In the past few years, I’ve come to realize I have an old rustic soul.

Which is a quite the change from my early “if it has an inch of pink I am not wearing it and I’m ultimate QB of our neighborhood football team” tomboy years. (I still can throw a great spiral hail mary, thankyouverymuch.)

Which somehow took a drastic turn into my “OMG I am totally going to marry Justin Timberlake, I <3 JT 4Eva, STAY *NSYNC years. (btw – HAPPY 31st, BIRTHDAY, JUSTIN!!! Sorry – you don’t just spend three years of your life covering your walls – and ceiling – with NSYNC Bop magazine posters or swearing that JC smiled at you when you were in the 6th row of their concert and then suddenly forget all of their birthdays. Just be happy I’m not sending a card. Or baking a cake. Not that I did that before.)

That then gave way to the more recent Ann Taylor LOFT-clad polka-dot-obsessed Mac lover with a paintbrush in one hand and a Keystone Light in the other. I also drove a mini-van yet was lovingly called  “Dora” by my friends because of my short hair, bright pink backpack and black goucho pants I seemed to live in. Man I miss college!

After college, I began to refine my style (but kept the black goucho pants) and basically filled my closets with even more LOFT clothes, Coach purses (from the Outlets, of course) and loads of size 7** ballet flats.

So when it was time to plan our wedding, my mom, friends and I think even Matt expected a stylish black-and-white (and possibly polka-dotted) wedding that was classic, artsy and a tad bit traditional.

Well, you can imagine the shock when I decided to get married on a farm.

I’ll explain more about this decision (and how I thought my Ma was going to pass out when a goat ran past her during an initial walk-trough) in a future wedding-themed post. For now, the point I want to make is that within the first few months of being in DC, I suddenly became this person who could not stop buying packs of mason jars or finding ways to incorporate yards of burlap into every day life (thank you Marb for feeding that addiction!). I don’t know what sparked this side of me to come out in full force. Maybe it was all of the trips to the farm to pick fruit, or the days I spent listening to stories about the old times in my great aunt’s house while making cannoli. Or maybe it took root a few years back while driving through the sunflower-filled countryside of Italy. Maybe it was because I was just homesick and wanted our apartment to feel more cozy or because I found three really great country music stations in DC.

Or, maybe it was there all along throughout my entire life, but I was too busy writing “I Heart JT” all over my Trapper Keeper to notice.

Long story short, my future goal is to now live on a farm and eat only what we grow and wear cowboy boots and make strawberry jam and chicken pot pie and surround ourselves with even more mason jars, burlap & twine. And maybe even milk our own cows (okay – I may draw the line there. I could hire someone to do that for me, right? Sarah, I can hear you laughing from here).  I also want the farm to have rows and rows of grapes so that we can ALSO run a vineyard. This isn’t unrealistic, is it?

Didn’t think so. But since I live in a city full of monuments, not manure, and am married to a boy who thinks even having a dog in the house is ridiculous, I will satisfy my inner country girl by sneaking more mason jars in our cupboards and learning how to can every type vegetable. Oh, and by making these rugged key hook curtain tiebacks. Yee-haw!

Key Hook Curtain Tiebacks
inspired by Country Living

Ingredients:
(most of which can be found at your local Home Depot/Lowe’s)

• two swivel eye snap hooks
• two key rings
• roll of twine, yarn, rope, etc.
• two nails and hammer

Directions:

1) Measure and cut four one-yard pieces of twine. If desired, fold each in half once and then once more. (Makes for a thicker-looking rope). If you’re using thick rope or want a thinner-twine look, only cut about a foot of twine.

2) Tie one piece of twine to key ring on the swivel eye snap hook. (No idea how to explain this sort of tie!)

3) Repeat on single key ring; latch key ring onto swivel eye snap.

4) Now you have twine tied to each side of the key hook, like the picture.

5) Wherever you desire on your curtain, tie the twine around the curtain, tight enough so it will stay put but loose enough so that you can pull it back.

6) Break out your hammer and place a nail about two inches from your window, where you would like the tieback to, well, tie back. Pull one side of the twine and hook it on the nail.

7) Repeat steps for the other curtain. Make sure to step back in between, to make sure you’re placing the nails for the tieback evenly! The twine-keyhook can be moved multiple times if needed, but hammering a bunch of nails into your walls if not fun or attractive.

Now who wants to buy me a pony?

 

**It’s my blog and I’ll lie about my big farmer feet if I want to.