Why is it so hard to pick a backsplash?

Maybe because I am trying to work with what we've got. Maybe if I was completely starting from scratch, I would do something like this:

But I will save that idea for our vacation house in Greece.

This is the actual kitchen (not in Greece) we are working with:

Pardon the mess - we were still moving in at this point! This picture is taken standing in the breakfast room looking towards the office/playroom. Below are some more pictures.

I included a closeup of the granite countertop because we are planning the kitchen redo around the stupid thing. Black granite would definitely not have been my first pick. And it furthermore irritates me when people think it's a good idea to slap new, expensive countertops on old and outdated laminate and oak cabinets to "update" the kitchen. You could get a cheaper countertop and paint the cabinets for better effect. But I digress. . .

Anyways, I feel bad ripping out nice granite. Especially since it is actually very beautiful and has grown on me. Hence the design around them.

Basically the plan is to replace the current cabinet doors with shaker style cabinet doors for a more updated, clean and modern look that would be a fraction of the cost of replacing all the cabinets. To save some money, we're going to have a local cabinetmaker make the doors for us unfinished, and we will paint the doors and the cabinet bases ourselves - white is seems will work best with the color scheme we have going on in the house so far. There are a few other things we plan on doing too, but I'll save that for another post :) This is kind-of an inspiration kitchen I have kept in mind:

So we're going to remove the current ugly backsplash (that is surrounded by a lovely brown oak quarter round that normally goes on the floor). But replace it with what??? It has to be something that does not compete with the granite. But plain old white subway tiles might make the room look too sterile. Which is why I liked the tiny mosaic in the above inspiration pictures - just the right amount of shimmer, but would totally go with the granite.

Problem.

I have no idea what backsplash that is. Why? Because just as I have copied pictures from someone's website without siting where I got them, so did the person I got them from, so, no source, and alas, no description of the tile. 

I have looked online for hours a bit and have come up empty-handed. Is it glass? Carrara marble? Mother of Pearl? Who knows. Probably is 3/8 or 5/8 in tile though. So that's all I've got. Oh and no stores in this area carry anything like it in person.

Sigh.

Another option that Home Depot actually carries is this:

That might actually be kind of cool - but would I grow weary of it's trendiness after a while?? Here's a couple of pics I found with a slightly bigger version so you can have an idea how it would look as a backsplash:

Kind of cool? Or not so much? What do you think?

Let's Start This Off With a Fun Project - Butterfly Art

I will start off by saying that no butterflies were harmed in the making of this art! These are paper ones, folks!

Did I mention I used to be a teacher? (Well, no, probably not since this is my second post and the first one was the self-deprecating intro.) Well I was.

And like all good teachers, I like to do arts and crafts, especially on the cheap. Why do we have to make things on the cheap, you ask? I am eyeing the soapbox but am walking away in 3...2...1...

I am in the process of trying to find an eclectic mix of pictures for a gallery display I want to put above the living room sofa. Something kind of like this:

Except not exactly like that, (that's what came up when I googled "eclectic picture gallery above sofa"), but hopefully you get the idea. (P.S. - strangely enough, I actually have a sofa almost exactly like that and a side lamp almost exactly like that, but I have a way different color scheme, as in not stripes with orange and green and brown) (P.P.S. - I am in no way attacking you if this happens to be your house. It's really not that bad. Really.)

Anywhoo, back to my art. So I thought I would incorporate some natural elements into my design scheme (fancy schmancy talk for I like butterflies. I think they will look good.)

I saw a cool butterfly thing at IKEA:

But it was a little more white than I wanted. Um, plus it was like 50 bucks. For paper cut outs of butterflies. Which got me thinking. . . maybe I could make my own version! So whilst at IKEA, I spotted an almost identical shadowbox frame (for $9.99 I might add - waaaay better than $49.99). It probably has a name like Rivkaslvkoout.

Oh, pardon me. It is actually called the RIBBA frame. (I was totally close.)  It comes with a mat but I chose not to use it.

Next step was to find various pictures of butterflies I liked - I decided to go super colorful, but there are so many different species of butterflies out there you could pick all kinds of combinations. I printed these beauts off on photo paper. 

I then began the process of cutting these bad boys out. I will note that after cutting out a few with the antennas I began to develop arthritis in my hand, and decided they didn't look that good with antennae anyways. So my butterflies are antenna-less.

They look pretty realistic, right?! Kind of looks like a biology project from 9th grade. You know, the one your parents you did the night before (actually I did my own homework, FYI - but as a biology teacher I sadly saw that often). Speaking of parents, my mom actually came over at this stage, saw the butterflies on my desk from a distance and asked if they were real :) 

To make my paper creatures look a little less 2D, I decided to try folding them in half, so they would be more 3D like the $49.99 one from IKEA.

And here's a shameless kiddo picture of the "baby" working on her own art while mommy did hers:

For the background paper, I found some thick white scrapbook paper, traced the outside of the mat so it would be that same size and cut it.

I then laid out the butterflies in a way that looked good to me, ran a little super glue down the "spine" of the folded butterfly, and stuck them on. (I really didn't do any measuring - I'm sure you could to make it more precise, but I kind of just eyeballed it.) I decided to go with a more symmetrical layout than the IKEA one, but it would be super easy to lay them out in the upward swoop shape if you prefer that to the scientific type mount I strangely defaulted to:

So finally I slipped the art carefully in the frame, put the back on, and VOILA! Instant (well, not really instant, per se . . .) art.  But it was cheap. And I am really happy with how it turned out! I promise to take a picture once it gets hung up in my "eclectic gallery above the sofa".

Anyone else have any cool uses or ideas for a shadowbox frame?

Getting Discouraged is Just a Part of the Journey

I figured I would post about this because it is important to note that the journey to the country, to a farm, or land is not an easy one. I guess if it was, more people would do it (well, maybe not :)

It has been a few months now and we are still here, still stuck, and unsure of our next move. I am beyond antsy. I guess I had this timeline in my head of how everything was going to happen. But it is not happening that way, and it is frustrating. My gardening and farming books sit on the dining room table collecting dust and mocking me! I should put them away.

We had originally planned a move to a particular area (we'll call it "the homeland" for dramatics) where my husband's family lives. He has tried and tried and tried and nothing is coming up in the way of jobs. To make matters worse (if you want to call it that), he has a good job here and enjoys what he does, and is actually lucky to have it. So we try looking for properties here. But there are a couple of factors stopping us here. He already has almost an hour commute one way, and moving farther out to land would make a bad commute worse. (Although we did discover a country area that would be closer to his job than he is now, but it is far away from family.) But aside from this, I know this may sound ridiculous, but the main thing stopping us here is that everything about moving to "the homeland" feels right, but when we think of moving to somewhere in our current area, it just feels all wrong (as does staying right where we are). We feel like we are supposed to go to "the homeland" but we have no way of making it work. We are stuck. We have the luxury to say we are tied to a good job in a rotten place.

My husband described it as he sees where he wants to go, it is so clear there is no doubt in his mind. Even when he was there last week to try to meet people, find leads, etc. he knew "the homeland" is where he belongs. He can see it so distinctly, so clearly, but he has absolutely no way of reaching it. It is like a mirage in the desert.

It is frustrating because time is running out to make a decision. We need some permanence, we need to know where to put down roots. We can't live in this state of uncertainty much longer. We need to know where to build our lives. I am especially affected by this as a stay-at-home mom, because I feel like each day comes and goes, and I am in limbo, just waiting. I have no idea what to plan for, when to plan for it. Each day drags on and seems wasted.

I hope this will pass quickly, I hope that we will gain some clarity soon. We have discussed putting our house on the market just to take a step in faith and see where God leads us. I think we have to do something.