Hey everyone! I've been gone for a while from actually blogging anything here and I feel it is time for a change! I haven't been blogging/ pinning/ planning, etc because life has been h-e-c-t-i-c! And when I say hectic, I mean hectic! Life for Dillon and I has always been sort of what we say, "hurry up and wait!" when it comes to the military....
As most of you know, Dillon is in the Marine Corps. In 2015 when he put in his reenlistment package it was denied due to budget cuts and it hit him hard. His life plan was to make the military his career. His long list of goals and plans was abruptly cut to a halt and it devastated us for sure. We then applied for an Active Reserve package, and while waiting for that to come back we were sent home from Washington, DC to California. We waited 2 months in California before hearing back from that and it was approved for New Jersey.
Regrettably, we let our emotions, damaged egos, and financial fears make our decision to deny those orders and stayed in CA. Well, after I urged him to attend college and serve as a Reserve Admin Chief here in CA we quickly realized we couldn't stand the fact that we let the USMC slip through our fingertips and started making calls to see what to do next. A year and a half later now in 2017, we just accepted orders to New Orleans, LA for the next 7 months while we figure out our next step. It is probably crazy of us to take something that isn't set in stone for very long, but we're learning to go with the flow and see where taking risks actually gets us. For 2 people who eloped at 18/19 after only meeting in person once, you'd think we would be big on diving head first into everything..... well, we're not! Ha!
So here we are, days away from another long distance road trip with our two kiddos and pup. I unfortunately had to put in my two week notice at Pier 1 and couldn't get a transfer set up in time, so I will be walking in with my resume and applying to new jobs. Bleh. But, such is life, right? Anyways, I am going to share some of my current Pinterest LOVES and finds. I have to start picking out furniture for our next home because of course we sold off our sofas and dining table/chairs. I have picked out a handful of things online and am trying to style the rooms in photoshop to really decide. At least that is one thing I can look forward to. I love getting to decorate a home I have never seen in my life....that the base housing happens to have ZERO photos of as well....... (waaaahhhh!!!)
Every photo here is from my Pinterest board for the dining room
and linked to the source of the photo.
First thing I wanted to talk about were these chairs!!!!!!!! I'm obsessed. I love that they're not really upholstered. (upholstered = stains when you're a parent to two toddlers.) I actually have chosen to downsize from our last dining table. We had a table that could easy sit 6-8 but I just felt like I was sitting really far from the kids. So a round table like this one from Ikea is what we're going for. And I mean, can you even beat that price? $179!!!! Score! Which leads me to why the next photo was pinned........
I originally had this table pinned because we will only be living 6 hours away from Dillon's side of the family and that means a lot of holidays/ visits with them. I was worried about table space but then I decided I can't really set up our house for those specific times when the other 98% of the time it will just be the 4 of us. So I opted for smaller. The other thing I loved about this table was the marble... DUH. Good thing I found some hacks for how to turn that Ikea table into a marble covered one as well. ;-)
This is the Ikea table in action- I love it. I am going to try to pull off a modern styled home, mixed with some traditional and artsy accents. I have a couple things that are on my online shopping list that will lean more towards traditional, but nothing that wouldn't be able to be pulled off together. Another thing I need to decide on once I actually see my house is if I want a rug underneath. Before, I had this really pretty leather rug form World Market under my dining table. The only down side is my kids are really freakin' messy. I hated that I felt it was getting destroyed. I still have it packed up and am going to try to clean it somehow... (I'm thinking I will hang a clothes-line in my backyard, and spot clean it and let the sun remove any stains.. but I have more research to do on how to actually treat leather.... WHITE leather. Ugh....)
I pinned this one because Dillon loves these chairs. I love the frame a lot too, I'm just not sure on the stain. I feel it may be too dark but that depends on the dining room. If it has sliding glass doors or a nice big window it may be nice to have some dramatic chairs... but if it is a closed off room and slightly dark, I'd vote a no to something like these. I do like that seat cushions being something that can be wiped down though. That would be extremely helpful for us as parents. Another idea I had was to get the kids some junior chairs from Ikea, but they don't have anything I really like style wise. :-(
Well, that's pretty much my board so far. I haven't thought about decor or anything else just because I haven't even seen one photo of our next house. So this will be continued.. Wish us luck, please!
