Booyah.

Dinner with the ladies tonight and I couldn't be more excited....Betsy this post is for you. Let's see....what else is new....hmmm....oh yes.

He put a ring on it. Booyah.

Happy Birthday Rives!

For the fifth year in a row Elizabeth and I whipped out our chef's hats and created Rives' birthday cake! This year the birthday theme was Star Wars and the cake was R2D2! I think it looks pretty darn accurate if you ask me!

victory

Success! The molcajete did not get the best of us and we were proud to serve some delicious guacamole in it to our friends Ben and Lisa. Will also be busting it out to host Mom and Dad for a Mexican Fiesta tomorrow night....let's hope they don't get any grit in their guac and chip bite.

Beach here I come.....

Been busy, busy, busy....will post something more next week but for now trying to get out to door to head to Hilton Head for the weekend! Yahoo!

DIY Herb Planters

I'm not much of a do-it-yourself person specially because I don't know how people find the time for these projects! When I get home from work its all I can do to scrounge up a meal for myself and brush my teeth before bed. HOWEVER, I saw the below on Pinterest and since I was planning on planting some herbs for this summer ANYWAY......I decided to go all Martha Stewart on you folks.

Step 1: Go to Lowes and buy: (1) terracotta pots (2) herbs and (3) a quart of Chalkboard paint, of which you are only going to use a few swipes leaving the rest to surely go bad as its being stored in your shed. Lay awake that night thinking of other uses for paint, and, other than paint all your walls with it so you can write on your entire house, resolve yourself to the fact that this DIY project is going to cost you more than just buying fresh herbs from grocery store every week. **sigh**

Step 2 : Attempt to put painters tape on pot, only to realize the due to some law of physics, or gravity, or some other geometrical math that you didn't pay attention to, when you put the tape on there it curves with the shape of the pot, thus creating more of a trapezoid than a square. Wonder if that's just your eye playing tricks on you or fancy science. Get ruler and measure equal distances from the top and bottom of pot to create square and then jerry-rig tape into a sort of straight line.

Step 3: Wonder if you should prime pot. Look in shed and luckily find latex primer leftover from when they painted your house. Put a layer of that on pot, tell yourself you are going to wait 24 hours for it to dry, become impatient and paint first layer of chalkboard paint 4 hours later. Paint second layer the next night and force yourself not to "test" chalkboard paint with chalk. Realize you couldn't test pot if you wanted to because you don't own chalk. Go to bed.

Step 4: Buy chalk at Target on way home from work the next day. Start gently pulling tape of pot and wonder if it would have been easier to just buy those cute little metal spikes that go in dirt with the herb names on them. Make mental note to remember that next time. 

Step 4: Assess pot and realize it looks pretty good!

Step 5: Test chalkboard out. Very pleased with yourself. Then realize that you wanted to put these pots outside and rain will inevitably wash off herb labels. **sigh** Put them outside anyway.

Step 6: Admit to your readers that you did this project last week, and still have yet to actually plant the herbs in the planters. Baby steps people, baby steps....

Music Monday

Had a fabulous weekend up in the mountains of North Carolina to celebrate my dear friend Anna's birthday! We sat by the fire, ate delicious food, drank great wine and relaxed! Pics to come but for now wanted to share a fabulous soundtrack that we listened to all weekend! The soundtrack for the HBO show Treme - we had it pretty much on repeat all weekend and its so great, check it out for yourself! "Feel like Funkin' It Up"......

Molcajete: The Battle Continues

So we've riced (I just made that term up, do you like it?) the molcajete 7 times, and then I spent a good chunk of last night grinding rock salt into table salt. Technically I used sea salt because my grocery store didn't have rock salt but at this point I could care less. THEN I ground up four cloves of garlic, a tsp of cumin, a tsp of pepper and a tsp of salt. I was tempted to get the tsp of salt from the 4 pounds of it I had just created with all my grinding but opted against it.

Then you leave it in the molcajate for 24 hours. I cannot explain to you how much my house currently reeks of garlic. It hits you upside the head like an awnry grandma when you walk into the house.

The true test will be tonight when I attempt to make guacamole!!! We are having another couple over for a Mexican fiesta and we are going to eat guacamole out of this container if it kills me which it very well might. I don't care if there is grit in it, I don't care if there is a whole pebble in it, we are eating guac out of this MOLCAJETE!!!! (insert Ellen shaking her fist in the air and making a determined face)





ugh.





Friends



Great Uncle Tom and Julia



Molcajete

This is Patrick "seasoning" my molcajete. What is a molcajete you might ask? Its that dang bowl made out of volcanic rock that they make the guacamole in at fancy Mexican restaurants. I make a mean gauc and so for Christmas last year, my sister got me one from Crate and Barrel (yahoo, thanks sis!). It came with instructions on how to season it - aka grind up white rice into a fine powder 6-7 times, then grind rock salt into table salt 6-8 times, then grind up garlic and a bunch of other spices until the rough and bumpy inside is smooth and ready for gauc.

Easier said than done! After ONE SESSION with the rice and molcajete my arm felt like it was going to fall off. It THROBBED when I went to bed that night and I had to take Advil. Last night Patrick took a turn for round 2 and 3. Tonight he is determined to get in a few more rounds.

One day in 2013 we'll be able to make some gauc, I can just feel it.

Others seasoning theirs:

Guest Room Project

So Santa Claus bought me these gorgeous antique twin beds for the new house. I can't really get a good picture because I don't have a fancy camera but you get the general jist. I'm in the process of decorating this room and I'm SUPER excited about it because (1) its a small space that I can decorate fairly quickly with not TOO much cost, allowing me to check at least one room off the decorating "to do" list and (2) it will be so nice to have a great space for people to come and stay with me in my first home! Been brainstorming ideas and you'll have to stay tuned for my post on the finished product in a month or two but for now here are some things I'm thinking.....

Pic of the twin beds....apparently step 1 should be "Buy Mattresses."

LOVE this fabric that my cousin Elizabeth and I found at fabric store. Got a bunch of good swatches to try out in the room - picking the fabric is half the fun! In the past I've made my own valances (note to self: share with you people the re-do of Lucky Charm's guest room that I did. Awesomeness.) but this time I might splurge and have a professional help me from me fabric store. They don't charge very much and the hours of labor I would spare would be WELL worth it.

Then I've been thinking of things I can put in guest room to make it feel welcoming and comfortable for folks. Things like:

Bedside Water Decanter and Glass....Love how the glass flips upside down to act as a lid! Inexpensive and can be found at Bed, Bath and Beyond, Amazon, etc. But Bed, Bath and Beyond means 20% coupons baby!!!

Luggage Rack from Ballard Design

Absolutely obsessed with this alarm clock from Pottery Barn. Its a pricier one (aka not $15 bucks) but might have to go on my birthday wish list.

On of my favorite bloggers, Dooce, has also recently redone her guest room and, although we have very different styles, her readers gave some great suggestions of things to include in the room. If ya'll think of anything you've seen or experienced that you loved in a guest room give me a shout! Always looking for ideas!



Keepin'. It. Real.

You know how it seems that people only put the best version of themselves on their blogs or Facebook? Only the pictures where they look the thinnest, or their hair is looking good, or their family looks all nice and clean and pulled together? When in reality, you know what a hot mess their life is, and that's ok......because your life is a hot mess too and its supposed to be that way. Life is very messy. And sometimes your hair just won't cooperate. It just won't.

Well, I just had to share this with you. I was working from home on Friday because the First Lady was visiting Raleigh and traffic was a nightmare. I was wearing these extremely attractive and figure flattering sweat pants with a t-shirt and some slippers. (Cause what else would you wear when you work from home? Not REAL pants! And by real pants, I mean yoga pants. Cause those are for "fancy" occassions like meeting your friend at Target.)But I digress....after a while, I got chilly. So I went into my closet and threw on a sweatshirt. About an hour later I caught a glimpse of myself in the mirror and the mystery was solved. THIS was where romance comes to die.

Such an attractive grey on grey sweatsuit ensemble I was rocking. Lucky Charms certainly is one lucky man.

Music Monday

That's right folks, its back. I haven't done Music Monday in a LONG TIME. And its not even Monday. I meant to post this yesterday but got distracted.....by Facebook. If you know me at all, you know that I love a good song in the "break-up" genre and any songs about being independent women ("the shoes on my feet? I bought 'em!"....man, I miss Destiny's Child!)

Anyway, take a listen below....Amazing song, love his voice....kinda reminds me of Phil Collins? No? Am I just making that up? I present you with Gotye featuring Kimbra singing "Somebody That I Used to Know".