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She Gets It From Her Mama

A Mother and Daughter's Take On All Things Lovely

Sandy T. Sick At Sea

Since 2008, every few years, my extremely generous parents have taken all of the adult children and our families on a fun vacay. Our first trip was in 2008 to Cozumel, Mexico. We knew we were going somewhere, but my parents kept it a secret until Christmas day. My Mom blindfolded all of us and had us open up bags with letters and just by feeling the letters we had to try and figure out the location. My Mom is so fun and creative (check out her Thanksgiving table creations here). My niece Lani was the first to figure out that we were going to Cozumel. It was such a fun trip!

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The Wall

Accent walls are definitely a popular design trend these days. Painted walls, wallpapered walls, plank walls, wood trim walls and so on and so on (pardon that Bubba Gump description). I only have two accent walls in my home (view one of my walls here). A royal blue wall in my family room and a wallpapered wall in my dining room. I love them so much and would have one in EVERY room but I am trying to keep my walls neutral anticipating that Jerry T. (my hubby) will walk through the back door one day and say “hey lets put the house on the market and move to Palm Springs.” If you know us, you know that is MY fantasy, not his. So until then, I am trying to follow the advice of every realtor I have ever known who will always say “keep everything neutral for a fast sale” (particularly Cynthia Welsch – my realtor in St. Charles, Illinois who quickly sold my house after I took her advice). Abby is the opposite. Almost every room in her house has an accent wall. And I must say they are all beautiful. She could care less about a realtor’s advice.

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My Favorite “NOT REALLY A CHRISTMAS PRESENT”

All the adults in my family agreed not to exchange Christmas presents this year. We’ve agreed to do this before, but there is always that one rule breaker who shows up with presents. This year it appeared that everyone would abide by the “no gift” rule until Christmas night when my son brought in this box and said “Here Mom, this is not really a Christmas present, it’s a New Year’s present“.

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Christmas 2017

I was excited that Thanksgiving was early this year because that meant I would have my Christmas decorations up even longer. I haven’t had my decorations up for two years, so I really had fun opening all the boxes and sort of “rediscovering” everything. If you watched our Instagram Stories last week, you probably saw that part of that rediscovery was a dead snake on one of the boxes! Yikes😱!!! That slowed me down until Jerry T came home and got rid of the snake. I’m still freaking out over that and will probably never go into the attic ever again! I mean how does a snake get in the attic?…

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How I Fell In Love With All Things Home

I think the first time I started to become interested in interior design was when my high school crush, Russell (shoutout!) came over to my house for the first time and was like “whoa, your house looks like the Real World House”. Back in the early 2000’s, the Real World reality series on MTV was everything. Or at least in my teenage world it was! It was definitely my favorite TV show. It was then that my interest in interior design began. My house was different from my friends houses. It was modern, contemporary and cool.

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Thanksgiving Table/Four Ways

I am sure you all are over Thanksgiving and on to Christmas decor but setting up this little website thing took A LOT longer than I thought. Christmas decorating seems to start earlier and earlier every year. At my home, Christmas has to wait until after Thanksgiving weekend. Family, food, fun and giving thanks to the Good Lord for all of our blessings define our Thanksgivings. No pressure of gift giving, no wrapping a ton of packages, no trees to decorate, just set a pretty table and cook up some yummy food. We have been cooking the same dishes for our Thanksgiving meal since my grandmother’s days. These dishes were created by my grandmother and mom and we look forward to them every year. Decorating the Thanksgiving table is the best part to me. This year I have decorated four tables, all a little different. The table and buffet in these pictures belonged to my grandmother and I was lucky enough to inherit them many years ago….

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