will never eat ready made guacamole again. It will seem like green sour cream to you after having fresh.

By the way, I perfer the Haas type to the big green ones. I think they are creamier and have more flavor. You sliced that guy in half and take your knife firmly in one hand and grip half the avocado in the other and wack the pit with the knife. No butter knife here. Make sure it's a good hard wack so the knife sticks then just twist it a bit and it comes right out.

See, just like that.

Now, if you want to have chunks for a chunkier salsa or to put them in salads then you just score it gently in a grid pattern. Mine was a little overly ripe so they were pretty soft.

You then scoop it out with a small spoon. If you had scored it it will come out in nice little chunks. If not then it is getting mashed up anyway and just scoop it out in big chunks as shown below.

You need to salt it well.  That's me, you salt as much as you like. Sometimes I add garlic. I was hungry and did not want another step.

Just mash away with the back of a fork. If your avocados are ripe then this will be easy. I have put them in a food processor when they weren't fully ripen but I do not recommend this. Just let them get ripe. Not mushy, but they should give a bit when you squeeze them. You can buy them hard and let them sit on the counter to ripen. I have heard that apples let off a gas that help speed that along. Keep them in the refrigerator once they are ripe.

Add some lime juice. Yes, that is a lemon. I was out of limes so I made do. Sometimes one must improvise when one is hungry. But lime juice is better. So, let's pretend that is a green lime. Okay?

You can add fresh chopped tomatoes if you like but here is my short cut. I always have salsa. I nice chunky one that is pretty tasty is Newman's Own. I do like the salsa that Publix has in the produce section. That is some fresh tasting salsa. Yum. But this is what I had on hand. I just add a couple of scoops. That's it. See how creamy? No sour cream needed.

Stir it up and enjoy! My son turns his nose up at this stuff which is fine by me. All the more for me and the hubby.

Craftyland, New Blogger Sneak Peek

Hello everyone. I want to share with you a new blog I came across last week. I stumbled upon Kimberly's blog Craftyland when I was looking through the link ups at The CSI Project. She had submitted two chairs that she gave an amazing makeover to. So pretty. I loved the fabric. You can see her chair before here. She's a jack of all trades it seems. From sewing to cooking to DIYing. That's a word.

Then I did a little browsing around on her blog and came across something that really caught my eye. Painting trim. I showed you how I recently painted a lot of trim around my house. Yes, yes, I still have lots left to do. Including my handrail getting stained darker. Hey, I ran out of primer. You can see the results of my white trim painting madness here. But Kimberly's results are amazing. She took an ordinary pale oak railing and really made them rich and lovely by darkening the handrail and then made it all pop with the white spindles. Go on over there and see exactly how she did it all.

Here is her before

Here is her after

Amazing right? The railing now goes so well with her beautiful floors. The white wainscoting is just gorgeous and now the white spindles just ties it all together. Makes me want to open up that can of stain and finish what I started right now! Okay, maybe tomorrow.

Kimberly just started her blog this month. I can tell already that she is going to have some great projects in the future and I can't wait to see them. I hope that you will spread a little blogger love and visit Kimberly @ Craftyland. I know how encouraging you all can be. I'm sure you will want to stick around to see what she'll do next. Tell her I said hello!  

Let There Be Light

I finally was able to get over to Joann's for some trim for the lampshade. I just wish I had more options when it comes to fabric and trims. I'm a touchy feely kind of person when it comes to fabric and trims and so it's hard for me to order it online. I really want to see it.

You might remember the beginnings of this lamp. If you want to see more of my $4 dollar lamp and how it got it's makeover you can look here. This is a bit of what it used to look like. Sad shape indeed.

Here is the Pottery Barn version that it ended up resembling. I had already had an idea in my mind and started working on it when I came across this lamp in their catalog.

The shade was what was giving me fits. I did have to order one online. I had to let go of the touchy feely thing. The ones around town were just too small or way too expensive. I had loved the shade from Pottery Barn with the jute trim but when I went to order one it was sold out. So, I found this shade at Lampsplus.com. It came pretty fast, was the extra large size I  needed and I even got free shipping on this item. I spent more on the shade than I wanted to but sometime you just can't find what you need on the cheap and you just go for it. I'm still way ahead of the Pottery Barn lamp.

Then came the trim. The trim I wanted was on a roll but was only 4 feet long. Now, it may not look like it from the photos but that shade is over 4' around on the bottom. So, it's bigger then it looks. I chose to layer it with two different trims. They are both a jute trim which gives me the PB look but with a little dimension.

Theirs:

Mine:

To be honest with you, it's not even glued on yet. I just have it pinned together in the back. I figure I can switch it out down the road a lot easier. But I'm happy with it like this for now. And the one thing I forgot to get. A finial. I grabbed one from another lamp. I will have to figure something out for that. Any ideas for a substitute finial? I wonder if a cabinet knob would work?

Linking up to:

Thrifty Decor Chick's Before and After Party