Author

gswarfield

I LOVE THRIFTING, but since Grant and I are on a budget, we have been trying to not buy anything which includes thrifting. When Simon was in town, he needed some clothes, so this was a good excuse to go as well. We went to two different thrift stores that we like here in Austin, and I would have to say that we found a pretty good haul. I got 3 banana republic shirts, 1 hollister t-shirt, 2 express shirts, an awesome pair of indigo shoes, and an amazing pair of jeans.

The jeans are Brand 7 for all mankind which I knew was a very nice brand, but since they fit great I figured why not branch out and buy my first ever pair of skinny jeans. So I bought these jeans for $6.99.

After a few days of wearing them, I was wondering how expensive this brand was… come to find out this pair of jeans brand new costs $155.00… I could never pay this much for jeans, but it made me very excited to own such a nice pair of jeans!

http://www.7forallmankind.com/store/productdetails.aspx?productid=1001&colorid=101

December 4, 2009

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Thanksgiving 2009

by gswarfield December 4, 2009

For Thanksgiving this year, we had a very laid back, fun, and family filled event. It was planned pretty last mintue because none of knew what this week would hold since Tanya’s pregnancy was up in the air. So, in the end, we ended up having this awesome celebration with Tanya, Wilson, Mia, Ally, Emily, Shea, Anthony, Simon, Grant, and myself. The men decided that they wanted to eat steak, the females had chicken, and then everyone else brought different kinds of sides, and the rest of the time we played games, ate, talked, and cooed over Emi-chan!

We picked up all of the meats on the way to Tanya and Wilson’s here is Grant’s Steak that they grilled at Shea and Anthony’s house.

Tanya and Wilson provided their home, their beverages, AMAZING cranberry fluff, and Mashed potatoes.

Here you can see Anthony’s Steak and Ally ready to go and get some food. Anthony and Shea provided their grill, and two different casseroles.

Grant and I brought the meats, 2 pies, and my favorite wine that we brought to Thanksgiving this year. It is a 2008 Saracco Moscato D’Asti Wine.

Here you can see Tanya drinking now that she is allowed… woot the baby is out.

I think this is a picture of Antony’s Steak which I heard was also Great!

Ally and me just chilling… She ate some of my food, but more than anything wanted to see what was going on.

Mia and ally wanted to join the fun! they love being involved with whatever is going on.

Finally me holding Emi-chan, I was trying to not hog her so much, but I could just watch her for hours, even when she is not really doing anything.

Simon sporting his new shirt from the thrift store holding Emi-chan.

Here you can see Emi-chan sleeping. She was so chill that whole time it was awesome!

December 4, 2009

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Things that I think are great!

by gswarfield December 2, 2009

There are a lot of different things that I like, but lately with Christmas coming closer and closer, I just keep seeing beautiful Christmas type decorations! Here are some of the things that if I had money, time, and a place to arrange them would love to do! It is funny how I have a very modern taste in furniture and art, but tend to like more traditional type decorations for Christmas. I am a sucker for Silver and Red so sorry about the repetition.

Here you can see some beautiful vases being used for ornaments. Now I tend to not use gold very much,but it is the idea that I like not their actual ornaments.

Here is my all time favorite wreath that I have found so far! They are selling it at Pottery Barn for about $85.00 which I know is expensive which is why I don’t have one, but I think it is AMAZING!

I don’t know if I would do this quite they way they do, but I thought it was a fun way of displaying some fruit rather than using a fruit bowl.

This was to me a GREAT Idea! I love making chocolate chip cookies, so I thought it would be a fun gift to give people pre-homemade cookie dough that is frozen and then they can cut and bake just like store bought cookies only 20xs better!

I think lanterns are always fun, and always look nice. I recently put two lanterns into my sister’s room for the make over, and she could easily add some pine leaves like shown above, put them outside on her stairs, and they would look great especially when lit up.

I always like home made wrapping paper, but if you do not have a lot of time then it doesn’t always save money. They look nice, but a lot of work.

Here again you can see burlap used to wrap gifts which I guess could be recycling if you just have burlap laying around,but it still looks classy I think.

A kind of Random picture compared to the rest,but I have been looking everywhere for a watch I like, and I still won’t get this one for a LONG time, if even at all, but these are very nice and they have them in LOTS of colors for only $65.00 at Dillards.

Most of the things in this room I don’t like at all, but I love the three wreaths on the front door, and I really like the garland going up the banister.

Again in this picture, the furniture I find is very horrible, BUT I like all of the windows which probably makes the room so cold you never want to be in there, but anyway, I love the wreaths on all of the windows!

This is the outside view of the room above, and again, I like the three wreaths on the door. I

normally like the garland around the entry way,but in this picture it is not my favorite way.

I would never want this on my house, but I thought it was a nice natural take on Christmas decorating, and since there are no Christmas lights it is more energy efficient I guess.

This pic
ture just looked very classic to me, some parts I like, and some I don’t but I thought it was a pretty nice representation of what I normally like for Christmas Decorations.

December 2, 2009

Uncategorized

The Make Over

by gswarfield November 29, 2009

Grant and I were lucky enough to be able to live with Tanya and Wilson for about 6 months after Grant and I moved to Austin to find jobs. Tanya and Wilson had been in a similar situation, and they definitley made life awesome by letting us live with them. We wanted to show them how grateful we were in a way that would really help out. We could have just given them money, but then since they have kids it would have most likely gone to helping the girls instead of using it selfishly. This of course is a good thing,but since we lived with them, I knew certain pieces of furniture that they were saving up for which made my job a lot easier.

So, I knew that I wanted to do this make over, but first I had to convince Grant. But before I could do that, I had to figure out how much everything would cost, but I had mentioned it to my mom and told her not to tell anyone because I didn’t want them accidentally finding out, but of course, EVERYONE knew about it then. So, I kept getting calls with more and more funding coming in which I was not going to refuse, but made everything a little bit more confusing. So, eventually I had a plan with everything that I wanted, and when my older Sister Kira was in town for a visit we went shopping and got pretty much everything but the furniture. My older brother Daniel went and picked up a bed frame in Houston for us that we had found on Craigslist.

Then came the whole dilemma with Tanya said she would be induced to have her 3rd child (Now Emily Ashlyn Robertson) the 27th of November, so everything was planned around then. My mom and sister were going to visit at that time to help with the girls and the make over, while I was working on the room, etc. But Tanya was induced on Monday the 23rd which was acutally my cousin’s birthday which made him happy,but it threw off our schedule! HOW dare Tanya have her baby when it doesn’t fit in with my schedule!!!! ;p So anyway, I went to work Monday morning, Tanya went to the doctor’s and then the hospital to be induced while awesome neighbors watched the girls. My mom and younger sister were on their way from Houston to watch the girls while my sister was in the hospital. During this time Grant was at our house getting all of the furniture and accessories that I had bought packed along with 200+ other items that I needed. My cousin Simon was also on his way from Houston to Austin with the bed frame from Houston.

When I got home from work to Tanya and Wilson’s and all of my stuff had been brought to their house, it looked like a total mess, my nieces kept telling me that they wanted to paint, and Grant and my mom had taken before pictures, had moved everything out of the room, and they had taped everything off! Shortly after me, my cousin arrived and we started painting the walls.

Here you can see the before pictures of their room.

This set up was our problem set up, because of how pictures would hang above the bed, it would mean that once we moved the glider and the crib thingy back in it would look bad. So, we did the reveal so they would see it normally, and then we mess it up and move it back.

Here you can see that everything is taped when I got home from work which was VERY awesome because I had work on Tuesday too, so after work was all I had.

We were trying to take pictures throughout, but we just weren’t fast enough since we were all in a hurry to take pictures every couple of moments. We painted and had lots of help! This was the first time that Grant and Anthony had painted, so I hope it wasn’t too bad of an experience. We had one little hiccup where the bed frame that we had gotten off of craigslist was adverstized the wrong size. We weren’t ripped off price wise, but now we have a full size bed frame in a style that we don’t want to keep and are trying to sell it now.

So, Monday we took pictures, moved stuff, taped, and painted. Then we put the wrong bed frame together, took it apart and had had enough for that day. Tuesday I went to work, but Simon and Grant had to go to Ikea to pick up the correct bed frame, so once that was done putting furniture together was most of what they did.

Here you can see my nieces wanting soooo badly to help, but pretty much just being in the way most of the time. But this is what I came home to on Tuesday.

Then I started making dinner for everyone while Grant and Simon followed my instructions on where I wanted everything in the room to be hung. From mirrors to pictures to curtain rods. Here Simon is using the Laser Level.

There were a few times when I thought that Tanya and Wilson might find out what we were up to. For instance, on Monday Mia talked to Wilson on the phone and told him that she is painting with Grant and Simon, but luckily she has a painting set of her own so they didn’t think anything of it. Wilson came home on Monday to put the girls to bed, and he realized what we were doing, but he only saw the paint color, and he made sure not to see it while we were doing the other work. Then when I was at the hospital with Tanya seeing Emily for the first time, she kept asking me questions and it was really hard getting around some of them to not make it sound suspicious, but in the end we pulled through it and Tanya was surprised in the end.

Here are the After Pictures!

Here you can see how close the bed and the chest of drawers are, this was not how I wanted it, but this was one of those pieces that Tanya and Wilson wanted in their room for sure. No matter how we moved it, it would not fit better, so we gave them options if they wanted it moved somewhere else, but at least all of the drawers open completely without hitting the bed.

Here you can see everyone in the room after the reveal and the girls fighting over their new little sister. Then we had to move everything to fit the crib and stuff, but eventually it will look nicer again.

And here is the Video with Tanya’s Reaction!

Another view from my iphone

November 29, 2009

Uncategorized

My New Addiction

by gswarfield November 10, 2009

Grant thought that it was time for me to confide in other people about my new addiction. I don’t think that he wants me to give it up since it has not shown to be harmful quite yet, but we will see. Tanya showed me this blog, listed below where this amazing lady writes out all of the deals in most major grocery and drug stores in the USA. She tells you the deals, the coupons to use, and how to completely understand each of the stores and how they function. It is soo much fun getting good deals, but it can also be very addicting. When you get something for $0.20 cents, it makes you want to buy it even though you don’t need a certain hand cream, etc. I have been trying very hard to not buy things that we don’t NEED unless we are getting them 100% free because otherwise we are still spending more money than we would have without the coupons.

Here you can see a whole group of items that I was able to get for free, some samples, some deals, some coupons, and some I could only have gotten with the help of this blog.
http://hip2save.blogspot.com/

One of the best things about the blog that I use is there are sooooo many free samples to keep up with that for the picture above, I couldn’t even keep up with all of the things that I have gotten for free! Here you can see free luggage tags that I got from KLM Airlines. I got one for me and one for Grant which was a fun thing to get in the mail.

Here you can see all of these items I got and only spent $1.32 which definitely shows how much you can buy for a dollar. Clipping and using coupons takes a lot of time,but since Grant and I are on a limited budget, it really helps us out. It lets us afford things that we don’t always need, and it lets us have some luxuries like some name brand items and some snack food that we would normally not be able to afford. We have even stopped doing the Angel Food Ministries because we are saving more money with the coupons. We still think that it is a great ministry, and is very good for people who cannot make the time to save money otherwise, but it just hasn’t been the right thing for us since I have come to enjoy couponing.

November 10, 2009

Uncategorized

Trip to Searcy Arkansas

by gswarfield November 2, 2009

A while ago now, Grant and I drove from Austin, TX to Searcy, AR for a weekend, or better yet two days. We left on a Friday morning when I had taken off of work. We made it into Searcy later that night, and then hung out with my Cousin Simon. We were also very blessed to be able to stay with the Robertson Family (My older Sister’s In-Laws) who seem to have almost adopted us since we are treated like we are their children or married into their family! The next morning, Saturday, we went to our storage unit and got winter clothes and random other things that we had been missing. After that, we headed back to Austin, TX and had most of Sunday to chill.

This was driving into Dallas, I thought it just looked like a nice city scape!

This was also in the Dallas Area, a nice body of water.

This is one of the funniest things that I was not expecting! Here you can see a TRANSFORMER! If you click on the picture and look at it more closely, you can see multiple Transformer Logos, and even Autobots instead of expedition or whatever make SUV this car is.

Here you can kind of see flooding on a construction site where they were trying to pour concrete… not the best conditions… this was leaving Little Rock.

In the next few pictures you can see more of the flooding where even equipment was under water.

As stated above.

This might not be the most interesting picture,but Arkansas is not the natural state for no reason! It is always so beautiful.

Speaking of natural, here is the infamous Trash Mountain, that is literally all trash… this is as we were leaving Little Rock to return home.

I love seeing funny animals, and this giraffe with its tongue stuck out really made me laugh! I cannot remember for the life of me where this was taken,but it was still funny to see.

And now after we have gotten home. I am sad to say that all of my clothes that we brought back are not yet put away. Since our return from this trip, I don’t think that we have been as busy since we have gotten married, but thus is life.

In this picture, you can see the items that I brought from the storage unit on the left. On the right, are the items that Grant decided to bring back. Also, Grant wanted me to mention that there are still more shoes in the storage unit that are mine, and I accidentally had 3 more pairs of shoes in one of the bins. We actually had more room in our car to bring more home, but we would need somewhere to put everything we bring back, so we refrained. I for one am ecstatic that I have more of my clothes, but am very happy and grateful for all the different things that Grant and I have been blessed with through out our lives and marriage that matter so much more than clothes and shoes.

November 2, 2009

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