Rug shopping

I have taken too many pictures of my front room.

I have shopped online for rugs for too much time.

I have even gone to a few local stores (though not many due to *the foot*)

I cannot pick a rug.

First, buying a rug online is a big commitment! You don't really know what the color is. Sure it looks ok online but what about IRL?  And then if you don't like it...what? You have to ship it back?? That sounds awful. And expensive.

I'm not looking at high end rugs. I just don't have the cash for that. So it's not like I'm buying something that I expect to have forever. But still, spending up to $300 for something is a big deal in my world.

I have found that some websites allow you to sort of digitally put the rug in your space.  I like this feature a lot.  But I still just don't know what to get.  I'm not super rushed. I'm ok with waiting for the right  rug.  I'm just a little worried that I will never find it.

So if anyone reading this wants to help me out, here are some pictures of rugs in the space from different websites. Help!

First, here's a closeup of my curtain fabric:

I like this rug but haven't found a website that lets me see it "in the room"

I'm also considering this one for the entryway, which is connected to the living room, so it needs to have similar colors and go well with the buffet in the entryway.

Here's the entryway:

Some other views of rugs in the room:

Also, I know I need artwork and stuff but seems like I should pick the rug first? Right?

I really don't know what I'm doing...

It's all in your mind

Several months ago I decided to grow out my grey hair.

This decision took me a long time to make for some reason (maybe it's about accepting that I'm getting older?...I don't know why exactly).  I have a couple of friends who have gone grey and I think they look great but they have all silver/grey hair and I know that my hair is only partially grey. I wasn't sure how it would look.  I'm almost all grey at the temples and front of my head but mostly still brown in the back.  Somehow in my mind, having grey hair at the temples has always looked manly to me.

*And, yes, I spell grey with an "e". I can't seem to accept the spelling gray.*

But guess what? turns out that I don't mind my grey hair so far.

At first, my hairdresser put some highlights in so that when my grey started growing in, it wouldn't be so noticeable. Blondes are definitely luckier when it comes to this.  Grey hair really stands out against dark brown hair.

For years now, whenever my roots started growing in, I would be somewhere between annoyed and horrified. OH NO! Must get to the salon!  I look awful! I look old! etc etc etc

But since I decided to let the grey hair be grey hair...it doesn't bother me a bit.

It was all in my head. (ha!)  But seriously, I thought it looked awful or manly or whatever because I didn't want it there not because it actually looked awful or manly. Now that I've decided it's supposed to be there, well, it's just hair now.

It isn't all grown in by a long shot so I might change my mind about it at some point (which I totally give myself the right to do) but I'm actually kind of digging it right now.   My hair has a lot of different colors going on: darker brown, lighter brown, darker grey, lighter grey and even some that might be called white.  It's kind of cool.

I wonder what other things in my life are the way they are simply because of my attitude?

Engaged!

Carter got engaged to Harley Thorpe!

They have been dating pretty much since we moved here so they've been together a long time.
It's funny because we knew it was coming (he's had the ring for some time now) and he had told me that it would happen over spring break.

So once he did finally propose, in our minds it was like, "yep, they're engaged officially" but it's not like it was a big shock or anything.
We've just been waiting for it to be official.
So it didn't really occur to me to call anyone or text anyone when it happened.
I didn't want to post on facebook or anything until they had announced it themselves. I don't want to steal their thunder, ya know.

They called the parents that night and told us, which was fun! And they did put it on facebook. And Carter personally texted or told his brothers and maybe his grandparents (haha not actually sure about that).

Then, people in our neighborhood started coming up to us all excited "CARTER'S ENGAGED!" and we are like "Oh yeah, he is!" They sometimes seem surprised that we aren't going around announcing it and freaking out.

We even went to a family party and Carter asked me if I had told everyone. I told him that I assumed they had learned on Facebook but that it was possible that some people still didn't know. Oops!

I realized it was because in our minds, he's been engaged for awhile! Haha it just wasn't known to the whole world until this week.

We are excited and happy for them. They are a cute couple!

We don't know Harley's family well yet, but we really love Harley. (Her family raised a great girl and they love my son, so I am pretty sure they are awesome) I think our house is pretty boring compared to hers...she's still got siblings at home plus an adorable nephew...but she still comes over and we play cards and eat dinner or whatever. She's easy going and handles Carter's joking quite well! Being able to handle the Hill sense of humor is important if you're going to marry in.

The wedding won't be for about a year so don't go asking me about details yet! Lots of time to plan. (Not that I will be planning much...my job as mother of the groom is, I believe, to shut up and show up. Ha!)

Carter is a romantic at heart and he had a pretty big plan for proposing. They actually took a spring break trip to Europe and he proposed in Paris with the Eiffel tower in the background!  He had it all worked out to meet Austin and Katy in Paris and they all spent time together. Austin was on hand to catch a picture of the big moment.

When the proposal is big like that, I don't know how you deal with the honeymoon or anniversaries afterwards! haha He's setting a pretty high bar.

Congratulations Carter and Harley!

To Eternity and Beyond!

There's a first time for everything

Today, for the first time in my life, I paid someone to clean my house.
It's been 12 days since my foot surgery and I am still quite useless. I spend the majority of my day on the couch with my foot up on pillow, often with ice packs as well.
Frank has done a good job keeping up with food and dishes and laundry. But there's been no vacuuming and no one has touched the bathrooms either.
He has a stressful job and I just can't bring myself to tell him at the end of a long day when all he wants to do is watch a show and eat some dinner that he really needs to scrub the toilets.
And so I hired someone.
Two very nice women came cleaned my bathrooms and kitchen. They mopped (I really don't do that often enough), swept, dusted and vacuumed. The house looks awfully nice.
I felt weird sitting on the couch while they worked but at least I have a good excuse, what with the ace bandages and scooter and whatnot.
It's obvious that I'm not just being lazy.
If it weren't so expensive it would be tempting to have someone else do all those things I don't really enjoy doing. But I think this will likely be a one-off unless my recovery is much slower than I'm hoping.
It's funny how you notice things when 1-you have guests coming or 2-someone is coming to clean.
Suddenly you see how dusty everything is. You notice your gross microwave. You realize you don't mop often enough.
When it's guests, you get to work so as not to embarrass yourself.
When someone is coming to clean for you, you still want to tidy up for them, but it doesn't make a lot of sense. Since I was basically incapable of tidying up, it wasn't that hard for me. But Frank did find himself putting things away and emptying trash cans before they were supposed to show up.
That made me laugh, I gotta admit!