A Southern Accent

I've never told you this, but I co-sleep with my little guy. I never intended to, but it just happened. As I've mentioned before, God blessed me with the world's worst sleeper. From day one, he's never liked to sleep and still doesn't now. I had all intentions of making him a crib baby. But, the best laid plans don't always work. He hated to be put down in his crib and hated to be in the bassinet. They say you can't spoil little ones early on, but I beg to differ. I tried everything, the books, the shooshing , the swinging, and finally had gotten him to sleep pretty good in his crib, then we moved when he was one. That ruined everything. I used to try the nanny tip where you scoot a little further from the crib each night, but he wasn't having that. I tried crying it out, and hubs would walk for an hour because he couldn't stand to hear it - made his heart break. Then he would come back and tell me, "if you don't go in there and get him, I w...

I have a thing for red shoes. Not really sure why, but I do. I didn't realize how many pairs of red shoes I have until I was cleaning out my closet this weekend and counted seven pairs, total. Maybe I want to go somewhere over the rainbow? Walk down a yellow brick road? Wonder if there is some deeper, hidden meaning to my red shoe obsession? Oh, and someone else likes my red shoes too...

I just finished a new blog header for Catholic Runner and wanted to share her new look. Obviously, she's a runner. I tried to make the lines at the top and bottom resemble the lines in the middle of the road. We went through two edits, but turned this around in one day! That's a record! E-mail me if you're interested in a new look too!

This may seem elementary to some, but it's a trick I learned a couple of years ago from my husband's aunt. She has a cute little stationery and gift shop and before I had the little man, I used to help her out every once in a while with wrapping gifts (especially around Christmas). She taught me how to tie a perfect bow on a gift, and as I was wrapping my father's gift last week, I decided to take pics of the process to share with y'all. Wrap a ribbon around the package, leaving enough length to tie around a second piece of ribbon and leave trailing tails. Cut another piece of ribbon and fold into a bow, but do not tie. Length and size depends on how large you want the bow to be. Tie the ribbon from #1 around the package and tighten - if you want, you can tie a knot (but if you don't tie a knot, it makes it much easier for someone to untie the ribbon when opening). Lay the piece of ribbon from #2 on top of the piece tied around the package from #1. Take ribbon #1 an...

I got an e-mail last week with the fun soda bottle centerpiece idea from Better Homes and Gardens (see pic below). I really liked the idea, but a) didn't have three soda bottles and b) wanted a bigger centerpiece, so I came up with my own interpretation of the idea. I basically took corrugated cardboard, bought stick-on letters from Target, and made a cute little "dad" nameplate for the vase of farmer's market flowers. This could be cute for any occasion - mother's day, monogram for a birthday, numbers to represent a birthday, anniversary, etc. The ideas are endless! Everyone that's seen it has made a comment on how cute and special it is - it just really customizes a vase of flowers and makes them feel like even more a part of the celebration.

Sorry I've been a bit missing over the past couple of days. I'm in Seattle for work, and have been busy working , sight-seeing, working , shopping, working , eating fabulous food and working . I just want it to be clear that I am working while out here. I got in Sunday and met up with several sales reps and we hung out in the concierge lounge for a while, then decided to go see The Hangover. OMG - that movie was hilarious!!!! I have not laughed that hard in a movie in such a long time. We did the high school thing and piled into a photo booth at the theater (see below). I'm here for a conference/trade show and after getting the booth set up Sunday, I'm basically just managing everything, making sure all goes smoothly, so I had a little time yesterday afternoon to check out Pike Place. I had a blast watching the market guys throw huge fish around for a while and drooled over the beautiful flowers. We had a wonderful client dinner last night, with lobster bisque, an ediv...

I often visit a blog that has the latest and greatest ads and this was on the site today. It's for a wood treatment (product in bottom right corner) but I thought it was hilarious. Copy Reads: Don't Let Wood Get Old. Quote from my mom: "This is not funny!!! Your day will come!!!"

I'm not a fan of mornings. Never have been, don't think I ever will be. I used to get tickets in high school because I had to park on the curb to make it to my AP chemistry class without a tardy. I iron my clothes and lay them out, along with my little guy's clothing at night. I put my make-up on in the car (don't judge). I air-dry my hair - all for a couple extra minutes of sleep. I could stay up until 2:00 am and not get tired, but once my head hits that pillow, I'm gone. I thought being a mommie would change that, but I'm only a little more used to getting up a gazillion times in the middle of the night and early in the morning (God blessed me with a child that absolutely hates to sleep). When I got a new director at work, I informed him that I would be coming in at 8:30 in the mornings because I don't function well any earlier than that. Luckily, he's cool with that. But I'm also the one that checks e-mail at 11:00 just to be sure I'm on top...

I live in Durham, NC and I love this town. Although Durham is sometimes incorrectly judged by people that have not visited or lived here, it's really starting to make people stop and rethink what they think they knew about Durham. Just a couple of exciting news bits about this town I call home: US News and World Report has ranked Durham as one of the top 10 places to live for 2009! The New York Times recently visited and wrote about The Scrap Exchange, the old cow store Mexican food joint(Taqueria La Vaquita) and Eno Park! The June 2009 issue of Men’s Journal magazine names Watts-Hillandale in Durham as one of the best neighborhoods in the southeast (we want to live there one day!). The magazine says that the Bull City may not be as well known as Chapel Hill or as large as Raleigh, but it is a city where “ sweet tea sidles up to espresso ." Here's a recent Durham tour guide , from Design Sponge - I love the photos! We have a brand, new, most fabulous performing arts cent...

The little man and I headed to the beach last Thursday, after deciding to take my 6-year-old nephew along as well. We were initially worried that he would get homesick, as he's never been away from mommie for that long or gone that far. On the first night, after stopping at Burger King for lunch, McDonalds for ice cream, perusing a fun antique shop while they played checkers on the front porch, swimming in the pool and walking on the beach, I asked him if he was glad he came. His response, "Yep, I don't miss my mommie at all." I said, well, I'm the next best thing to your mommie anyway. Between the beach visits, walking along the sound, hours at the pool, seeing Up at the movies, pizza, boats, putt putt and visiting the aquarium, I don't think he was very homesick, what do you think? BTW, I went to bed at 8:30 last night.

My in-laws recently sent home some papers and such for us to have and one of those things was my husband's baby book. It's the first time I've ever looked at it, and it was so cute. But the best thing, was the story of his baptism when he was about one and a half. His mom writes, "Mike really had to show his personality. He saw daddy and started saying ball and it echoed throughout the church." This is so especially cute because my husband loves any kind of sport, any kind of ball and is actually a head golf instructor at the local country club. He lives and breathes sports and my little guy is going to be the same way. Just as his father, my little man's first word was ball. Maybe he'll get a scholarship because of his mad skills one day.

If you haven't been following John and Sherry over the The Young House , go there now and read all about the 48 hour design challenge they've participated in. This is the last week of the contest, and they are currently in second place. Last week, they were in first place, but have now fallen to a close second. We want them to win so we can see all of the great things they'll do with the $5,000 they'll receive! So, please vote now, and every day until Friday! Here are some pics of what they put together for the $500 challenge. Just imagine what they could do with $5,000!!!!!

If you loved Saved by the Bell, you'll love this:

Yesterday we decided to drive by our old townhome to see if the little guy remembered anything about living there. He was one when we moved to our current house, so I wasn't sure if he would. I also wanted to sneak around the back to see how my little flower garden was managing. We drove up and immediately saw a for sale sign in the yard. The front door was open, so we walked up to it and knocked. I figured if they are selling, then they probably don't care if we look. The lady came to the door and let us in. It was really strange to see "my house" with someone else's interpretations. They left the kitchen "chili pepper red", as I'd painted it, but had painted cream paint over the great green and white stripes I'd painstakingly painted, measured and taped off in the bathroom. The garden was getting along well, basically without any assistance. I took a peek and the ivy and ground coverings I'd planted almost seven years ago were now plush, vi...

The clover has taken over our yard this year. I'm hesitant to spray anything on the yard to kill it, so I was happy to see our own personal weedeater show up a couple days ago to help us combat our "growing" problem. He seems to know just which weeds to eat and is pretty tame. He has a particular affinity for clover, which is good because the buffet is always open. Of course, he drives Lulu the pup a little crazy and I've had to chase her through the neighborhood a couple of times when she darts off in an attempt to eat my weed eater. That would not make me happy. Anyone have any advice for killing weeds, other than yucky pesticides and such?

I've become obsessed with the Chippendale Fretwork print. I didn't know what it was called (or even how to start looking for it), until I did a little Google research but I finally came across some info on Thomas Chippendale, the 18th century furniture maker. Thomas is typically known for his "Chippendale Furniture", but he also had a style called Gothic Fret, which was influenced by Chinese art and design. This is where the Chippendalte Fretwork print comes from. Where am I going with this? Well, I wanted to design something to put in my hall that incorporates the fretwork print. I wanted it to be light and colorful, but still be retro, modern and fun at the same time! I've finally come up with the below artwork and I've ordered my prints via mail and they will be here soon! The pic below shows them with a bamboo frame, just something I was playing around with online, but I think maybe I'll be able to go to TJ Maxx and find some fun frames that would work...

My neighbor recently visited Seattle and we were chatting at the pool yesterday about how much we love the city (I'm headed there the end of this month in fact - can't wait!). She said she saw a lot of little girls with dresses and jeans and that it seemed to be a trend there and that women were doing it too. I think this is something I would like - a little funky, a little hippie - and could wear to work on Fridays, but not sure this part of the South is ready for it. And if you didn't do it right, you could certainly be confused for a homeless person. For sure if I had a little girl I would totally dress her in this trend. What do you think? Confusing or cute? Homeless or hip? Childish or cool?

Nothing says summer like a great night at the ballpark! We are fortunate enough to live close to one of the best minor league baseball stadiums in the country (but I'm extremely biased). The movie Bull Durham was filmed at the older Bulls stadium just down the road, and it made the team pretty popular back in the day. It was looking like rain all evening, but we watched the sky as the storm circled around us and we stayed dry. Unfortunately, there were no home runs for the Bulls Friday night, so we didn't get to see the Bull's red eyes light up or see him snort smoke from his nose. But summer's only just begun...