News Flash!

It is finally happening (although it will be a little over a month).

U2 has a new album!

No Line on the Horizon


It will be released on March 3rd and you can already get the first single, Get On Your Boots, on iTunes.

For more info go here.

I'm just waiting for concert dates to be announced.

New Year, New House

Not really, but it feels like it. After a week or so of frigid weather the sun actually came out yesterday and we decided to enjoy it.

After church the roommates and I headed for the front yard. We couldn't really sit there and enjoy the sunshine considering the hideous mess of a yard that lay before us. It had been a while since anything was done to the yard and it showed. And since we are in Mississippi, even though it was 14 degrees two days before, the clover had already started to take over, the monkey grass was growing again and the grass actually needed mowing. So, we spent about 3 hours pulling weeds, cleaning leaves out of the flowerbeds and so forth.

Today was no less sunny and we continued the process by mowing, edging (with the kind assistance of a roommate's dad), replacing light bulbs, fixing furniture, Windex-ing anything we could, and getting the leaves out from the carport.

We bought fresh flowers this weekend for the living room. The lilies smell great and look even better in an antique refrigerator jar I found at an antique shop over Thanksgiving.

We bought new hooks for the aprons hanging in the kitchen at Anthropologie. (They are hard to see in the picture, but I promise they are cute.)


We also rearranged a "bay-ish" window in our kitchen. It has always been cluttered and kind of junky and we were plain tired of it. So we spent maybe two hours deciding what to put where. So far we like the final arrangement. A separate place for all of our cookbook collections, bowls of fruit and pottery made by one very talented roommate.

Here's to a very early spring cleaning!

New Year, New Deal II

I may not need these now, but wouldn't these knobs look cute in a girls room, or maybe on a ladies desk in the office I someday hope to have? At $2.95 I couldn't pass them up.


And what about these? Every year I go in search of new flip-flops for the season. I usually end up with some that are OK, but not great because price is a determining factor. Not so in 2009. While in J. Crack (thanks for that nick-name Seleta) I found last year's super-cute flip-flops for what? $4.95 a pair.


At that price I snagged two! Thank heavens I have small feet and it's usually my size that's left in the clearance bin.

New Year, New Deals

Yep. We're barely into 2009 and I have already snagged quite a few notable bargains.

On January 1st, after finishing lunch with my cousin in Nashville, I was browsing through Pottery Barn and saw a display of lanterns - all on clearance. I wasn't particularly in need of lanterns, but thought I would look just in case.


I picked up one the cutest ones (three orange enamel lanterns) and expected the sale price to fall somewhere in between $10-$20. I read the price and promptly asked the sales clerk to make sure it was correct.


Yes, they were $2.97 a piece (originally $39.00). I bought all three. DEAL!

After I got home and told my mother she called and did a nation-wide store search for them. She now has two en route from Cincinnati.

How cute are these going to be hanging with twine from my front porch!


Or maybe as centerpieces at an outdoor party (since we will have 5) - picture them with hot pink and yellow Gerber daises.

So tired...

I can't seem to recover from the events of the past week. We've been laying around the house a lot...even the dog. Hopefully the new year will bring some more excitement into the picture.

What's Your Favorite Christmas?

While eating Christmas dinner my dad started asking each of us what our favorite Christmas was. Hands down, mine was Christmas of 1993.

I was in fourth grade and was aching for a beautiful, blue, colonial style dollhouse. I was doubtful I would get it because of the ridiculous price, but my parents had actually purchased a kit to make it. All fall my dad would disappear after dinner and not return until I was in bed. He said he had meetings at work and at church and I believed him. He was really sneaking over to our neighbors and building my dollhouse in their garage.

I was shocked and so excited on Christmas morning. It was beautiful - three stories tall and my mother had put Christmas wreathes on all the windows and a tree in the living room. Dad had glued on countless shingles, banister rails and crown moulding. I collected furniture and carpet for it and eventually we wired it with electricity so the ceiling fans would spin and the lamps would light up. It's in the attic now, but I can't wait too pull it out and add it to a playroom one day.

This Christmas certainly is up there in the list as well! Mom and Dad outdid themselves once again and here are a few of the fabulous surprises I awoke to:

Mom found these beautiful hand-painted plates at an estate sale. I can't wait to hang them up!

She also found these antique planters which will be great on my kitchen shelves.

I inherited a set of china from my grandmother. It's almost a full set and I have been collecting the rest of the pieces to complete it. Mom found this covered casserole dish and I found these berry bowls to add to it.

On the Eleventh Day of Christmas...

...I went to a Christmas Concert.

(Actually I went to two on consecutive evenings)

The first night I headed up to Nashville with eight other friends and went to dinner and the Trans-Siberian Orchestra. My review: stick to the CD. Thankfully the food and company couldn't have been better.

The next night I took a spur of the moment trip to Birmingham with four friends and met up with eleven others for dinner and the Red Mountain Christmas Concert at Workplay.

My Review: FABULOUS! It totally redeemed the previous evening's event.

I purchased Red Mountain's Chrismas CD (Silent Night) around the beginning of December and have been listening to it all month. The concert was also with Drew Holcomb & the Neighbors and I bought their Christmas CD too (A Neighborly Christmas) - so fun! I'm hoping they will do it again next year so we can make it an annual event. If either group is ever near you please go! It will be worth it!

On the Eight, Ninth and Tenth Day of Christmas...

...I did a lot of this

and this...

and this...

while sitting beside this!