luxury lodge

Winter has come; a thin layer of snow coats all that it touched in the first storm of the season, & it is colder than I would ever wish for in sanity (or insanity - however you wish to look at it). Our thermostat is jacked up to something unheard of, yet being bundled in a sweatshirt and blanket seem insufficient. The positive to all of this: I am sitting here...in my very own "luxury lodge"...

As promised, I will give a brief update of the happenings surrounding the grand HGTV production that has taken place in the Corniea household for the last two days. "Decorating Cents" is a decorating show that usually entails a room makeover, but this was a special Christmas edition of "100 Christmas ideas for under $100". Basically, the crew came in and added Christmas spunk to our preexisting decor. And to say the least, I am quite pleased.

It has been a whirlwind since Saturday night, and I am exhausted (I realize that I say that a lot, but no worries on my end, so there need not be on yours). Granted, I only saw the crew yesterday morning and again tonight, but all of the thought and prep in between was exhausting.

My neighbor works for the production company, and called me up last minute on Saturday night to see if we would be willing to be involved...Interested in being involved in a show that is done on my favorite TV station in the whole world, you say? Absolutely! And so, it began. I readied my home as much as possible for something I knew very little about. I slept not a wink on Monday night, only to be bombarded by a crew of production people on Tuesday morning. They invaded army-style to the point of having to do a sideways shuffle to move around the mass conglomeration. We then prepped to do our first filming of "family time" out in the cold rain for the next hour. Funny enough, I would never be out with my kids in the rain in freezing weather acting "natural". So, it was as natural as could be. After that was done, we handed them the keys, said our farewells, and agreed to come back the next evening for the big reveal. From this point to the last was the most difficult as I began to think of some of the monstrosities I have seen on reality television, and trying to coach myself as to how I would handle a situation like this if it were to arise. Thankfully, I needed no such planned reaction, and should not have thought twice as the designer is great!

Walking into my house tonight was a scene out of TV, literally. Something about being blindly led into a room of your own house while Joan Steffend tells you to open your eyes whilst envisioning a "luxury lodge" is incredibly surreal. Honestly. I felt as though I was downstairs watching from the comfort of my own family room, and for some reason forcing myself to act out an appropriate reaction in my head. Acting was not very necessary, though, as the surrealness of it all hit us as I'm sure it hits every other homeowner. And they didn't even remodel-they just added to it! I don't think I could handle such a big ordeal as that. Christmas specialty was a perfect fit for my first time. What a fun story to add to our life happenings book...

And so, again, at the end of the affair, this is some of what I have to look at:


The show will air on HGTV on November 27th, sometime in the evening (not specified yet). I am unashamedly plugging this, because when does this stuff ever happen again? This also entails that a viewing party is in order. That being said, come one, come all. Be there or be square. If you're not, watch it wherever you are!