We live in a deed restricted neighborhood. I’m SO glad we chose the house we did, because there aren’t as many of that model, so despite living in a place where there were only 6 models to choose from, our floorplan is definitely in the minority. And our house is the only one of our model with the paint color we chose, and the shingle color we picked out. In a neighborhood where all of the mailboxes look the same, anything that makes your house stand out a bit is a good thing.

What are your thoughts on cookie cutter homes and deed restrictions? Yay or nay?

I shared pictures of our new motorcycle on my other blog, and someone commented on our clean and tidy garage. Jim put a lot of work into that, and actually, he puts a lot of work into keeping it clean. I was surprised that our builder didn’t offer any upgrades for the garage. We were able to add extra cabinets into the laundry room, and I’m sure my husband would have loved to added garage cabinets in the garage. Any extra storage space is useful, especially when you’ve got as much “stuff” as we do! Some modular metal cabinets would not only look sleek, they’d hide all of our accumulated clutter from tools and toys and things we store out there.

With the success of the show Grey’s Anatomy, I wonder if Washington state is seeing a little real estate boom? Who wouldn’t want a little trailer in the woods like McDreamy, or a cool house like Meredith Grey? And the scenery when the doctors went on that fishing trip - wow! The mountains were beautiful - I wonder if the show is filmed on location, or specifically, where that fishing expedition was filmed? That’s the kind of camping I could get behind - no bugs, no heat, no humidity.

I’m not sure about Seattle, but Marysville real estate is booming! Whether you want a newer home, an older home, or brand new construction of a home or condo, you’ll find it in Marysville. This realtor also sells in Everett, Lynnwood, Tulalip, Smokey Point, Arlington, Stanwood, Lake Stevens and Snohomish - all beautiful areas nestled in the foothills of the mountains. While I can’t promise a McDreamy, McVet, or McSteamy siting, I can promise beautiful views, tons of outdoor activities, and a break from the heat. If we see more of the great outdoors on Grey’s Anatomy, we might just find people flocking to buy Marysville WA Real Estate!

We did a lot of planting this month, and now that everything is in the ground, I’m doing a lot of watering! We have a hose reel mounted on the wall outside our garage, but by the time I’m done watering everything, I usually am so over it that I forget to coil up the hose and put it away neatly. The kids are just as bad! This new no crank hose reel is just what we need around here - the hose is out of site, and there’s no excuse to trip over a hose snaking around the house or one concealed in the grass, ever again! It uses water power to wind the hose up, so you don’t need batteries, and you don’t need to plug the hose reel in. I think I smell a potential Father’s Day gift!

When you live in a subdivision like I do, all of the houses tend to look a little cookie cutter. There are 5 or 6 models, 5 or 6 paint colors to choose from, etc, so it’s very easy for your home to look just like your neighbors. Personalize your home and make it a reflection of who you are with some curb appeal. A plant on your front stoop, or a personalized address plaque, or fountain in your front flower bed. Spring is the perfect time to add some curb appeal to your front yard!

When we moved into our house, we went to the local home decor store and bought white faux wood blinds for all of the windows in our house. We’ve had them in every house we ever owned, and I love them. The blinds look good, they hold up great, and they’re easy to install. There are a lot more options online though, than what you’ll find in your local stores.

If you can measure your windows, you can easily order from a site like Guaranteed Blinds - without errors! They don’t just have the faux wood we’re all used to seeing - how about natural bamboo, or roman shades? You’ll find a handy dandy measuring guide for before you order, and an easy to use installation guide to use once you get your order at Guaranteed Blinds. I’m interested in the heat blocking window shades myself…the rooms at the front of our house get a lot of mid-day and afternoon sun.

You know, I never liked the idea of using air fresheners in my house, until I stumbled across these Glade scented oil ones. Every time I walked into my house from the front door, all I smelled was drywall - this left over construction smell, despite the fact that we’ve been living here for almost a year. I got the Glade oil thingies with the extra outlets, in a vanilla scent, and put one in the foyer. Instead of getting a whiff of drywall, I get hungry for cookies when I walk inside!

I finally bought candles for my wall sconce this week. I found some beautiful colored candles at Target that I loved, but they didn’t have enough of any one color…I need 9! I decided not to risk buying 5 at one store, and then driving around to other stores to buy 4 more. I spotted a 3 pack of off white pillar candles (vanilla scented) and got those for now. They’re only 3 inches or so high, and after I put them up, I realized the sconce needs taller candles, but something is better than nothing. And they smell yummy, so they’ll stay for now.

Springtime makes me want to get outside and be productive around the house. Last week, we did a lot for our curb appeal by adding decorative curbing, and a ton of pretty new flowers in our newly designed flower beds. I couldn’t help but drool over the outdoor accessories in the home & garden store, but I promised myself that we’d get the planting done FIRST, and then I could accessorize! My mom lives next door, and her house is a bit more dressed up than mine outside, but then again, it’s just her. I have to get my husband to agree to everything I want to do! One of the things she’s got outside are those decorative flags - right now it’s a leprechaun for March. I’m sure next month features the Easter bunny! I found the perfect flag for our house - of course, it’s a weiner dog flag!

What I really want though, is a small garden fountain - the sound of water running through a fountain is just something that relaxes me, and I think one would really look neat in our flower bed out front. I’d love a plant stand or wall mount planters for our lanai too - it’s a little bare and needs some greenery to spruce it up!

If you’re like most people, you take your security for granted. You go to bed at night, locking & deadbolting your doors, or you buy a dog for security. What about when you’re not at home? When your dog is kenneled because of your vacation? Is a neighbor bringing in your mail and newspaper enough? A home security system, and monthly monitoring, really isn’t that much of an added expense. For as little as $35 a month, you can have a full service alarm monitoring company look after your home and family. And they don’t just worry about people breaking in - they’ll also monitor for fires as well. For me, the testimonials speak for themselves - yes, sometimes it is a false alarm, but I like the peace of mind of knowing my family is ok if it’s the real deal.

I happened to be in Bed, Bath & Beyond this afternoon, and decided to look for pillar candles for my new sconce. Of course, being that I was where I was, the only candle choices I had were either Yankee, or generic. The generic candles weren’t too bad - they were 9 to a pack for $10. The only issue was that the color choices were white, or this odd flesh color. I love Yankee candles, but since these are for display, there’s not really much point for spending money on those.

I hate to admit it, but my husband was probably right when he suggested trying WalMart for the candles.

I need a big ole’ pat on the back. I have these fancy collectible Winnie The Pooh plates that I got when my oldest daughter was a baby, and in our last move, I lost the plate stands that held them up. They’ve been laying flat in our entertainment unit ever since. I kept meaning to look for new stands, but never remembered to! Today, I was in the store and FINALLY did it. I picked up the two stands and I can rearrange my Disney shelf in the entertainment unit tonight!

The search is over for our wall decor issue. At least, part of the search. After looking in several stores, I knew what I wanted…but my husband wasn’t so sure. Today, he decided that he did like what I wanted, and went to Bombay and bought it. “It” being the Shelby wall sconce:

What a nice surprise for him to bring home! I won’t even hassle him to hang it tonight, since he went out of his way to pick it up and surprise me with it

My husband and I hit Lowe’s last night to look for plants - tonight he wants to see what Home Depot has to offer. I’m all about comparison shopping, but for plants? I’m pretty pleased with what I saw last night, and I’m already plotting out where to put things in my head. I’m not sure that we’ll find anything at Home Depot that’s different, but I’m willing to kill an hour looking with him, if it makes him feel better about it

Our new landscaping curbing was put in today - yay! I came home to a much nicer looking out - on the outside at least Because we now have a landscape edging, we went to Lowe’s tonight to pick out plants. We didn’t buy anything yet, because we’ve got to measure and plot things out at home, but we have a few things we’d like to buy. We live in a tricky part of Florida. It’s typically very sunny, and hot. You need plants that are drought resistant, and can take full sun. You also need plants that won’t die if you get a frost, because it’s been dipping down into the 30’s overnight.

We picked out Verbena, Plumbago, and my favorite - Azaleas. (I was just noticing all of the Azaleas in bloom today when I went to lunch - absolutely beautiful!) We have one side of the house that gets a lot more sun, so the Verbena & Plumbago will go there. The Azaleas are for the shadier side of the house.

I also promised my daughter she could grow a tomato plant. We had one at our old house and left it behind when we moved. We have a lot more space now, so I’ll probably end up being talked into a few other veggies being planted as well.

As soon as my husband has a day off, we’re getting our hands dirty!

I’ll admit it. I’m a model home junkie. I love going into new model homes in the various communities being built around town and seeing what design choices they made. Doing that not only gave me a lot of ideas when we were building our home, but I go back now to get inspired on things to put on my own walls. Once trend I’ve noticed? Those ladder bookcases. Have you seen them? At least one model home by each builder has a ladder bookcase. They’re really great for displaying items…not so much for stocking with actual books. I’ve seen them online at different website, like Coaster furniture, and I wish I had somewhere to put one in my house. They’re really neat looking, and I could just see one loaded up with my family pictures and the art my kids bring home from pottery class at school.

I love candles and use them in my house as home decor quite a bit. I’ve got a pretty display of 4 different colored pillar candles on one of the end tables in my family room, a neat red tealight lamp on my new table in the foyer, and a big lavender jar candle in my bedroom. Since my kids are older now, they’re more careful…but there was a time when I couldn’t burn candles on tables and such. Too much tempation for little fingers! Even now, I’m careful to put my candles up where a dog’s wagging tail won’t hit it.

Battery Operated Candles are a great alternative to the real thing, especially for a household like mine with pets and kids. And, they’re great for tight spaces too. For instance, I can’t put candles on my entertainment unit shelves. There’s not enough air flow, and the heat from the flame would do damage. These flameless (smokeless too!) would allow me to light up my entertainment unit with soft, natural looking candlelight.

Think you’ll miss the scent of real candles? Nope. These battery operated candles come with scents, like this vanilla scented pillar candle. And the technology behind these makes the flickering light look just like a REAL candle. Amazing, huh? I’ll bet people wouldn’t even know the difference! I can’t from this picture - it looks like the real deal to me!

Or, how about using one of these tea lights in your bathroom, as a nightlight? The flickering glow would be much nicer than a plain old night light plugged into the wall. Not to mention, you’re keeping an outlet free, because the candles are battery operated!

I guess it’s the cheapskate in me, but I am really excited about my toilet paper purchase. Yes, toilet paper. You see, yesterday I found a whole endcap of it on display at Target. The packages were on clearance, for about $1 off regular price. I had a coupon though, so I got even more off the price. That explains why I have 6 packages of toilet paper in my upstairs closet right now. With a family of 5, and 3 toilets in the house, we’ll go through that in no time, and it makes sense for me to buy it when I see it at a great price.

But, I’m not sure about spending $60 EACH on this sconce:

I found it earlier today when I went looking for a picture of the foyer table Jim bought me. It’s a match for the table, and we dicussed doing a mirror above the table with a sconce on either side. My issue with it is the price. $60. Per sconce. Times two! ALMOST what Jim paid for the table on sale. I guess we’ll have to go to Bombay Company and see it in person to decide if we really love it or not!

Since we moved into our house…since BEFORE we moved in, I’ve wanted a table in our foyer. I wanted a table, and something over it, so we had a nice looking foyer…not just an empty room with the front door. For whatever reason, my husband thought it was a dumb idea…and he fought me on it. I was always sure to point out tables in foyers and entry halls when I saw them - in model homes, on TV, whatever. Finally, he cracked, and it was a complete surprise. He took the kids to a local mall last week to go ice skating. When they returned home, the kids couldn’t wait to tell me what he had ordered at Bombay Company:

I love it! I love to be surprised too, so that was a bonus. I love that it has a drawer for extra storage and the size is just perfect for the wall in the foyer. Now we’re searching for something to put over it.