Then and Now: Blue and White Summer Lace

It's been a long while since I've done one of these posts but they have always been a favorite.

Last month I bought a new dress to wear to my brother-in-law's wedding in Charleston.  Actually, I had plenty in my closet to already choose from but after tie shopping with my husband for an unknown amount of time (the man really takes it seriously), I decided to make him sit through some dress shopping in Anthropologie.  Of course instead of following me around the store like I imagined,  he quickly found a comfy couch and that was that.  I picked out this really simple but modern looking blue dress.  Loved it.  I liked it's simplicity and thought the cut was pretty different than what I usually go for.  I had seen another blue dress near the front of the store and strolled back by and decided to try it on for fun.  Everyone else does that too right?  This dress was not simple.  It had crinoline underneath for goodness sake.  And it was Tracy Reese.  My favorite dress in my closet is Tracy Reese.  I like to think of it as my Mrs. Obama dress.  Well, I tried them both on.  The simple one was fine.  But the fancy one was, well...fancy.  I took them to the husband on the couch and asked him to pick which one he liked more.  Obviously not telling him the price of either.  That would be silly.  He said the fancy one.  Well, darn.  I had to get it now.

I randomly came across this vintage dress not long after making the purchase and tucked it away to share.

It was the best Charleston wedding (guest) dress.  Loved it, especially the buttons and opening in the back.  Turns out Jon didn't get to wear his specially picked out tie.  So, I'm thinking we will need to break out these outfits again before the summer is over.

Then Dress: MillStreetVintage

Now Dress:  Anthropologie

this week:: 5.5.14

Happy Cinco de Mayo! I pre-celebrated with margaritas with some work friends on Thursday and then for a friend's birthday on Saturday so maybe I don't need a margarita tonight.  Who am I kidding, of course I do!

Another reason to celebrate-closing on the house in one week!  So far I've packed up all the drinking glasses and other small glass fragile items in the kitchen.  Yep.  That's it.  We don't have to be out of our current rental house until the 25th so we aren't in any major rush to be moved out by next week.  Plus, packing is the worst.  I still have the college mentality of just throw everything in your car and it will all make it there safe and sound.  It's only 15 minutes away so I'm sure that will be happening a lot.

Oh, and only 25 school days left.  Let's have a margarita for that too!

Here are some of my favorites this week:

Meeting Avril Lavigne sounds like the worst ever.  

Pretty flowers for mom.  Or yourself. :)

I'm obsessed with painting something in our new house this color.

This finally decided it.  I'm cutting off my hair (again).

I could even go this far.

And just because I can't stop thinking about it, here is another.

this week:: 4.27.14

Weekend already over.  Jon and I did some new house furniture browsing.  We need a lot of things but will need to decide what we need the most first.  It's almost May!  May is the fastest month for teachers, which can be a good and bad thing.  Spring break always makes me so much ready for summertime.  We have a few good trips taking shape that I'm getting excited about. 

Here are some things I loved lately: 

This brought up a few tears.

I'm way too excited about new house things.  Even organizing the pantry.

This skirt.

Or any circle skirt.

Mine is named Kate.

Jon started a blog!  Music of course :)

New House!

Jon and I bought a house!  Woohoo!  I'll use that as my excuse for not blogging for the last month and a half although Jon did the majority of the nitty-gritty work being that he isn't surrounded by 21 little people all day.  It all happened pretty fast.  One weekend we went driving around a different neighborhood (Stonehaven), liked it, and started looking up some houses.  We went from "Could we buy a house?" to our final offer in what seemed like a few weekends.  Closing is on May 12 and I'll be filling up my New House Pinterest board til then.

The house is in pretty good shape so no huge projects will be needed immediately.  Mostly just painting.  I have no idea where to start with that.  In my last single girl apartment I painted a few rooms with my mom's help but the idea of having an entire house to paint and coordinate colors is slightly overwhelming.  It has been noticed that a lot of my favorite rooms I pin or find on blogs have white walls.  I love the idea of an entire white walled house but not sure it would work with the style of our new house.  We have about 2 weeks in between when we close and when we can move out of our current rental house in Plaza Midwood.  We plan on moving a small stuff a little at a time and hopefully I can get some painting done before everything is moved in.

There is one project I'm going to do first thing...paint this fireplace.  Here is a sneak peak:

Thank you, YHL for making me feel pretty prepared to take this on.  The light is great in this room (great room, den, family room?) and I love the ceiling beams.  And the little stained glass window!  Can't wait to see how a few layers of white paint will brighten it up even more.

It is a lot different than our current eclectic bungalow neighborhood but I think our new house has nice little touches of character for a house built in 1975.  I can't wait to get the keys and take pictures to share my favorite things.

Come on May 12!

3rd Grade Says-February Edition

My class cracks me up.  Today I was making mental notes of some of their hilarity and decided to share.  This was just today.  I'll have to start remembering more for next month.  

"What am I going to do now that Ms. Judy is gone!  I'll have to start robbing cars!"- Who knew your cafeteria manager retiring could be so dramatic.

"You know when you want to kill someone but even killing them isn't enough?"-Umm, no actually I don't.

"It's like I always say, men are totally a waste of time.  Well, usually."- She is a wise one.

My Blo Out Experience

For Valentine's Day I had booked an appointment at Blo Charlotte to have my hair blown out for the first time in ages.  It happened to be the week of the big snowstorm and since we had dinner plans for Saturday anyway, I rescheduled my appointment.  It was super easy to book (or reschedule) an appointment on their website or their app and they have locations all over.

When my stylist took me back to the chair she had me look through their "Style Guide Book" to choose a style.  I chose the Red Carpet look since it still had some bend to it.  I'd love to go back and try the updo or even the fishtail braid.  The girl next to me was having the "Holly Would" look which had a lot more curl and bounce.  Maybe that's what the girls with straight hair go in and request.  :)

My stylist loved having some "virgin hair" to style.  She was good with the round brush!  I told her she was a magic woman, she made it look so easy!  A few tricks I noticed, she 3 products-a straightening cream, a volume spray on my roots, and a little dab of some smoothing oil on it when it was finished.  Also, she free dried it for more than I ever would have done before using the brush and it still ended up so smooth.  I would always still end up having to use the straightening iron or curling iron for the pieces around my face which are always the curliest.  She did it all with the brush, I was amazed.

Jon was surprised too, I didn't even tell him about it.  He had never seen my hair straight and asked when it would change back.  Like it was a Fairy Godmother spell and would change back at midnight!  We went out to dinner and kinda felt like a different person.  You just feel like you are looked at differently.  It was fun for the weekend but by the time I washed it (it still looked great) I was ready for my curls back.

I'd love to go back again, maybe next time with some friends and all try different styles.  That would be a fun way to start a girl's night out!

this week::2.16

Last week was a bit crazy- many snow days and a great Valentine's weekend.  Hopefully the week won't be too long (really, I have to work 5 days instead one and a half?!), the weather will warm up and stay warm, and I can get back to yoga a lot more.  I've been missing my lavender scented washcloths!

Here are some pretty great favorites:

Ice Dancing to Drunk in Love.  Not really but still great.

I love some music in the kitchen.

Whoa.  This just shows that any space can be beautiful.  Mobile homes included. 

Yay, big naturally curly hair on a magazine cover.

Snow cat!

Date Night::2.14

Happy Valentine's Day!  The date night of all date night I suppose.

The snow probably ruined a lot of romantic date nights around Charlotte.  We are still digging out of all this snow and are actually going out for our fancy date tomorrow night at Halcyon.  I ordered a Stich Fix that was set to arrive yesterday but we have not received any mail since Tuesday.  That was kind of my Valentine's outfit plan, whatever my "stylist" picked out.  Hoping it shows up today and I can share what is inside soon.

For tonight, all I want are mole enchiladas from our favorite Mexican spot down the street, a margarita with lots of salt (or two), and to watch Breaking Bad with Jon under a lot of quilts on the couch afterwards.

Cabin fever has set in and here are some pretty, pink, lacy, flowery thing to get inspired about.

1. Love a bright pink dress. (sold out, similar)

2. loveliest phone case

3. wishbone ring dish

4. These shoe clips would make any outfit happier.

5. Oh-la-la lace romper!

Hope everyone has warm hearts tonight. ;)

True Valentines

I had grand plans to get this funny card for Jon this Valentine's Day that Joanna posted a few weeks ago.  I mean it is perfect.  I love laying in bed looking at my phone next to Jon.  Then, I went to order it and the Etsy shop was on vacation.
 :(

I found another that will do the trick but also I'm really loving this one by Rifle Paper Co.

Anyone who has lived with a boy knows this is the truth.  Love you Jon :)

Mrs. Wicked

When I told my 3rd graders last year I was getting married, they soon wanted to know what my new name would be.  I told them Wicker, and several minutes later one of my girls raised her hand and said very matter-of-factly, "Well, if your students think you are mean they can call you Mrs. Wicked."

Umm...hadn't thought of that yet.

Where is this heading you ask?  My new favorite nail polish-  essie's Wicked.

I'm pretty much a red nail polish girl.  I have way too many shades of red.  Sometimes I'll pick out a new color at the store only to get home and realize it's the same color I already have.  When I purchased Essie's holiday collection as a Christmas gift to myself (doesn't everyone do that?) I was most wanting to try out the darkest shade in the bunch.

I finally got to it last weekend and must say I'm loving this shade.  It is kinda sexy.  It took a few coats but the dark, almost black shade reminds me of a big glass of malbec. What could be wrong with that?!  It's definitely more of a winter shade but I'm happy to retire my bright reds for as long as it keeps snowing.

this week:: 2.2

It's February.  Last week was the craziest.  Early release for snow on Tuesday, followed by two snow days.  I'm not going to know how to handle a full week of school.  Or maybe I should say that my 3rd graders aren't going to know how to handle a full week of school...

1.  Loved him. Sad day.

2.  Liking these pretty painted shelves.

3.  House envy.

4. Non-Candy Kid Valentines.  As a teacher, I support this.

5.  I'm still getting used to having longer hair.  I'm loving all of this inspiration.

Blo Date

I have curly hair and I love it.  Every curly girl has a dark history though and here is mine:

In middle school I would spend hours blow drying and using a very primitive straightening iron to smooth things out the best I could.  I did this at night because who has time to do that each morning. I had a trusty round brush and a huge paddle brush.  And the products, oh, there were lots of products.    Then I wore it curly one day.  People complimented me.  A lot.  Thank goodness for that. I would have ended up with carpal tunnel for sure.  Using a round brush and a blow dryer on these curls is no joke.

Sometimes though, I want to shake it up a bit.  So, on a whim I made an appointment at Blo Charlotte.  For a girl who hasn't touched her hair with a blow dryer or curling/straightening/ironing device in over 5 years, I think that paying some dear soul $35 is totally worth it.  I had read about "dry bars" and was very curious when I saw one open up in Myer's Park in the past year.  Valentine's Day seemed like a good occasion and I made an appointment after school that day.

I'll share the results.  Here is to hoping it won't rain.

this week (and last)

Still getting back in the habit of writing.  Here is some things I liked lately:


I used to think about taking dance classes again.  Glad I'm not the only one.

This little cart is kinda perfect.  So many uses! I would love it for my classroom, kitchen, bathroom...

How amazing is she and this dress???

And then she wore this one?!?!

Planned Out

Last week it became very clear I needed a planner.  I'm pretty much a fly by the seat of my pants kinda girl- What is for dinner tonight? No idea.  Maybe I'll go to yoga after school, nah, maybe in the morning.  Etc. Etc. That doesn't always work out anymore these days.  So, to Target I went to invest in a planner/calendar/something.

I found a cute display and picked out this one that I later found out was by Sugar Paper.  I've seen there work around the blogosphere for awhile now most recently with their J.Crew Bridal line of stationary.  So far (one week in, ha) I'm loving keeping up with my little calendar.  Cute colored Sharpies also help add to the fun.  I have a 5 color code going on now- Pink-Jon, Blue-work, Teal-yoga, Coral-friends, Black-what's for dinner.  Hoping I can keep it up.

This Week:: 1.12

First full week of 2014, right?  It seems like 2014 is already old news.

It was a lot easier transitioning to going back to work after a 2 week Winter Break when you have two 2 hour delays because of the Polar Vortex.  Still hoping for at least a real snow day this year.

Until then, here are some favorites this week:

1. I make silly resolutions.  Once it was to wear nothing but dresses or skirts for a year.  I did it.  This year my silliest is to make at least one cute/over the top cake a month.  "Spend more time with cake" is a better way of putting it.

2. Speaking of baking, before I get back to it I plan on organizing my pans like this to avoid the deathtrap that is the baking pan cabinet in my kitchen.

3. Did you grow up in a naked family?  Made me laugh.

4. Can't wait to watch these two Sunday night

...after a Panther win of course.

5.  Jon and I took this quiz while waiting on Downton Abbey last Sunday.  We disagreed over some answers but in the end were Mary and Matthew.

Wedding Day- Part Two

Now for Part 2: Vows, Fried Chicken, and Dancing.  

As I was selecting these photos I kept thinking, "Oh, that was one of my favorite things" over and over.  

Here is a short list, sorta like a wedding photo scavenger hunt:

-The Weather-Who knows what a late September day in mountains may bring-  50's and rain? Snow??? Luckily it was 68 and partly cloudy. Perfect.  I did go on a last minute shopping trip (Anthropologie to the rescue) for a cute sweater to wear in case it was cold that night.  It got into the 40's after the sun went down and while most other girls stayed by the fire I was oblivious, obviously too happy, to notice I was cold.

-The Cake- Exactly what I wanted.  Simple. Vanilla Cake with Buttercream. Flowers. Oh, and some strawberry jam filling :) We also had other desserts: Peach Cobbler, Hummingbird Cake, and Pecan Pie. 

-Wedding Quilt- I dreamed up this crazy idea of having a Guest Quilt.  Luckily Jon's mom and good friend Alice are quilting geniuses and were able to make it happen.  It is finished now and amazing.

-Cheerwine- This was a must have.  Jon, friends, family, and Cheerwine in a bottle. A Salisbury girl has to stay true to her roots! 

-Blue Ball Mason Jars-  While reading way too many wedding blogs while planning, some claimed mason jars had been overdone.  Too bad I'd been planning on using them before it was a trend.  My grandmother gave me a small collection of jars my grandfather had saved up and I knew they would be used at my wedding.  When I saw the "family" long table with them and many more we collected running all the way down it, I cried!  They were perfect with the flowers Peggy had arranged.  It was really one moment where I had to slow down and take it all in.

-Photo Wall- All Jon's idea and a surprise to guests.  The Rifle Paper Co. heart print in the middle was my color inspiration for the wedding and a birthday gift from Jon before the wedding.  We looked high and low for vintage frames to showcase our friend's and family's own wedding photos.  Jon and I sat right in front of it and loved watching everyone's reactions.

-Jukebox Place Cards- Another Jon creation-we had to fit his love of music in (besides the playlist he spent the entire engagement perfecting).  For each guest we (mostly him, a little me) thought of two songs (either one of their favorites or something to fit their personality).  This project ended up coming down to the wire and at times I thought this is too much but it was so worth it.   

-Firepit- Danielle, the coordinator, kept bringing this up and we finally thought it would be a good idea.  It was.  S'more kits for favors.  Lots of rocking chairs and quilts to keep warm with.  

-FOOD- Fried Chicken, Mac and Cheese, Pulled Pork, Cornbread, Collard Greens, Corn on the Cob, Mashed Potatoes...  When people told me it was the best wedding food they had ever had I considered the entire day a success on that alone.  Chef Andrew made amazing food for us all weekend.  He told my grandmother this was his favorite menu to prepare and it was easy to see why.  

-Toasts-I totally underestimated how much I would love these.  Rachel was hilarious.  I laughed, I cried, everything.  You know it was a good toast when the next time you walk by your principal's table she wants to know more about your skinny dipping adventures.  My dad totally surprised us all.  He is quiet like me and must have practiced a lot.  It was sweet and I was so proud.

When people told Jon and I that your wedding day goes by in a flash, they weren't kidding.  I thought I was prepared for that part of it but it still happened so quickly.  We already have our anniversary booked at the Mast Farm Inn and I can't wait to go back.  It's cliche and after this I'm done sharing wedding momentos -probably :)- but it was my favorite day.

Oh, and our first dance song:
Tougher Than the Rest- Springsteen cover by Camera Obscura

Details:
Photographer: Jon Black of Matt Powell Productions; Venue- The Mast Farm Inn, Valle Crucis, NC; Taylor's Dress- Robert Bullock via Bellissima, Veil- Jennifer Leigh, Shoes-Seychelles, Hair Pin- Jennifer Behr, and Earrings- Anthropologie; Mom's dress- Siri; Bridesmaids Dresses- Modcloth; Flowers- Pearl's Garden; Hair- Shear Shakti; Makeup- my aunt :); Food-Chef Long at The Mast Farm Inn; Cake-The Mast Farm Inn; Musicians- The Forget-Me-Nots