Tomorrow is October!

Ever since I was a little kid, the first day of October would be Halloween decorating day. I blame my Mom for my obsessiveness over holidays, she has boxes and bags full of decorations for Halloween, Christmas, even Valentine's Day. Every year we'd pick out a new ornament for our Christmas tree and a new piece of decor for Halloween.

As much as I love Halloween, I do have a serious weakness. . .scary movies. To this day I can not watch a scary movie without covering my eyes and peeking through my fingers to see what's going on. Yes, I know, it's sad.

I specially remember a cardboard witch I picked out one year. I thought it was cool in the store, but when we took it home to put it up, I refused to walk down the hallway! It had red, glowing eyes, and it freaked me out at night. So my Mom took it down and it was never to be seen again.

Anyhow, I leave you with a picture of my dog from last Halloween. I haven't decided what she's going to be this year!





Check back soon to see my Halloween decor!

Weekend Visit: My Family

This weekend my family came to visit us for three days. They arrived Friday night and left Monday afternoon. I loved having them here, which made me realize that I like having guests. We've never had guests before, as we had no where for them to sleep in our old place! Now that we do, I hope to have guests more often. Now that they're gone, the house feels empty, and I'm having some emotional days. I knew it was going to be hard to say goodbye to them again and I wasn't prepared for the aftermath. Now that they're gone the house feels empty and I'm going to be stuck at home for awhile until we get a new car. We took one of our cars with us from Miami, my 1998 Saturn which is at the end of it's days. I don't want to drive it unless I have to, hopefully we'll be able to start looking this weekend for a replacement.

Anyhow, I wanted to share some pictures. My mom's birthday is October 2nd, so in a way, my parents came to celebrate her birthday with me. I made her a birthday cake and a home-cooked meal.

Here's my Mom and I in front of her cake!

Me with my parents and my brother

The BEST chocolate cake I have ever made. I got the recipe from Good Things Catered. Everyone loved it so much that now my Dad, husband, and brother want me to make it for their birthday's!

How was your weekend?

Today's Updates: Living & Dining Room

As previously mentioned, my husband and I made some updates to our home this weekend. We hung up our scones in the dining room and our collage frame in the hallway. Today I did a little shopping and found a beautiful plush throw to drape over the new couch. I also bought some cute pumpkins and fall foliage for the living room.

Our scones in the dining room.

The collage is hanging right by the front door, same place we had it in our old apartment.

Our living room all decked out for Fall!!

The pumpkins look so cute, don't you think?

For those of you who don't remember, I am a native to Miami, FL. Right now it's over 90 degrees in Miami; the heat smacks you in the face as soon as you step outside your door. Who wouldn't prefer Michigan weather over that!

So far I love living up north, and yes, I know, everyone tells me, just wait until the winter! Very soon I'm going to start experimenting with Fall recipes, anything that has to do with apples as I've never baked anything with apples before.

Oh, and I almost forgot, take a look at my front door!

<3

Weekend Updates: Sleeper Couch!!

Several house updates were completed this weekend. Scones were hung up in the dining room, more fall decor was purchased, a set of frames was hung (more on these updates in a later post), and...our sleeper couch arrived!!!

I was waiting all day for the delivery truck to show up on Friday. Of course I was given a time window between the hours 12-5. I just knew it was going to come at around 5:00. I was sitting on the floor of the guest bedroom talking to my mom when an unmarked truck stopped in front of our building. I jumped up to wake up Sergio (who was taking a study break, napping in our room).

Here's how the room looked without the couch.



Big, empty wall....



Now filled by a beautiful couch!!





Here's a close up of the ottoman.



And the matching chair that came with the set. It's in our bedroom.



I'm in love! I LOVE the couch, so much that I wish we had a TV in there so I could hang out on the couch! It is sooo soft and cozy and I absoutely love the color. I didn't think it would go so well with the rest of the room but it really does. It's also the perfect size, any bigger would have been too much.

We tried out the mattress that came with the sofa and it's pretty good. I think my parents will be more than happy. :)

Now that we have the couch, the wall behind it looks even more naked. So you know what that means...I'll soon be cruising the stores looking for something to fill up that wall!

Today's Spotlight: The Guest Bathroom

When we moved in last month, we were on a time crunch to paint our place. We had a week before Sergio would start medical school so we lived, breathed, and ate paint. We painted nearly everything, except our guest bathroom and the kitchen. It was our first time painting so we didn't really know what we were doing! We also started to paint our master bath, but the color is hideous so it's going to be painted over.

My project for this week was to Tackle the Guest Bathroom!! All our paint supplies have been sitting out in the porch. I went through everything on Monday and saw that we had almost everything I would need to paint the bathroom. For a while we were just going to hire someone to finish up for us, but I figured, what the hell, I've got nothing to do so I'm going to paint it myself!

And I am very proud of how it turned out.



Bathroom Door on the left, Linen Closet on Right





If you keep on walking past the shower, there's the toilet! I still have some touching up to do, but overall, I'm happy with how it turned out!

Did you complete/start any projects this week?

Weekend Recipe: Banana Bread!

My mom has been making banana bread since I was a kid and I had a craving for it this weekend. I called my mom to have her read the recipe to me over the phone but she couldn't find it. :( So, I went online to search for the perfect one.

- 4-5 mashed bananas (I only used two)
- 1 cup sugar (I used a little less)
- 2 large eggs
- 1/2 cup shortening or vegetable oil
- 2 cups all purpose flour
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 1 teaspoon vanilla

1. Preheat oven to 350 F (180C) and grease your loaf pan.

2. Take a large bowl and add sugar, shortening (or oil), and eggs. Mix for a while and then add mashed bananas and mix some more. OK, now add all the dry ingredients - flour, salt, vanilla, baking powder and baking soda and mix some more. You should get a nice and very thick batter.

3. Pour the batter into the loaf pan and bake for around one hour. When you stick a toothpick in your banana bread and it comes out clean, you are finished. Leave it to cool for a few minutes and - eat! :)



My banana bread was done after about 45 minutes. I let it cool for a little bit, then cut a slice for my husband and I and spread a little butter over the top! Yum!!

This Weekend's Purchase: A Sleeper Couch!!

I've wanted a sleeper couch for the spare bedroom since we've moved in. My parents are coming to visit in three weeks so I definitely wanted to find one for their stay. Every couch that we've seen has either been ugly, enormous, or overly priced. We went to Jennifer Convertibles over the weekend and finally found a sleeper couch that we love AND that wasn't ridiculously expensive!! It's on the small side, but that's okay, we didn't want a huge couch to take up most of the room. We also got two matching ottomans and a side chair for a very great price. I'm sooo excited and I can't wait for it to arrive!

Here's a picture of the couch.



And this is the chair that we got. Why is this lady in this picture? Weird.


The website doesn't have a picture of the ottomans. :( They are circular with removal tops and have a small space inside to store things. They're so cute, I love them. They'll be here in two weeks and when they arrive you know I'll take pictures...

Did you buy anything this weekend?

Today's Spotlight: The Dining Room

Our old apartment had an open concept layout. Our family room, office, and dining room were all in the same space. I didn't mind having the family and dining room in the same space, but the "office" was a sore thumb sticking out. Not to mention there really wasn't a place to store and organize papers, bills, and whatnot. I love that our new place has a room for EACH, a family room, dining room, and spare bedroom that we're using as an office. Even though we do live in an apartment, the separation of rooms definitely makes it feel more like a home.

Today's spotlight is the dining room. It is the most elegant room of our home. I LOVE the paint color- it goes perfectly with our dark wood furniture and gives the room a very warm, cozy feel.

I decided I didn't want to wait for the cooler weather to roll in before setting up my fall decorations.









I had no clue that I was going to love this rusty, orangey color so much! Everything works so well together, I love it! I still want to add a few things to the room. I'm sure you noticed the hideous light fixture; that has got to go. I also want to add curtains, most likely a shade of green. The other walls are empty, so I will be hanging candle wall art. Other than that, it's perfect!

Which room is your elegant room of the house?

Today's Purchase: Fall Decorations

Back in Miami it's a little silly to be decorating for the Fall. Some people do, but not very many. "Fall" in Miami is really no different from Summer. The temperature is pretty much the same and the leaves don't change. There might be a slight temperature change in November when it will be 60 degrees in the morning but will warm up to 80 by 12:00. Doesn't feel like Fall!

Now that I'm here in Ann Arbor I can't wait to decorate for the Fall. I've already started to see the stores bring out Fall decorations and I just had to go check some places out today. First, I went to Marshall's. I was a little disappointed; they only had one aisle of Fall decorations mixed in with Halloween stuff. So I only bought one thing:



It smells so good and I just had to have it. And it was only $5! I think it'll go in the guest bathroom or maybe in the kitchen.

Then I went to Michael's. I've always loved Michael's and I can spend hours there, especially in the scrapbooking section. Michael's is all ready for Fall and Halloween; aisles and aisles of stuff is ready for purchase! I bought several things:





These pumpkin candles smell amazing and I can't wait for their scent to fill the house. I've never bought an arrangement like this before, but it's really pretty and it was 50% off. :)

Last, but not least, I went to Bed Bath & Beyond for Fall placemats.



Yay!! I'm happy with everything I have so far. I'm going to keep the tags on the placemats for a little while to see if I find something else. But I really do like the color!


What did you buy today?