Shall we?

Let's do some window shopping at Anthro ... with no budget....Here are some items currently in my shopping cart/wish list:

stamp art dress. pretty & love the pop of aqua.

swathed gingham blouse. love this for summer with white jeans!

solar star blouse. this would be cute & work appropriate with a black pencil skirt.

Salitre blouse. love the pattern and bow. would be pretty with dark jeans or white pants.

leading role dress. ruffles!! perfect jersey dress for summer.

four petal cardigan. i always love the contrast of black and white. this would be pretty with a black pencil skirt.

collective leaves tank. love the rope detail.

buds & stripes top

for some reason i like this tank. the front is silk and the back is jersey. i think it would be cute with black capris and heels.

ok, that was fun...now back to school work. bleh! be back tomorrow with my DIY nailhead trim headboard and new artwork for the bedroom...stay tuned!

Weekend Recap

We didn't do much this weekend. Watched the Cats beat Vandy Saturday and relaxed and on Sunday took Logan (my 2 1/2 year old nephew) to the park. The weather Sunday was such a nice break from the snowy, super cold days we have had as of late. So ready for spring!! Glad I'm going to visit my bff in FL in three weeks...I could really use some more sunshine!

Hope ya'll had nice, relaxing weekends! Thought I'd share some videos of my favorite boys playing at the park:

Logan was too cute (and somewhat obnoxious). He wanted to play basket ball with the other kids, who happened to be like 15. I told him he was too little and he told that "no, i AM bigger" and stood on his tip toes. Love him :)

Bluegrass Blogger Meet Up

If any of you local ladies wanted to come to the lunch that Brit and I are planning & didn't get an e-vite let me know!

done & done

I finally finished the curtains for our bedroom. The fabric had been sitting in our bedroom, still on the bolt, for about 3 months. I made two panels and a fixed roman shade. I bought 7.5 yards of fabric from JoAnne's and the curtain rod and clip rings from Walmart. {sorry in advance for the dark b.berry pics}

I wanted the panels to be 89" so I cut the fabric at about 96", allowing for a top and bottom hem. Ya'll, this really wasn't as easy as I thought it was going to be. Figuring out how to make the hems level and how to make sure that the entire panel stayed at 89" was tough! So, a little secret...I made about a 2" hem at the top of each panel and then went ahead and hung them up. (truth be told, I only did this on the second panel bc I tried doing the first one the hard way and only then did I come up with this genius idea) Once they were up I pinned the bottoms so they would just touch the floor. I then brought my handy portable sewing machine into the bedroom and sewed the bottom hem while the panels were up! I realize this is probably not the most professional method, but it worked! As for the side hems, (obviously I did these before handing them up) I left the fabric the width of the bolt and folded it under once, then one more time and sewed a straight stitch down the length. Ironing the folds really makes this step easier.

The day after I got these done I found this tutorial over at Young House Love. If you don't sew, or just want to use an easier method, I suggest you check out their post!

I made the fixed roman shade following Darby's tutorial, which you can find here. Mine is a little wonky and of course not as great as hers, but I like it ok.

see how it kind of goes up on the right? oh well!

a look for less...sort of

I have been wanting to get a Clarisonic for quite a while now. All my twitter friends rave about it and I've only heard great things. However, on a law student budget, the $200 price tag was pretty high for me to shell out for a beauty product. I figured someone must be making a similar product for less. Right? Well, I did some searching and there are several facial brushes out there that claim to be similar to the Clarisonic. The product that appears to be the most similar is the Pretika Sonic Dermabrasion Facial Brush. I have read tons of great reviews on the Pretika and for $41.50 it is much more affordable. The Pretika used to be sold at Brookstone but it doesn't appear to be sold on their website any longer. You can purchase it here at Drugstore.com. Plus, first time buyers get free shipping!

vs.

{you can purchase Clarisonic from Drugstore.com here}

Both products claim to reduce pore size, deep clean, tackle fine lines, and generally improve the appearance and feel of your skin.

The Pretika website says this about its facial brush:

• SONIC HIGH FREQUENCY MICRO-PULSATING CLEANSING TECHNOLOGY
• USE SEPARATELY OR IN COMBINATION WITH DAILY BEAUTY ROUTINE
• Prepares the Skin to Better Absorb Skin Care Treatments
• ADVANCED BRUSH HEAD TECHNOLOGY, For Delicate, Sensitive and Normal Skin Types
• ADJUSTABLE POWER LEVELS. Low - Gentle Care, Keep Skin Firm, High - Penetrating Exfoliation
• Use daily to remove the Epidermal (outer) layer of dry and flaky skin cells and reduce the appearance of fine lines and wrinkles so your skin feels smoother. Gentle enough for use as part of your daily beauty rotuine. Also helps reduce appearance of pores, oily areas, dry skin patches and blemishes.
• Cleans so effectively for Healthier Skin - and prepares the skin to better absorb skin care treatments.

Have you all tried either/both of these products? What do you think? Seems like a good buy to me! Mine hasn't arrived yet, but I will be sure to let ya'll know how I like it after it gets here!

not much to report

hey loves, sorry for the lack of posting lately. i haven't really had anything very interesting to blog about....just same old same old. i have been working on some projects around the house, but none of them are finished just yet, will share when complete!

the bluegrass is expected to get several inches of snow tonight and tomorrow. hoping classes get cancelled, hate driving in the snow!

hope all ya'lls weeks got off to a good start today! be back soon with something more interesting to write about!

{photo of downtown lex from flicker}

somethin' is cookin' in our kitchen...

SO, after a mere 3 months, I've decided that I don't like the blue color in our kitchen and that it has to be changed. Ben isn't pleased (as he will be doing most of the painting) but luckily we don't have much wall space in the kitchen anyways.

The walls will be going to this:

"Wheat Bread" by Behr, and then I'm considering doing this board and batten on the walls in the "dining area" that is still in the kitchen....not sure yet bc I don't know how they would look butted up against the cabinets.

there is a great tutorial and pictures (including the two above) that you can find here!

have any of you attempted to DIY board and batten? how did it turn out?