just what we needed

friday night is usually date night, 

but wade was in canada skiing,

so nikki an i got to have a date.

we've been rubbing each other the wrong way the past couple of weeks so i thought we'd better spend some alone time,

no piano practice, no dance, no school projects, or spelling, or room cleaning, or chores, or whatever else can vex or frustrate one or the other of us.

just us.

aaaaaaah.  it was just what we needed.

we ate out at one of our favorite restaurants, the one wade hates and never wants to go to so i always reserve it for girls' outings... not that those happen ever anymore, but this certainly counted as a girls' night out in my book.

nik instructed me in the proper way to roll your eyes.

i don't think i've got it down as well as she does,

but she did give me some good tips to work on.

really.  she had a list.

in the makeup store nikki couldn't get this perfume to work.

it had no smell.  

it wasn't until the sixth spray that i realized it was body glitter, not perfume.  man was her face be-dazzeled!

we shopped around

then we hit claire's (which store i really can't stand, but what little girl doesn't love that place?)

followed by very frappy frappuccinos.

i like vanilla bean with skim milk.  

nik likes strawberry with 2%.

whipped cream on top, of course.

then we went up and down the escalator approximately 6 times.

nikki thought she was in heaven.

why do kids like that so much?

then to the pet store where nikki drooled over the parakeets and came up with a plan as to how she might earn one.

we'll see.

"did you know parakeets are easily trained and are natural clowns, mom?"

i do now.

then we went to one more store where nikki confirmed it really was her lucky day after she lost her scarf, searched the entire store, searched the car, then went back into the store to ask the store clerk who, miraculously, had it up front.

i think it was actually my lucky day.

 the best part of the whole night for me, and i think for nik too, was that nikki got to just talk and talk and talk the whole time about whatever she wanted to without having to take turns with any other kids and without interruptions.

a couple of times she stopped and asked if she was talking too much.

i just smiled and shook my head.

what a sweet little lady that nikki is.

(and when i say "lady" i don't mean to imply that she's lady-like, since at dinner she also taught me the art of passing gas without making a sound... or a smell.  i'm very skeptical of that one.)

winter thus far

my oh-so-mature husband put this together.

it's amazing we have anything to show, considering the amount of snow we HAVEN'T had.
max is getting so good.
he must take after me.
HA!

messy bedroom

the other morning devan walked up to my side of the bed,

said her good mornings,

gave her kisses,

did whatever else she had to do,

and walked towards the door.

two steps before she exited,

she stopped, paused, turned to my bed and wondered aloud,

"how come i'm not tripping all over stuff, mom?"

listen, kid, maybe i decided to clean my room 

before the end of the year.

do you have to make such a big deal out of it?

besides, have you seen your room lately?

shees!

we're losing it around here

a couple of weeks ago it happened.  

whitney finally lost her first tooth.

she'd been waiting her whole life for this moment.

her toothless grin in all its gloriousness.

it's perfect

then over the next couple of days max and nikki each lost a tooth,

and all three of them have another loose tooth.

we've had a dry spell of falling-out teeth,

now it's like a flood.

we're going to bankrupt our tooth fairy.

harsh accusations

at cost plus today, after checking out and preparing myself for the grand ol' haul-em-out-of-the-store act,

i cheerfully encouraged my girls out of the shopping cart with a 

"let's go, boogers!"

to which my little devan replied, after a very tween-ish jaw drop, gasp and head snap,

"mom!  why would you call us FOOD?  it's because you don't love us anymore and want to eat us!"

first of all, i consider "boogers" to be a term of endearment.

period.

second of all, the fact that my daughter classifies boogers as belonging to some sort of food group is just wrong and disgusting.

i guess we know how she spends her spare time.

and how in the world did the situation escalate from a playful nudge out of the store to me being a bad mother who cares so little for her children that she would rather eat them (if i were in the habit of eating boogers) than take care of them?

such drama.

and then after a cute old man carried on a sweet "conversation" with gwen, for his own entertainment, whitney looked at me with a big question mark.

"mom, what village is he from?"

i thought that was really funny, for some reason.

craigslist and cookie dough

my garage is full of things that should have been sold on craigslist months ago.  while i tell my neighbor how "easy it is" to sell stuff on the sight, i secretly need to bite the bullet myself and create listings for i don't know how many things in total.  enough that my garage would feel instantly less congested, and my wallet more so, after making these sure-fire sales.

hmmmmm.

maybe i could pay my sister-in-law to list everything for me.  she's good at that kind of stuff.

and when i say "pay"  maybe that could be in the form of under-salted cookies, since, because it's fund-raising season, i now find myself with two giant tubs of dough that i was guilted into buying (by my husband, not my neighborhood kids) exactly two days after i threw last year's tub away because it produced very lardy, under-salted cookies.

  

if i know anything, i know how cookies should taste.

and their primary flavor should not be under-salted lard.

i'd much rather a salted lard taste.

at least i might imagine them to be chunks of bacon instead of a poor excuse for chocolate chunk peanut butter.

come on!

when you tell my i'm about to eat peanut butter and chocolate in combination i get excited.

so, obviously, when i threw the 3/4-full tub  in the trash, i had very good cause.

maybe the oatmeal raisin and cranberry shortbread versions will be more acceptable.  i doubt it.

tubs of cookie dough are for people who don't like to bake cookies,

not for people whose life mission it is to find the ultimate best version of each of the major cookie groups.

you've got food groups, i've got cookie groups.

and since i've only checked off one of my cookie groups as having found the ultimate best, and since i'm not getting any younger,

clearly i don't have time, or freezer space, to waste on this mass produced frozen crap.

oh well, i'll just count it as my good turn for the day,

even though every time i see them in my freezer, wasting precious space, i'll be reminded that $15 (times two tubs)  could have gotten me something much more satisfying.

why couldn't they have been selling wrapping paper? 

does that still count as a good deed, though?

i didn't think so.

but you know what would count?

if my sister-in-law sold all the crap in my garage for me.

i wouldn't even make her eat the cookies. 

a little change-up and an adventure in thrifting : gilded mirror

so i have this bench.  it's fine. nothing special,

but it's the perfect size for this weird nook by the stairs, and it's really well constructed.

and comfortable.

but it's all too much ho-hum,

if you ask me.

plus, a solid, light velvet shows all those 

curiously-placed sings of children,

like boogers and drool and snot and ear wax and jellied-fingers,

that a print hides so much better.

plus, it's a lot more boring.

and then there's this mirror.

scored at the g-dub.

i tried to talk them down, but they wouldn't budge on this one.

i think they could see it in my eyes, how i was going to buy it either way.

still, it's doesn't hurt to ask.  

only gives you more practice for when something really 

haggle-worthy comes along. 

but it was too much shimmer what with the gaudy gilded frame and the shiny mirror.  

i wanted to tone it down, and i didn't need another mirror.

so i turned it into a chalkboard.

why do i need a chalkboard?

i don't.  i just needed that frame on center stage, but not the mirror.

i brushed on about 4 coats of magnetic paint (right on top of the mirror.  not really the best, but i was too impatient to cut a piece of wood) and then a couple coats of chalkboard paint.

i wanted a really textured finish, so i used a brush, but use a roller if you want a smooth one.

exactly two seconds after i hung the mirror chalkboard,

a little devil thought it'd be great fun to scratch off the paint.

who was that?

i'll let you guess.

it's an easy one.

SHA-ZAM!!!

how you like me now?!

that's much, MUCH better, if i do say so myself.

i unscrewed the seat and did a quick re-cover.

i didn't remove the velvet, just stapled the ikat right over it.

that way it'll be easy to change when i get tired of it again.

and i will some day, i'm sure.

but right now i love it.

Pilling Summer Fun 2011

wade made this video and insisted that i put it on the blog.

so, here's our summer wrap-up.

if santa wanted to know...

this is what i'd put on my list this year.

this lovely trio of stacked gold rings.

size 7, thank you.

i really do love nars' blushes.  

and this sampler looks to be the bomb!

this is probably good for getting in the christmas mood...

but santa would have to make an early delivery on this one.

these look perfect for the snow.

oh yes, i did just put this all-clad set on the list.  

it's just time for a grown-up set.

what?  you don't think it'll fit in my stocking?

since we're throwing out suggestions that won't quite squeeze into my stocking, how about this here beauty? 

not sure which fabric, santa.  i'll have to get back to you on that.

also, our thanksgiving was superb.  we hosted this year and my mother-in-law and i spent the whole day cooking and chatting.  i love cooking with people i really like.  it's just really fun to me.

i tried my hand at dying my table linens.  i was going for more of a deep navy, but i really liked the purpley-blue i ended up with.

also, i got to use my thrifted goblets and share the spoils of my glorious ebay victory - my flatware.

my poor family.  they were forced to celebrate the perfect shape of each spoon bowl, and fork tine all weekend long.

i suspect they were actually making a bit of fun of me.

look, i get excited about these things.

oh, and the food was awesome.  

and relaxing all weekend long with some of my favorite people...

good stuff. 

another hi-light of the weekend: 

wade's brother, brad, got a bunch of old pictures off a dinosaur of a computer that's been sitting in my closet for six years, AND he hooked up my vcr so my kids could watch our old-school vhs tapes.  we have some good ones.

it took him about 5 minutes to do what i've been "trying" to do for six months.  thanks brad!

i do feel very blessed.

let's talk kitchens...

because i think about them a lot.

let's just dream up the perfect kitchen.

actually, let's just dream about kitchen windows.

i get specific on my wish lists.

 face it.  unless you're weird, you don't like doing dishes. that's why you need a great view from the kitchen sink.  standing at the stove without a window isn't a problem.  the entertainment is in the pan, but dishes = drudgery, so i need me some windows while i scrub.

preferably a whole wall of them.

without any cabinets at all.

just straight up glass.  

atlanta homes

they could have left that little cabinet out and gone for one more window.  but it's still nice.

birmingham home and garden

this is kind of a cool idea.  takes the open shelving to a whole new level.  and that mutha' of a slab of marble countertop is amazaballz.

and i really love the parson style island.

and the windows.

?

i prefer the windows to come closer to the counter, but this is still really pleasant, and those walls are $TUNNING.

look at all that marble!

plus, i've always been a fan of stairs coming down to the kitchen.

like in the family sitcoms from back in the day. 

frank randolph

i love the windows wrapping around the corner here.

actually the whole package is pretty sweet.  maybe a little more counter to the left of the stove.

am i picky?

katie ridder

yes!

hello bridge faucet.  i love you.

lonny

bijou home

steel cased window vs. wood cased windows.

i can't decide who wins.

it's an ongoing battle for me.

atlanta homes

greige design

hello again, bridge faucet.  you're my friend.

elizabeth dinkel

southern accents

jill sharp

southern accents

the windows at the end of the room make up for there being just one at the sink.

susan marinello

this is kitchen perfection to me (except there needs to be some counter  space on either side of the stove.  that's a major oversight) but i guess i'd live with it if someone gave it to me for free :)

pinterest

velvet and linen

john howard

?

tobi fairly

take those little cabinets down.  you don't really need them anyway.  you've got a few others.

maybe we'll do this again.  i love dreaming about kitchens.

next time : kitchen hoods?

what's your dream kitchen?