Totally imperfect 5-minute wall projects

I have been an absentee blogger. I have several posts lined up, and I have not forgotten about my 30 in my 30s list, but I've just been on a sort of "life hiatus" for the past month or so. There's been a lot of sickness and working overtime and terrible weather at our house so far this year, and I've given myself permission to live in survival mode for just a little while. Get work done, take care of Bennett, rest. That's what we're doing right now, and we're fine with that. I have been reading up a storm on my Kindle, though, and have a book review ready to post soon.

For now, I thought I'd post a few pictures of some of the decorations I've put up in my "new" kitchen. As you know, I am not very crafty or good at decorating. Oh, I'd like to be, but it just doesn't come completely naturally to me. I know what I like when I see it, but I have a difficult time creating it. My projects are all very simple, and if they can't be finished quickly and with minimal precision, I get frustrated and lose interest.

My first five-minute project was redoing the key hook that hangs near our back door. When we first got married, I had visions of a French-themed kitchen with lots of cobalt blue, etc....totally not my style anymore, and I have tons of "Frenchy" stuff to work with. Here is the original hook (that's a glass of cranberry ginger ale on the counter- this year's holiday obsession):

I used scrapbook paper to cut out squares for each of the three openings and a scrapbook kit sticker to put a quote in the middle:

I don't have the greatest camera, but the quote says "There is nothing like staying at home for real comfort." -Jane Austen. Can you still see a tiny sliver of mirror at the top of the middle square? Yes. Am I too lazy to redo it? Absolutely. As it hangs on the wall, the sliver is not visible and I feel fine about this:

The second project was born out of necessity. After years of promising Ben I would not make our house too "country," he was appalled that I wanted to hang this on the wall (again, sorry for my terrible picture-taking skills):

Keep in mind, he was fine with this piece hanging above the hutch...

...but apparently, a single rooster hanging on the wall with no accompanying words or matching rooster friend was just way too country-ish. I got both these pieces at Flower Factory (aka cheap stuff heaven) and was- yes- too lazy to return the single rooster, so once again I broke out my scrapbook paper and stickers. The result:

A little tribute to our adorable daughter. The picture is of her standing in my parents' field while it was in hay this fall, looking down at an apple she picked from one of their trees. I took the picture on my dad's phone. 

The sticker underneath says "perfect," because she is perfect and also because it's ironic since this project looks anything but perfect. The top left corner is sticking up and I haven't gotten around to fixing it yet:

One of these days...

I added a new shelf to another wall and feel like the new kitchen look is pretty much complete. The milk bottle is from the Farm Fresh store on Fosterburg Road in Alton, the road my grandma lived on since before I was born until she died. We always called it "the milk store." Best chocolate milk ever.

Now all that's left to do is finish painting and papering behind the fridge, clean up the trim, etc...like I said, one of these days!