Makin' An Old Thing New

Months ago when we moved into our first apartment, we were faced with the "problem" of not having any furniture to fill it. Lucky for us, we live close to my family and they are oh so generous. It just so happened that my brother and SIL had moved into their first home a few months earlier and had some "hand me down" furniture to give us. Although I felt incredibly blessed they gave us 2 bookcases, 2 end tables and a coffee table--they didn't quite go with our grey + yellow theme that I had my mind set on. So...we got our DIYer caps on and transformed them...we used an electric sander to take off the previous paint/finish then used a gray paint and laquer to finish them off so they wouldn't ruin easily. I was and still am so happy with the end result!

Low Country Boil

One of the many advantages of dating a Southern Gentleman is the delicious food that he can cook up. This weekend we had our first "Low Country Boil" here in Southern California. Our chef boiled up some sausage, corn, potatoes and shrimp that turned out amazing! We also had some of our longtime family friends, Mike & Kristi, down to enjoy a little taste of the South.

Beach Camping

This weekend we headed down to the beach for a weekend of camping to celebrate Shannon's 25th Birthday. We had a blast hanging out with great friends, playing smash ball, bbqing, bon fire jamming and treating the "Birthday Queen" to special birthday festivities-cupcakes, pinata and all. We couldn't have asked for more perfect weather, and we're already looking forward to doing this again someday soon!

Coffee Table Tray

For the past few months I have been on the hunt for the *perfect* coffee table tray. Unfortunately I didn't find one that I loved, or if I did it was out of my budget. So...I did what any other lover of all things creative would do and made my own. I didn't use a whole lot of supplies in creating this tray, and luckily I had most of it on hand already which meant I only had to spend about $10!

I knew this tray was going to live on our gray coffee table, so despite my first ambition, I could not paint the entire thing gray. Instead, I incorporated the yellow color that we have in our living room, and also added some burlap to get the more rustic look. To harden the burlap and make it stick, I used modge podge [a whole lot of it].

Brother Birthday & Easter Fun!

This past weekend we went out to celebrate my big brother's 30th birthday [I can't believe I just typed that...we're getting old]! He is not the "surprise party" type guy, so my wonderful SIL planned a nice night of drinks at the Rooftop in Laguna and dinner at K'Ya Bistro. We had a great time drinking Mojitos with a beautiful Spring view of the Ocean and eating yummy tapas. Sunday we celebrated Easter [Easton's First!...see more of his first egg hunt over here] and made a wonderful brunch, complete with homemade Eggs Benedict [a lot harder to make hollandaise sauce than one would think] and peach bellinis!

Me and the Birthday Boy!