Merry Christmas

Posted on December 25, 2011 by April

The poochies were all snuggled in their beds for a long winters nap…

Here’s hoping you all have a very Merry Christmas, and remember why we have such a beautiful reason to celebrate!

” ¹¹For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Saviour, which is Christ the Lord.

¹²And this shall be a sign unto you; Ye shall find the babe wrapped in swaddling clothes, lying in a manger.

¹³And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God, and saying,

¹⁴Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men.”

Luke 2:11-14 KJV

Thanksgiving

Posted on November 24, 2011 by April

“They will celebrate Your abundant goodness and joyfully sing of Your righteousness.” Psalm 145:7

Thank you Lord for bringing me so much to be grateful for. And thank you for giving us this holiday to reflect on all those great and marvelous blessings.

Oh, family and our similarities…thank you.

My Bubba, with his Superman curl and silver hair, which are each named April…thank you.

My dogs who patiently wait for their walks while I try to find matching socks…thank you.

For my home, be it messy and dusty it shelters me from the cold and the rain…thank you.

Have a happy and grateful Thanksgiving!

Abundant Treasures

Posted on October 31, 2011 by April

I am participating in a ” 31 Days of…” series for the month of October. You see a whole bunch of sweet blogger buddies have been getting together the past few years to do 31 posts in 31 days. The topic is always something they have a passion for. This year they have invited all of their readers to post 31 days of their passions. If you are interested in participating in the 31 Days of…series, or you’re just curious about what everyone else is writing about, please visit The Nester, Jen, Melissa, Sandy, Darcy, Emily, and Emily. I hope you enjoy my series on finding treasures both vintage and of the heart. Let’s hope I can overcome my inconsistent blogging habit and share those 31 posts within the next 31 days!

Here we are on the final day of what was supposed to be 31 straight days of treasures. In this series of treasures I included any treasure be it a vintage treasure, a found treasure, or a treasure of the heart. Unfortunately, with travel and illness and general laziness, I wasn’t able to touch on all of the treasures I had hoped to touch on. So, be on the look out for a random treasure filled post here and there.

I had planned on ending this very short non-31 day series with a bang. However, I’m not really sure if I have any big bang content. So instead, I’ll share those treasures that are most dear to me.

Family that is also friend.

Faith in Christ.

Assistance with everything I do.

Watchful eyes guarding my every move.

Pretty things to photograph.

My love. The man, not UTEP.

What do you treasure most?

Post One Hundred

Posted on September 23, 2011 by April

Finally, the 100th post. Most people fall upon this milestone well within their first year of blogdom. However, I must be a late bloomer when it comes to blogging as my post one hundred is falling 4 months after my first blogiversary. Which by the way, I nearly forgot about, and had to include in one of my monthly wrap ups. Unfortunately, those monthly wrap ups have also fallen to the way side. Consistency is boring don’t you think?

Anywho, to celebrate 100 well written and life altering posts (Har-Har), I thought it would be fun to revisit some of the milestones that occurred here at Casa de Yellow. So let’s revisit those bad photo laden and run on sentence ridden posts shall we? (Not that you can’t find those in more recent posts.)

Way back in May 2010, this little blog that could was born. My first post extolled the joy that is Polyvore. Within this post I explained my plans for our living room, which at the time was Caribbean Sunset, a nice warm yellow tone. However, that has recently changed to Oat Straw by Behr. It’s more of a tan with some nice grey undertones. Not as bright or jarring as Caribbean Sunset, but no less smile inducing. Here’s what I had planned for my living room in May 2010. Click the picture to see what I said about the room.

Apparently, my style choices have changed over the past 1 1/2 years. Those choices now lean more towards neutral walls with pops of bright color here and there instead of bright walls with pops of color everywhere. I have found this change to be much more soothing to my style palette and my little eyes. Although, I still have an appreciation for color, and see nothing wrong with homes that still favor the bright walls. It’s just not for me anymore, or at least for right now. Whose to say that I won’t be repainting my walls yellow within a year?

After sharing the joys of Polyvore, I finally talked about painting our one and only bathroom. This may not seem like a huge feat to some, but for me and Bubba it was a big deal. Our old bathroom was peach and minty green with hints of mold and water damage. So, after finally getting an exhaust fan installed to eradicate future mold issues, I was able to paint our lone loo, Cincinnatian Hotel, a pretty light blue by Valspar. Here’s what she looked like after I stuck a fork in her and called her done. (Please excuse the poor quality photo, this was taken at night with my simple point and shoot and long before I got my fancy schamancy camera.)

Not much happened in July 2010, just the usual inspiration pictures from the interwebs. I did try my hand at a book review without much ado (Woo-Hoo! Rhyming is fun!). August came, and finally something big and life changing happened…

That’s right, Bubba finally gave in and put a ring on it. Once I was over the stunned shock of being a betrothed woman, the wedding planning frenzy began, and then quickly fizzled. At first I was super excited about having a shin dig all my own. But then the stress started in, dates were set and then changed, illnesses came and went and then came back. All of August and September 2010 I was laid up with a horrible case of bronchitis that caused me to lose my voice. Bubba thought this was hiliarious. Until he realized this meant he would be making all the phone calls to priests, preachers, and dressmakers. (Karma rears her ugly head! MAWHAHAHA)

With wedding planning going on, I really didn’t blog much, except to share some verses that were pretty poignant to me at the time. Actually, I still read through them. It’s like April from a year ago is teaching present day April. Those posts touched on subjects such as timing, waiting, impulsiveness, patience, and constant prayer. At the time I was struggling with these issues, in fact I still do. So thank you 2010 April! Maybe 2011 April should leave some wise words for 2012 April.

The fall of 2010, marked a very short engagement to Bubba, teeny bit of illness and some wedding plans mixed in for good measure. Bubs and I toyed with the idea of running off and getting married with just us. We also thought it might be nice to wait until spring had sprung to say our vows. But in the end, a quick engagement is what best suited us. After 7 years of dating bliss it was time to experience martial bliss. So, on December 29th 2010, we became Mr. and Mrs.

Getting married was stressful and if I could there would be things I would have done differently. But the man I chose to marry? I wouldn’t change that for the world. And I got to share our special day with some of my loved ones and lots of his. It really was a blessed day.

January flew by, and before we knew it we were in February. The month of love brought a new furry friend cuddle up with.

Goldie, the lovable yellow lab mix. In this post I talk about having her on a trial basis, but little did I know I’d fall for her loving brown eyes and sweet tail thumps “hello”. I am proud to say that Goldie is now a permanent fixture in our home.

March blew in and brought with it more cold weather, and the hope of a green lush yard. Bubba and I ripped out our crusher fine in preparation for grass seed. So our yard went from this:

To this:

You can read about the beginning of the yard saga here and here. Sadly, after looking at these photos, I can see that the plants were in better health before any work happened. Wonder if it could be linked to some bad wood chips.

Here is my yard a couple months ago:

The grass that is 50% dead there, is now more like 75%. I’m hoping that by watering a little more and fertilizing it should come back. I may also over seed this fall. Here’s to hoping the dogs don’t completely destroy my efforts!

In April, things were still windy, but that didn’t stop me from celebrating my 30th birthday and taking a quick roadtrip to Arizona. Where I partook in the hype that is In-n-Out Burger. The verdict…meh. I much prefer the local favorite Lotaburger. But I’m not biased.

In May, I finally took the plunge and had our block wall stabilized and extended. In the lower part of this picture you can also see our attempts at grass seed.

June flew by, and I was working too hard to worry about maintaining a silly blog, there was a party to plan for darn it! But I did manage to complain about cheap mulch I paid a pretty penny for. Which still causes me grief when I’m stabbed by mysterious sharp objects every time I weed or clean the yard. Honestly, the stuff gives me the creeps and I fear it may be responsible for my dying established plants. GRRR

After the frustrations of June, July finally arrived! Which meant that it was finally time to party!

A great time was had by all. Even I had boo-hoos of fun! All that work and stress was so very worth it to be able to share my home with friends and loved ones.

After all the work over the summer, I wasn’t really up to much in August and September. I spent my time trying to catch up on blog posts, general house maintenance and reconnecting with my old friend, Sir Sofa.

That’s my year and 6 month review, lots of big milestones happened over the past year and a half, our lone loo got a small makeover, I went from girlfriend, to fiance, to wife in less than a year, the backyard is slightly more grassy than it was last year, and we have our own little fortress of solitude in the back. Wonder what the 200th post will bring…

Slacking

Posted on August 18, 2011 by April

My slackerdom has finally cast its ugly net onto my blogging habits now. Today I realized it’s been nearly a month since my last post! There’s got to be some sort of cure for this slackery. It’s even reached it’s craggly cold hand into my photo editing, as I am still working on editing all the photos for the much awaited and talked about party post. But rest assured, that is coming very soon!

The lack of posts doesn’t mean that Bubba and I have been sitting around twiddling our thumbs, or that I haven’t been snapping copious amounts of dog photos (believe me, my furkids run when they see that huge black clicky box). It just means that I’ve been too preoccupied enjoying the summer. There’s been too many fun things to do out and about rather than sitting at home typing away at my laptop. Even with all those great and spectacular things that have been keeping me away from my beloved blog, it was high time to come back for a little RR in my cozy net cottage.

So pull up a virtual chair and grab a glass of virtual lemonade and cozy up on my virtual front porch for a photo story of what we’ve been up to these days.

Like observing the local wildlife. Be very quiet, the native Annie dogs are grazing.

Notice how intently my Golden girl is still observing the grazing Annie. This is what the evening dog outings entail. Run, eat grass, run, watch other dog eat grass, repeat as needed.

This tail, although it may look harmless, has caused the demise of many a milk glass vase. But isn’t it beautiful?

Aside from observing grazing Annie’s and avoiding happy dog tails, there’s also been other wildlife to enjoy. I’ve got a pair of praying mantis’ living in the front flower bed.

Annie loves to observe Bubba in his natural habitat, the couch, with a Sponge Bob Square Pants Gameboy.

Sometimes the observing pays off, and you get a new frisbee.

A tail wagging new Frisbee.

And a tail wagging and sniff inducing chew bone.

Also crazy eye inducing bone.

After the new toys had been sufficiently chewed, torn, and otherwise played with, it was time for an evening drive. Goldie loves car rides.

Annie not so much.

But once one has arrived at one’s destination, it’s all business. SNIFF SNIFF

We take our walks seriously around here.

We also take our sunsets seriously. And I mean seriously, is God a great artist or what? He creates a beautiful sunset for us to be blessed with every evening. And they are all different. I hear sunrises are just as awe-inducing, someday I will wake up early enough to enjoy the beautiful sunrise our Lord has made for us….someday.

All that running and chasing and picture-taking calls for a special treat. How about some peach cobbler? Bubba made this from fresh peaches, baked in his new vintage Fire King dish.

Here’s what it looked like a couple of days later.

We may or may not have had cobbler for dinner one night this week, and it may or may not have been eaten straight from the casserole dish. And my jeans may or may not have screamed out in agony.

After all that cobbler it’s time to snuggle up on the couch with your sweetie.

That pretty much sums up the goings on at Casa de Yellow. We have been slacking on some of our chores, but certainly not on our enjoyment of summer.

Lazy Days of Summer

Posted on July 21, 2011 by April

If you haven’t guessed, our belated wedding/ house warming party is now over, done, finito! Honestly, I wasn’t sure if we would all make it to the other side alive, the preparation, the work, the stress, the sleepless nights, (did I mention the stress?) all seemed to take its toll. But surprisingly, or not so surprisingly, we made it, and we can now relax and revel in the fact that we have our spare time back. We no longer need to spend our weekends moving rocks or scrubbing the bathroom. That is, there are no chores or projects on a deadline any longer. Unless the bathroom is starting to turn green and fuzzy, then we are definitely on a deadline to kill that green germ-y beast!

All this talk of having no time for fun makes it sound like I did everything on my own, but that’s far from the truth. I know without a shadow of a doubt that things never would have gone so smoothly without the help of our family and friends. From set up to tear down, our sweet loved ones were there! My aunt and uncle from Ohio even flew down for the party! I never felt so loved. My poor sweet mother came over 3 times in one week! That’s asking a lot when you consider there is 81 miles ,one way mind you, between my house and her house. She must really love this little party planner!

By the way this little party planner would love to share lots of great artistic photos, but alas, she was much too busy making sure everyone had a place to sit and food to eat. But now that the dust has settled, I really wish I had taken the time to document more of what we ate, and how things looked. Especially, now that I have had the chance to think about how much time went into those things. But really, I got some nice snapshots of all our sweet guests, which is much more important than the food or the decor. Maybe I can sweet talk some of our guests into sharing the shots they were able to capture while Bubba and I were busy hosting. *Hint Hint*

In the mean time, here’s what we’ve been doing with all of our free time…

Enjoying our messy house, which has been cleaned up a bit since these pictures were taken. I can only handle a disheveled kitchen for so long.

All those glasses on the table are from the party. I insisted on using real glasses, even though I had to buy them behind Bubba’s back! He wanted to use all plastic ware as it doesn’t need to be washed which is a valid point. But I just couldn’t bring myself to seeing red plastic cups on my pretty tables. So, the morning of I ducked out to get some last-minute items, one of which was the real glasses you see here. Purchased from the dollar store, a box of 16 for $8 , not a bad deal if you ask me. However, upon my return home with my purchase, Bubba’s only remark about the glasses that we will surely reuse, “Well, your washing them after the party!” Thankfully, Bubba’s sweet aunts must have sensed the tension and took the initiative and washed all of them when I wasn’t looking! Marrying into a huge family, with 8 new aunts, certainly has it’s benefits! Thanks to my new aunts-in law!!!

Aside from dodging dish washing, I decided that after three months of having dirt under my nails, it was high time to do something girly and relaxing. So I went and got a mani-pedi. The poor lady that had to sand off my hooves, wasn’t quite as relaxed. But she got a good tip for putting up with my nasty hooves and dirty finger nails. I love being a girl again!

I’m not the only one relaxing these days, no Bubba didn’t go with me to get a mani/pedi. The doggies must have gotten tired watching all the work, this was the scene on our sofa the day after…

{By the way, I have some posts coming about my new gallery wall, which by the way will be relocated, and my new living room paint color!}

A couple days after the party, my mom was back in town to drop off my sweet aunt and uncle at the airport. As always, the puppies were oh so excited to see her. Especially Goldie…

My golden girl refused to release my mother from the ultimate snuggle…

There came a time in the middle that all my poor mother could do was grin and bear it.

When we weren’t napping on the sofa or terrorizing our guests with the never ending snuggle, we all enjoyed a nice sunset stroll…

There’s nothing like kickin’ back and watching the sunset…

This was our view…

Sunset strolls make some of us very happy…

However, some of us prefer trolling the internet for good deals…

Sunset walks are fun and call for a butt wiggle at the mention of them, (yes, sometimes I participate in the excited butt wiggle) but watching the neighborhood from the comfort of your own home is priceless…

Before my aunt and uncle had to head back to the Buckeye state, my mom and I got to grab some precious time with my aunt at Goodwill. I love watching sisters shop, especially when they both have such flowery personalities (notice the floral theme). See, much like other families, in mine we tend to have similar styles and tastes. At least for the women in my family, I really can’t see my uncle wearing a pink shirt with white flowers.

Since, I don’t have a lot of party pictures to share yet, I will give you a sneak peek of what I do have. Some of these were taken after the fact, others were taken as a practice run before the party. Example, the beautiful pork loin that my sweet husband made the week before.

Here we have my tissue pom-poms, this was taken a week after the party so you will have to excuse it’s droopiness. I made at least ten of these guys in yellow, white, and green. Our theme was lemon and lime, I just love the way yellow and green just go together perfectly. If you are interested in making your own pom-poms please visit my good friend Martha Stewart here.

I also hung yellow and white battery operated lanterns in my little tree. Most of them came from an online store, but I picked up a few extra white lanterns at the dollar store. I found the dollar store lanterns were much brighter and held a battery charge much longer than my special order lanterns.

I had lots of color hanging from my tree with the pom-poms and lanterns, but I also wanted color on my tables. Enter my bazillion and twenty yellow flowers, I was able to use all 16 of my vintage milk glass bud vases! It was an exciting time.

And we’ve gotten to enjoy these cheerful guys long after the party.

I’ll end on the most important aspect of throwing a party, the food!! Here is the practice pork loin that Bubba smoked the week before. Isn’t it pretty, and he even achieved the much sought after pink ring, which means it was smoked perfectly, not that it’s raw! Which was my first inclination when my sweet husband proudly proclaimed the perfection that is the pink ring. At least when it comes to smoked pork.

I have a story to tell about the smoking meat the morning of the party. But since I am at 1, 326 words now I’ll end with a few words of advice. When having a party at your home, hire out as many home improvement professionals as possible, hire a maid, and be sure the fire department is on speed dial!

I need an Armadillo

Posted on April 20, 2011 by April

Yay! We have grass! It’s not much to write home about, but it’s green! Which means a lot when you live in a water conservative desert city.

And not only do we have green grass, but the apricot tree is sort of coming back.

Never mind the dead branches in the middle, those are Annie Dog’s signature. (She likes to jump into the plants and trees when we aren’t watching.)

Speaking of dogs, the grass would be greener and more plentiful if it could actually be watered. Annie and her assistant Goldie, tend to enjoy chewing on hoses, and rendering them useless until being meticulously repaired by Bubba.

Here are the most recent victims…

Hopefully these poor unfortunate souls can be repaired and re-used in the front.

I know you can’t count them, but there are FIVE hoses there. Five hoses that watered the once pretty yard. Five hoses that only lasted a couple of weeks, sometimes a couple of days, due to the rotten beastlys that I have chosen to share my yard with.

Numerous methods of curtailing the hose chewing have been attempted. We have used a quick connect, to remove the hose entirely from the yard, hence, removing any temptations from Annie’s habitat.This didn’t work, because it curtailed our watering habits since the hose needed to be brought in from outside the yard and connected to the faucet. Then, we used a hose reel. This worked pretty well, as the hose lived inside a box, which effectively concealed and protected it from our canines. However, the tangled mess that became our hose was too hard to deal with. Frustration ensues…So to end the frustration, I am currently looking at some different watering options, but that’s a whole different post.

The hoses and sprinklers are not the only things getting injured around here. Friday while Bubba was trying to repair yet another chewed up hose, he cut through the hose and through his finger.EEK!

Three hours at the urgent care and six stitches later he was good to go.

Maybe it’s time to invest in one of these…

Via

I love the pooch they have on their site…

Via

That look of utter disgust is just hiliarious. That’s the look I want my doggies to make the next time they try to chew through an expensive hose. Of course, I don’t want them to get hurt, I just want to discourage the hose chewing and plant-eating a bit.

By the way, does anyone want two “free” dogs?

Green and Spring all over

Posted on March 31, 2011 by April

March to me means, green and lots of it. Maybe it’s that certain holiday that requires most of us to wear green lest we suffer the pinchie consequences, or it could be all the green that’s popping up in the emergence of last years dafodlis and iris bulbs.

Or the FRUITING Mulberry tree in the backyard. Yup, fruiting, which means we have mushy mulberries littering our walkways during the summer months. Yummy but messy.

The rose bush is sorta coming back, I hope the ole girl didn’t completely freeze over the frigid winter.

Hopefully soon I’ll have some green grass to show you, but if you are interested, tales of our grass growing saga can be found here and here. Here’s Bubba sowing the seed…

Is that a sprout?

By the way we have the little fence up to keep the brat dogs out of our grass experiment. It’s not working…

Here’s to hoping for lots more green in the coming months!!

P.S. I am linking up the the monthly color story over at Pancakes and French Fries. This month the color was shades of yellow, but I cheated and decided to switch April and March (I’m a rebel like that!). Now, here at my casa/blog March will be emerald and April will be yellow. Sorry Jules, hope you forgive me!

Tail Spins

Posted on March 24, 2011 by April

The past few weeks Bubba and I have been shoveling, scraping, occasionally cursing, and wishing we’d had enough funds to higher our own guy. No we haven’t put a hit on anyone and buried them in the backyard, but we have torn out the old xeriscape, weed membrane and all.

Here’s our progress thus far…

{Notice the little aussie shep enjoying the newly un-earthed and muddy dirt that lay under the old plastic weed membrane and pea gravel.}

Here’s what we started out with…

It doesn’t look so bad in the pictures, but it really is that bad. The dirt and dust get trapped in dog fur and carried into the house. Yuckie…so there is definitely a need for some sort of ground cover. You can find more of my ideas for the yard and some before pictures here.

As you can see, we’ve got a lot of work to do. Only half the yard has been stripped of it’s gravel. And that half hasn’t been tilled under and seeded yet. And I am still researching pet friendly and desert friendly plants to put in the flower beds.

But in between all the work and the planning, there is plenty of fun being had. For instance, Bubba and the doggies have been going on “spins”…

More??

I don’t think so buddy…

Of course both dogs get a spin

But personally I think Annie likes the hug more…

Aww…

P.S. Bubba would like it noted that in the sequence of Goldie being spun, it may appear she was dropped after her spin. But to the contrary she was gently placed on the ground, he was simply asking her if she would enjoy another “spin” around the yard. Thank you, and good day!

Colors of Winter…

Posted on February 4, 2011 by April

For nearly a year now, I’ve been blog stalking. Stalking fashion blogs, DIY blogs, designer blogs, food blogs, photography blogs, blogs about blogs. I’ve grown quite an affection for the blog. That’s why I started this silly little blog back in May, I needed a blog home. A place to come back and covet others blogs. You know the ones, with pretty pictures and pretty words, with proper grammar and witty comments, and no run-on sentences. I know it’s wrong to covet, but I can’t help myself when it comes to other peoples beautiful blogs.

One of my favorite covet worthy blogs is Pancakes and French Fries. This lady is hilarious, and beautiful to boot. ( Heh heh, I can’t say boot without thinking of Robin from “How I met your Mother”, a-BOOT). She’s recently started a series of color stories on her blog home, and has invited her blog friends, and I’m hoping blog stalkers, to partake in this project. And in keeping with one of my many New Years resolutions, I’ve decided to step out from behind my blog “stalkiness” and participate.

For January, Ms. Jules, chose grays and creams and pretty much anything that could be found on a cold winter day. So, I’ve done my best to find subjects that were gray-ish and creamy and sort of winter-y. I will be a copycat for my first color story, and present this puppy in journal/story form.

In January…

We got married. (Well actually, we got married at the end of December, but it was close enough to January I thought I’d include it.)