Giveaway Winner!

Thanks to all of you who participated in the giveaway! And let me tell you, I thoroughly enjoyed reading all of your wonderful, and hilarious suggestions! You guys sooo crack me up.

Some of my favorites...

*Redoing the Rectory (good one, Karen!)

*One Can at a Time...and it Only Cost Me a Dime! (June, you know me too well...)

*The Krylon Kottage (very clever.)

And I just have to share an emailed suggestion from my Mom:

*Brushstrokes and Little Folks. 

Is that not clever?! So cute. Now why did I not get some of her smarts...

There seemed to be quite a large consensus voting for The Painted Parsonage, so that's what I finally decided on. And I think it suits this blog pretty well :) So, for the very first time...

WELCOME TO THE PAINTED PARSONAGE!

And now without further ado...

Mr Random Number Generator has selected.....

***drum roll please***

Number 17,

Brenda Stevenson! 

Congratulations, Brenda! I'll get the prize to you a.s.a.p. 

There were 22 valid entries, I had to delete a few who left duplicate comments, just to be fair to everybody!

Thanks again for participating, and for making it fun!

It's a GIVEAWAY kind of day!

Let's have some giveaway fun today! 

I happened to come across a jack pot the other day, and I thought of all of you. (sniff, sniff...)

So...today, I'm going to giveaway something I love.

One winner will receive 4 cans of Oil Rubbed Bronze Spray Paint!

I realize that it's been getting harder and harder to find, and I found a place locally that had a whole bunch of it. This stuff is just so awesome. I cannot even begin to tell you. 

BUT...there's a catch :) Because I'm sneaky like that.

You have to help me rename my blog! 

I realize that "The Fogleman Family" just isn't the best choice to sum up all that this blog is about. Not all posts are about family. Besides, I'm not overly fond of my name. My husband is a real sweetie, and he's just the cutest thing....but I did NOT marry him for his name. 

Or his money.

Back to the point...

I've had a few ideas floating around in my head, like...

The Painted Parsonage

The Cottage Parsonage

I'm certain I had a few other ideas, but they've left me. Anyway, get where I'm headed?

 So all you have to do to enter this giveaway, is to leave me ONE comment telling me what you think I should name this blog! Give me some new ideas! But be nice. Please. 

Now for da rules:

Open to US and Canada residents only.

You can enter until midnight (central) Monday night. 

Winner will be chosen by random number generator, not necessarily by the best name submitted. 

Winner will be announced Tuesday morning. 

I don't really care whether you're a follower or not - everybody gets the same chance.

If you leave an annon comment, please leave your name and an email address. 

That's it! Now go forth and NAME THAT BLOG!!

Fabric Rosettes Tutorial

Can you believe it? I'm finally getting around to that tutorial. So, are ya ready to make some roses?!

Let's get started!

First let's gather our supplies.

1. Strip of fabric

(mine was 3" wide and 24" long. Use longer strips for fatter roses, or shorter strips for smaller roses.)

Don't bother hemming the edges, we kinda like the unraveled look here.

2. Glue Gun

3. Some Tunes. (optional...)

Now we're ready to start. 

First you put a knot in the end of your fabric strip, like this:

Then, with a dab of hot glue, tuck the tiny little tail under the bottom of the knot, like this:

Then you're ready to "twist and glue"!

 Put a bead of hot glue around the outside edge of the knot, twist your tail of fabric (as in the pic below), and as you twist,  wrap it around the knot before your glue dries.

It should start looking something like this...

Just keep twisting and gluing. You get extra points if you make it all the way to end without burning the bajeebers out of your finger.

When you get all the way to the end of the strip of fabric, tuck the tail under the rosette, and stick it down with glue, like this:

When you're all done, it should look something like this!

Now, wasn't that easy peasy?!

A 24 inch strip of fabric will make a rose about 2 inches wide. So if you want a larger rose, cut your strip longer. I like to make all different sizes and the group them together, as in the top photo. 

If you want them to look more "finished", you can glue a circle of felt to the back, and attach a pin. For my bags, I just stitched them directly onto the bag by hand. 

That's all there is to it! Have fun!!

Another Thrifted Treasure...

You know, it doesn't have to come in a little blue Tiffany's box to make me happy. I found this beauty at the Thrift Store last week...

can you say LOOOVE? She had me at hello. 

The price tag said 149.99. A little steep for this tight wad. BUT -  it must have been meant to be, because the tag was blue, and blue tags were 70% off. Yep, I brought her home for a whopping 45 bucks. I kinda felt like I'd just robbed a bank....hehehehehe

She's in great shape! I'm thinking about adding some glass knobs. She was just what I needed to finish off the guest room.

Oh my, look at those curves :) 

Step into my office...

First of all, let me give you a wonderful update one Connie. She's doing sooo much better. She sent me a note a few days ago saying that it really touched her to see all of your comments, and to know that you all were praying for her. She was able to go to church last Sunday :) And the cancer cells have drastically reduced, so we are all so happy that she's well on her way to recovery!

I've been inspired lately to pretty up my office. I had not done much with it since it got moved to the back hall. 

This is what it looked like when we first moved in...

As a temporary fix, I ripped out the moldy orange, yes orange, carpet, and painted the paneling white. (Under the carpet was old hardwoods. They're pretty rough, so I'm thinking about painting them. We haven't gotten to it yet, but that ceiling fan has got. to. go. I'm thinking a cute white chandy...)

Much better, but still seemed a little blah, and I really wanted the white accessories to stand out more. So while blog hopping one day, I came across some real inspiration.

I just love Kasey's living room, at Lola B's. I was totally drooling over the paint color, and how it really made her white things pop. So I emailed her and asked what the color was,  she was so friendly and helpful, and emailed me right back. She used "Faded Silk" by Ralph Lauren. So off to Home Depot I went. They don't have the Ralph Lauren paint anymore, but if you ask, they can still pull up the formulas on their computer.

It was just what the doctor ordered...

Ahhh.

I'm loving it. 

Now my bulletin board doesn't disappear into the wall, but it says, "Hey! Look at ME!" 

Now, anybody got any great ideas for a quote for my chalkboard? Nothing's coming to me at the moment.

I haven't finished the other side of the room, yet. So I'll give you a full tour when I get it all done. But I'm so excited to have a pretty place to blog hop, pay bills, check email, and check up with everybody on facebook :)

Now it's just that much harder to get off the computer and sort dirty laundry...

The Cottage Guest Room

Well, it's not totally finished, but it's well on it's way!

Come on in and see our guest room...

This is the only before pic I could find:

You can't really tell in this photo, but the paneling was light green, and the stripes were a dark teal color. Yummy. 

I felt I was doing the world a good deed by painting over that stuff. 

The wood floors are original, over 100 years old. I don't even want to refinish them, I love how they show the many years of living on them :)

And again, here's the after:

The only things we changed  was painting the walls, and hanging an old chandelier that we brought from our last house.

 Total monies spent? 45.00. I'm not kidding. Pretty cheap redo! 

This room is sort of my memories, and heirlooms room. The antique bed belonged to my Granny, the mirror over it hung in my great grandmother's living room, as well as the sewing desk. Also in this room is my old cedar chest that my grandparents gave me when I graduated, and laying on it is a cathedral window quilt that Dave's grandma made for us when we got married.

I used the 2 antique sewing machine tables as night stands. 

This one holds the Bible that was used in our wedding.

I found this old crib springs in a storage room, and I thought it would make a great memory board of sorts. OK, so maybe my mind's a little twisted, but I'm willing to accept the fact that I'm probably the only one that likes it :) I guess I just have this crazy need to be different.

The little dress was handmade, and was worn by the flower girl in our wedding.

Both of my boys wore these crocheted booties when they were babies. I've always loved them :)

These were the slippers that I wore in my wedding. 

They got all stained up when we took some pics outside - the ground was wet.

Carson wore this tiny little hat when he was still in the hospital.

This corner of the room has the little outfit that Carson wore when we brought him home, Jackson's baby shoes, and my Memaw's travel case. I have memories of her carrying that thing to camp meetings all over the country :) I found the other old suitcase at the Thrift store, and the little trunk was from TJ Maxx several years ago - it made a great little toy box for awhile.

Aren't these the cutest little shoes?

The bedding came from here, there, and everywhere! I'm not real big on matchy matchy sets. It's more fun to just mix up all kinds of stuff :)  Anne would say "there's so much more scope for the imagination."

I must say, I'm taking a breather now! That was the last room in the house to be painted - WOOHOO!!!

Since we moved in, I've painted 11 rooms altogether. I'm thinking I've earned a good looooong break :) But, boy, I love having it all done. I finally feel like I can sit back and enjoy it.

Well, at least until I get the urge to paint the outside....

Happy Independence Day!

Where would this country be without geeks brilliant technologically minded individuals?!  I'm so happy to announce that my own personal geek squad has located and fixed the problem on my computer. Whew! Big sigh of relief. Soooo, I can share PICTURES!! 

We made some fun Independence Day memories with a cookout on Saturday. I'm thankful for the freedoms we enjoy in this great country, and I say it's worth celebrating!

We had some fun and yummy decor...

refreshing lemonade...

made memories with the family...

enjoyed some all American hotdogs and hamburgers...

had some fun playing the homemade corn toss game...

cooled off with a little swim...

enjoyed homemade ice cream with fresh strawberries...Mmmmm...

and we finished the day off with some fireworks and "sprinklers"   :) 

A certain Daddy may or may not have burned a rather large hole in his shirt with some bottle rockets. And a certain Mommy may or may not have laughed her head off at his peril. It's just barely possible.

Oh, and one more thing. I made some fabric rosettes to add a bit of festive bling to my plain red shirt...

Ohmygoodness....I think I shall go clean my mirror.

 Right. Now. 

I pinned them on with safety pins, so they're removable.

I hope you all had a Happy 4th!!

Happy Birthday America,

 God Bless the USA!