I came home from grocery shopping and found this...

A completely clean kitchen!  Isn't it beautiful?!

Thank you, Hubby!!!



Stella got her groove back...

...and Tara got her style back.

My sister-in-law, and business partner, Sarah treated me to a cut & color yesterday so I made the hour hike to Wake Forest.  Well worth it!  I was starting to feel pretty drab and now I feel pretty again.

(For a professional photographer, I take horrid self-portraits. Please dismiss the lighting, background and poor quality as they are taken from the point-n-shoot due to my laziness.)

Baby on the Way!

Nope. Its not me!  One of my closest friends, who happens to live 8 minutes from house to house, just found out they are having a BOY!  Nursery theme is picked, painting party is scheduled for next weekend and we are heading for a little shopping trip to Motherhood Maternity tonight.  I am so excited to be a part of all of the preparations and canNOT wait until this little roly, poly bundle of joy makes his entrance!

This is what I call "fresh color" :

I have no idea what kind of flowers they are, but the woman who lived here before me has a serious greenthumb so I get to reap the rewards of her labor. The fresh, yellow flowers make me want to sit down at the dinner table. How about you?

The food isn't too bad either. ;)

A Man's Touch

"Would You EVER Let Your Guy Pick Out Your Clothes? I Did, for a Week"
http://shine.yahoo.com/channel/beauty/would-you-ever-let-your-guy-pick-out-your-clothes-i-did-for-a-week-2482587#photoViewer=9

Her boyfriend actually didnt do too bad, until that last day with the pigtails. But I can see where he was going with it. There have been times where my curiosity has gotten the better of me and I've asked Mark to pick something out for me to wear.  His typical response is to look at me and say, "That's good.", and notion to whatever I am wearing at the moment.  He never actually picks anything out though.  So, would you dare to accept the challenge?

Callas

My favorite flowers are calla lillies. Last summer I purchased some bulbs, planted them and they grew but no flowers bloomed.  They grew with avengence this year and I clipped off my first bloom!

Callas are so classy and understated. I love their crisp color. I cannot wait for the rest to bloom.

Even when...

This is one of those songs that when I am feeling down, defeated and dumpy, it returns my focus upward.  I am posting this for a special friend going through a particularly difficult time.

"Daddy was a preacher
She was his wife
Just trying to make the world a little better
You know, shine a light

But people started talking
Just to hear their own voice
Those people try to accuse my father
Say he made the wrong choice

Though it might be painful
You know that time will always tell
Those people have long since gone
My father never fell

Even when the rain falls
Even when the flood starts rising
Even when the storm comes
I am washed by the water"

http://www.godtube.com/watch/?v=JBMB9FNU

I was trying to post the actual video or sound clip here but couldnt get it to work. So, follow the link instead.

We have to stay strong. Push forward through the storm and know that the outcome will be better than before.

Fresh Produce

The boys and I accompanied a friend to the HUGE farmer's market in Raleigh on Saturday. 

Jacob loved all of the free samples of fruit.  He enjoyed the blueberries so much I bought the quart for him. Normally I'm the only one that likes blueberries, so I never buy them. It was a treat for him and I!

The differences between a woman and a man

I am not a novel reader but love self-help books about marriage, security, parenting, self-worth, organization, etc.  I guess Austin's distates for storybooks comes from me. Our last trip to the library consisted of five books about various animals and we read about reptiles or dinosaurs nightly - but that's in a different direction than I was planning, so to get back on track- I am currently reading a book about intimacy in marriage.  I found these points interesting enough to write down, so I thought I would share them:

What do women need?
1. Affection
2. Communication
3. Commitment to Family

What do men need?
1. to be Fulfilled
2. to be Respected
3. to be Needed

What does a woman really long for?
-Intimacy
-Security
-Being known and loved unconditionally
-Feeling like she can be whomever she wants to be
-Being freed from trying to please everyone *this one would have been highlighted if it was my own book!

What does a man really long for?
-A 12-month football season
-A pocket satellite dish
-A wife who is assertive & aggressive in the bedroom
-A soul mate (someone who really understans how he feels when he dares to share his feelings)
-A wife who needs him (not others, just him)

The author is Dr. Kevin Leman. I have read another one of his books, "How to have a new husband in 7 days", which really gave me a great understanding of a man's mind and behavior (a must in a house full of testosterone!). His style is very straightforward with lots of humor thrown in, so it makes for easy reading.

From the Heart

My Mother's Day was great. The four of us spent much of the day in the yard beautifying it.  However, the night before, Jacob presented me with a homemade gift from the heart:

All out of the blue, all on his own.  Its even better than the coozie he decorated for me at school! 

Reuse

My mom created a table arrangement for the head table at my wedding reception. I have made it a part of my home decor for the past 8+ years and have moved it from Michigan to five different homes in North Carolina.  Today, I took it apart. I decided to reuse quite a few of the stems and fill a few empty vases.  

I'm not sure how it will look once the walls are "Windsurf" (by Behr) blue but it adds a bit of "pretty" to my room right now. 

Bike Ride

Austin rode a bike (with training wheels) for the first time today!  Go Bubby!

By the end of our ride, he was soaring down my parents' driveway and "scratching it". (Austin's way of saying hitting the brakes so hard the bike slid and made a noise.)

Beach Retreat

We took a trip to Jekyll Island, GA over the weekend to see my grandparents. They are "snowbirds" who live on the island nine months out of the year now. 

The ocean was surprisingly warm for April. It felt like bath water and I regretted not putting my bathing suit on so I could join the boys in the water.  Mark and Jacob played at the sandbar and every scoop of sand they brought up had a living sanddollar in it.  I haven't seen so many at once before!  The second day we were there, the tide was coming in and we found a few jellyfish that had washed ashore.

Since Mark and Jacob were scorched by the sun, we spent Sunday walking through the Historic District.  Houses dating back to 1889 have been restored and belonged to those such as Rockefellar and Goodyear in the early 1900's. The Jekyll Island Club Hotel is beautiful and used to be the clubhouse where the elite club members met.  I would love to stay at the resort, even just for a night, to fully experience such a piece of history.

The Goodyear Cottage

Sans Souci

It was amazing to look at the photographs from the 1900-1920's and see these young trees that are now massive and winding across yards and pathways.  The island recently repaved all of the roads and sidewalks in the Historic District with a stone and shell mixture to make them more like the original roads.