{The New House} Silver Reflections

{The New House} Lovely Mantle

I love our fireplace—it is not messy at all. I love it because even I can start a fire---by switching the “on” switch. :)  At first I hated our mantle---it was just so “blah.”  Then we painted the living room walls the nice Cobblestone gray color and now the white mantle just pops!  Recently, Cliff and my dad mounted our television and then began running speaker wires for Cliff’s new sound system that he “got for his birthday” when really I told him since it would make things easier—he could just go buy the sound system he wanted for his birthday. I decided to add a few of our pictures and I recently bought the cool silver candle holders at ZGallerie in Dallas last weekend.

Any way, here is our mantle:

This isn’t the best quality of picture---it was pretty late at night and for some reason I just could not eliminate the shake on my camera---which means I’m usually too lazy to break out my tripod. Oh well, it’s a picture—so there ‘ya go. :)

365 Photo Project

Well, we have moved into our new house, (even though we have a few straggling boxes left at the apartment and some odds and ends….

I have not done a 365 post in a WHILE---so I thought I’d update with some images.  I have not been so successful with capturing an image every single day; it is definitely more challenging than I originally thought.

Without further adieu, here are some more of my 365 images:

Day 6: The chandelier in our dining room with the new wall color: Cobblestone from the Martha Stewart Living collection. I am surprised that Cliff actually went for the gray color—I figured it would be more of a fight!  Eventually, I would like to get some white drum shades for the bulbs on this chandelier.

Day 8: Saturday, October 2nd. I love this basket that I found at Maypearl’s Antique Alley weekend recently.  I think it will be great on our kitchen island or bar.  It will be especially great for holding some cookies (as shown) or treats during the holidays, (which, we are hosting Christmas this year for my Shankle family!)  This image is from my grandfather’s 80th birthday party last weekend out at the Batchelor cabin in Naples. We had SO many cookies all homemade by my aunts and cousin!

Day 9: Sunday, October 3rd. Our new kitchen island in the back of my dad’s truck as he’s driving off from Canton First Monday Trade Days with it.  We are so excited about this island! It’s perfect for our kitchen and it’s repurposed out of an old school.  My dad put locks on the casters to make it less likely to move around.  The top has a lot of carvings in it such as, “Viva Mexico, Erika!” and “Carlos” and several other things….including one that is inappropriate that we did not notice until after we bought it.  We are contemplating carving our names in it and the date we moved into our new house---not sure if we’ll do that or not though.

Day 10: Monday, October 4th. Our living room, equipped with new paint! I did not like the fireplace much at first, but with the new paint color---I’m definitely liking it more!

Day 11: Tuesday, October 5th. I’m so excited that we both have a covered parking spot that no one will take---in our own garage!!!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Day 12: Wednesday, October 6th. Our dining room with the new paint color!    

Day 13: Thursday, October 7th. I drove through and got some bar b que at the brand new Rudy’s in Arlington on the way home, in hopes of not loosing time on packing. It is SO nice to have a Rudy’s close now! We are big time Rudy’s fans!

  Day 14: Friday, October 8th. This is about the time we went to bed---finally on Friday night---why you might ask?  Because we were still packing---and I wouldn’t say we actually finished it—we just began to shove crud in baskets, sacks, and boxes to move other stuff to the house.

Day 15: Saturday, October 9th. MOVING DAY! Yes, I color coded the moving boxes according to which rooms they went in. Then, I took it one step further and posted a legend by each door the guys would be coming in with our stuff!

Well, that is it for now! I’m hoping I won’t lag farther behind on my blogging due to not having internet if At&t doesn’t get their act together and let us know for sure whether or not we can have U-Verse at our house. (All the houses we share a property line with have it---but the website is saying that we can’t.)

Happy Sunday, and see ‘ya later!

{DFW Photographer} Wait, You Mean I’m a Grownup Now?

Life has been crazy busy in the last few weeks.  Just in the last week a couple of very eventful things happened in our family.

Monday started with the birth of our beautiful niece—the first Carpenter grandchild, Zoey Carpenter!  Zoey decided to come 5 days early because she just couldn’t stand hiding out any longer.  Around 10:00 Monday, September 20th, Zoey made her first appearance into the world. (pictures to come later.)

Friday was a very eventful day on a personal level for Cliff and Myself.  We took the plunge, nearly emptied our bank account, and purchased a house.  You might remember that we started searching for a house back in January, and it ended up being quite the ordeal if you have read this post. We didn’t broadcast the information very much to our friends or on facebook, etc. because we did not want to go through the frustration of explaining to everyone again if the deal fell through.

The house is not as large as the last one we had under contract---but it is of good quality and in a good neighborhood, and it was cheaper! We were able to put the house on a 20 year note, so we’ll have it paid off faster! Nevertheless, we are still very excited to be purchasing our very first home together and getting it ready to move into during the next couple of weeks.

In lieu of starting a new chapter of our lives together, AND getting my trusty little point and shoot—the Canon G11, (which I am LOVING,) I have decided to start a “365” project where I post one picture a day, (or post several pictures—one representing each day prior,) based on our first year adventure as being home owners in Mansfield, Texas.  I’m not sure that these photos will always be the best quality that I am capable of, but I did want to document this first year journey of becoming home owners because this is a place we worked so hard to get to, and there was a lot of time invested in the search for this new home. (So the above displayed photo of Cliff and me standing in front of our new house counts as day #1.)

Here are images from the 25th and 26th of September.  Shamefully, I kind of forgot and didn’t take a singe picture yesterday on the 27th. :(

Here is a shot of our cousin’s daughter: Kenna, singing at the top of her lungs with a paint brush in one of our guest bedrooms.  This girl cracks me up, and is not afraid to sing and dance in front of you.  She makes me smile every single time I see her. Love her and her parents SO much!

 

Like I said, these photos are not of great quality but hey, they are photos and they are part of documentation of this new journey we are taking this next year!

Today’s image is of the custom cupcake picks I made for my grandfather’s 80th birthday party set for this weekend. Think he might get me for posting an old football picture of himself?

On another sad note, I am so glad that we were not in Austin today to have to experience the shooting at the University of Texas.  Cliff is a UT alum and we visit fairly often.  If you have not heard, there was a tragic shooting in one of the libraries on campus involving a student shooter who fired off several rounds before taking his own life.  Fortunately, he did not hurt anyone else, but it was scary either way.

Ray's Pharmacy

Today is MLK day.  I'm doing my part of service by taking care of Cliff while he's recovering from the flu.  He seems to be feeling a little better today, still has some fever, but it seems to be going down.  Last night he didn't have to get up at all and he only slept with one blanket.  It seems things are getting back to normal. 

Well, we ventured out to get some Wendy's because that is what Cliff was craving for lunch, and on our way home we stopped by a local pharmacy that opened a new location on Broad street in Mansfield. 
The building has classic appeal and fits in nicely with a small town.  By my standards, it is super cute.  Cliff and I walked in the door and found ourselves in a pharmacy of traditional style--equipped with a gift section, pharmacy, and a soda fountain!  Near the front we managed to meet the man who started Ray's pharmacy in 1954, Mr. Lee Roy Ray.  In the back there is an old large oak cabinet with glass doors that lift up with a collection of Ray's memorabilia.  Mr. Ray shared memories about some of the items in the collection and the history of the pharmacy, including a prescription book that was opened to a prescription written for his future daughter in law when she was two years old.  We found out that Mr. Ray sold out to his son and now there are five Roy's Pharmacy locations in the area. 

I loved how small town and traditional feeling that the pharmacy still embraces.  It seems to pull off that feeling in a town that is booming with five high schools and has neighborhoods popping up all over the place.  The owners seem to have done things right, because the Soda Fountain was booming with lunch business, and as a result, others were roaming around the pharmacy as well. This pharmacy reminds me of the trips we used to take to Louis Morgan in Longview that has now blossomed into a gift store popular for local wedding registries as well as a pharmacy.  I really enjoy shopping at local businesses and supporting of my local community, and hopefully developing relationships with store owners and having that friendly interaction, so I think Ray's Pharmacy will probably be getting some of our future business.  If you live in the Mansfield area, check them out!