A Typical Monday

I had a day full of organizing, gardening, vacuuming, laundry, and chasing around 5 kids. I made Braden take a minute to snap a photo for a project I'm working on, with a peek at the chicken run I featured on hello there! house today. Head on over there for a better look of what we worked on this weekend. Now I'm off to relax and watch some College Football- Roll Tide!

Foto Friday: Week 18

I've been delving into my new gardening obsession, and planted some seeds for the very first time into my raised beds. I started out slow with putting in lettuce transplants, which are doing phenomenal by the way, but I've been so nervous trying to grow something from a seed. Kelly sent me some seed packets and I put some seeds into the ground. As I walked out to my garden at the beginning of this week, what did I see? Little sproutlets peeking out of the soil, and my heart leapt! New life!

I don't have a macro lens, so this is as good of a shot I as could get, but I'm so thrilled about this major acheivement! Pretty soon, these will be Endive greens that we will gobble up. We've had a fabulous crop of lettuce from those transplants that we got out and pick from everyday to create the BEST salads I have ever had.

Now bounce over to the other ladies of Foto Friday's blogs to see their Beginnings posts

Meg

Hilary

Kristyn

Christine

This week has been devoted to deep cleaning

I've scrubbed and scoured and washed every inch of my house EXCEPT my kids rooms. I don't know if I have it in me to take it on today- but I must try since we break ground on our chicken coop TOMORROW! Squeee! So thrilled to finally start this, since in no time our chickens will start laying eggs.

I've drawn up plans and Braden is getting all the supplies together so we can get this thing in gear.

Until then though, I will try and find the strength to finish the last room- but oh! I have the best thing to share. I gathered up a TON of homemade cleaning recipes while I was on my cleaning rampage and shared them all on the hello there! house blog! Head on over there for a printable PDF that you can stick on your fridge to have handy!

Our Christmas Tree

Exciting news over at hello there! house- we have begun our Christmas Tree Tours! We started with me, so head on over there to see how my tree is shaping up this year:

Washi Tape Kit & Christmas Art Brushes from my favorite Elf

Cyber Monday Madness

How was everyone's weekend? Mine. Was. Fabulous.

I cooked and cooked and we ate and ate. And ate. My Thanksgiving meal was a hit {yes, I actually prepared everything on the menu and we have leftovers for 3 weeks.} and then I had a fun Black Friday morning running around San Tan Mall with my mom, grandma, and littlest sister Barrett. I didn't go out searching for anything crazy, but I DID grab a gift for my sister Eryn and snagged this darling scarf for myself at a great deal {Penelope wanted to model}.

The rest of the weekend was spent as The Christmas Fairy sprinkling cheer and holiday decorations all over my house. It was THE BEST! Braden had to go out of town unexpectedly, so I stayed up super late making up a ton of Christmas stuff! I'll show it off here tomorrow for Team Tuesday, and there will be a sneaky peek of it on the hello there! house blog later today for My House Monday feature, The Watson Abode.

Now onto the Cyber Monday Madness! Rhonna Designs is having a fantastic sale, 40% off of a $20 purchase with the coupon code RDcyber11. Look at all the fabulous new fonts & kits that came out today:

Apex Font

$2.99

Bit O Honey Font

$2.99

Chic Shack Font

$2.99

Christmas 2011 Font

$2.99

Lulu Font

$2.99

Rhonna Designs Dingbat Font

$2.99

Sol Man Font

$2.99

Swell Font

$2.99

Christmas Junque Card Kit

$15

Junque Labels Kit

$6

Punk Junque Kit

$6

Isn't all this new stuff too fabulous? I am obsessed with the Punk Junque. And the fonts? The Christmas dingbats are going to be so awesome to uses for gifty tags. 

Now, also for this Cyber Monday fest we are having, I must shoo you all over to the hello there! house blog this morning for our Handmade Holiday Gift Guide that the fabulous Lindsee put together for us! There is something for everyone on your list there! 

Team Tuesday: Garden Art

I've finally started my garden here at home, and I couldn't resist adding a little bit of pretty to all my potted herbs. It just adds some flair to the typical everyday plant. 

For these fun little garden flags that I've used to label my herb pots I used the Grateful Glam Background Kit and the Honeycomb Background Kit.

I printed a bunch of backgrounds out on cardstock with the herb names in Campbell Font. Then I ran it through my mom's laminating machine she bought like 10 years ago, and glued them to some skewers to mark off the plants. Easy Peasy Lemon Squeezy.

Don't you just love how all the Rhonna Designs Kits work together so well? I'm working on my Thanksgiving decorations this week so I'll some more fun Grateful Glam to share!

Grateful Glam Paper Kit

$10

Honeycomb Background Kit

$8

Check out more Team Tuesday Entries on the Rhonna Designs Blog!

Team Tuesday: Harvest Wreath made at hello there! house

Now that hello there! house has finally finished up it's first event, I can share this fun project I've been hoarding using Rhonna Designs Grateful Glam Flags & Tags Kit!

This Harvest Wreath was made with the budget crafter in mind. I came across this little gem on Pinterest:

Source: thepennyparlor.com via Rosemary on Pinterest

That sent me on over to Home Depot to clean out their plumbing foam piping to cut in half, tape, and VOILA! you have 2 foam wreaths for $0.97!

I wanted a more simple and streamlined wreath, so I simply cut strips of burlap about 3" wide and wrapped them around the wreath, hot gluing as I wrapped underneath to secure. I bought the burlap at Joanne's last November- one whole bolt of 10 yards for $25. I have finally gone through it all and went to get another bolt, but they didn't have them anymore. I'm hoping they get the bolts back in stock for Thanksgiving- until then, their burlap that you cut off the bolt is $3.99/yard but you can usually use a 40% coupon {get the Joanne's app for your phone- never have to carry in coupons again!} and get a lot for a great deal. You would only need about a half yard for one wreath, however this is our Hello! Holidays: Thanksgiving project for hello there! house, so I made up 50 kits. 

I then grabbed a white bedsheet I got at Goodwill for $1, and ripped 3 strips across the width of the fabric to hot glue into rosettes. The technique for the rosettes is the same as I shared on Jaimee's blog last year, but you hot glue the rosette onto felt as you go along {shown on Rhonna Farrer's video tutorial here}

I wanted to another simple detail to the wreath, so I printed off a page from Rhonna Designs Grateful Glam Flags & Tags kit, cut out the mini buntings and hot glued them to a piece of brown Divine Twine, then cut out a banner element and hot glued it onto my rosettes. 

To finish it all off I cut a piece of 1.5" satin ribbon I bought at SAS fabric in Tempe {$5 for a bolt of 50 yards} and there you have it. An extremely inexpensive, utterly lovely Harvest wreath that can be used all throughout Autumn. Add some white pumpkins to your doorstep, and you have a chic doorscape (did I just invent that word?) to welcome your guests. 

Visit Rhonna's Blog to see everyone else's Team Tuesday entries!

Please Oh Please Join Us for hello there! house

We are only 14 days away from the big event, and we are working like busy little bees getting everything prepared to make it the best thing ever. We'd like to fill up the event to max capacity, so we're giving away a smoking deal of a two day event pass for only $100! You can't get a better deal than that! Visit the hello there! house blog for more info for what we have in store for you for the weekend, and register for the event at the hello there! house eventbrite page. We'll see you October 7th & 8th!

Our very last hello there! house Meet 'N' Greet

It's almost time for our FINAL Meet 'N' Greet at Joe's Farm Grill!!

I've been packaging up all the project boxes & swag bags, printing up all the handout for the classes, and preparing all the contributors for the Joe's Farm Grill Meet 'N' Greet.

Don't you want to come and make home decor magic with me? We'll be raffling off a FREE hello there! house home & garden event pass at the Meet 'N' Greet AND giving out $50 off coupon codes just for our Meet 'N' Greet guests! Get your tickets at http://joesfarmgrillmeetngreet.eventbrite.com/ to join in the fun!

Also..........our Early Bird Pricing ends Saturday so hurry over to our hello there! house EventBrite Page to get your two full day Event Passes for only $150! 

One Month Away.....

I can't believe it's only ONE MONTH until hello there! house home & garden event! There's so much to do but I can't wait until it's finally here! I've been working like a busy bee for months and it's shaping up to be a fabulous event! If you live in Arizona, or are planning to be in Arizona Ocotber 7th & 8th- you don't want to miss it! It's going to be absolutely Ah-Maze-Ing!

And to top it all off, we are doing an Early Bird Throwback until our last Meet 'N' Greet at Joe's Farm Grill September 17th! Buy your tickets to hello there! house home & garden event at hellotherehouseconference.eventbrite.com , and get tickets to the Meet 'N' Greet at joesfarmgrillmeetngreet.eventbrite.com

Visit our website at hellotherehouse.com to learn more about our event, meet the teachers & contributors, get info on all the classes offered, and even sign up for our Boutique Market and sell your wares on Mill Avenue to the public and event attendees!

Last Day to Get Your Entries in For A FREE hello there! house event pass!

Head on over to the hello there! house blog to get your entries in for the FREE 2 day Event Pass to hello there! house home & garden event October 7th & 8th! You won't want to miss it! 

The Excitement is Mounting....

It's our very last Meet 'N' Greet before hello there! house! And it's at the fabulous Joe's Farm Grill- one of my all time favorite places. We will be handing out fun painting take home projects, giving out lots of new swag, and doing a class run-down with all our teachers! It's sure to be a great time- get your tickets at http://joesfarmgrillmeetngreet.eventbrite.com/- there's limited availability so don't wait!

hello there! house Giveaway Contest!

We're doing an awesome giveaway over at the hello there! house blog this week! You can enter to win a FREE  day pass for hello there! house home & garden event October 7th & 8th. This pass includes 2 days full of classes & keynotes, breakfast & lunch by The Center Bistro, all kinds of special swag from our Boutique Vendors & Sponsors, entrance into our Happy Hour AND our Goodbye Bash! It's going to be an amazing weekend- one you can win for FREE! You can get up to 4 entries via your blog post, facebook, twitter, and Pinterest! Visit the hello there! house blog for more details!

Not my first Rodeo

It's so nice once you get into the swing of things. This time around, I feel so much less stressed about our Meet 'N' Greet tomorrow. The Make & Take Boxes are all packed up nice & pretty, the swag bags are all stuffed with darling little bits of fun things, and our itinerarys are all ready to go (I know I'm a nerd; but remember, Prior Proper Planning Prevents Potential Problems). I even have all the info for our last Meet 'N' Greet before the hello there! house event in October. I am set & ready to go. It's going to be a great time, with all my favorite people <3

So join us, won't you? If you are an AZ local, I promise you won't be disappointed. It's the perfect way to spend one of the last Saturdays of Summer. I'll be there with  the biggest smile. :)

And a big huge hug & thank you! to Jaimee Rose for featuring us on her blog today! Her style is so killer, just check out the photos of her abode and you will want to start redecorating projects this weekend.