Piano Lessons

I am so excited!  Today I start piano lessons!!  Me!  I have never played an instrument in my life.

We have a gorgeous 9 foot concert piano in our home.  Right now Gary is the only real player in the family.   He is classically trained from The New England Conservatory School of Music.   Because of that and his continued love of playing, his music is beautiful.

I have been wanting to learn something new and sort of push the boundaries a bit and one day as I was thinking about window treatments while standing in the piano room, it dawned on me--why not put this baby to good use and learn how to play her.

My music teacher arrives this evening at 6:30.  I feel like a first grader!

Here are a few shots of our piano from a few weeks ago getting a 4 hour tune-up from our piano tuner (need a good piano tuner, we can hook you up!).    Our piano was stored while we were living in our 'transition' home so she needed a lot of love and attention when we finally got her back.

Finger prints on the side....tsk tsk

This is so fascinating to me.

Piano Tuner at work.  Sort of reminded me of a mad scientist.  He was so focused and detail oriented.
We know our piano is in good hands with him.

See?  Naked windows in that room still. 
That is Gary playing.  He looks like a mad scientist as well :-)
My cousin's daughter by Gary's side.  She has been taking lessons and plays very well.

She is such a sweetie.

Well, wish me luck!
I'd love comments (below). 
-Lisa

Last of Easter as well as Some Ham and Brie Goodness

Well today is April 1st.  Time to put away the Easter decor and focus our energy on the great outdoors!!!  Spring is finally here and all my windows are open just a bit.  Love it!!

Today's post includes random thoughts to finish up the month of March and welcome April.

Here is a pic of my beautiful Easter basket that sat on my kitchen table for the last few days.  I was in search of white tulips all weekend and couldn't find a one!  I settled on lots of white baby's breath and I am sort of happy I did.  I forgot how gorgeous these are, especially all on their own.

Okay, that's the last of Easter pics for this year!

So I want to share with you an A.M.A.Z.I.N.G.  recipe I made for our Easter get together that was a big hit and so yummy yummy yummy, it's a ham and brie panini with maple syrup for dipping.    I found the recipe on Pinterest and thought I had pinned it but when I went back to find it, I guess I never pinned it!!!  So this is from memory and it was soooo good.

This year we had a huge Easter gathering.  Over 20 friends and family so I decided my normal Easter brunch would need to include a few appetizers.  This appy has only a few ingredients:

     -really good white bread (not wonder bread!)

     -sliced smoked ham

     -brie cheese

     -maple syrup, REAL maple syrup (the other stuff should be out lawed as far as I am concerned)

     -optional--dijon mustard

Simply assemble your bread, ham and brie.

Hey looky-I'm on sale!!  Pick me pick me!

The dijon idea was mine because I just love it, especially with ham.  Country Dijon by Grey Poupon is the best!  I think when entertaining if you do choose to serve it with dijon  then you should offer it both with and without because many people do not like the kick it provides.

Pure goodness!

Fire up your skillet as if you were making a grilled cheese.

Good ole' Crisco for the outside.  Just a little itty bit otherwise it is greasy!  Use this instead of butter, butter burns too easily.  Crisco is your best bet when making grilled cheese.

Pour your maple syrup in a shallow dish appropriate for the number of guests.  I am doing this the day after for the tutorial so this is not what I used.

Cook your sandwich on very low heat so the cheese melts and the toasting of the bread is gorgeous!!   When I did this yesterday I cooked many sandwiches all at the same time on a very large electric skillet.  I prepared them about an hour before and kept them in a warm oven till ready to serve.

Slice your sandwiches in long strips and put on a platter with the maple syrup close by.  Watch as they disappear!

Ya, this will be a keeper for me!  And my guests will all be happy and make me feel like an iron chef.  Life is good.  

Last but not least for this random post.  I wanted to share one of my latest finds at a local consignment shop.

It is a gorgeous soup turine.....

Isn't she purdee?  She has a surprise......

She plugs in!!!!

Oh how I love her.  She keeps soups warm, she keeps mashed potatoes warm, she keeps anything in her warm!!!  Her lid rests nicely on her handle.  She really is a pretty little work horse. 

So that's it for today.  Enjoy your first day of April and don't be fooled!

-Lisa

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A Very Understated Easter

(bear with me while I work out the kinks with Instagram linking to my blog)

Let's take a peek into my living room to see what sort of Easter decor I have come up with, shall we?  Easter has never been a big decorating holiday in my home.  After all it really isn't a holiday about bunnies now is it!!  I call this my understated Easter decor...

I found these adorable bunny toys last year (I have 2 of them).  I just love them.  The stocky cream candle is Target via Goodwill.  Brass candlesticks are an antiquing find.  Tapers are super old candles found in a local antique shop.  They are gorgeous, black and the floral design is more wax that has been intricately painted.

Are you spying my smocked burlap panels?  Oh how I am in love with these babies.  More on those in a future post.

Simple and elegant, just how I like it.  Not too foo foo.

So tough to take pics in windows!  Plus I am using my iPhone rather than my camera.  Little bunny with moss egg on her back to the left.  Vintage post card to the right.  The candle is stunning in person.  Another vintage find.  Intricate painted wax detail adorns the entire candle.  I will never burn this little lovely.  I call her Fraulein because she was made in Germany.   The lamp is super duper heavy italian marble, of course an antiquing home run.  Bust is Homegoods (I think she does a great job holding her own among these vintage finds).

Here is my adorable little (well he is a bit stocky I suppose :-) English Bully, Albert.  The brick under my chair is a staple of the room for a while.  The leg was damaged in the move--life happens!  When it does, stick a brick under it!

If you missed last year's tablescape, check it out here.  You will see a common theme with my decor---earth tones.

Must have a faux moss bunny in my house every Easter!  Boxwood in my sweet little iron bird feeder.    This is real boxwood treated somehow.  I really am pleased with the quality.

I love vintage postcards.  Especially when they have a real note on them.  This one does.
Floral frogs are perfect for displaying these.

I have always found this little guy a bit creepy.  He sits atop my Anne Geddes Until Now book.    The book was a gift from Gary, he knows how much I love babies.  Especially naked chubby babies!!!  Anne's books are full of them.  Bamboo cabinet is a recent vintage find.

 Thanks for stopping in! Have a lovely Easter.
If you are not a follower of my blog, please become one!  My posts are light hearted and hopefully inspiring.  I also LOVE comments., they keep me going.

-Lisa

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No Minimalist Here

New House Pics---NOT

So I got this amazing MacBook Air from my honey Gary a while back for no particular reason, he just new I hated the laptop I was using and decided to change that for me  (thanks honey!).   I have to say I love the MB Air for sooooo many reasons--the main reasons are speed of powering it up and the other is the fabulous slim profile and weight of it.  What I have yet to conquer is how to cut and paste photos from the web.  I have no problem uploading my own photos but when I try a web pic I get a little blue square with a question mark in the middle.   Well that is not the image I want to share with all of you!!!  

Rather than not post at all today, I am going to improvise and use random photos from my rolodex of photos to insert rather than go out to the web and get more fitting pics.  So here goes....

The move is 'moving' along...

had I been able to capture a web photo--this would have been a turtle moving along very slowly....I think this photo will work in a pinch!

In reality the purchasing process was fairly quick however for Gary and I it has moved sloooooowa because we have truly fallen in love with our soon to be new home.

A little background...

 What movie this is from???  I know.

You see, we are a blended family.  I had a home and two amazing sons (oops, did I just say that?), Gary had a home and two amazing children (yup-did it again!).
We met....

Angels sang

Our overall plan was that I would sell my home, move in with him.  We would then sell his home after a year and we would rent for a bit while we searched for our dream home.  Guess what?  We did all of that with ease.  Up until the one year rent plan....  We rented a lovely cape that certainly met our needs (BASIC needs).  Our intention was to rent for just a year and before we knew it, one year was two, then three, then four!   Life took over at that point and for us that was quite ok.  We have four children between the two of us so you can imagine all of the important things that happen along the way.  A new home was less and less important as we nurtured our children and focused on them during a time of great transition for all of them.

Things settled down and we began looking again at the real estate market.  Long story short, we will be closing tomorrow!  Can you believe it?  Closing on the last day of December and starting the New Year off in our forever home?!

Because we will be closing tomorrow, I will soon have so many more pics and so many more posts.  We have a New Year's  party tomorrow eve as well---luckily we are guests rather than hosts.  We are sharing our New Year's Eve with wonderful friends who matter and will travel into the new year with us.  I feel blessed.

Hope my sparse photos did not bore anyone.
-Lisa

I'm Back!

Well hello and a how do you do?  It has been so long since I created a post I found it challenging to navigate my own blog!  

I never expected to be gone this long but life is life and sometimes we have to just sit back and take a break, let things follow their course and hope to land somewhere great. 

So much to catch up on but before I do that I must say that I had planned on 'coming back' last Friday however in light of the devastation that occurred on that terrible day, I just couldn't bring myself to post.  Those precious innocent children and their parents will forever hold a place in my heart.  

Let me first say that I have been following all of my favorite blogs the entire time I was on sabbatical from my own.  They make me so happy and inspire me everyday.  Pinterest has become a part of daily life, I have discovered new blogs and made a few more blog friends along the way.  So even though I haven't been posting, I have been bloggin'!

My plan for this post is to keep it short and sweet.  Sort of ease back into it...

The most wonderful thing has happened when least expected.  Let me give you hints by saying Christmas this year will be a blur, it will be the first time in my adult life I have not gone all out and decorated, it will be the first year we do not have a tree (heavens to Betsy!!!), first year my house is complete chaos with lots of cardboard floor to ceiling.   Did you guess yet?  Well here are few more hints...

Hope that helps.  Talk to you soon.

Lot's of love

-Lisa