The Final Countdown

I'm going to give myself a little pat on the back because this last semester was pretty project packed and yet I still managed to stay on top of most of the chores around the house. Also, as most of you know I'm a bit of a scrooge when it comes to Christmas but I still took a break from everything yesterday and decorated both the inside and outside of the house, followed by a little Wii competition with Sloan and Drew.

With the end of any semester in less then four days, I must of course give a big I love you to Drew and Sloan for putting up with me, I have the greatest husband and daughter ever! Drew is slowly learning he can be right or he can be happy. Here's a little excerpt of Drew keeping our marriage rolling along smoothly.

Drew: (A bit flustered) Do you know where my jeans are that I put on the chaise?

Laurie: Well they were put down the laundry shoot and are downstairs.

Drew: (A bit more flustered) Have they been cleaned?

Laurie: What do you think?

Drew: (Pausing for a bit too long) Ummm clean?

Laurie: Good answer!

He's learning isn't he!

I LOVE THIS BRACELET

Anyone who knows me knows that other then my wedding ring, I'm usually all about vintage jewlery, like the pearl and crystal necklace of my grandma's that I wore when I got married, or a fun piece from JCrew, or honestly cool cheap pieces from H&M, Forever 21 and my good old standby, Target.

So, I was thinking because I have saved Drew so much money in my prior jewelry purchases then to splurge on the Love bracelet from Cartier would be totally acceptable...right?

Tween Room Sets Records! (Ok Not Really)

There's about 2 1/2 weeks until school is done for the semester and I'm busy with all my final projects but I thought I'd report that Sloan's bedroom has just past the 100,000 hits on Rate My Space on the HGTV site. I've actually gotten some nice feedback from the room which is surprising because the people on that site are brutally honest and retarded. People complain they can see a lamp cord or they don't think the brown curtains go with the beige countertops or they suggest you add a border to a bedroom. It seems the people that are the most critical are usually the ones who do not have any photos of their rooms on the site. Hmmm....big shocker!

Not Enough Hours in the Day

We've been pretty busy lately and quite frankly I don't know if I'm coming or going. Drew, Sloan and I have all been sick. I've had strep since last week and Sloan has a fever of 102 that won't seem to go away or down. To make matters worse, school is so busy that its pretty darn laughable. If I have to hear one more professor talk about the real world I'm going to scream. I miss the real world, I miss going to work at 9 and coming home at 5 and most of all I miss my paycheck at the end of the week. Most of all I want to ask them why the need for 100 hour final projects in addition to the final comprehensive final? I keep looking at the cover of my book to see if its not anatomy or physics because surely this must be medical school, surely you don't need to do this much work in order to pick out some fabric do you?

The photo is a picture of the inside of a house called Samara that i visited for my furniture class. The house was built by Frank Lloyd Wright and is in West Lafayette. It is a amazing home and I appreciate Wright's talents on a whole new level. The inside of the house is not for everyone's taste but honestly I don't think anyone could come up with a bad thing to say about the exterior landscaping of the home, its absolutely beautiful. Although I wasn't thrilled about having to take this field trip on my day off of school, I'm really glad I had a chance to see it.

25 days and counting until the semester is over!

Week Two

Nope, I'm not even joking, this is the space I'm turning into my design studio. Pretty isn't it! This space is the scary place in our basement. Like I have stated before I have a desk upstairs in our loft but with the large projects I work on they end up being in everyone's way. Not only is this space scary and ugly I'm also doing it on a budget.



In between class and homework and Sloan I managed to go through all of my office things and art supplies. I wonder how many architect rulers one can actually own? Everything has been processed, and organized and will be ready for the space once the space is ready for it.

While organizing I ran across one of Sloan's 2nd grade journals and thought I'd share it with everyone, it is entitled, "When We Went to the Relatives House." I've left in the grammatical errors for the full effect.

I love the holidays when relatives come. Now here's how the storie goes. It was a cold but sunny day and it was a good holiday....Thanksgiving!!!! A.K.A. my moms favorite holiday. Okay now back to this story. Okay well as you all know it was Thanksgiving and we were goint to my aunt and uncles house for the feast. I loved to go there. So me and my mom went shopping for some food to bring to the feast. After shopping we got ready and went to the Thanksgiving feast. When we got there everybody who was suposed be there was there. My grandma, her dauter, aunt, uncle, great granma and us. First the grown-ups drank some wine. Then we ate the turkey and stuffing. We ate everthing exsept the pumpkin pie. (my favorite pie) So we ate the marbouless (I think that's supposed to be marvelous) pie. After we ate the pie the grown ups talked for hours. Everytime I tried to talk to my mom she said, "in a minute." and would always forget when the minute was up. But is was so so so so so much fun!

Me talking too much and my family drinking wine???? I think Sloan is a big time story teller!!

So my tip for everyone is to clean that office and those files, you'll never know what you might find to make you smile!

Nice Try!

It seems the older we get the more we eat at home. I never thought I'd say this but I actually enjoy staying home and having dinner with the family every night. The downside to eating at home every night is there are always dirty dishes and for some reason I am the only one who knows where the dishwasher is. It never fails the moment I get all the dishes put in the dishwasher or put away I look in the sink to find new dishes waiting for me.

This morning after getting out of the shower I discovered new dishes in the sink that weren't there 15 minutes before. I can't help but think where are this dishes coming from? Are they hiding them in the sock drawer? Enough is enough right? So before I left to drop Sloan off at school I left a note for Drew on the sink that read:

Please start putting your dishes in the big silver box next to the sink.

I arrived home before Drew saw the note and so I happened to be in the kitchen when he read it. This is our conversation after he read it.

Drew: Big silver box, what's that?

Laurie: Yea, I'm pretty sure I've never introduced you to this little machine but its amazing, it washes our dishes.

Drew: Yea, but you need to buy something or make something, afterall you're the interior designer to put on the dishwasher so I know if they are clean or dirty.

Laurie: Yes, you are right, I am the interior designer and that is the reason we're not going to put something on the dishwasher. How about this concept, open the dishwasher and look at the dishes. If they are dirty well its safe to put more dirty dishes in there.

Drew: (Grinning) Yea, I can never tell.

Laurie: Yea, right Drew, I'm thinking this is like how you ask me if you can cover a dish with aluminum foil and put it in the microwave everytime I ask you to help with dinner! Nice Try!!!

Happy Halloween!

We had lots of fun last night carving pumpkins and in our household nothing is complete without a little competition. We need your help so tell us which pumpkin do you like best?

For the record, Kim, there was one done specifically with you in mind so I'm counting on your vote!

It Has To Start Somewhere-Week One

When I design a new space this is how it usually starts out. I tend to buy a lot of decorating magazines and I also get a lot of catalogs in the mail. I'm not one for clutter so I usually go through the magazine quickly and tear out what I like and put it into a master book that I keep. The book comes in handy when I start a new space.

I'm currently working on redoing a very small space in my basement to be used as my office. I have a desk upstairs in our loft area but its not really working out for me because my projects tend to take up a lot of room.

I've given myself 10 weeks to finish the project so I hope you'll enjoy seeing how it all comes together!

Start a New Tradition

Life gets crazy sometimes but its nice to have traditions. Our family tends to eat at home during the week but every other Sunday we try out a new recipe and take turns cooking. It doesn't have to be fancy just something we haven't tried before.

So get out the pretty china that you only save for special occasions, light some candles and try a new dish with the family. Its really a nice feeling to be celebrating nothing. I think the best memories are made at the dining room table.

The first recipe I'm going to share with you is a Turkey and Noodle Bake. Drew is a big fan of anything baked and well stuffed with meat! Hope you enjoy it! It was really yummy and a great fall dinner!

1 package of egg noodles cooked
3 cups of cubed white turkey meat
1 cup of chopped celery
1 medium red bell pepper
1/2 cup of chopped onion
3 tablespoons margarine or butter
2 cans of condensed cream of chicken soup
3 cups of skim milk
1/2 teaspoon garlic salt
Fresh chopped parsley

Cook noodles. Preheat oven to 375. In medium saucepan over medium heat, cook celery, bell pepper and onion in margarine until tender. Stir in soup, milk and garlic salt; mix well. In a large bowl, combine soup mixture with cooked noodles and turkey. Spoon into a greased 15 x 9 inch backing dish and top with fresh parsley. Cover; bake 30 minutes or until hot and bubbly.

For dessert I made my famous sugar cookies. I used my Halloween cookie patterns and for fun we frosted and decorated our own cookies. Drew won for the ugliest cookie!

How It All Began

My name is Laurie Jones. I am married to Drew and I have a 10 year old daughter named Sloan. I live about 10 minutes from downtown Indianapolis and really love living so close to the city. I was a paralegal for close to 15 years and I finally got to the point where it was either go to law school to get my law degree or go back to school and study interior design. This time, I followed my heart and not my head and I am currently in my 2nd year at IUPUI getting a degree in engineering and technology, which is really just a fancy way of saying interior design.

Looking back, I should of made the choice 20 years ago. As a little girl, I would actually get excited when I came home from school to see that my mom had rearranged the living room furniture. I spent hours in my own room drawing out sketches of my room and my future house. I would get yelled at for taking my mom’s Home magazine from her room and not putting it back where it belonged. While most kids hung pictures of Andy Gibb (yes I’m that old) on the wall I hung photos of rooms torn from my mom’s decorating magazines. I would look through the JcPenney’s catalog at the draperies and tell my mom about the perfect gold curtain for the living room!

I have lived in more houses then I care to admit to and its usually time to move when I have finished decorating it. I have a habit of selling everything and starting over again and my taste seems to change quite a bit. For the first time in my life I feel like things are falling into place.

I hope you enjoy my blog on my interior design studies and my home remodeling projects and who knows maybe some client's projects! I will warn you when I get stressed I use humor and sarcasm to get through it so be prepared for anything.