I am so uncool

Do you ever walk around all confident thinking you look great only to glance in a mirror and find out it's all gone awry and you're a mess? That's me today. I'm wearing my cute tan and white seersucker dress with a Jacki Cardi on top and a funky belt on the outside of my sweater like all the mannequins do. My hair is doing what I asked it to, my shoes are current. I'm making a point to really tailor today's lesson about job applications and resumes to the kids and show them I know how it is to be applying for a first job and to colleges. But today these high schoolers are my mirror and as it turns out I'm not coming across at all like I thought I was.

Kid 1: Are you a mom?
I'm thinking that's a reasonable question and respond that no I don't have any kids yet.
Kid 1: Oh, cuz you seem really momish.

Kid 2: You remind me of someone.
Oh yeah? Who do I remind you of?
Kid 2: Mary Poppins. I don't really know what it is but you seem like Mary Poppins a lot.
Kid 3: Oh yeah I totally see that too, but it's ok because I like that movie.
Seriously? What about me says Mary Poppins to you?
Kid 4: I can't figure it out, but it's definitely there.

Couldn't someone, someday say I remind them of Maggie Gyllenhaal, Zooey Deschanel, Julianne Hough, anybody but a mom and Mary Poppins? Geez! I guess there's no sense filling my head with silly ideas like that.
No, Erin, you are not cute and put together, you are not cool.

Spring Mantel

I've been waiting to post a picture of our mantel all decorated for Spring and now seems like as good of time as any. It's changed just a little bit because I've added a couple of specifically Easter items, but this is probably how it will stay until May or so. The framed item is Galatians 5:22-23 that I bought the PDF for from here .

Do yall remember how uncrafty I told you I was? Well this Y is about the level of project I can actually accomplish. And it's ok if the back looks like that. I have quite a bit of that fabric left over and am trying to figure out something I can do with it to carry it throughout our living room a bit. Linking up to this party:

Wedding Wednesday-Centerpieces

Before my wedding I had started to collect milk glass and I knew I wanted to gather up enough pieces to make centerpieces at my wedding. Most of it I got off of ebay and some from this famous wedding blogger that she had used at her own wedding. I wanted lush, frilly, English garden style flowers and that's exactly what I got! My flowers are my favorite part of my wedding, besides the getting married to my love part. This was my inspiration picture that I showed to my super-awesome floral designer, Erin McLarty of Eden's Echo. She did an awesome job recreating it with the flowers that could survive Texas in July. She blogged about my wedding here. I went to the studio where she was working and we had a trial that came out like this.Gorgeous right? I'm talking about the flowers of course, not me. I look like a mess! The plan was to have three different types of centerpieces one would be a single large arrangement with several votive candles surrounding it. The second would be a cluster of three smaller arrangements in varying heights with fewer votives. And the third would be a big heap of flowers in kind of a ring around a pillar candle. I used navy overlays from a different vendor and the mirror circles that came with the hotel. Following are a few shots that show the centerpieces in action. While we mingle and such.I wish I had more clear pictures of the flowers like this one because they really were stunning and exactly what I hoped for. Also appearing in the tablescapes are the table numbers on cards I bought on clearance from Boatman Geller and had my maid of honor write the table numbers on in her calligraphy.

This is one of the mound with candle examples.
And this one is the cluster example.




I love those Bells of Ireland shining there! That what the altar flowers were mostly except that they didn't make it to the altar and instead we had all those carnations and daisies provided by the church you've seen in all of my other wedding pictures.

It looks like my guests were enjoying themselves, no? What do you think about my centerpieces?

And the Winner is...

Carrie

from Mizell Mayhem!

Congratulations to you! I hope you love your new bowls and cookbook!

Thank you so much to everyone who entered! There were 27 contestants who all asked excellent questions. I'll be working on the answers for a post coming soon. After making a list of everyone who entered I had my trusty husband (who's an auditor, so you know he follows the rules) use Random.org to pick. Lucky number 22 is the winner. I had fun with my first giveaway but you can sure it won't be the last. And I just want to say again how happy I am to have each of my readers. I look forward to getting to know all of you better.

I've emailed Carrie and I'll be sending that package out as soon as possible.

Top 2 Tuesdays - Truly Random Facts

In order that these top 2 random facts about myself could truly be random, I went ahead and made a list of 20 random facts then used the random number generator to pick out two. Here's what I ended up with:

5. My childhood lovey was a Pink Panther stuffed animal named Pinky.
My uncle gave him to me before I was born (I think) but he only became my favorite when I lost Pooky my clown. He has a really weak neck and despite several "surgeries" where my mom restuffed it and stitched him back up, his head hangs down. My friends would shake it or throw him and I was super defensive of him. I still love Pinky but he says at home with my parents.

12. I don't have an iPod.
My first MP3 player was given to me by a good friend but it wasn't an iPod. It wore out and I got an iPod nano but I never used it. This Fall I sold it in our garage sale. I want an iPhone but probably will never get another iPod.


So there you have it! If you're a new visitor from Top 2 Tuesdays please enter my giveaway. It ends today when I get home from school and do the "drawing." I'll announce the winner tonight! Good luck to all who entered.

Giveaway reminder!

Tomorrow is the last day to enter my giveaway for a set of 3 Liberty of London prep bowls and Peace Meals cookbook from the Junior League of Houston! If you haven't left a comment on that post yet, go do it now! If you have, tell a friend or sit back, cross your fingers and hope for the best! I look forward to announcing the winner on Wednesday!

Menu Plan Monday

Monday: Penne della Palma, salad, Fig Newtons for dessert
this was supposed to be our Palm Sunday (also called Fig Sunday sometimes) meal but we got invited out to eat last night so it's pushed to today.
Tuesday: Cheesy Taco Puffs Ours will be made with venison. I can't tell you how eager I am to get that meat out of the deep freeze, Spanish rice, mango
Wednesday: Italian Chicken and Potatoes with apples
Thursday: this is our not-even-close-to-authentic-but-at-least-I-thought-about-it Passover meal. Lamb chops, couscous from a box, steamed spinach, and the first three radishes from our garden!
Friday: fasting for Good Friday but we'll have a small meal of pintos (without the hamhock) and cornbread

Sing-Along Sunday

Here's the songs running through my head this Sunday morning. When I posted a few a couple weeks ago, Mary Beth at Live. Laugh. Make Something. suggested adding a MckLinky so everyone could actually sing along. I think that's a great idea, so if you want to post any music that's on your mind today, go right on ahead and link up (if I set it up right). I'd love to listen to what you're listening to! Have a blessed Palm Sunday!

This one is by request of the hubs. I like it too!

I got it!

Remember this? Well, I got what I wanted! Brian and I got each other bikes for Easter and I couldn't be happier about them!

Fill-in-the-Blank-Friday

doesn't she have the greatest theme pictures?

1. The best piece of advice I was ever given was it's hard for people to not like someone who likes them. So smile, and be kind .
2. If I had a million dollars to give to one charity I would give it to Project Ultrasound or another pro-life charity, but I'm not sure the ones I currently give to would be prepared to accept such a large donation.
3. If I got to choose my "last meal" it would be from Liberty Bistro. I'd have Thai Beef Salad with soft warm bread, soup, and wine with Pot de Creme for dessert. Speaking of "last meals" have you read this?
4. My hair is chestnut, like my Grandma's used to be .
5. If at first you don't succeed try something else! You might be better suited at that thing.
6. I have always been very laid-back. It's pretty tough to get me riled up and I can keep a calm head in almost any situation.

7. Oh....and by the way.... check out the new checkbook cover I got from Gussy! It has a big pink ruffle on the front and a lemon print on the inside. It's like having Summer in my purse!

For those of you who forgot, or are here from The Little Things We Do or New Friend Friday, be sure to enter my giveaway for Liberty of London bowls and Peace Meals cookbook!

Six Degrees of Blogging

The Outnumbered Mama found me yesterday as she was playing a round of 6 Degrees of Blogging. It seems like she found some cool new friends so I decided I would play too.

Here are the rules:
*Start on your blog and clink on another blog's link. Keep clicking through to another blog until you get to the 6th blog.

*Leave a comment on their blog saying "Hey, I found you through 6 degrees of blogging! You are being featured on my blog today! (Leave your blog URL so they can find you and the featured post.)

*Write a quick blurb on your blog with the 6 degrees button, a link/button to your featured blogger and a few nice words about them and their blog. Encourage your readers to visit your featured blogger and leave them some comment love!

*Link your blog up on the MckLinky blog hop (feel free to grab the blog hop code if you want) so we can visit your blog and see who you found! The goal here is to find new blogs. Find someone who might not have found otherwise. To encourage other bloggers by leaving them comments of support! Follow other bloggers and they will return the favor by following and commenting on yours. Now go click your little heart out!!

1st Degree: From my blog I clicked over to the blog of my most recent follower that has one, which is Emily! We became friends after being assigned as swap partners about a year ago and she just started up her blog Phone Home Designs by E.T. about shopping and designing things on the cheap. She's really good at it!

2nd Degree: From there I clicked on the first entry in her blog list and found Gigi's Gone Shopping who had just posted about J.Crew, one of my favorite topics of course.

3rd Degree: Then I clicked on the profile of the girl who had commented right before me and found her blog, DaniBP Mop Philosopher. She was talking about some great J.Crew finds and also a beautiful Liberty of London scarf, get this, not from Target! Yes, they have been around much longer.

4th Degree: I clicked on a random one of her followers, actually it wasn't random at all, I liked the glitter shoes in her icon picture. There I found CoCo of Ruby Shoe Blues. It seems like a lot of her blog is about shopping too, and cute stuff is featured there, especially Anthropologie! But I read a post about some big plans for writing and career that she has.

5th Degree: After that I read through her blogroll and tried to pick one that isn't about shopping. I chose Dea Diaries. It turned out she writes about shopping too, but there was a very lovely skirt being featured and Dea herself might as well be a model! Lovely blog!

6th Degree: I picked out a sweet comment from the list before me and that took me to Sweet Tea in Seattle. She had posted the cutest OOTD and also talks about her family and other fun stuff. I'll definitely follow.

So there you have it! If you were wanting to start reading any new blogs, especially fashion and shopping ones, check these out first! Or post your own 6 degrees. I had fun!

Wedding Wednesday - Photographers

I'm linking up again today with Courtney from One Fine Wire for Wedding Wednesday. Just ignore the fact that it's Thursday morning now. The theme for the week is photographers and I wouldn't miss the chance to tell you about mine.

When we first started out wedding planning my parents offered us a certain budget and said anything we didn't spend from the wedding we could keep as a gift. I took it as a mission to get the wedding of my dreams for as little as possible so that we'd have some leftover to put toward a house. Do I really need to tell anyone who's done this that we ended up a bit over budget? At the beginning of planning though I made decisions based almost solely on price and that led me to look at Craigslist for a photographer. I did find several very talented photographers there, one of whom was Lauren Goldsberry. She was just starting to get into the wedding photography game and was offering this killer package of an engagement session, bridal portraits and full wedding coverage for dirt cheap. It was incredible and I liked all the pictures of her's that I saw. We met and really hit it off too. I could see that we had the same ideas about a lot of things and would work really well together. Pictures never really ranked that high on my wedding priority list though. I figured as long as our wedding was documented, I'd be happy. We set up our engagement session in San Marcos by the river where Brian had proposed. She took tons of photos and we had such a good time doing it! Here's my favorite shot

and this is the one we used in the newspaper for our engagement announcement

Click her name above where I linked and you can see several others on her site. Unfortunately, a couple months later I got an email for Lauren saying that she just didn't have the confidence or experience to trust herself with our wedding pictures yet and gave me a chance to get out of our contract. I was very impressed that she was honorable enough and had the integrity to do that. So I took her at her word and started looking for a new photographer, having paid only a trifling sum for that great engagement shoot. I hope that she gains more experience and is able to grow her business as she wants to.

I was a little big more discriminating when I conducted my second search which lead me to Jason Speros. Looking at his portfolio online, I recognized one of my good friends from middle school and talked to her and she highly recommended him and it turned out that my florist who I was in love with had used him also. We worked out a deal to include bridal portraits (which I never ended up getting, my fault, not his) and wedding coverage. We hadn't met at all before the wedding and we actually introduced ourselves in my dressing room before the wedding. I was very happy with the work he did! Sadly, he was using two cameras at the wedding and reception and one of them was stollen by someone at the hotel. Big bummer! There are a few parts of the wedding including the grand march and cake cutting that I don't have pictures of and it's because they were on that camera. All the wedding pictures that I've posted on here before are from him, here are a couple of my favorites from the shots he blogged about here. I would have included more but come to find out snapfish is now blocked at school. Dang it! I'll be posting more of them with future Wedding Wednesdays and other posts, I'm sure. I'm hoping to have some printed out and a book made by our one year anniversary. I think he did an excellent job of capturing the joy of the day.

LOL and JL Giveaway!

I know I've been promising this giveaway for a week now, but you didn't think I'd let you down, did you? I have only been blogging for a few months, but I'm surprised at what an enjoyable part of my life it has become. Comments from readers are like crack and I get way more excited about them than getting emails or Facebook messages any day! I love how well I've gotten to know some of you through reading your blogs and sharing mine and I hope to get to know all of you much better! Out of excitement of 50 followers plus wins on 5 other bloggers' giveaways (so far, I don't plan to stop entering) I figured it was time to host my own.

Here is what's at stake:

This pretty set of Liberty of London prep bowls comes tied up in a ribbon and would be lovely at a Spring or Summer brunch or to brighten up the kitchen and would make a perfect hostess gift. I drooled over them as soon as I saw them and knew I needed a set and one of you did too! If you've been wondering what all the hype is about in the blog world over the new Liberty of London line, get thee to a Target! Fabulous cheery prints by the famous Liberty of London are all over the store. I have a bathing suit, blouse, watering can, and these bowls from it now, and I'm waiting till they get my size back in stock for a new dress!

Along with the bowls comes one of my favorite cookbooks so that you'll have plenty of great ideas for what to whip up in them. I love Junior League cookbooks in general because everything in there is tried and true by excellent hostesses so you know what you make will turn out pretty and delicious. Peace Meals by the Houston Chapter of the Junior League is the best I've seen!

Here are the rules to enter:

1. You must be a follower of this blog to win. Friends and family are eligible, as are you, no matter where you live.


2. You need to have your email available in your profile so I can contact you or you can leave it in your comment.


3. To enter, leave a comment asking a question you'd like me to answer. Silly or serious, easy or hard, it doesn't matter to me, but in the interest of knowing each other better, I'd like to put together a question and answer post in the next week or two.


4. If you think your Twitter followers, Facebook friends or Blog readers would like to know about my giveaway, I would love for you to share it with them. There aren't any extra entries for this though, I want to make it as easy and fair as possible!


5. The giveaway will run for one week. Next Tuesday, March 30th, I'll gather up all the entries and use a random number generator to pick the winner and contact them by email!

Good luck to all of you! I have been so thrilled to win each giveaway that I've won and I want the same excitement for a lucky one of you!!

Top 2 Tuesdays- Things I choose not to live without

The topic this week for Top 2 Tuesdays hosted by Taylor, the Undomestic Momma is top two things you can't live without. The point has been made, and justifies repeating that the things we're posting today are much less significant than the things you really can't live without, you know food, water, shelter, love of God and family, etc. These are the things that I surely wouldn't like to live without.

1. My hot rollers.

I curl my hair every day. Like, EVERY SINGLE DAY. Since 4th grade. I love big body and bounce and it's kinda my signature style, you know? I've stuck with my hot rollers while my friends moved from curling irons to round brushes and blow driers to the Chi. I'm just loyal like that. I would be quite self-conscious without them and I choose not to be.





2. Dr Pepper

I know I drink way more Dr Pepper than is healthy, and not the diet stuff either, but I LOVE it! I shocked one of my health professors once when I admitted to drinking about 50 ounces a day in college. It's much less now, more like 20 on average. Dr Pepper beats Coke and Pepsi hands down any day and don't even bring Mr. Pibb around here, it won't be pretty.

Menu Plan Monday

We decided minutes ago that we weren't up for going to the young adults group tonight so now Brian is whipping up something on the grill for dinner. That made me realize I needed to come up with stuff for the rest of the week. You see, it's not only blogging that I've been completely slacking on. Cooking, cleaning, reading, the dvr and the doogies are all falling behind after this completely wonderful Spring Break. Laundry is a success though. I'm totally caught up there. Take your wins where you can. I'm going for quick and easy meals this week so I don't give up before even getting started.

Monday: some version of chicken and potatoes.

Tuesday: Bermuda spinach salad and crusty bread

Wednesday: Cali Chicken Paninis (with sprouts, roasted red pepper and avadcado) with chips and fruit

Thursday: Fried backstrap, hashbrowns, okra

Friday: Kale and white bean soup

yes, there is still a giveaway coming! I promise!

Giveaway coming soon!

I have had a streak of luck like you wouldn't believe!! In addition to winning the two giveaways I talked about here, I also won this one, this one and this one! Thank you all so much! I love my prizes! I also passed up the 50 followers point I was looking forward to! I'm really thankful to be part of such a generous group of bloggers and also to have such awesome readers and commenters. In order to say thanks and pay it forward I'll be hosting a giveaway of my own. I'll post about it when I get back in town but hopefully you can get a little excited because the giveaway will include something from the new Liberty of London via Target line. Have you checked it out yet? LOVE

Weekend Recap (In Pictures)

Friday night at Billy's Ice to see Lost Immigrants. Where we listened to the music and made fun of the drunks.

Saturday during the day we worked on the boat and finally got it put back in the water. Brian worked hard, I tried to help. I also got a little Zoro action on my feet with these tans.
Saturday night we headed into Austin for dinner at Trudy's then drinks (Coke for me) at Doc's. One friend flaked, but my old roommie came! And I played MySpace in the bathroom so you could see my cute new dress.

Sunday we finally got to actually use the boat! It had been a year since we were actually able to sail because of work being done on it, busy schedules around the wedding and droughts that made the lake unusable.

All in all, great weekend! I didn't post a menu plan yesterday because I'm out of town now. Brian is stuck at home with some frozen Stouffer's meals for two nights. I had a Republican Women luncheon yesterday then I headed into Sugar Land to my parents house. Brian, poor thing, has to work this week, but I'm on Spring Break. Today, my mom and I are headed to South Padre to visit my grandpa and hang out with my Aunt for her birthday. Hopefully the weather is better there than here! I'll post pictures when I get back, but probably won't be able to be on the computer much till Friday at least. I hope you have a wonderful week!

Sing-Along Sunday

Just thought I'd share a few songs that have been in my head lately. I hope you enjoy because it might become a weekly thing!

Lenten Check-In

We've reached the halfway point in our Lenten journey now. How's it going? In bouncing around the blogosphere, I've read several bloggers' Lenten resolutions and a few re-resolutions as things didn't go so well or focus changed. I think it's awesome to be in such great company of people trying to grow closer to God and to tweak some of the negative things in their life to become more like the people God wants us to be. I realized that even though I had good intentions to do so, I never let my readers in on my Lenten plans. Now is as good of time as any to talk a little bit about the areas I focused in on and how I'm doing with those.

Usually the first thing that comes to mind when talking about Lenten observances is the "giving up" part. That's really only one of three ways that someone might commit themselves. It's the fasting and abstinence part. In choosing to discontinue a behavior that is bad for us or to give up something that may be good for us, we can increase our self-control and dependence on the Lord by not partaking in it. I chose to give up alcohol during this season. One of my friend Stefanie's favorite quotes from me is "alcohol is a pretty big part of my life." No, there's not a problem here or anything, don't worry please. It just seems like in all the good times my family, friends and I have alcohol present and enjoy it. I wanted to focus the joy of my life more on God an less on a party or relaxation that depends, at least in part, on alcohol. I've done very well so far! One beer only, and that was last Sunday. Sundays are usually exempt from sacrifices. My first temptation will probably be tonight though. Brian and I are going to an ice house to hear some Americana music. I think I'll feel a little funny with water in hand, but it's definitely for the best.

The second way to observe Lent is through prayer and the sacraments. It was important for me to go to confession at some point during Lent and I did go last week. The freedom that comes from that sacrament is indescribable! I love it and had stayed away for too long this time! Also, Brian and I committed to praying together as a couple daily. We recognize the benefits that come to us when we do set aside time to pray together and not just alone, but neither one of us grew up with a lot of family prayer beside grace before meals and it can be a bit of an awkward practice to get into for us. We haven't done it every day like we had hoped to, but we have increased which I'm very glad about.

The third commitment is to service and alms giving. I chose to focus my service very locally, in my own home. I'm not a natural housekeeper and have to make quite an effort to keep up with cleaning and tidying up. I do think it's an excellent way to serve my home and my husband though and I've been trying really hard. I started using the FlyLady system and that's really made such a great difference. It goes in such little steps and she is very nurturing and encouraging which helps me a lot. I love it when I can look around my house and feel pride in my work! Life runs so much smoother when everything is put away and neat. I really hope I can keep it up.

I'd love to hear what you decided to do and what fruit it's bearing in your life! Of course, if you don't practice Lent, maybe this Spring brings a time of renewal anyway and you might think of a way you can resolve to improve your living, you know, if you want.

Fun with Blanks

Hosted by Lauren!




1. The best day ever was my wedding day. I know that's what everyone says, but I seriously had so much fun! Even if it had been someone else's wedding, I think I'd still count it as the best day ever.

2. My favorite meal of the day is brunch. I love getting to go out for brunch with Brian or friends. It feels so luxurious!


3. This weekend I hope to go hear some music tonight, go sailing for the first time in over a year on Saturday, and spend Sunday in worship and relaxation.


4. Never in my life have I dyed my hair.


5. The only thing better than singing loud to your favorite song is singing and dancing to that song with someone you love.


6. I could really do with some sunshine and warm air .

7. The most recent thing I bought myself was a fillet o'fish and a large sweet tea (which came with a free dvd rental! score!

Square Foot Gardening: Phase 2 - Planting

I spoke about our plans to grow a spring/summer veggie garden here. Now that it's been planted, I wanted to update you on how it's going. Brian built us these two planter boxes that are set up on a layer of cardboard so weeds don't come through out in our side yard where they can get full sun. Each one is 4'x4' with dividers that rest on top of the soil creating 16 square foot boxes for planting. There are two of them, so that makes 32. 4 feet across is a pretty good limit because it is possible to reach all of your plants to water and tend to them. Then we filled the planters with Mel's Mix which is one part compost, one part vermiculite, one part peat moss, and one part soil. We underestimated how much would be needed and had to go back and get another load of that stuff.

In the last installment I talked about planning the spacing of all the plants and purchasing the seeds. For those of you in Texas, this resource put out by Texas A&M horticulture has been invaluable to us in figuring out when each species should go in. As you can see, there's still time left for lots of varieties of plants just in case you haven't started your garden yet. We've been following that schedule for each plant since late January and just about all of the seeds have germinated. The only ones that didn't were the asters and forget-me-nots (the flowers I'd petitioned for). So we went ahead and turned them up and put squash there instead. You can see in the picture how well the peas are doing! I'm looking forward to when they start climbing that trellis Brian made for them! The seeds only go in about half an inch, you don't have to dig. You can put a couple of seeds per spot, then thin them out the the spacing required by variety. This weekend we thinned out several of the boxes so that the plants weren't overcrowded and we also put in some transplants for tomatoes and peppers. Before the transplants went in we weren't having to water almost at all because we've been having quite a bit of rain around here, but tomatoes take a ton of water so we'll have to pick up the pace on that. We use a watering can that sits out and collect rain water. I think we still have some thinning left to do but it hurts my little heart to pull out plants that are trying so hard!

Here are the little sprouts in their beds.

Planter 1

Those are the peas on the left and the radishes on the right. broccoli, beets, carrots in the middle. They aren't very big yet. The bricks are there for when we've had to cover the planter for freezing nights. That's probably over by now, but just in case.

Planter 2

Those are cilantro, a couple different varieties of tomatoes, jalapenos and banana peppers. The little ones you don't see very well are swiss chard. Brian won that one. I've never bought swiss chard and didn't see much point in growing it.

I would be remiss if I spent a whole post talking about these plants we're working hard for and didn't even mention the "volunteers" decorating our yard. Oh lovely dandelions and buttercups! Even mower blades don't phase you!

If my parents' yard looked like that they'd be getting a letter from the homeowners' association, but you have to understand. We're in the country, yall, and they don't really care what we do with our yard. There's a sailboat sitting in it for pete's sake! (with any luck that'll be gone this weekend, back to the lake where it belongs) Last year with the droughts we had a half acre of dirt. This year I'm thankful for the weeds just as long as they don't take up their place in the planters!