Southern New Year traditions

In the South, there are many different traditions when it comes to the new year.  Every family has different traditions, and mine is no different.

Food is a main center of a Southern New Year.  In this house, we must eat black-eyed peas for health, and turnip greens for prosperity.  I hate turnip greens, but on New Year's Day, I force myself to choke down several large bites, just in case.  Other families insist on hog jowls, cornbread, and cabbage.  Thank goodness my mama never insisted on the hog jowls and cabbage or I would be miserable.  HAHA!

We also have the saying that you can't wash dishes or clothes on New Year's Day because you will wash someone you love right out of your life.  So there is always a mad dash to have all the laundry and dishes washed, dried, and put away before the stroke of midnight on New Year's Eve.  It is nice to have all of those chores done to start the new year, I must say.

Finally, we have the tradition that whatever you do on New Year's Day, you will be doing for the rest of the year.  For instance, if you are fighting with your spouse, you two will be fighting all year.  If you are spending time with friends, then you will spend time with your friends all year.  If you are cleaning, you will be cleaning all year...but of course, you will have to clean all year long anyway, unless you have a maid or want to end up on an episode of Hoarders.  HAHA!

So on our New Year's Day, we started the day with church, then home to eat our traditional meal.  Once finished (without washing the dishes), we headed to Home Depot to buy paint!

Paint?

Yes, paint.

In a sort-of spur-of-the-moment decision, I've decided to redo the kitchen.  Yes, I'm redoing my 4 year-old kitchen.  I'm tired of fighting with the green, and moving to a much more user friendly brown.  Don't get me wrong, I love the green.  It was exactly the color I envisioned for the space when we built the house.  It has been a nightmare making anything else work with the green, however.  It just doesn't fit with the rest of the house.

Marty's sister, Penny, volunteered to help us finish the crown molding this week while Marty was off, but he wouldn't do it if I was going to eventually paint.  Well, I've been wanting that stinkin' crown molding DONE for the past 4 years (the source of much bickering in this household), so I was going to get that room painted ASAP!

So after procrastinating for as long as possible, we started painting.

Kitchen before:

Goodbye green, hello brown!

The brown was supposed to be the same color that is throughout the rest of the house, but once it was on the wall, it is significantly darker.  But, it's a good blend of the living room color and the dining room color and we think we will like it.

Then, since we (well, since Marty) got the kitchen painted yesterday, Penny came this morning to help hang the crown molding!

I am beyond excited to say the least!

As ALL of the projects we have done, it's been a huge pain, but it's getting done.

  

SLOWLY BUT SURELY.

So, I hope our home improvement projects continue throughout the rest of the year, preferably without all the  headaches, though.  LOL

I hope all of you are having a wonderful 2012 so far!!