Thanksgiving 2010

Here's some pictures of our Thanksgiving...better late than never, I guess!

You can tell they're related to me!

After dinner I had the kids play pin the feather on the turkey. They were pretty good!

Everyone was nice enough to come to our house for Thanksgiving!

We had food...

and more food...

and more food!

And desserts...

and more desserts...

and MORE desserts. For thirteen people we had a total of eleven desserts (apple pie, pumpkin pie, chocolate chess pie, chess pie, chocolate trifle, pound cake, chocolate pound cake, pumpkin cookies, ice cream, chocolates, and chocolate covered potato chips). Welcome to a Johnson holiday!

We hope your Thanksgiving was as wonderful and dessert-filled as ours!

Thanksgiving Decorating Mania

I love reading decorating blogs and I religiously stalk the Better Homes and Gardens website. So many people have such creative ideas for decorating their homes and I love to see all of their amazing ideas. Occasionally...haha, ok, let's be honest, all the time...I steal their ideas to use in my own home.

This weekend I caught the craft/decorating bug. Our home has basically been devoid of any Thanksgiving decorations and, since we're having Thanksgiving at our house this year, that would just not do. So, much to my husband's delight (read: disdain) I headed to the store to stock up on supplies for several crafts I'd been wanting to recreate.

To make the below craft I purchased a pack of IBC rootbeer, a bundle of straw, and some stickers. I made my husband drink the root beer (he was such a good sport to suffer through for the sake of my craft), sent the bottles through a dishwasher cycle, wrapped some yellow and brown paper around them, stuck the stickers on, and shoved some straw in each bottle. Pretty simple although it cost a little more than I thought it would (who would have thought a pack of stickers would cost me $4.99 and my first child!).

I got the idea for my second craft from Better Homes and Gardens. I simply took some bundles of dried greenery and wrapped a ribbon around them. I hooked them to the railings with my secret weapon--a twisty-tie! (That one's for you dad!) I am IN LOVE with these bundles and these pictures don't do them justice. Just imagine the most adorable thing you've ever seen....and these are cuter than that!

The next picture isn't really of a holiday craft but I wanted to show you my newest piece of furniture, the black drawer set. "How cute," you say or "That's nice," you might reply. But what would you say if I told you I got it FOR FREE off the side of the road at ten o'clock at night and, on later inspection, found a prison release form in one of the drawers? Well, in that case, you might cry that I had better lock my doors at night.....but more than likely your heading to get your car keys right now in the hopes that while driving around you'll spot a similar find. The drawer was in a little bit of a rough condition but after some nails and a new coat of black paint it looks as good as new!

Ok, now for the most important part of decorating for Thanksgiving...the TABLE! Here's some pictures of the semi-done table. My husband thought I was absolutely crazy for setting everything up a week and a half early but I'm OCD like that! The tablecloths are courtesy of my wonderful mother-in-law, thanks Heather!

The runners are simple two wide strips of brown satin ribbon laid along the table side-by-side.

And I made the SIMPLEST centerpieces, also courtesy of Better Homes and Gardens. We used some vases we had from our wedding, bought 6 white candles at $0.25 each and filled each vase with corn kernals. This was so simple, hardly cost anything at all, and looks so beautiful.

Last (but definitely not least), have you ever experienced that feeling where you see something and you just can't get it out of your head? That's how I've felt for the past year about this picture. I saw this on Better Homes and Gardens and fell in love with the wreath. Well, after a year of wishing I finally just gave in to my innermost desires and made it.

I started with a 12 in. wreath, some pussy willows, some sort of brown nut looking things, feathers that I happened to have on hand from a pheasant I once shot (you know, something we all have laying around the house), ribbon, and a glue gun.

After laying out where I wanted things, I just glue-gunned them onto the wreath. [Too bad I had bought the incorrect size of glue so I had to cut them into quarters and hand-feed them through the gun! Ugh!]
Here's the wreath about half-way done.


And here it is completed and hanging on my yellow wall in our front hallway. Gorgeous!

So, after doing all of this in one day--haha, yes I did say I did this all in one day--I feel like my home is ready for Thanksgiving. Bring it on!

I hope you all have a wonderful holiday next week and enjoy being with family. I'm so blessed to have family here in North Carolina with me but I'll miss all of you who are across the country. Love you!

House Updates and a Coupon Trip

I hadn't posted any coupon trips for a while. Since I had a pretty good trip last week during Harris Teeter's super doubles I figured I'd post about it.


I got:
Two boxes instant potatoes
Laundry detergent
Potato Chips
KoolAid
Hormel Pork Loin
2 Packages of frozen Chinese Food Dinners
3 Boxes pierogies
5 Frozen pizzas
6 Green Giant boxed vegetables
4 Pillsbury Cinnamon Rolls
Butter Spray
3 Packages Yo-Plus yogurt

I saved $70.32, I spent $13.06, and I got a $3 off coupon on my next shopping trip. Not too shabby!

We also finished painting the last two rooms in our house. HOLY COW I'M NEVER PAINTING AGAIN!!! Here's a picture of the dining room when we bought the house.


Here is the dining room now. We used the drawing my brother, Doug, had created for our wedding as our start piece and then worked from there. It only took three different gallons of red paint to get the correct shade :) Ah, the joys of painting.

We also finished our upstairs bathroom. I'm sorry to say we did not take a picture of this before we changed it because it was NOT pretty. The walls were done in a neon-teal blue color. Changing the color of the walls did amazing things to this bathroom.

August Trip to Utah

In August, David and I went out to Utah for several different reasons. It was one of the nicest trips we've ever made to Utah because everything we did there had an eternal purpose to it.

We got to hang out on Temple Square our first day there. Here we are in front of the conference center.

We also had the opportunity to go to a wedding of one of David's good friends. In between the wedding and reception there was some ping pong playing.

Here's all the "Lakefield Boys" and their wives at the reception. We were only missing Matt Case and his wife. All of them are such great people and I'm so glad that my husband and I can associate with them!

Brother Carlson and Chris

The Lakefield boys and Brother Carlson at the Bountiful Temple. They were called the Lakefield Boys growing up because they were all in the Lakefield Ward together.

My family also took family pictures while we were there. Here's one I took from the side while they were snapping grandma and grandpa with their 17 grandkids!

And finally, the thing I'd been looking forward to the most, was going through the temple with my grandmother. She hadn't been to the temple in 67 years and decided it was time she went back. My whole family was there--cousins, aunts, uncles, brothers, sisters, and family friends. It was one of the happiest days of my life. It was also one of the most spiritual experiences I have ever had. To be in the temple with one's entire family is exactly what heaven's going to be like!

Just Some Pictures of Us

So, David and I bought a sleeper sofa for our downstairs office and I had the bright idea to have a sleepover on it that night! Let's just say we didn't get the best night's sleep of our life that night. Here's David pretending to sleep.

We drove down to Charlotte to be with David's family for the Fourth of July. David's niece Caroline loves to cuddle with him!

Courtney made one of her amazing cakes for Heather's b-day.

And she made a nutella poundcake for David's birthday....it was amazing!

Here's some pictures of us that we took while waiting for the fireworks on the Fourth of July.

In July I got to go to a Michael Buble concert with my wonderful friend Sarah. It was AMAZING!!! I absolutely loved it and would love to go to another one of his concerts. We had a blast!