Quick Master Bedroom Update~Painting Picture Frames

Happy Monday! (and Happy National Coffee Day!) I'm back today sharing a quick update I did to the master bedroom.

When we did the big Master Bedroom Reveal...(you can see the whole post HERE), I showed you how I spray painted the mats in these picture frames from a hunter green to white. I was happy with the white mats, but still wanted to lighten up the frames a bit. As you can see in these "before" shots, the frames were a dark brown. 

They matched the wood on our headboard, night stand, and armoire, but I was itching to use some grey paint on them. 

We also had this dark brown frame on the armoire that I thought needed some lightening up. I thought it would match the white frame on the right a little better if it was painted a light grey. 

And here are the "afters."

I think the grey goes a little better with the overall color scheme. And I'm happy with how it flows nicely with our new Grey Master Bathroom.

I'm really happy with how the one on the armoire turned out...

Below is a closer look at the frames on top of the armoire (and if you look closely, you can see the whole reason these pictures are up here...to cover up that eye sore of a speaker.) 

Well, that's all for now. I plan on sharing my Fall Home Tour later this week. I'm waiting until I clean the house on Wednesday to photograph it though, so you don't have to see all my dust bunnies. :)

I have to say, I went in a totally different direction with my fall decor this year. If you want to see last year's fall decor, you can click HERE , HERE, and HERE.

Thanks for stopping by and I hope each and every one of you have a wonderful week!

~Lisa

A Lucky Streak and a Sneak Peek at Fall Decor

I seem to be on a roll lately with winning giveaways! Just look what arrived this week...

My sweet blogging friend Janine of The Happy Happy Nester teamed up with Jennifer of Dear Lillie to host this awesome giveaway, and I won! I love this pretty Autumn chalkboard print! Actually, I love pretty much everything Dear Lillie creates. :) I have it on the mantel for now, but I know I'll enjoy moving it around during the season. 

If you haven't visited Janine's blog yet, be sure to do so. She lives in my favorite state of California and has some awesome decorating ideas, recipes, household tips, etc. She's cute as a button and has the most beautiful smile too. :) I follow both Janine and Jennifer on their blogs as well as Instagram and there is always plenty of daily eye candy on there. :)

Oh, and continuing on the lucky streak, look what happened the other day...

I opened my almond joy to find an EXTRA ALMOND!!! Hee! What a nice surprise! Maybe I should buy a lottery ticket. ;)

I've been getting out all my fall decor and hopefully will share it with you soon. For little sneak peeks, you can follow along on Instagram at "texasdecor"

Hope you all have a beautiful day!

~Lisa

Easy Scone Recipe, Holly's Obsession, and a Cozy Mystery Book Recommendation

Have y'all started baking more now that it's getting closer to Fall and all the holidays? Oh my goodness...I can't seem to stop baking things!

I've been making this chocolate chip scone recipe for years and it's SO good!

It's from Sandra Lee (love her!) Here's a link to the recipe if you're interested: Mocha Chip Scones Recipe. 

I also made some pumpkin bread...

I always make two loaves (at least) and it's so nice to have it around for snacks and breakfast. 

Y'all...Holly is OBSESSED with ribbon!!! 

She LOVES to play with ribbon! And what's funny is that she totally prefers the red or pink ribbon to any other color. Lol! She will grab her ribbon, drag it over close to me, drop it at my feet and sit there looking from me to the ribbon while meowing until I get up and drag it around for her. Ha! She sure has figured out a way to communicate, despite our lack of a common language. :)

Oh, I almost forgot...I also made this chocolate bundt cake...

Do you see all that icing? That's a double recipe! Some days you just need a little (or a lot) of chocolate in your life. :)

Okay, I've talked about my love of Cozy Mystery books HERE. Basically a "cozy mystery" is more of a light mystery with little or no blood and gore. Most of them inject a little humor too. In the link above I talked about some of my favorites. My mom recently found a new cozy mystery series she's enjoying and since we pretty much have the same taste in books, I gave them a try and I loved them! The author is Gayle Trent and they're the "Myrtle Crumb Mysteries." Here's a link to her website where she talks about the series:

Myrtle Crumb Series

I think they're only available on Kindle right now. I got it on my Kindle, but my mom has the Kindle app on her iPhone and got it on there. The books are a quick read (around 100 pages each) and are only .99 cents on Amazon!!

Have y'all read any good books lately? Do tell!

Hope y'all have a wonderful day!

~Lisa

Household Tips

Hi there!

I can't believe it's been over a week since my last post! Things have gotten very busy since school started back up. Anyway, I did want to pop in and share a few household tips with you. 

First up, it's prime mosquito season in Texas. I'm telling ya...they're bad right now. I opened my front door the other day and there were about 50 of them just waiting to get inside. Yikes!

I think I shared this product once before, but if you're new here (and dealing with mosquitoes) this will be a life saver...

This is hands down, the BEST mosquito repellent I've ever used! I've never put DEET on my kids. I prefer to use a more natural product (especially when it's something you're spraying all over your skin). Here's a close up of the ingredients:

Even my hubby, who was VERY skeptical, was incredibly impressed. We've been using this stuff for years and it never disappoints. I've purchased it on Amazon, at my local health food store, and at my local grocery store. I think I paid around $12 for the 8 oz. size, but they also have a 4 oz. for about half that price.

Okay, on to a cleaning tip. Y'all have probably heard me say how much I love to clean. Well, that's true, but there's one thing I DON'T look forward to cleaning and that's the shower. Ugh. All that scrubbing is for the birds! I recently started using a combination of a couple of products and the results have been great!

Here's what I'm using...

I spray the Tilex on everything (glass, tile, shower floor, etc.) I let it sit for about 2-3 minutes, then I squirt some Soft Scrub on my scrub brush and start scrubbing. I think the combination of the two along with the bleach in the Soft Scrub is what does the trick.

What do y'all use to clean the shower? I know this sounds weird, but I LOVE trying out new cleaning products! :)

Oh, before I forget, here's one more tip for you. I keep Holly's litter box in the laundry room. I've never had a problem with an odor, but I still obsess about it. I use clumping litter which I think helps a lot because I can scoop the pee and the poo. (sorry for all the potty talk~ha!) And thankfully she's pretty "regular" so I pretty much know she's going to use the litter box right after she eats breakfast, and then again right before we all go to bed. Because of this, it makes it easy to empty the box right after she goes, which (hopefully) eliminates any odors. 

But, having said that, I still continue to worry about any lingering odors. So, here's what I came up with and it's so incredibly simple and inexpensive...

Yep...Bounce dryer sheets! I don't actually use them in my dryer, but I got a free sample in the mail the other day and I just kind of tucked one of the sheets beside a basket in the laundry room and my goodness...the whole laundry room smelled wonderful!! 

The fresh scent lingered around for days and it just smelled like freshly laundered linens. :)

In fact, the scent was almost too much, so I cut the sheet in half and that was just about perfect. After I used up my free samples, I bought a 40 count box for around $2 at the grocery store. And bonus... with cutting the sheets in half, the box will now last twice as long! 

Well, that's all my tips for today. Do you have any household tips to share? I'd love to hear them!

~Lisa

Phone Pics and Daily Life

Hello there! First of all, I wanted to thank y'all for all the sweet comments on my Home Tour! Y'all are the best! I even updated my header with new, updated pics and put a "Home Tour" button on my right side bar so you can click on it at any time to see the full tour. I think my Home Tour was the biggest post I've ever done with around 60 pics!! Lol!

I also heard from a few of you who were able to get in on the $5 magazine subscription sale on Amazon that I posted about on Instagram. Yippee! I love using Instagram to get the word out about quick sales and steals and deals I come across. (I would have done a post on my blog about the sale, but it was a one day only sale and I know most of you get my posts emailed to you and by the time you got the email, the sale would have been over) Anyway, I'd love for you to follow along on Instagram. You can find me @texasdecor.

Anyway, today I wanted to share a few phone pics with y'all. A lot of them are of food (nothing new there) and some are just pics of what I've been up to. 

Am I the last one on the planet to start reading Veranda Magazine? Oh my goodness, it is my favorite magazine now! (BTW, I used the "Pic Tap Go" app on the pic below. It has a feature called "lights on" that helps me so much with my dark pics. Check it out if you are into photography apps) 

I just recently subscribed to Veranda and I look forward to its delivery like you can't imagine. It's one of those magazines that I find myself studying. You know, like, I'll stare at a picture for several minutes just taking it all in, studying it and trying to memorize how they styled a coffee table, what different elements they brought in, textures, etc. Love it! (It was also one of the magazines included in the $5 sale and a few of you were lucky enough to get in on that! Score!)

Okay, have y'all seen these Cotton Candy flavored grapes?

I heard about them and was surprised that my local grocery store carried them. They're a tad expensive, but so worth it! I was VERY skeptical, but you know what? They really do taste JUST LIKE cotton candy! I have no idea how they do it, but they're wonderfully good, and good for you!

I told y'all about my affinity for Fresh Market, right? Oh. My. Goodness. They have the best cupcakes! Just look at how yummy this looks! In my defense, I do have to say that I cut it in half and only ate half of it (for breakfast) and saved the other half for dessert. Calories don't count when you split them up like that, right? Right??? By the way, you can NEVER have too many sprinkles in my opinion. :)

Did I ever tell y'all I wanted to name little Holly cat "Joaquin?" I LOVE that name and really wanted to name her that, even though she's a girl. But alas, my boys wouldn't have it. Oh well. 

She sure is enjoying my new garden stool as much as me. :)

Oh, Dollar Tree...you always seem to have something I "need." How cute is this little textured pumpkin? 

So, we went to Sam's the other day, and look what hopped into my cart...

Do you SEE how many are in there??? EIGHTY FOUR, Y'ALL!! Why can't I have the metabolism of my teenage boys? I'm telling you, they can eat anything and remain tall and skinny. Lucky! (said in my best Napoleon Dynamite voice) ;)

Do you remember how I was complaining that my youngest son was spending around $9 a day for his school lunch? Part of the problem was the $3 Starbucks frappuccinos he was purchasing daily. Well, I took care of that with this 12 pack from Sam's. 

They had a sale and they came out to about .90 cents a piece! Much better than the $3 he was spending on them at school. Now I can just send one with him each day and we're both happy. :)

Well, that's about it for now. Do you have a favorite magazine I need to know about?

Hope you all have a great day!

~Lisa

Ten Minute Kitchen Update

Hello! Did y'all have a good Labor Day weekend? I'm sure everyone's kids are probably back in school by now. The summer sure went by quickly. I have a little kitchen update to show you, but first I have a funny story to share with you about my son's school lunch. 

My youngest is in high school and first of all, can I just say how much school lunches have changed since I was in school? Oh my goodness...they have build your own burger bars, taco bars, pizza bars, etc. They even sell Starbucks Frappuccinos and Chick-Fil-A sandwiches. 

Anyway, I'm able to upload money to his lunch account online, then he uses his PIN number to pay for it. It's definitely convenient. I can also go online to see what he's buying and how much it costs.

After the first few days of school, I decided to go online and see what he had been eating and how much it was costing me. Well, I was a little shocked to see he was spending around $9 PER DAY!!! What??? Yep, nine dollars for a single day's school lunch! 

The problem was that he was buying a $3 frappuccino along with nachos, fries, cookies, etc. Needless to say, we had a little talk about a more appropriate amount to spend each day. ;) I do have the option of blocking certain foods (basically you can place a block on certain things so they can't purchase them) but so far, he's been able to curb his spending a little.  Is it just me or do y'all think $9 is a bit much for a school lunch? 

Okay, so on with the kitchen update. Remember when I said I had other plans for that frame by the backdoor? Well, let me show you what I did with it. 

Y'all probably remember this chalkboard I have in my kitchen. I love changing up those little papers for different holidays, birthdays, etc. (you can see the makeover I did on this chalkboard HERE) While I still love it, I thought it was time for a little change. 

So, I took the frame from the living room, and added this piece of scrapbook paper and this little "nest" printable I got several years ago. 

You can click HERE to see where I got this free printable. Like I said, I printed it several years ago, but I think the link still works.

I simply used double stick tape to attach the scrap paper to the white cardboard that was in the frame. Then I attached the printable right on top of the scrap paper and popped it back into the frame.

I just love this little definition of a "nest." :)

And here's the finished product...

Here's a close up of the frame. My sister in law gave it to me several years ago. She was going to donate it, but I scooped it up and brought it home with me. :) I think it was originally black, and I spray painted it Heirloom White. Then I dipped a foam brush in some watered down brown acrylic paint and just kind of rubbed it on the raised portion to bring out the design. 

I love how it looks on that wall!

Below is a wider shot. 

I've gotten a few emails about that clock. It's one of my favorite buys from Lillian Vernon years ago, but unfortunately I don't think they make it anymore. 

I've seen similar ones at Kirkland's from time to time. Do y'all have Kirkland's coupons texted to you? I signed up for that awhile ago and it's so neat to have their coupons so handy. 

Well, that's all for now. Hope y'all have a great day!

~Lisa