Christmassing!

Well, at least I never told you I would be a faithful blogger. :)

We have been busy with life in general. Work, school, and church. That's what we do. But lately, we've been mixing in a little Christmassing around here at the Murphy house. 

Like making Christmas goodies.

We've been hanging stockings on the banister with care. Ours and the dogs, of course.

 Decking our halls, and whatnot.

Love our Christmas tree! 

 My grandma made this years ago, and I always remember it being on the top of her tree growing up. She has a small tree, now, so she gave me this! I think it's so cute. :)

 Here's the dining table all decked out, too! 

I think that's a cheese tray, right? I got it at the thrift store for like $2 I think! 

Anyway. I don't use it for cheese. I use it for pine cones. And I like it.

Nativity set made by my wonderful Mother-in-Law. There are a ton more pieces, too! I just have room right now for the main people. Maybe next year we can put all of the pieces out!

 Merry Christmas, from us! I hope you all have a blessed holiday season, remembering what this is really all about! 

Before & After: Love those thrift stores!

Found these at a thrift store for $7.  They came with hideous shades, too... But I actually took those off and left them there. They were nasty. I didn't even want them in my trash can. 

...I digress. Look, one of them even came with a lightbulb! What a steal. :)

Anyway, a few coats of spray paint later, and some new pretty drum shades, and we're in business people!

Paint addiction.

I have been on such a make-ugly-things-pretty kick lately.

Found these possible pretties at a thrift store:

[excuse the cruddy cell phone picture...]

Put some paint and TLC into them, and ooooh pretty! 

I am loving these end tables :) I may just have a rotation of furniture going on in my house!

*Edited to add:
The paint color is a Home Depot version of Benjamin Moore, Palladian Blue. I just told them  that's what I wanted, and they worked their magic! :) (It is VERY close to "Tide Pools" by Behr.)

Happy place.

Everybody needs a happy place. :) Where's yours?

Wedding Shadowbox!

All these random wedding items can either be 1) shoved in a closet, or 2) displayed like so. 

I pick the latter. :)

1- Invitation to our happiest day. 

2- My gorgeous, gorgeous veil. I love it.

3- The sash that was tied around my dress.

4- Well look at that, I don't have a number four... move along folks... nothing to see here. Literally.

5- Josh's boutonniere.

6- The flower that was on the blue sash around my waist.

7- Engagement picture.

8-My very favorite picture from our honeymoon.

What do you think? I am not usually a huge fan of shadow box displays, as I think they can look cluttered. But I also really wanted to find a way to display these items to remember the best day of our lives! 

Table Love!

So I found this full-of-potential table and chairs set on Craigslist. For $40. 

Yes that's right. $40.  And we don't have a truck, so I offered $10 more to have it delivered. Sold!

We painted the table white, and the chairs blue. How cute is that?! Thank you, Pinterest, for the inspiration. You are good for a select few things.

Also we picked up this light fixture for a steal. You can't see it because I stink at taking pictures. But it's cute. Trust me. 

I seriously love it. 

All we need to do now is reupholster the chairs, which will be easy enough, but won't happen until next paycheck. :)

Special thanks to my dearest friend, Ashleigh, for spending an hour with me in Home Depot picking out that perfect shade of blue. :)

[Edited to answer a question!: The chairs are "Tide Pools" by Behr, and the table is "Moon Rise" by Behr.]


And for you Better After readers... no, I haven't done the fabric yet. That will come with another paycheck :) Until now, the upholstered part just looks hideous. Don't look! :)

Why I hate Pinterest:

Maybe hate is a strong word. Because really, I don't hate Pinterest. I use it often, in fact, and have made recipes from it that were good, I've discovered making my own laundry detergent is easy-peasy and I'll never go back, and I've gotten cute house-y ideas from it.


However. Because I have pinned my little heart out, I sometimes feel so very... not enough.

My hair isn't good enough. My food isn't good enough. My clothes aren't good enough. My body isn't good enough. My makeup isn't good enough. My fingernails and toenails aren't painted good enough. I can't decorate cakes good enough...blah blah blah.

You know what? My sweet husband loves me the way I am. He tells me all the time. And oftentimes, I find myself second guessing him because I don't look like I stepped off my Pinterest page. But really I should care more about what my husband says, than what I think Pinterest would say. Right?

So I'm still going to use Pinterest. Because in all reality, it's pretty fun/cool/neato.

But I'm going to make a conscious effort to be the best me I can be- without caring what Pinterest would say. Of course I'm going to put effort into myself and try new hairdos, recipes, workouts and stuff... But I'm not going to try to be one million things I'm not! Not to mention... it's a huge time waster!

Much Love,
Not-a-super woman/baker/cake decorator/fashion designer/foodie/skinny/awesome/decorator/high fashion/weird makeup wearing/chef.

aka: Mel.  :)

The Best!

"Grow old with me, the best is yet to be."

Happy 1st Anniversary to us! It's been the best year ever! I can't imagine it getting any better... But I'm told it does! 

I love you, Josh. :)

Easy Berry Cobbler

When my little sister stayed with us a couple of weeks ago, not only did we make Cinnamon Rolls, but we also made this dessert we found on Pinterest. It has three ingredients. Looked easy enough, so we wanted to try it!

You can find the recipe here, but I would make a few recommendations. (Next time I make this I will make these changes!) 

-DO stir the soda and cake mix. I didn't like the crumble it left. It was too...powdery. Not crust-like at all. Josh liked the powdery part though. So I guess it's just a personal preference! 

-Use fresh fruit or thawed fruit. I think it was too 'soupy' since the fruit was frozen. 

Otherwise, it really was actually pretty tasty- we all liked it! And it was super easy, too.

Cinnamon Rolls!

Hi, I'm Mel. And I don't keep up on this blog. My bad!

Today I am going to share a recipe with you that my sweet sister Hayley and I made this weekend. I liked it because it seems like a lot of cinnamon roll recipes look delicious, then they say "Yield, 978 servings."

And I'm like, no.

This yields a 9x13 pan. That's plenty. :)

We found the original recipe here, but tweaked it since we 1) Didn't have bread flour, and 2) Ran out of cinnamon. There's some in there, but not as much as we wanted to put in!

Here's the recipe!

Dough:

2 1/2 teaspoons bread machine yeast (I use active yeast)

1 cup warm milk (110 degrees F/45 degrees C)

1/2 cup white sugar

1/3 cup butter, melted.

1 teaspoon salt

2 large eggs, room temperature ( we used this since I can't have eggs and it worked fine!) 

4 1/2 cups flour. (or bread flour if you have it!)

Filling- use it all! :)

1/3 cup butter, softened 

1 cup brown sugar, packed

2 tablespoons ground cinnamon

1 teaspoon nutmeg

splash of vanilla

(optional add-ins: raisins, apples, nuts, etc.)

Icing:

Mix together:

3 cups powdered sugar

3 tablespoons milk. 

*Note, I ended up using probably a whole extra tablespoon of milk. Just play with it 'til it looks good!)

Directions: 
Dissolve the yeast in the warm milk in a large bowl (or stand mixer). Mix in the sugar, butter, salt, and eggs. Add flour and mix well. Knead the dough into a large ball (or use your dough-hook for about 5 minutes. That thing is amazing!) using your hands dusted lightly with flour. Put in a bowl, cover and let rise in a warm place about 1 hour, or until doubled in size.After the dough has doubled in size turn it out onto a lightly floured surface, cover and let rest for 10 minutes. In a small bowl, combine brown sugar and cinnamon.Roll dough into a 16x21 inch rectangle. We didn't actually measure this. We just kinda rolled it out and said "Hey that looks great." Spread dough with 1/3 cup butter and sprinkle evenly with sugar/cinnamon mixture.

Roll up dough and cut into 12 rolls. Place rolls in a lightly greased 9x13 inch baking pan. (We made these the night before, and covered them and stuck them in the fridge at this point, then we just took them out 30 minutes before it was time to cook.)  Cover and let rise until nearly doubled, about 30 minutes. Preheat oven to 400 degrees F (200 degrees C). 
Bake rolls in a preheated oven until golden brown, about 15-18 minutes.


After they come out, top them with icing and you're ready to go! :) 


Linking up:
Baked in the South

The new things.

Just thought I would share some of the new items/custom orders I've had lately! These are available through my Etsy shop. Which you are always welcome to browse around, and tell your friends about! :)

 I also have a Facebook page, too! I do giveaways on there, so go "like" it to make sure you get in on the free stuff!

Random Update!

Well it's been busy here per usual, so I thought I would update you on the recent happenings- with pictures and everything. 

Here's the cutest little child, Nadine. One of our bus kids. She drew that picture. Does it look familiar to you? (It's ME. Can't you see the similarities?) What a doll.

Our church bus kids typically come from some pretty low income areas. Not all of them. But a good majority. Anyway. We had "Missions May" and encouraged them to bring as many pennies as they could (it was a competition between all three bus routes, and whichever bus had the most weight in their bottle would win a pizza party.) We totally won. The bus workers helped a bit, but I am so proud of our kids for bringing their little zippy bags full of pennies!

In other news, you've seen our fire pit. And we have been putting it to good use lately. Here, we Josh's brothers, their wives, and my sister over. And Josh sat in his Kool-aid. 

Food cooked over a fire is always better in my book!

Also. I love s'mores. Did you know I had them at my wedding? *thinks back... have I even posted wedding photos on here?!*

In other news, my little sister graduated from our Christian School at church. This is my mom and I listening intently to the service.

Josh and I also listening intently.

These are the newest addition to my Etsy shop. I love these babies. You can find them here!

That's it for now! A whole lot of everything going on. Love it. :)

High Five for Friday!

Long time no blog!

I know. I know. Life has been crazy! Anyway...

I am linking up for the first time ever to Lauren at From My Grey Desk! Love her blog!

This has been a great week, as far as high-fives and such go. It's been a draining week, too. And I'm rather glad it's over! I must say, the mail has made this week fun. I never get mail. But this was a fun mail week. And also, Josh just makes everything awesome.

One: I got my first Birchbox! I was sooo excited to open it!

Pretty fun stuff! You should try it!

I came home from work one day to a painted bathroom! Josh is so sweet. He's on a short break before summer school starts, and he chooses to spoil me! We still have decorating to do, obviously, but I am LOVING the grey!

And he also made this one day! We have a huge backyard and we have tons of plans for it. One of them was a fire pit. Well, my handsome man made it happen this week! Isn't he awesome? We'll eventually lay bricks all around it, but for now, I'm just really excited to go make a s'more. :)

Ok. This wasn't THIS week. I am a bloggy failure. But I wanted to show you my new mug that I got from the coffee mug swap over at Suzelz Says! 

Leslie at Peace, Love & Everything Pink sent this one to me. I love it! I have been using it so much this week! Isn't it adorable? And very me. :) 

And my far-away friend Melissa sent us the pretty green throw on our couch for a wedding gift!! I had mentioned to her that I was looking for a throw, and viola, it came in the mail! :) I love it so much. She is too sweet!

Pretty good week overall! :)