Early Fall

Hi Friends,
Thanks for stopping by The Chalkboard Cottage today.

Happy Fall Y'all!

Early fall here in North Carolina means....the weather is slightly less hot, the mornings are a tad cooler, the daylight hours are a little less, the leaves are just starting to show some signs of yellow on the edges of the leaves, and I have begun hearing Canadian geese flying off to places unknown to me.

Today as I was preparing for a course I'm teaching away from home later this week I found it lovely sitting outside on the screened in porch with some cooler breezes than I felt in the 90 degree day we had two days ago.

Early fall here is still too early to put out the real pumpkins and I haven't bought the bright yellow mums yet but still there are pops of autumn around our home. I've put away a lot of blues, greens, and sea life décor from summer (though of course being a beach loving girl, there's still some around) and brought out the warm neutrals....browns, more wicker, warm fuzzy pillows and blankets. I have a few woodland creature friends that I look forward to bringing out each year too. I bought a new woodland friend this year, an owl, which my son says 'freaks me out'.

Somehow I'm finding myself wanting to lay around more than this week and read. I made a trip to our local library to pick up several books I had on reserve and am dying to start reading. Have you read any of these yet? I have been loving Grit this week and am going to Devil in the White City next. If you haven't heard of Grit, watch the author, Angela Duckworth's awesome Ted Talk here:
https://www.ted.com/talks/angela_lee_duckworth_grit_the_power_of_passion_and_perseverance?language=en

I think you'll become a fan and want to read more!

I wanted to share with you some pops of fall in our favorite family room where we are finding ourselves wrapped up in blankets watching movies, new fall tv shows (thank you networks!), and reading:

New light from a store in South Carolina, great bargain!

Pumpkin artwork by my daughter:

 

Newest handmade craft- paper leaf wreath:

 

These two chairs are my latest thrift store purchases. The one on the right was free and I made a custom drop cloth cover for it. The ottoman was super cheap from, you guessed it, a thrift store. I can't stop sitting here and reading or watching tv:

 

 

 Dollar store leaves and acorns-

Woodland friends, watch out for the creepy owl-

 

In October, a few pretty garish Halloween decorations will make their presence known in this space then a few turkeys will follow a few weeks later. Then it will all be cleaned up and swept away to the attic for another year.

Thanksgiving weekend you will find me with two little elves in decorating heaven putting up our four trees this year. Let the decorating begin....

I wish you the happiest and healthiest of falls. Take care friends.
Happy decorating & living,
Megan

Recent Make-Over Projects

Hi friends,
I can't tell you how happy I am to be home after a week of traveling for work AND that fall is officially starting this week. As a girl who works on furniture make-overs in my garage, I'm so over summer hotness and sweatiness and so ready to welcome in cooler temperatures.

I wanted to share a few furniture make-overs with you that I've tackled lately. See you think....

1. Ugly brown floral arm chair. This was a free chair that a thrift store gave me because part of it was ripped when I bought other pieces from them. I figured it was free so I could do something with it. I'm going to keep it as I don't feel comfortable selling it as it was my first attempt.

Before-

 

 

After- this one I will keep as I don't feel comfortable selling it as it was my first attempt at using drop cloth material to cover an old chair. Practice piece. The make-over cost was $20. I used a nail gun and glue gun to complete this piece.

 

 

 

Here are some other thrift store finds I recently made over and one client project (two white chairs) plus an oyster shell project I did to our eat in kitchen existing light fixture:

 

 

 

Thanks for joining me friends. I hope you have a fantastic week. I'll share some projects I'm working on this week soon. Take care.

Happy decorating and living,
Megan