My (say, what?) Yes, My Better Homes and Gardens Shoot-Part 1

(Yup, 2 parts, indulge me in my 5 minutes of fame:)

Let, me paint you a picture...its mid May and I innocently opened my e-mail over a cup of steaming coffee and the first message that pops up is titled, "A Potential Better Homes and Gardens Story" GULP.....my first thought was, this is a joke. How would BH&G know about little old me?

My heart racing a mile a minute, I dashed upstairs to my husband with an insane look on my face and blurted out, "UM Better Homes and Gardens e-mailed me!" Then I quickly grabbed a BH&G because I wasn't even sure he had heard of the magazine. He cocked his head and told that of course he had heard of BH&G and then he was all, "what do they want from you?" While my husband, Ian, is always supportive of me, I don't think he thinks I am quite as cool and crafty as I think I am.

I then immediately responded to Kit Selzer, Senior Editor at BH&G and kept my fingers crossed that this was legit and not some cruel trick the universe was playing on me. Well, she emailed me back and we had a super exciting phone call the next day and off to work I went. Kit had found my blog and was interested in my projects and ideas for a "green" Christmas. Kit asked me to gather some of my past projects and new ideas for her to pitch to the editor-in-chief in 5 days....5 days! Well, this is what happened...

and a bit of this...

only a little of this...

and a lot of this...

All at once, for 5 days, on every surface in my house the kids couldn't reach. Photographing, crafting, burning myself with glue, putting the explanations together, and trying to convey all the cool ideas crowding around my brain. I sent off all of the information and had just a ball of excitement and nervousness in my belly.

I kept telling myself that chances were they probably wouldn't go ahead with the story, but I should just be thankful and honored and they found me and liked what they saw. I mean this is me we are talking about....just me. Nothing exciting, no design training, no professional decorating experience, no real skills so to speak of. This is Better Homes and Gardens for goodness sakes-I mean those houses are like....nice. Super nice, way out of my league.

Finally a few days later another e-mail form Kit was sitting in my inbox and I felt like I was going to throw up as I opened it....

"Good news, Kim! We are using a few of your ideas for our "I did it" feature.

I can't even explain how absolutely insanely stoked I was. How could something so freaking cool actually be happening to me. I started this blog 1.5 years ago on a total whim and now I am going to be in a magazine. A BIG magazine.

I had a big trip to my hometown planned and relaxed and enjoyed, because I knew when I got back home in early July, I would be super busy with everything for the magazine and sprucing up my house. My husband said a lot of things like:

"Do you really think you need to scrub under the kitchen sink?"

"Will they be showering in our kids bathroom?"

"Please don't make replace our carpeting before they come?!?!"

I didn't, they got to enjoy all the crazy messy kid & dog stains and no, they did not peek under my sink at my shining and organized cabinet. But I somehow felt at ease, knowing that if they did happen to peek, it would be sure to impress!

I probably went overboard, but wow, I finished a gazillion projects around the house that have been nagging me, and cleaned this place within an inch of it's life, and can REALLY relax now that the whole experience is over.  I could never have done it all myself. I had so many people helping out and I cashed in every favor I could. Wendy, Amanda, and Katie were complete champs taking my little ones for play dates, swimming, lunch, and the like so I could work in peace. Ty saw a drill and a pile of knobs for my kitchen cabinets and proceeded to install them all (26 cabinets and 17 drawers-UGH), and then all my crafty girls just helped me a ton with making the items for the shoot!

Casey, Courtney, Gayle, Amanda, Katie, Wendy, Melissa, Amy, and Jessica made short work of a huge portion of my project!

How did I get such enthusiastic support?

Then, just to make things interesting, I didn't receive imperative supplies until 6 days before the shoot!

Biting my nails...to the nth degree. So I spent the weekend prior to the shoot watching the entire 2 seasons of Downton Abbey on Hulu and working away!

It's my new favorite show!!!!

So by Monday I had finished all of the shoot stuff and just continued on my frenzied mission to create my perfect home. Then both of the kids got sick...UGH. My 3 year old was puking into the big blue bowl, while I continued to yell, "YOU CAN'T BE SICK." This was Wednesday....the magazine was coming on Thursday....no puking aloud. The angels smiled down on us and they were both fine by Thursday when I needed them O-U-T of the house.

I woke up Thursday morning with a perma grin and breezed around here singing like Mary Poppins....

{Read Part 2 Here}