Charleston, SC

We visited Charleston with some friends visiting from IL this weekend. Charleston is one of my favorite cities to visit for a quick weekend getaway . The city is just gorgeous! I love the flowers, the houses, the water, the restaurants, and the shopping!
Here are a few pictures from the trip







Charleston is full of creepy graveyards

Nautical Influence

Spring is here! It went from 50-90 in about a week! 90 is a little hot for this time of year, but I love warm weather so I'll embrace it! Its finally back in the 70s right where it should be.
Spring has me thinking about summer clothes, I love dresses, sandals, and especially anything nautical inspired!
here are a few wishes/purchases!
I bought these sandals today, they are really comfy and match just about everything!



I ordered this striped tee online, I haven't received it yet.


it looks boring alone, but I was inspired by Fabulous Florida Mommy




I am also lusting after this anthro top. Its not available in my store yet, so i'm not sure if its cute in person. We'll see next weekend!


Next weekend we have friends from college visiting us. We will be spending the weekend in Charleston, SC. I just love Charleston. It is a gorgeous city with good food, shopping, and site seeing. Its going to be mid 70s next weekend.
What outfits do you wear for this type of weather when walking around all day? We will be doing lots of walking there!

Decorating Projects

We have recently bought some new furniture and are working on painting and decorating our master bedroom and guest bedroom. This weekend we are going to start painting. This is our first house and neither of us have really painted anything, should be interesting!
In our master bedroom I'm going for a a calm coastal look.
I showed the bed we recently purchased a few posts ago:


We also purchased a media console. We previously had our TV on an ugly glass stand. Wow it makes the room look so much better!



The furniture I want to purchas for our master
bedroom is below. I plan to move our current furniture into the upstairs guestroom. It is an old dresser and night stands I painted black.


I purchased paint this weekend at Sherwin William's 25% off sale. For the bedroom I got a blueish grey. I had them colormatch a color i found at lowes. it ended up being too blue so I had them add a little grey. So the color is... my creation.
For the guest room I had them color match Restoration Hardware's Ash

I will post "reveal" pictures as soon as it's all finished!

March

March is almost over! In March we celebrated Johns birthday, worked on some home decor projects, and had John's sister and her BF visiting us.
Here are some pictures :

Our Visit to Chapel Hill and Duke ( Illinois is my alma mater so we are allowed to visit both of these school ; )
Duke has a beautiful campus, especially Duke Gardens. But it being only March, there wasn't much in bloom.
















John's Birthday Cupcakes!

Finally Vacation pictures!

Along the Black beaches of Dominica



















This is on our trip to Nevis- gorgeous island, makes you feel like you are dropped in the middle of a deserted island!

Sailing the Caribbean!

Ahh i'm still in post vacation depression. We've been back for two weeks now and its hard to get back to work!
We took a cruise with 10 members of my family. To some this could be a nightmare, luckily I love my family : )
I have been on two cruises previously. I usually prefer a beach resort over a cruise, but I guess I had never been on a nice cruise before. We loved celebrity! We had a great itinerary to St. Thomas, St. Kitts (Nevis), Barbados, Dominica and St. Maarten.
I'll post a few pictures from each place.

Big Purchase today!

I ordered a new bed today!
next up mattress shopping and new furniture!




I promise to add vacation pictures soon! I have been lazy getting back into the routine!

I have been on Vacation!

I just got back from a 10 day cruise to the Caribbean! It was awesome and I will post pictures this week.
Right now i'm still trying to get back into our routine and get the house and work together. More on the vacation soon!

Good Bye Grandma

On January 19, 2010 I lost my last grandparent. My grandma passed away in her sleep. She was living in a nursing home for the past year and had really deteriorated in the past few months. She was 92.
I had a unique relationship with my grandma. She had 4 boys. When i was born, she treated and spoiled me as her girl. She was my daycare for the first two years of my life. When I was two my grandpa died and my grandma decided to move to Las Vegas, "her dream". We visited her almost every year and she would drive out to see us. She bought my my American Girl doll when I was 7. She was a talented seamstress and able to copy the outfits from the cataloge. She moved back to my town when

I was a freshman in highschool. We always had a special bond before, but this is when it turned into a friendship.
I met my grandma every saturday morning. We went grocery shopping, ran errands, and always went to lunch. We talked about my dad growing up, tv shows, current events, sporting events, celebrity gossip (she loved gossip! and trash magazines). We did this until I went to college. She gave me her car when she decided she could no longer drive. I would come home at least once a month to see her and we talked on the phone twice a week. After college I moved to St. Louis for grad school. We still had many phone calls and our visits continued. When I was planning my wedding, all she wanted was to live to go to it. We shopped for her dress together. I am so grateful she lived to attend. My other grandma died a week after graduated college very unexpectedly. When i moved to NC, I thought it would break her heart. We still had many phone calls and I would send her pictures.

I last saw her at Christmas this year. I just knew it would be the last time I saw her. I am so grateful for the time I got to spend with her and the relationship we had.

A Great Read

I picked up this book on a whim and its a winner! A little bit of history, present day in Paris, Intrigue, Mystery.. A definite page turner. This would be a great book club book, lots to discuss!

Puppy Love

Things to look forward too in 2010

The past few years have been filled with moving, new jobs, buying a house. BIG LIFE changes. I'm hoping 2010 will be a year of settling into life. 

Something I am really looking forward too is our Caribbean Cruise! We leaving February 4 and will be have 10 glorious days sailing on the Caribbean Sea.T

 
I ordered this last night from Anthropologie. I hope it's as cute in person as it is online! 

Already Jan 17th- Catching up from the past 3 weeks

I took this picture of my aunt as she was getting makeup done for her wedding. She got married December 30, 2009 and I'm so happy for her. 

I love this photo, not only does she look gorgeous, but look at the great bokeh! 

Attempting 52 Week Project!

So many of my fellow friends are attempting the 365 project. The point is to take a picture a day for the next year. That is a big commitment, so I am going to attempt at least a picture a week. This is great timing because we just bought ourselves a canon XSi for christmas. 

this will be a great opportunity to test out our abilities and track our progress throughout the year.