Christmas Tree :)

  One of my absolute favorite traditions during the year is the Christmas Tree.  In the McAleer family we would always go together to the Christmas Tree lot, pick out a tree together and decorate it together.  My dad would put the lights on the tree and I just LOVED helping anyway I could.  After the lights were on we would as a family decorate the tree, drink hot chocolate, and listen to Christmas music.  

This year Philip and I decided to start a similar tradition and it was so much fun :) Here we are at a Christmas tree farm exploring :)

Here is our wonderful Christmas Tree on top of our car :)

We put the lights on the tree and had a wonderful time decorating it while listening to music.  We decided that Philip is going to put the angel on top each year.  After we drank hot chocolate and enjoyed the beautiful tree.  Here is our tree :)

Interior Design

Since its the end of semester I have been reminiscing about what I was doing around this time two years ago... Interior Design Projects.  I can't even believe I am about to say this but I actually find myself missing those long sleepless nights scrambling to finish a project for an Interior Design.  Although it was mentally and physically exhausting trying to put together boards, binders, and plans in time for presentations... once it was over the feeling of accomplishment was incredible.  Here are some photos from different projects I did while at Auburn.

The first photos are from a project we did of a bank.  We were given the building with exterior walls and support beams and had to develop a floor plan and then furniture plan.

Here is the Floor Plan

This is an interior perspective of the teller area in the bank

This is one of my boards completed for the final presentation

The next project is of a coach store.  

We had to come up with a layout for the floor plan and redesign of a store.  

The top is a sketch of my ideas for the store and the
bottom picture is of the outside of the store

This picture is from a page in my portfolio of the store.  The top image shows a wall designed where each "C" is a shelf to hold products.  

The second image shows the other long wall in the store

The last image shows what you would see when you walked in.  There is a sitting area in front of the checkout counter.  The back wall has the facing C's that would be lit up.

This project was to design a kitchen for a family.  We were given a client description of what that client needed and then designed the space and chose the finishes.  My client wanted a french country kitchen.

The drawing is an interior perspective I drew of the dining area and cooking area.

This last picture is of a pin-up for a project.  We were turning an old railway station into a restaurant.  My floor plan is in the middle and all of the materials and finishes are pinned up around the floor plan.

Joseph Louis

Just wanted to share with you all a few of the new pics of Baby Joseph from our sonograms.  He is growing so big and LOVES moving around at night while mom and dad are sleeping or trying to ; )  

Here you can see he is sucking his thumb. Those are his
fingers coming sideways from his face.  You can also see his lips
puckered if you look closely.

This is the back of him.  He looks like he is leaning his head against
his hand.  I think he is telling us he is bored.

This is from our most recent ultrasound.  He is getting big :)
You can see one of his eyes. 

I have to stop myself from going into too many children's stores because I always end up buying him something.  Here is one of my most recent purchases.  I couldn't help myself... He is going to look so handsome! 

Joseph's newest outfit

Project #3 Upholstered Headboard

It had been bothering me for quite a while that there was no headboard to our guest bedroom bed.  The space just felt incomplete and bare.  The guest bedroom felt more like an office that happened to have a bed in it instead of a bedroom that happened to have a desk in it.  I had been thinking of different things we could use as a headboard in the bedroom but I really wanted to make one.  I convinced Philip that it would be a great idea and after much work and a little bit of money we completed our upholstered headboard project!  

Here is our Fabric!

Here we are after stapling the mattress pad and about
to start stapling the fabric.

First we had to decide how large to make the headboard.  We made it to fit a queen size bed even though the bed in our guest room is only a full size bed.  I wanted to keep our options open whenever we move or if we ever get a new bed.  We purchased a piece of plywood at Lowes and had them cut it down to the size we wanted.  We had an adventure trying to get this HUGE piece of plywood back to our house.  We managed to fit it in the car with the seats down but couldn't close the trunk.  This normally would have been fine but it was just a little cold riding with the trunk open since it was snowing as we were driving home :)

Making an upholstered headboard requires plywood, upholstery foam, batting, fabric, hot glue and a staple gun.  Upholstery foam is VERY expensive so we saved money by buying an egg crate mattress and putting the egg crate side down.  We also used an old mattress pad as batting which I think ended up making it sturdier and saved us more cash :)

Here is a closer view of stapled
mattress pad.

We picked out fabric at JoAnn Fabrics and I was SO excited about it! I LOVE the fabric!  It was not wide enough to cover the width of the headboard so I had to sew some on to each side and make sure the stripes repeated correctly.  After finally finishing sewing we could assemble the headboard! 


We hot glued the egg crate mattress to the headboard and cut off the excess.  We then wrapped the mattress cover around the foam and plywood and stapled it to the back.  Then we wrapped the fabric around the headboard and stapled it to the back.  We had to make sure the fabric lined up correctly with the headboard sides because we didn't want crooked stripes going up the headboard :)  

It turned out great and we are so excited to have visitors come stay in our guest bedroom!!

Finally Completed :)

Bert and Midge

Cuddling on the couch with Bert and Midge

Sweet Puppies

I'm taking a break from posting about our projects around the house to inform whoever is reading that I really miss my dogs :)  Although I do miss my family more, I at least get to talk to them on the phone.  This is not the case with our family dogs and I miss them very much.  The two families I nanny for each have a dog and I have found my self recently petting them whenever I get the chance just to get some love from a puppy.  Bert and Midge are two of the best dogs in the world (although I may be a little biased)!  I can't wait to get some puppy love when I go home for a visit :)

Even though Sam isn't alive anymore I couldn't write 
a blog about our dogs and not include a pic of my 
favorite old friend :)

Project #2... The Desk

The nice blue desk

I don't know if any of you remember seeing pictures of our guest room but we have been very busy working on making it look more like a guest room and office than junk yard.  We FINALLY painted Philip's desk from bright blue to gray.  It was my desk in high school and I thought it was fabulous then but now it is a little bright... especially for my manly husband.


Here are some before and after pictures of the desk :)

OHH Ohh... were half way there...

All Done!! :)

 

Whistle while you work

Its been pretty busy around the Martin house lately.  We have been up to our elbows in projects.  It all started when I decided I wanted to work on my sewing skills.  


My first project... 


Window Treatments :)


I found some fabric on sale at Jo-Ann Fabrics that I loved and decided to make window treatments.  The fabric is very busy so I didn't want it to cover the whole window.  I also wanted to add some height to our dining area to make the room look larger.  I knew that I wanted a solid fabric in the middle of my window treatment and the pattern somehow at the top and bottom.  I wanted a cream fabric for the majority of the drapery treatment and after looking around realized that it would be easier and cheaper to buy something simple at target and add some special touches to it.  Here are some pictures my project :)

Here is a picture showing me adding fabric to
the bottom to make it hit the floor.

I made hanging tabs out of the patterned fabric
 and sewed them to the top of the cream
window treatment.

All Finished :)

Another view of the finished window treatments.

Wedding Trailer

Here is the trailer to our wedding video!  I wish I could put the entire video up here but no can do so here is a glimpse of our special day :) Paul and Holly from Four Seasons Films did a wonderful job and I am so thankful to have this to look back on and remember!

http://www.fourseasonsfilms.com/jennifer&philip/

The Other Martin Family

Blessed Louis and Zelie Martin

I love many saints and I am always asking for their prayers constantly.  But while Philip and I were preparing for marriage we decided we needed to find a saint who would be our saint, a friend in heaven we could ask to pray constantly for our marriage and our family.  One day while praying that God would help us find that saint I stumbled across Blessed Louis and Zelie Martin who are the wonderful parents of St. Therese or Lisieux.  I was so excited for many reasons.  First of all they are married and were so holy which is perfect because we can look up to them in their marriage.  Secondly we all share the same last name...BONUS!  Thirdly, they prayed for their children and offered them up to God for his will to be done in their lives which is what philip and I were doing.  They did such an amazing job raising their family and teaching them to love God.  I mean, St. Therese, Doctor of the Church, is their daughter!  Not only that but all five of their children who lived (they had a few children die after birth), all girls, entered the religious life :)  Needless to say, we have fallen in love with the entire Martin family!


Continuing on with my story... We have been asking all of them to pray for our marriage and our family (Its funny how we started out trying to find one saint and we found a whole family of them).  As many of you know St. Therese's feast day is coming up October 1st.  

St. Therese

Philip and I have been so excited about our second sonogram and hopefully finding out the sex of our first child.  We had an appointment two days ago and were told we were measuring early by our first sonogram and our due date is February 12th :)  Dr. Gray told us we are about 19 weeks pregnant and should come in next week for our second sonogram!  We listened to the heart beat of our child which is always such an incredible blessing to hear it so loud and strong.  As we went to make our appointment for the sonogram the lady at the front desk asked if we could come in OCTOBER 1st at 1:30!!!!!!!  Holding back tears and much excitement I told her OF COURSE WE CAN! 




So... get ready everyone!  Next friday is going to be a wonderful day! 

St. Therese, Pray for us! 
Blessed Louis and Zelie Martin, Pray for us!  

The Martin Family

If you want to read more about Blessed Louis and Zelie Martin here is a link although I am sure I will be  posting more about them :) 

http://www.sttherese.com/Parents.html , http://www.thereseoflisieux.org/their-pastoral-significance/

Birthday Adventure

Frank Lloyd Wright's Fallingwater

Philip and I after Dinner

Our Hotel at night

Philip surprised me and planned a fun adventure for my birthday present... a trip to southwest Pennsylvania!!  While in Interior Design at Auburn we studied many architects but my favorite was Frank Lloyd Wright.  My sophomore year I did a project on him and a house he designed... Fallingwater.  As soon as I realized we were so close to Fallingwater I was so excited!  We left friday midday and drove to our hotel which was amazing!  It was built in 1907 and served as a hotel for travelers along the "National Road" which connected the east to the west.  The hotel has had many guests over the years two of which are Thomas Edison and Henry Ford.  It was very old world looking and beautiful!  We ate dinner there at the restaurant and enjoyed music from a wedding reception that was taking place in the next room :)  It was fun to reminisce about our wedding.   

The lobby of our hotel

View from the hotel balcony

Saturday morning we got ready, ate a delicious breakfast, and traveled about ten minutes to Fallingwater.  The tour was wonderful!  Unfortunately we were not allowed to take pictures during the tour and of the inside of the house which I think ended up being a great thing as I just enjoyed being in this marvelous home.  It was fascinating to see all of his designs up close and fun to see in person rooms and details that I drew in my projects.  We ate a delicious lunch there before driving 2 hours back to Steubenville in time to fix dinner and watch the first Auburn game of the season :)  It was a wonderful birthday present! Thank you Philip!

Here I am in front of the

Beautiful fallingwater

Another view of the house surrounded by nature :)

All smiles at the end of our tour

Fun adventures in Ohio... or Pennsylvania

Sorry for the long break in posting. I am still a bit behind in my posts...

Around the end of August Philip and I took an adventure to Pittsburgh with some friends we have met here, Nick and Emily. They are from Illinois and are both getting their Masters in Theology with Philip. They all agreed to take a break from studying and take fun friday trip.

We went raspberry picking outside the city and then ventured into Pittsburgh for the Ducky tour and dinner. We each picked 2 pints of berries and ate a few along the way :) It was a perfect day to see the city! The Ducky Tour goes through the city on a bus/boat. The bus/boat is an amphibious truck built by General Motors Corporation during WWII for transporting goods and soldiers over land and water. It was so cool to be on the land driving around and then suddenly the boat drove off the road into one of the 3 rivers surrounding pittsburgh. One interesting fact we learned is that Pittsburgh has the second most amount of bridges in the world. It is second to Venice, Italy!

Afterwards we went to dinner at Joe's Crab Shack for delicious seafood and completed the evening with ice cream for baby martin. It was a wonderful day getting to know our friends Nick and Emily laughing and sharing lots of stories from life in Illinois and Alabama :)

Yummy Raspberries :) 

Enjoying the sun picking berries

Nick and Emily picking berries

View of Pittsburgh from the water in the Ducky boat/bus

Steelers Stadium from the water

Here is another Ducky boat/bus passing by us

After the tour with Nick and Emily in front of our Duck boat