Parisian Café Tray

Tags

bed tray, breakfast, breakfast in bed, brunch, café, café tray, craft, decoupage, France, Paris, postaday2011, relax, relaxation, relaxing, tea tray, tray, tray table

My personal goal over my Christmas break was to take one day for myself. I’ve been back to work for two weeks and it still hasn’t happened. We spent an extra day over break in the Philadelphia area; a few days our plans were snowed out and we extended our trip to include some of the traditional holiday activities. My expat sister was home from Scotland, so it was good to spend a little extra time with her. It’s always hard to say goodbye and I was looking forward to a day of relaxation… but we were busier than we thought we’d be when we returned. I wanted our place to have a clean start before the New Year, at least I was successful at that.

Now, with Hubster working late nights, you’d think I’d have a moment for myself, but our schedule is just jam-packed. Back from a hectic weekend… I need a little relaxation. So while Hubster is busy watching football, I’m going to slip into the other room for a few hours… (which also means tomorrow’s post will be later). I’m going to load my new Parisian Café Tray with macaroons, petite fours, thé au lait, a bottle of Evian, a few fresh-cut flowers and a good book. My iPod loaded with Claude Debussy and Maurice Ravel. For me to truly have a relaxing moment, all my senses need to be submersed.

Parisian Café Tray

 

I purchased an unfinished bed tray at the craft store and quickly turned it into my Parisian Café Tray. I stained the wood in a dark finish and allowed it to dry overnight. I applied Mod Podge to decoupage scrapbook paper, black & white photos (from a calendar), and ribbon on the surface. I allowed it to dry in between coats and then sprayed it with a sealer.

This tray is great and I look forward to using it often (hopefully). It’s great for working on small crafts while I’m sitting in the living room or bedroom… Maybe Hubster will take the hint and serve me brunch in bed one weekend… that is if I ever get to sleep in…

How do you relax?

 

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Relaxing Weekend

Tags

relaxation, relaxing, solitude

Last week was busy and hectic (as you can see by the lack of my posts) and extremely stressful. This weekend, Hubster and Pumpkin had fishing plans and spent the weekend at my in-laws’ house. I had a relaxing weekend for the first time in about a year. I don’t mean a few hours of relaxing or a full day of relaxing, I mean a full weekend of relaxing. The house was completely straightened and cleaned. Friday night I had dinner at one of my favorite restaurants, with my favorite cowgirl (after visiting her lil’ buckaroo first). Saturday: leftovers for breakfast, reading, lunch with another good friend, leftovers for dinner, and watched a good movie. On Sunday, I relaxed and pampered myself: caramel latte, yoga, home pedicure, tried a new shampoo.

I had a lot of recipes I wanted to try… I enjoy baking, but then I’d have dishes to clean up and have to run out to the grocery store…
I wanted to post a few things on my blog, but then that required looking at the computer screen…
I had a few sewing projects, I really wanted to get started (and some finished) now that I had time, but the required energy and thought…
I turned on the radio to distract myself, then quickly turned it off because I prefer to listen to the silence.
So at moments, it was a struggle for me to just relax. I thought about how my students had no problem day dreaming, when they were supposed to be working. After all, I have this gorgeous dogwood outside my windows

Dogwood Flowers

Just relaxing bliss…

A guess what? On Monday morning, when the 6 o’clock alarm buzzed… I awoke energized and ready for a new hectic week.