Shout Out and a Preview

This weekend Michael and I drove to Galveston for a fancy dinner party. That's what Brandi decided she wanted for her 30th birthday. I have about 400 pictures of all the work that went into it and the party itself, but that post will have to come a little later this week.

I don't know if you've been to Galveston, but it is humid! And you know what that means:

 Cowlicks.

My cowlick would like to give a big shout out to all its friends from middle school - that was the last time it was seen in public. (I've since bought a straightener) The 1000% humidity apparently called it out of retirement. So I took a picture, pinned it back and went to a party.

Here's a little tiny taste of what you can look forward to in future posts:

Come back in a few days to see what that's all about!

Letterpress Post!

Michael says I look at random stuff on the Internet. One of the things that makes him say that are all the letterpress prints to be found on etsy.com. I love 'em! And I want you to love them, too, so I waded through more than 100 pages of listings today to bring you the best ones. You're welcome.

I'm going to do my best to list the store names that go with the prints. If it's a collage, then assume they are listed clockwise from the top left. (to go straight to any of the shops, go to www.etsy.com/ and then type the name of the shop.)

Okay, so the most common listings are those with lovey sayings on them:
(from twopaperdollsshop, nickagin, nickagin, durnalldesigns, rollandtumblepress, and thebigharumph)

Baby decor is also popular, and most of what you find is unique stuff that's not too precious.
(from sycamorestreetpress, thebigharumph, and 1canoe2)

I especially love the quote in the biggest picture here. It's from Winnie the Pooh.(plus a little addition from the artist.)
(from rawartletterpress, handz, and goldteethbrooklyn)

I would totally buy this one if it was colors that would go anywhere in my house:
(from bittersugar) Maybe it would look good in my office eventually.

Lots of random object prints like that one to be found.

(both from thebigharumph)

I love these framed ones:
(all from jigsawgraphics)

Some are super-Southern:
(from YeeHaw)


(both from YeeHaw) I believe these last two are actual posters advertising this festival. There are a lot of those kinds of things on there, too.

(from NashArt) Love It.

Some are British...
(from ClerkInkWell, RubVictoria, TakeTheProverbial and JacksonCreekPress) I think the bottom right image is a "you made your bed..." kind of quote. Anybody know for sure?

...and otherwise European:
(from sycamorestreetpress)

Letterpressers like to make images with quotes from famous authors.
(all from TagTeamTompkins)

(from LetteraryPress) I like it when they do that.

These are cute:
(from AllisonCornu)

(both from ColorBoxDesign)

(from BUUPP)

(from YeeHaw)

(from HoneycombPrintShop)

These are sweet:
(from HappyDeliveries)

(from 1canoe2)

And these make me laugh:
(from TwoPaperdollsShop)

(from DearColleen)

And these make me go, "Now, what now?"
(from YeeHaw)

What's awesome about these is that they look all trendy and expensive when you frame them (most don't come with a frame) but they average about $20 a print.

I have now spent entirely too much time writing this post. Hope you liked it! Now go spend all your money on etsy.

A Sweet Shower

What a sweet baby shower we had this afternoon! Our friends Jessica and Todd are expecting a baby in about 7 weeks, and today we got together with a few of her friends and relatives to shower her with gifts and prayer.

We had the shower at:
It's a really good place for a shower. It barely costs anything and takes hardly any decorating to make it pretty.

Of course, we're not going to NOT decorate! We added a few sweet details to the already pretty room.



The cake from Sweetish Hill Bakery on 6th Street was delicious! And they did such a great job of making it match the invitations we found on etsy!



Jess's sister, Lee, planned some cute games that had everyone laughing and talking. The one I got the most photos of was guessing baby food flavors. We passed out spoons for people to taste them, but most of us could not get past the smells! I can't believe babies eat this stuff!





Also fun, was seeing what everyone thinks the baby will be! Jessica and Todd aren't finding out if it's a boy or a girl, so they're having everyone guess the sex.
(I guessed a boy at 8 lbs. 2 oz. - But now I'm having my doubts now, because I don't think I've ever guessed one right.)

Of course, the whole idea of a shower is to get the new momma set up with all the things she needs.




We had guests write little blessings for the Alguires on these "tweet" little birdies. (Yes, I'm that corny!)



And we wrapped it all up with a really sweet prayer time for Jess. It was the perfect ending! Now Jess has a lot of what she needs to welcome Baby Alguire! Can't wait to see if it's a Ben or a Grace!

This Cracks Me Up

I'm a Starbucks Gold Card member! Ha!



I apparently registered my first Starbucks card in 2010 and have, since then, bought enough coffee to earn me gold card status! I don't know how much coffee that is, but I think I would be embarassed to find out. So we won't go down that road.

I do loves me some Starbucks though. I have, in fact, written for this blog from a Starbucks several times.

Also, next time you're there, buy a gift card and put like $5 on it. Then register the card. You'll get a free drink on your birthday! It doesn't even matter if you never use that card again. In fact, I gave a friend one of my emptied, unregistered cards to register under his name. And even that got him a free drink! Just a little tip. Free coffee never hurt anybody! I don't think. I mean I haven't researched that or anything...

Did I Ever Show You This?

I know you saw the nightstand from this post: http://jifferdoodle.blogspot.com/2010/09/look-what-i-can-do.html. But I don't think I ever went back and showed you the rest of the progress I made on the room.

This is what our guest room looks like right now:

I saw those LOVE pillow covers at RED in Fredericksburg last summer and I wanted them sooo bad! But they were a little on the pricey side so I hemmed and hawed too long and by the time I made up my mind that they worth it, every one else had decided the same thing and they were gone. So I cried.

But then! My favoritest sister that I've ever had tracked them down all the way to the UK and ordered them for me for Christmas! It was such a good surprise and I'm so glad she did it because I think they look great and really kind of make the room.

Also, I decided with this room that I would try to break out of my normal habit of using solids. On, like, everything. I'm a little bit ascared of patterns but I love them whenever I see them in magazines, so I decided to go for it, but in kind-of a weenie dog kind of way. I used all the patterns I could fit into one set of bedding, but I did it all in beige so that it wasn't too scary.


I like how it turned out.

Now the walls in the room were beige and, if you remember from my bathroom redo, painting takes me a long time. So I wasn't willing to start that again with this room.

So beige walls and beige bedding needs a little color somewhere. I took a little inspiration from a Scentsy plug-in thingy I received as a gift, and decided that turquoise would be my accent color. It's pretty easy to find things in turquoise and I really like how it looks with the beige stuff. Stands out real good.

Here's an example:
See?

I have a few more things to do in here. I bought one of those wrought iron decorative thingies to go above the bed, but I want to paint it turquoise before I put it up, so that's not done yet. And we need some curtains. And a full length mirror somewhere. But it's pretty comfy for guests now, so come see us!

Great Minds Dress Alike

Me and my sister live in different towns, so we don't mind having some of the same clothes. But yesterday we totally had ESPN and dressed exactly alike.



Logan, what did you wear yesterday? Gray pants and a pink belt?

Also, this is not a "Who Wore It Better" piece. Please don't tell us. We don't want to know!

Unless it was me...in that case you get a prize!

Not Exactly What I Was Picturing

I wanted the chocolate drizzles to be all thin and delicate like this (only in chocolate chocolate, not white chocolate):

But instead they came out all fat like this:

But I still like it and it definitely tastes better than last time. Michael thought so too.

Michael didn't even want a second piece of the first cake I tried. This is the man who ate chocolate pie with a salty meringue and didn't notice it. So you KNOW the last one was bad!

This one was moist and good and had the cream cheese icing from the Dr Pepper cake recipe. Plus it had chocolate drizzled on top:

And it was still chocolate inside:

All I have to do now is figure out how in the world I'm going to fit enough candles on it!