Movie Review

Bridge Of Spies was not on "my" must-see movie list, but it was on Wild Bill's. We finally saw it this afternoon.

The first half was a little slow while they set up the background, but the second half made it all worth while. It probably won't surprise you when I say I spent the last 10 minutes just bawling. No, not the noisy sobs, but the couldn't-catch-my-breath-for-the-big-lump-in-my-throat kind of crying.

We gave the movie two thumbs up. Definitely see it at the movies as the big screen enhances the gloominess of the scenes in East Germany and on the bridges during the spy exchange. 

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Fall, Halloween And PicMonkey

I've been playing with PicMonkey, and I 'll warn you now it's addictive. 

I found some pictures of my old scarecrow and used PicMonkey to make the pictures look aged.

 I added just some slight color to the pictures to make them look old and faded.

After playing around with coloring and aging, I pulled up a picture of myself and used some of the tools in the Halloween effects section to make myself a vampire. I couldn't get it to fade as much as I would've liked, but it was fun just fooling around.

Here's a few of the original pictures so you can see what I started with. I purchased this fabric scarecrow about 7 years ago at a Cracker Barrel restaurant in their "country store" section.

The lighted pumpkin was $1.99 at a Walmart in 2004 or so. It still works well after 10 years, and I think it's just as cute as it can be. 
Since the smiles on the pumpkin and scarecrow are such happy ones, I like to put them by the front door to put the little Trick or Treaters at ease. 

If you haven't tried PicMonkey just click on the link below. It's free to use for their basic features. I did join for a small yearly fee recently but, to tell the truth, the features I use the most are all available for free anyway. 

If you have some time (make that lots of time) on your hands, try it. Here's the link, but remember I warned you it is addictive.

PicMonkey

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Note: Just sharing my opinion. No one at PicMonkey knows I exist and they sure didn't pay me for my opinion.


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The Dedicated House

Painting Aids From The Garden And More

The weather in Texas has finally cooled down enough to make it possible to paint in the garage again. Just in time for me, since I've been storing up painting projects most of the Summer.

 I stacked two chairs together and started painting with Annie Sloan's Chalk Paint in Country Grey. 

Yes, it does look like white doesn't it? It's actually a greenish-yellow-beige as far as I can tell. Here's a closer look at Country Grey on a frame I'm working over  on. Squince up your eyes so you don't see my bowl of onions, OK?

But, getting back to my story here...When my back started hurting from all the bending, I commandeered the rolling garden seat. We bought this mobile seat at Sam's Club, for around $69, early last Spring. 

 We haven't used it much for gardening, but it sure has come in handy for working on projects around the house. The seat swivels around and it's low to the ground, which allows for easy access to low areas.

 While we're on the subject, another handy low-cost item that I've found really helpful with painting projects is this flat moving dolly. We bought it a few years ago at Lowes for $12 and found it so handy, we immediately bought a second one.

It's great for moving a stack of boxes or you can use two of them to move couches, chairs and all sorts of furniture. I use them when I paint large pieces of furniture. Here is a cabinet I'm painting sitting on the flat dolly.

By placing the furniture on top of the flat dolly, I can paint the piece all the way to the bottom since the dolly holds it off the ground by a few inches and allows me to turn the piece all around. 

I'm not going to paint the cabinet Country Grey. I was just checking out how the paint adhered to the press board finish. I'll be back with these pieces when I get them done.

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Something To Talk About

Another Stop At 3 French Hens

On the trip to see our middle daughter's family, we planned to have lunch in Wildwood Missouri. This is my favorite lunch stop because the Three French Hens shop is located in Wildwood.

 I love the barely-there green color on the cabinet above, and I think the distressing is perfect. I couldn't take my eyes off it. If we had been headed toward home instead of away, I might have strapped it in the back of the pickup even though it was way out of my price range.

Though the Three French Hens store is located in a rural area about 20 miles west of St Louis, the place is huge. Because of time constraints, (Wild Bill was outside timing my 30-minute stop to the nano second) I really had to fly through the store to see everything and buy a little something.

 I like the black and white checked Mackenzie-Childs decor, but I'm not a huge fan of it. I took a few pictures to post for my fellow bloggers, like BJ at Sweet Nothings blog, who do love their stuff. Three French Hens has a lot (like two or three rooms full) of all things Mackenzie-Childs. 

The middle of the store is my favorite area. That's where this great old rock fireplace is and it's always decorated beautifully. This year, they moved their huge moose head above the mantle and decorated it for Fall. Love, love, love it!

Several sections of the store are decorated for Halloween. At the front door, you're greeted with beautiful trees wearing Halloween decorations in every color from bright apple green to deep purple. Here's one of the trees from a couple of angles...

I was really taken with the cloches full of Fall decor. I decided I had to try to duplicate one of these that I found especially pretty... 

 Just as I was trying to find something similar in their floral section, the owner stopped by and asked if I needed help. She walked back with me to the section where the cloches were and generously opened the cloche and took the pieces out that I admired. Since we couldn't find the exact one I was smitten with, she told me to take the one out of the cloche and she would have the florist rebuild it. This is one of the things I love about their customer service...the owner and her staff always make you feel nothing is more important than their customers!

I was fast running out of time that day, but still wanted to buy some of their cute Fall/Halloween ribbons. I regret I didn't take pictures in the floral department as their wreaths and door hangings (made with baskets instead of wreaths) were really pretty. If you look to the left in the picture below, you can see part of the floral section and some of the door hangings...

In addition to the two floral "leaf" rings, I bought a variety of ribbon yardage while at Three French Hens.  My plan is to make a duplicate of their Fall cloches and to make a hanging door basket. I already have a large cloche and one of their flat hanging baskets that I bought last time I was there.  

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From My Front Porch To Yours

A Post About Nothing And Everything

We have been 'out on the road' for ten days or so.

Our plan was to stop by and see Middle Daughter and family, do some babysitting while they took a quick 3-day break, then head down South and do a Southern Road Trip. 

Middle Daughter has been working on re-doing some of her rooms.
She bought a new table from World Market, which made her old chandelier look a little outdated. 

Before our trip, I asked her if she needed any furniture or help with anything. Don't laugh, but I'm always trying to pawn furniture off on our girls.

 She texted me the picture above, along with an image of her favorite Pottery Barn (PB) chandelier. I think the PB one she liked was this one or something like it...

She was thinking of replacing her chandy with the PB one.
Ugh...too much work taking a chandelier down!
My response: "Why can't we just paint yours, remove the globes and try the Edison bulbs that are popular?"

She responded she had an Edison bulb and shot me back this photo of one installed without the globe thingy.
With the lights on, the picture makes the silver chandy look like oil rubbed bronze, which is the look she wanted.
MUCH BETTER...

I told her we could try to age it down with stain as I did with a chandelier at our last house. I just rubbed wood stain on it with rags while it was hanging up in place (can you spell lazy?)

Post On Fixin' Up The Chandelier

Well, we went another way with it...
but I think it's going to turn out great. You'll have to wait til it's finished to see the final outcome though.

We had to leave early before it was completed due to a dental emergency and family issues. I broke the back of my tooth off the same day we learned Bill's cousin was in the hospital on life support. He died early the next morning so we decided to head home to the dentist and to attend a memorial service.

Life certainly throws you curves...

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