How Pinteresting...

Because I'm stuck on bedrest, some things I'm loving on Pinterest lately:

Because I'm a dork. (From here)

Fall prettiness. (From here)

Yummy pumpkin pie bites. (From here)

To remind me to capture the details. (From here)

Yup. It's pretty random. And that's okay. :)

PS -- Pinteresting is totally Jared's word. And I totally stole it... :)

Nursery Dreaming

So not only have a lot of my friends been having children lately, but a few weeks ago, Jared and I found out that we are expecting too! "Meatball" is due the end of September. Since we don't know what house we'll be in at that point, my nursery planning is quite limited right now. On top of that, we don't know if Meatball is a boy or a girl, so that limits things a little as well. Although I must say, I am not one of those people that believe girls should have pink and purple and boys should have blue and green and red... We'll see what the colors end up like, since we may not be able to paint in our next rental (and since we're on a fairly limited budget). But here are some things I've found that I like.... So enjoy my little bit of day dreaming!

I like the chair rail and the paneling in the lower half of this room. It always looks so sophisticated to me. I also like the idea of the wall graphics...anyone know if those are removable or not? (From here)

Love the idea of Chinese lanterns! Not only do they give light, but they're fun for baby to look at!

(From here)

Again, I like the wall graphic. And the wall color in this room. (From here)

Aren't these whimsical little sheep cute??? (From here)

This would be awesome for a little boy... (From here)

What nursery decor/items were fun in your nursery or what would you like to have in your future child's nursery?



It's been how long??

Yeah, so just call me a slacker now. Except that I really do have good excuses... really. None of this "the dog ate my homework" type stuff either... so where have I been? Why has my blog gotten slightly dusty? Let's see... since the last blog post I have had one amazing concept shoot (put together by the lovely ladies at Anwen Elizabeth Photography, Chrissy Rose Photography and myself), have been to Connecticut and back on business, and now have some family in town. So last night, more than a week after the concept shoot, I finally had a chance to actually look through the photos I took that day. So today you get a sneak peek, just enough to pull you in and get you as excited about it as we were and still are! Meagan and Nate were awesome models, as was their adorable Basset, Frannie. So enjoy some of the eye candy and check back for more later this week!

Some of the amazing details:

Frannie was super all afternoon!

Love this shot. Totally Chrissy's idea!

 RAWR! Both of you. Seriously...

And a shot of the 3 photogs. Laugh like Julia Roberts!! 

Your personal paparazzi ~ Gainesville Portrait Photographer

It's after Christmas. The holiday hustle and bustle has subsided. Spring hasn't quite arrived yet. It's that lull of a time between seasons and it's the perfect time to spare a little bit of attention for yourself.

Something came to me the other day, as I was writing the blog post about my mom and her photos. She asked me to take some photos, not because she particularly wanted any of herself, but because she wanted some to give to my dad. Because our husbands, our family, our friends, they love us how we are. So even though so often we think "I'd like to lose 5 pounds" or "I need my hair cut" or any of those thousand other excuses we give; the people that love us don't see that. They see us.

I thought about this again after our For the Love get together (You can see my shots here, here, and here. Photos from Wendy are here!). Jared (my husband) saw the photos Wendy took of me and loved them. Now, I wasn't particularly thrilled with the way I looked that day, but we did all have fun and Wendy is a wonderful photographer who took some great photos of me. As I was on the other side of the lens, I felt a little awkward at first, but then started to have a little bit of fun. It was fun to dress up a little bit, put on a little make up and pretend for awhile that I was the prettiest thing out there. That these were my paparazzi. Because I deserved them.

And I think that's a feeling that everyone deserves. So this spring, take some time for yourself. Or buy a gift certificate for that woman in your life that needs to take time for herself. To feel beautiful. Do it for your husband. Your boyfriend. More importantly, do it for yourself.

Let's set something up that makes you feel beautiful. Forget about that five pounds, that imperfect hair. And let me make you the center of someone's attention for awhile. Let me be your paparazzi. Because you deserve it.

Home Inspiration

I have never been one of those people who has one of those homes. You know, the one you walk into and feel like it's perfectly decorated. Like everything was hand picked to fit perfectly into each room. The ones where the colors are all complementary (or purposely chosen to stand out). My excuse now is that we're in a rental -- can't change the floors, can't paint the walls, and why do I want to buy things that will match this house when I know I'll be moving in the next year or two anyways? But really, that's just an excuse. Even when we owned a house, I wasn't one of those people. Don't get me wrong -- most of the things in my house matched, and went with a general theme if you will, but it wasn't well decorated.

So why am I talking about this? Well, for Thanksgiving, Jared and I visited a friend's house (well, a friend's mother's house) and w.o.w. It was Amazing (that's right -- with a capital "A"). Mrs. C has the quintessential Southern house. It was beautiful! But the thing that impressed me most was that while it was well decorated and extremely well thought out, it was also very livable. It was not a museum -- people lived here (and it didn't hurt that it smelled like a wonderful Thanksgiving meal being cooked....). I could go on and list the things I loved about the house, but that's not really the point of this post. It reminded me of what I want someday, when once again I have my own house. A pretty house, a put-together house, but a livable house. A place where my eventual children can play, a place where my friends always feel welcome, a place where I am always at ease. My place. My home. So I dream. And I keep photos of the things I like. and the things I love. Here's a peak at my dream, in no real particular order:

Someday, I will have floor to ceiling bookshelves...

Maybe ones that look like this, though.

Love this wine rack/cabinet for the kitchen... plus the bonus counter space!

This simple bed from Ikea would look awesome with a darker or splashy bedspread...

And I love this!! How can you resist wanting to look in each of those drawers for treasure???