A Southern Accent

There's been a lot of buzz on the Web about the recent picture of Lizzie Miller in Glamour magazine. I'll admit, I'm no skinny thing and look nothing like the women in these magazines, and I so appreciate the attention this is getting. I will say that Lizzie is gorgeous and may be considered a plus-size model, but her overall appearrance is still not "typical" of every woman. She has no chins, her arms look skinny and she has no back fat. She just basically has bigger thighs, some stretch marks, and a little tummy (she just wasn't sucking in on this shot). I just can't decide in my mind is it good for women and their body image? Should fashion magazines try to change the way we think about out bodies by having more realistic images in their pages, or do you enjoy looking at the surrealistic photos that are somewhat mythical in their representation of a woman's body?

I've got a new print now available in my Etsy shop - inspired by one of my favorite songs...and cupcakes, cause everyone likes cupcakes! It's only 10 bucks and I think it would look great on an office wall, in a craft room, or a teenage girl's room.

The little man has gotten quite brave with his back talk lately. He seems to be picking this interesting habit up from school-mates, cousins, his father, etc. Some of the more popular ones I'm hearing these days: I don't care. Blah, blah, blah. (He says his cousin taught him this one) You guys are soooo silly. You are weird mommie. I don't care, I don't care, I don't care, I don't care. A co-worker of mine once gave me some great parenting advice. She said the only time she ever spanked her children was when they made a choice that would harm them (i.e., running out into the road). Whenever her kids said something inappropriate or rude, she would actually wash their mouth out with soap. I'm seriously considering it. I even threatened it tonight. His response? "You're weird mommie. Blah, blah, blah." My often angel is, at times, my little monster...

We headed out to Kenan Stadium in Chapel Hill Saturday afternoon to meet the UNC football team. It did rain a bit, but that didn't keep my boys from tossing the pigskin on the field. My little guy has got some skills, if I can brag a bit. As some of you may know, hubs is a Duke fan, but he even picked out a carolina-blue golf hat to wear Saturday, such a good sport. At one point I snapped just a photo of the football on the actual field of the UNC TarHeels and I said, "ahhhhhhhhhh (in a reverence sort of tone, if you can imagine)...look at that." Hubs thinks I'm weird sometimes. Also,I hate the skinny cheerleaders ( and when I say hate I wish I had their cute little figures that look great in hardly anything, all while they are jumping up and down and nothing is jiggling where it shouldn't be ). Just sayin. GO HEELS!

My cousin requested my assistance in updating window treatments in four rooms of her house. She just happens to live about five minutes from the only IKEA in North Carolina and I'd never been to one, so what better place to pick up some curtains on the cheap? She brought her little girl, and I brought the little man, of course. The place was crazy busy - we North Carolinians like design too - and there were no regular carts available, so we had to get a cart that you attach a bright yellow IKEA bag to. At one point I had two kids hanging off my cart, and those wheels are greased so well, it took myself and the little guy to turn the cart on the slick concrete floors (and my slick-bottom Rainbows didn't help much either). We decided to have lunch in the IKEA cafeteria (I'd heard the meatballs were amazing) and we got great food, on the cheap as well. You can even buy the food they serve in a market area after the check-out (I picked up some meatballs for hubs and he loved t...

I'm not a big fan of flying , but the more I do it, the better it gets. Hubs is even more nervous about it, hence we've NEVER been anywhere that we can't drive. I'm hoping for our tenth anniversary in two years I'll be able to convince him to jump on a plane to some island somewhere with me. I'll probably have to drug him first. On my flight last week to Madison, there was a cute little girl in front of me that had already flown three times in her life and on the way back, a six-month old baby that had already flown four times! Wow - those kids are already racking up the frequent flier points! I feel so sorry for the parents of kids on planes because you can tell they are uptight about their kids throwing a fit and upsetting everyone on the plane. When this little cutie below started crying, I played peek-a-boo with her and made her paper airplanes out of my magazine reply cards and it got her smiling pretty quick. She liked my camera too.

I know, I was a little MIA last week , and will probably be scarce this week too because we're in the midst of planning and I've got several freelance design projects I'm working on the side at night. I'll still be around, just not posting every day. So, last week I was on the road, in Madison, WI for sales meetings. The last day, we went to a Milwaukee Brewers game. It was hot, but we had a great time. That stadium is amazing too - people up there love their baseball, brats and beer for sure! I tried my first real brat, cooked in beer and marinated in onions and sauerkraut. I think if I liked beer, pork and sauerkraut, I probably would have enjoyed it, but I think I could go another 34 years without another. I also tried my first cheese curds, which I'd never heard of before now, and I love anything cheese, so those were a winner. Here are some pics I snapped from the tailgate and ballgame. Happy Monday everyone!

We officially hired a dog trainer to come over last night to help us get control of the crazy dog. What I’d chalked up to puppy behavior was getting a little too old, and so was the dog. She’s a little over a year and a half now, so I decided these were patterns of behavior, not just a puppy doing what puppies do. I Googled a dog trainer in my area and clicked on the first link at the top, and wow did I get lucky. When I visited Marcia Martin’s website , there were tons of success stories of how she’d turned people’s lives around in just a couple of hours. I picked up the phone and called Marcia, expecting to pay an un-Godly amount of money, weeks of training and tons of frustration waiting for results. I told her about our doggie issues – jumping on everyone, not listening, counter-surfing, pulling the leash, peeing in the house – and she said we could probably address everything in about two hours, in one evening, at a really great price. I didn’t believe her. She showed up with a b...

Wow, the summer has flown by! I can't believe it's school time again, but why not take one last chance to throw a party before the hustle and bustle of the school year kicks in? I pulled together some ideas I found online that will hopefully inspire you to put on a fun back-to-school bash. I also created a blank invitation you can print from this link . Just print, cut and fill in the information. Some ideas: - Have each child bring $5 of school supplies to provide to a local school supply drive for those in need. - Buy a pencil or crayon pinata and fill with pencil tops , erasers , stickers , crayons and candy. - I love the idea of a centerpiece made with paper airplanes (see pic below from Rachel Ray), you could even have the kids make their own paper airplanes and have a contest to see which plane can go the longest distance. - I picked up the crayon-branded items below from Michaels. Right now they have these in the dollar section - cute note pads shaped like crayon boxes,...

I'm so excited to share my recent interview with Mel at I Pick Pretty ! Today I am highlighted as Mel's Friday Featured Blogger and I am so honored. If you haven't already discovered I Pick Pretty, please take a chance to check out Mel's witty humor and hilarious comments on fashion and life. She's even honest about her own fashion infractions (my all-time favorite post). Thank you for the sweet comments Mel! May we all have the same aspirations as you - to be prettier, wittier and more blonder than nature intended!

We hit up the local flea market in Raleigh last weekend and had a blast. I hadn't been there in several years, so the little man had never gone, but he loved it. It ended up being a great place to make a ten dollar bill go extremely far on the toy purchasing scale. I actually said to my friend with me, "why in the world would I ever visit the toy department in Target again when I can come here?" My most favorite booth, one that has been there for years, is of old home hardware. It has boxes and boxes of old glass doorknobs, drawer pulls, keys and hinges. Great place to find some fun and unusual art materials, or add some vintage flair to a home. My single purchase (for myself) was an old Durham Diary milk bottle, for five dollars. It's currently filled with flowers and sitting in the center of my kitchen table.

As a woman in an office setting, I get so tired of looking at other women's boobs. You know the women I'm talking about - low-cut dresses and shirts, bras with no padding and skin-tight tees. Seriously, do these women not realize that you can see all the way down to their belly-button when they lean over? Do they not feel the breeze when their shirt has shifted to show a little too much cleavage? Sure they do, but they like it -cause they know there are others out there that like it too. Then there's the group of guys that just get embarrased by the whole setting. Their faces turn red when they accidentally see some skin and they blubber all over the place. They make for awkward moments when you just want to walk out of the room. I actually found a great article on this growing trend: Cleavage: Coming to an Office Near You Barbara Bartlein Jul 8th 2009 at 8:00AM Noticing a bit more cleavage at work? You're not alone. No matter where they are, women seem to be showing ...

One of the things I love about my son is that he loves arts and crafts as much as me! So, we've starting having "art time", which allows me to work on some fun things while he's cutting, gluing, drawing and making a big old fun mess! We had art time Saturday morning and I was able to finish a jewelry board I'd been working on, inspired by a post I saw online . The original post I saw used a corkboard, but I took a piece of styrofoam and created a similar look by covering it with a piece of fabric. Then I decorated it with ribbon and rick-rack (which is great for hanging earrings on) and inserted some picture hooks and it was done! Obviously, I have a thing for chunky necklaces, so I'm glad they are no longer all tied up in a big wad of mess in my drawer. Do you think I should sell these in my Etsy shop too? I'm definitely going to be making some for Christmas gifts!

I know I said I'd do this Friday, but it was hectic around here! So, the winners of the southern books are: Happy Dash and Sarah Ladies, please e-mail me your shipping information and I'll get these out to you! Congrats! Happy Monday Y'all!