Candy popcorn

Candy popcorn is one of my favorite childhood memories.  My mom made it a rainy day tradition, so growing up in Arizona, it didn't happen all too often.  I will always remember the taste of a candy coated wooden spoon and the crunch of the half popped, candy coated kernels.  

So I've had some family members nagging me for the recipe, so here it is!  Sorry it took so long :)

Candy Popcorn

Ingredients:

2 cups of popcorn kernels popped in an air popper

2 cups sugar

1/4 cup water

2 tbsp butter

1 tsp vanilla (I always add more, but here's a good start)

food coloring

Step 1: Pop the popcorn and cool in a large bowl.  (Traditionally we used metal.  Perhaps because it will help with Step 5.)

Step 2: Combine sugar, water, butter, and vanilla and bring to a boil.

Step 3: Continue boiling the mixture till you develop a string dripping from your stirring utensil. (Tradition states it must be a wooden spoon) 

Step 4: Add food coloring to your preference.

Step 5: Pour the mixture over the popcorn and stir like crazy.  The best way seems to be plunging down at the furthest edge and digging towards yourself as you turn the bowl with each plunge.  You'll have to stir for a couple of minutes before the mixture cools and dries.  If it doesn't dry, you didn't boil it for long enough. 

Step 6: Put on an awesome kids movie and serve up a delicious treat!

What's your favorite treat from your childhood memories?  I'd love to hear it and get more ideas for my kids.  Sugar isn't always going to cut it :)

Crate to Ottoman

A couple of weeks ago, I did a little dumpster diving and found a crate.  I was lucky to find one that would fit into the trunk of my 10 year old Mitsubishi, so I brought home my new find.  It sat in my trunk for a while as I contemplated all the possibilities and potential for this crate to be something useful and creative.  Could it be a wall shelf, an herb garden, a nice piece of wall art?  My head was whirling.

As I was watching TV with my family one day, I was wanting an ottoman really bad to put my feet on.  We recently moved into a small townhome, so what I needed had to fit certain dimensions of our tiny family room.  Low and behold, the crate was the exact dimension I was looking for.  I hopped over to my favorite store, Home Depot, and bought four legs and black gloss spray paint.

I went to town on that crate then realized I can have an upholstered top on it easily.  I tried out a new store (to me) called Mesa Sales for the upholstery foam.  Best prices in town, I tell you and they cut to size!  I was also able to find the fabric I wanted at Home Goods.

I'm so happy with the results, as long as I can keep my husband from putting his shoes on the top.  This project has helped me embrace the industrial look of design in my house.  I'm wondering what I can think up next.

Residential Design - Job #1

HGTV makes design look easy!  Well, it's not, but it is so rewarding in the end!  I had the pleasure of being the designer on an independent home design project.  I got this contact from our mortgage broker.  She called me and said, "I've never had a designer to refer to someone, but I have a client who has been in his house for 2 months and is ready for it to feel like a home." That was the beginning of my first independent professional journey into the industry of interior design.  

My client is an older gentleman who is single and lives in South Chandler in a 4 bedroom home.  While he has a full time job in the south west valley, he wanted a home he could come to at the end of the day and feel warm, welcome, and comforting.  He needed help hanging artwork and accessorizing, but through our visit, it turned into painting, back splashes, draperies and more.  

I had recently met, through our house search, Mark and Debbie Barber with Barber Contracting, LLC.  They had come to a house my husband and I were looking at to give us an estimate on remodeling a "fixer-upper."  As I walked through my client's house, I immediately thought of them and got them on board.  Here are pictures of the final product. 

In this photo, you'll see the window treatments we added by the dining area table to match the rest of the shutters in the house.  We also added cellular blinds so we didn't have to block the beautiful backyard view. We also added the bamboo roller shades on the patio doors, the pot rack, bar stools, and a little paint accent.

This photo is to the left of the last photo.  I designed this tile install as the Barbers worked so hard to make it just right.  

Here's a close up on the tile back splash I also helped with the design.  I've always wondered why back splash is so hard for designers to do on Next Design Star, now I know.  Cutting, spacing, drying, grout, it just takes way too long.  But this design looks great! It only took 4 Home Depots to get the right tile patterns in the quantities I needed.

This room was given a paint treatment and a chair rail.  Once the artwork was hung and small furniture put in place, it really felt complete, warm and inviting in here.

This space didn't have much in it before, so we decided to make it a nice rest area with a paint accent, console table and greenery.  The accessories are from the owner to help give it a personal touch.

Before, this window only had sheers.  I found a great contact, Cindy Bluth, who sews custom draperies. I'm really glad to have met her.  I know I'll be using her in the future as well.  She also pointed me to my new favorite fabric store, Home Fabrics on Stapley south of the US-60.

This master bath was lacking rugs and needed new window treatments that had more of a masculine touch. The previous drapes were fluffy, flowery, and huge dust collectors.  We replaced them with these bamboo roller shades, inside mounted which really performs well in places susceptible to moisture.

Thanks for checking in and viewing the final product!  I hope you saw something you liked.  

Many thanks to:

Barber Contracting

Rebecca Rodgers with I-Mortgage

Stefanie Cross with Visionary Properties for putting me in contact with the above mentioned people!

Cindy Bluth with Primrose Design Shop

Home Depot

Lina's Home Furnishings

Home Goods

Home Fabrics

and finally my husband for watching the kids on the late nights and Saturdays!

House 2 Home: Vance style

Welcome to our first House 2 Home spotlight.  I'm so excited to show you how amazing my uncle's home in Utah is.  He's really great at leaving personal touches in architectural details and my aunt is really great and making the whole house look so cute.

One thing you should notice about the front of their house is the archway above their front door.  If you look closely, you'll notice the letter "V" above the arch.  I've seen him do this in other places which shows he's proud to be a Vance.  Much like what Thomas Kinkade does with his pictures when he hides a letter "N" for his wife's first initial.  Look it up!  It's fun to look for.

As you walk to the front door, the pathway you walk on is very rough and organic feeling with it's textured cement treatment.  I've also figured it is required of every Utah resident in the area to have a gorgeous display of flowers in your yard.  This home is no different.

This front door with rich warm tones and knots is amazing and the welcome wreath puts all of mine to shame.

I know this might seem like an out of place picture to this post, but I wanted to use it to show just how much thought and work my uncle puts into his home. Have you ever thought about your ceiling being something wonderful to look at?  If you look close (there is a closer image next) he's treated his ceiling in no other way I've ever seen.  I asked him how he did it.  There is a brush sold in hardware stores with the bristles spread out in this way.  As he was preparing to texture the ceiling, he dipped the brush in the texture then scraped it flat.  Once that was dried, he painted the ceiling with wall paint mixed at 25% what the room was and spread it on the ceiling.  Caution: the way you treat your ceiling could have a profound effect on your acoustics in the room.  However, this had no problem or strange effects that would deter you from it's beauty. (I'm quirky about it, I know.)

Here's a cool idea.  Ever hate that feeling of needing to go to the bathroom in the middle of the night, but dread turning on the light for fear of burning your eyes right out of their sockets? Why not install lights under your counter?  This soft glow will surely keep that sleep in your eyes while you find your midnight relief.  I can't remember what material he used for the countertop, but in the commercial design world, there is a material called 3-Form that can be treated the same way.

And if your bathroom is too far to go in the night, install some crown molding with lighting above!

I love the rawness of this wood floor!  You can see every groove as if each plank were hand carved.  Talk about TLC!

I've been seeing a lot of bead board on the walls lately and I'm in love.  It's not too often that I find it in a wood tone.  This paired with the floors gives me nice warm fuzzies inside.

As a mom, this has to be my favorite personalized feature of the house.  This pantry door closes flush with the wall and looks like it's not even there.  The facade of it holds two sizable cupboards for spices, seasonings and baking goods.  When the pantry door is opened, a motion sensor detects it and turns on the light.  BRILLIANT!

Not only do they hide the pantry door, but this bench also doubles as a trash drawer.  

If you don't have one, GET ONE!

Everyone wants to be in this kitchen.  I'm sure I would enjoy doing dishes more here than at my house with a deep apron sink and a 2 drawer dishwasher that can be run with both or just one of the drawers at a time!  You can't see the microwave drawer very well, but it's there and it rocks!

I was in this area of Utah for less than 24 hours, but managed to see quite a bit of beautiful scenery.  It was great seeing family in their homes instead of waiting for them to come to Arizona.  Had it not been so cold and windy while we were there, I'm sure I would have spent more time on their back balcony over looking this view of the valley.

In the center you'll see the Mount Timpanogos Temple and dotted all around are the LDS chapel steeples.  Yep, this is Utah after all.   

I hope you enjoyed the first House 2 Home spotlight.  I hope you found some things inspirational to try in your homes.  

If you know of a home you'd like to see in the series, please leave a comment with your email and I'll be in contact with you.

Linked to:

Making the World Cuter

Crafty Confessions

Lil' Luna

New Beginnings!

So many things have changed for me over the last couple of months, hence me not being on top of the blog.  However, with change comes new beginnings.  My husband starts a new job today, I'm completing my 6th quarter of school (and ready for summer break).  My oldest daughter is preparing herself for 3rd grade.  My youngest daughter is finally potty trained!  Oh, and did I mention a new season of Design Star has started?  Of course I'm rooting for the Arizona contestant and not just because I'm from Arizona. Yes, I'm sure I'll be talking about it every week.

I also wanted to take a moment to prepare you for my upcoming series on the blog called 

House 2 Home  

I got this idea from Apartment Therapy's House Tours, but I like to add my own rendition.  This series will feature homes that I've visited that have creative uses of space and decor.  Little punches of personality can really change a space from feeling like a house to a home. (Get it?)

So keep in touch to see the beautiful Vance home I visited in Utah this last month.  You're going to want to see this!

Work in progress

{B}'s room was redone and my 3 yr old {T}'s room was neglected.  So I decided I had some materials on hand to at least get a start on what I wanted to have happen in her room.  

I started with a lamp I had that I ripped the shade off.  The prior shade was all white, but had a bright pink lining which made everything look pink when I turned it on.  So I kept the wire frame for it and tied some spare ribbon I had in "tutu" fashion around.  I mixed up the color and texture to give it some contrast and stand out from the white base a little more.  Although I may still spray paint the base in the near future.

The next part was some wall art.  One of the great perks of going to design school is the Resource room they have for the Interior Design students.  We just got in this HUGE amount of wall paper books so I get to bring home some discontinued samples and play around with them however I like.  So I attached some to foam core and made some instant wall art for the room.

You might remember this little dresser/nightstand from a recent post.  But I added just a little something extra as I lined it with the same contact paper I used for {B}'s desk.  

My in-laws were so generous to give us a twin bed.  It had an old cream vinyl like material upholstery on it so I decided to cover it, first with batting to give it some of that comfortable look and then with this fun geometric graphic I found at Hobby Lobby.  Where would I be without a staple gun?  I'm just to scared to imagine.  The bed set came from Target and the curtains (which you can't see very well cuz they will be soon replaced) I sewed from clearance fabric at Country Curtains.

So just this little corner is done for now, but the plans are to make the other side of the room toy and dress up storage.  My {T} loves to pretend so here's where it's going to get fun. You'll have to wait and see until I'm done with it.  

Linked up to:

Happy President's Day

Happy President's Day everyone!  I get to spend it at school.  (*yeah*)  While I have some down time, I'd like to share some inspiring spaces I've found that are "American" inspired.


Who doesn't love a red painted wood stump to sit on? 
as seen on:
Apartment Therapy


I like how there's a Navajo inspired rug mixed into the group.  Authentic, right?
as seen on
DJD Design


My favorite part of America is the beach :)
as seen on:
Bear Hill Interiors


I'm totally diggin' this industrial look!  I love the contrast these colors bring out.
Shared by Design to Inspire


This absoluetly looks relaxing!  I love the solids mixed in with the unexpected patterns.  It truely makes the space feel used. And how cool are those towel racks?!
as seen on
Attic Mag



So Happy President's Day everyone! I hope you got to enjoy a day off!