Chocolate and Bribery

I think that the people that take care of your children should be treated wonderfully. Thank you notes, treats, flowers, baked goods, Starbucks, etc. An extra thank you never hurt anyone - right? Plus, I think that the sooner you butter up the teacher, the better your child will be treated.

Some people may disagree with this theory, but I have been doing it for the past 18 months and have had not had one single complaint from Miss A's church nursery workers. (A similar theory goes for traveling with babies/toddlers/kids - dress them super cute and you are less likely to get those glares from other passengers)

And now that Miss A is about to start preschool, I now have 2 sets of teachers to bribe/woo with treats. Luckily, I love to pretend that I am Martha so this is super fun and easy for me. Miss A's meet the teacher night at her preschool is coming up and I am making homemade chocolate chip cookies for her teachers.

Every holiday will be met with an appropriate treat - pumpkin bread, cranberry muffins, a basket of bloomimg mums, etc. Other mom's in the class might hate me for doing this, but such is life.

Oh yeah - you better believe she is going to be dressed like a little doll baby on her first day of school. A camel gingham smocked dress with brightly colored scissors in the collar and a bright red bow.

Weekend Roundup

We had a pretty great weekend... how about you? As always, it went by quickly, but we had a great time. One of my very best friends was in town for the weekend, so we had a wonderful time just spending time together.

She got in town late Friday night and we spent the evening catching up while drinking wine on our patio. It was perfect.

And then on Saturday she was able to partake in our Saturday morning family tradition - donuts, coffee and Diet Coke at the neighborhood donut shop. This shop has the most delish donuts - light, fluffy and the perfect amount of glaze. Ahhh.... I could eat them every. single. day, but I only let myself indulge in this goodness on Saturday mornings. We have made a couple of friends at this shop and we always look forward to running into them on Saturday mornings.

After that, we went to a local farmers market. They had fresh bread, homemade pasta, organic cupcakes, Texas olive oil and tons and tons of produce. We decided to buy most of the ingredients for our dinner at the market - it was fun to see what we could come up with. We ended up making a pasta dish that we all loved. Garlic basil pasta with spinach, bacon, tomatoes, basil and olive oil. We also had to get a loaf of the jalapeno cheddar bread.

The rest of the day was spent walking around the mall and enjoying a baby free day. The Mr. stayed home with Miss A, so we were able to spend the majority of the day shopping without having to deal with strollers and sippy cups. It was a nice little break.

And then we came home and whipped up this little masterpiece using our loot from earlier in the day. Mix in a bottle (or 2) of wine and it was a perfect day.

I just finished watching the Emmy's and now I am about to crash.

And that was my weekend.... how was yours?

Game room curtains

I was flipping through the August issue of Real Simple and came across a page featuring some fun and exotic patterned shower curtains. I am not in the market for a new shower curtain, but I fell in love with a couple of the curtains that were featured.

I am thinking this Wal Mart find would make great curtains in our game room.

I am going to order a couple and put them to the test. I love thinking outside the box when it comes to home decor.... Have you ever used something other than curtains as curtains?

Texas heat

The Texas heat has finally fried my brain.

For the majority of the summer we have had temps like this:

And yesterday was even the hottest day of the summer. The "official" temperature was 106 at 3 in the afternoon. Yikes.

And I did not feel a thing. Miss A and I spent the afternoon outside - I even thought yesterday was not even as hot as previous days. It was not until my mom was talking to me about the temperature did I even realize how stinking hot it had been.

We are outside almost every day, so I guess we have just become used to these temps.

Today the high is supposed to be 100. And we have an afternoon play date..... outside!

Adios contractor beige

I have mentioned before my love/hate relationship with color. I love bright vibrant colors, but at the same time I also love the calming whites. This can make for a heck of a fun time in the Home Depot paint section.

We have only painted 2 rooms in our house - the dining room and the nursery. Other than that, everything is a boring contractor beige. I think the previous homeowners painted the entire house the same color before they moved out because I can see hints of sea foam green and red in places. Eek!


I had finally had enough of our living room being the blah beige, so I finally made a color selection.


Silver Sage by Restoration Hardware


I bought a sample can, painted 2 small areas and then slept on it. I still loved it the next day, so we decided to take the leap and paint the living room. Our house is very open and the entire downstairs flows from one area to another - this is great, except when trying to figure out which walls to paint. We left one huge wall blank (only for the time being) because it is about 100 feet tall and I need to either hire a painter or find some scaffolding.

We love it. The pictures do not do it justice.... it is color, without being too in your face. It looks wonderful next to the white trim, white mantle and white built in book shelves.

Now, I just need to pick a color for the game room....and the master bedroom.... and the study.

Like my homemade Martha Stewart paint fan?

**New pictures on Baby M**

Just like Momma

When I was younger, I can remember always wanting to play with my mom's jewelery. (Heck, I still try to wear some of her stuff...) I loved to put her stuff on and wear it around the house and admire the lovely baubles I was wearing. To this day, I still love jewelery. Ever have a question about what I want for my birthday or holiday - jewelery. Can't go wrong.


Well, it looks like Miss A has inherited a love of jewelery from her Momma. She has seen where I keep my jewelery and now she tries to help herself to it. She loves to wear my stuff around the house and I love it! She looks like a miniature version of me, so when she dresses up in my jewelery, it is adorable.


Adorable until I see her try to give Jake one of my earrings or a ring.


I am thinking that if she has her own jewelery box, then she will love to play in that, versus get into my stuff.

I made her her very own jewelery box and even filled with some of momma's jewelery! She loves it and carries it all over the house with her.

I love doing little projects like this... pretty soon the folks at Michael's and Hobby Lobby are going to know me by name.

**pictures of Miss A wearing my jewelery over on Baby M**

Hey Good Lookin, What Ya Got Cookin

Everyone having a good summer? I can hardly believe that it is already August. Lately, time just seems to be flying by and I have to stop and remind myself to take it all in. I feel really old talking like that..... plus, I just bought some stuff from Talbots, so I am definitely an adult. (Talbots is awesome lately. I am in love with their fall collection.... now, I just need to wait for it to go on sale.)

Anyway, when we are experiencing temps of 107, I like to keep the cooking to a minimum and NOT turn on the oven. Last night we had the best summer salad. I have always had this as a side salad, but since I was making it the main dish, I decided to add some grilled chicken to the mix and call it a meal.

I really think the dressing is the kicker... I am sure you could use a store bought vinaigrette, but this is easy to whip up and is delish.

Dressing:

2 tb vinegar

2 tb oil

2 tb honey

1/2 tsp paprika

s/p to taste

Salad:

Mixed greens

Sliced strawberries

Goat cheese

Sliced almonds

Diced purple onion

Grilled chicken

(The dressing recipe makes enough for 2 large salad portions.....)

In Love

Have you ever seen pictures of a house and thought - that is me! I stumbled upon pictures of Suze Yalof Schwartz's NYC apartment and fell in love. (She is the fashion editor at large for Glamour Mag)

The all white kitchen. CHECK.

The all white bathroom. CHECK.

The turquoise glass collection. CHECK.

The color coordinated books. CHECK.

The gallery wall. CHECK.

The occasional pop of color. CHECK.

Here are some of the after pictures of her apartment..... for some of the before, go here.

She recently announced on her blog that she is about to move to LA. Can you imagine completing this wonderful apartment only to have to move?!?!