Can you hear the song?

Yes, Christmas is gone, but I love the winter whites and I will keep them around for a bit longer.

January is Q's birthday month so I decorate for winter and girl birthday this month.

I wanted to show this project. I said in a prior post I'd show these salt trees. Here they are!

All you need are some paper tree forms, mod podge, epsom salt, white paint and some brushes. Oh yes, a cookie tray would be useful as well.

I began with painting my paper trees white.

Next prep your cookie tray/fill it with the salt.

Then brush the mod podge on generously and roll in the salt. I found it easier to just get the whole thing glued at once and roll it, rather than doing it it sections.

Let it dry.

If you are anything like me you strongly dislike little salt particles falling onto your clean floor anytime anyone touches said tree! Apply a generous coat of glue after to avoid this!

And, here you have them! White winter trees. They will be out for a while!

I do love this time of year! I am a shopper, oh yes, I do love a good bargain! This time of year is full of them! Last week I met my cute sista Damita for lunch and shopping. Oh the fun we had! Love this girl! She is my buddy, my sister, my friend! Love her!

Nyet Spaciba! Any of my college friends remember that from our visit to Ukraine?

We hit Burlington Coat factory first. Now ours is a bit, um, well let's just say I am afraid of nothing and I love to hunt high and low for a great deal! :)

And deals I found! I'm already thinking about my decor for next Christmas and I was super excited to find these 6 large ornaments... for a whole $2!!! Not kidding!

AND I turned the corner and found all of these sparkly trees! Forget Christmas, I have a little girl party to host, and Valentines is coming up and those purple trees will look great with black spiders all over them come Halloween... sky is the limit... and got them dirt cheap!

Speaking of next year and Christmas, as I was cleaning up this past week I decided to divide my ornament balls into color, that way, when I am sure about what colors go where I can easily find what I need. This makes me happy!

OK, back to Burlington, because I couldn't go on w/o showing your my fabulous new shoes... I can't put into words how much I ADORE these new shoes! LOVE them! ADORE them!

I don't even have to put them on! This picture just makes me happy!

Also on my good deal shopping list, a million feet/yards of ribbon and tulle! Got this at Hobby Lobby this past week. $2 for 100 yards of tulle and 90 feet of organza ribbon! Crazy!

I use this stuff often so I grabbed one of every color. Again with the happy!

There has been sickness in our house this past week. The boys have had the trotts, big time! They skipped a whole day w/o going #2 (really diarrhea should have a # of it's own right? 1.5 maybe?) then yesterday both celebrated when they actually pushed a solid #2 out! Sorry about the poo talk!

It has been fine to stay home. I've had my own sickness to deal with... that of the redecorate!

I get this way every year! It would be a miracle if I could just put the Christmas stuff away w/o touching anything else! After I took the tree out I moved furniture around in our front room. I put regular decor away this time of year to make room for holiday stuff. As I bring up all the decor and redecorate w/ it, it's like a whole new house! First I have to rearrange and clean... deep!

I am very pleased with the changes, finally at peace! This room has given me some challenge over the years!

I do plan to repaint our front room and kitchen this year. I'll show photos after the paint is done!

I had a shoot on Saturday. Loved it! I'll share that on the photo blog.

After that I returned some things, and fell into the 'good deal' trap at Old Navy. So much for returning! BUT, I got Q and E new coats... for $12 and $10... seriously love this time of year!

Little Q has been patiently waiting for me to get my crap, I mean our house, put back together so she can decorate for her birthday. When I came home yesterday we sat down and created her invite together. She loved having input, she gets so excited! This will be on my mind for the next couple of weeks! Must make it fabulous!

The husband and I finished watching 'The Lord of the Rings' trilogy this past week.

This is

such

a shocker! Why? Husband doesn't like SciFi, Fantasy Fi, Romantic Fi. He can't stay awake for the life of him! So you can imagine my shock when I came home from church a while ago and he was watching the first one. WHAT? Why are you watching this?

What I failed to mention was that he bought himself a new sound system for Christmas. It really was a magical gift because now he likes just about anything!!!

So, he didn't just rent one of these shows to watch he went ahead and bought them all in blu ray! Oh silly! It has been great watching them together. It took us the whole Christmas break plus some, but we did it! I'm so proud!

Last story to share... this is a doosy! I dropped by a client's house on Thursday after dance. I had photos from their shoot. I went to the door, handed over the goods, was invited in, took off my shoes, watched client open goods... ohh-ed and ahh-ed, sat down, chatted, chatted some more... time to go, where are my keys? I opened their front door, oh yes, they would be in the van, that is still running because I was just planning on dropping these off! Really? Yes, really!

I remember stuff, I do! BUT, get me distracted and all bets are off!

I'm just glad my car was still in her driveway! It sure was toasty when I got in!

I love the winter weather... Epsom Salt Trees