I was Featured!!!!

Today I found out that my 

Little Red Riding Hood Party

is being featured as the

"Party of the Day" over at

Catch My Party!!!
(hope you'll peek in :)

Also, I would love if you would visit my "new"
Party 'til Dawn  blog if you haven't already :)

become a follower,
 I will begin posting regular party inspiration there very soon!!!

Today...

I was "excused" from jury duty

and

the sky looked like this much of the day

so, I drank lots of this

{tea with a candle lit for my friend Emily and her Mom}

spent a little time working on this

and reading this

{I LOVED Rob Lowe in the 80's...I thought for sure we would get married :)...glad things didn't work out that way :)}

Today I ....

spent some time refilling these, and making a list of what I need...I love buying lots of my staples in the bulk section at my grocery store and putting them in jars

drank one of these, since it didn't feel like winter outside....

sat outside in the SUN reading my new FAVORITE cookbook, and trying to drink more of that ☟...

roasted chicken to have on hand for a quick meal with brown rice...back to eating clean!

listened to practically every bloggers favorite on Pandora...must buy this on Itunes!

loving THIS website my friend Emily shared with me

and....I want to remind you not to pass up this color for spring...Nice is Nice

oh...and YES, I am still a little obsessed with this

Cheers!!

Are you ready?? Will you be watching??

This is so great...I am pretty sure, the real wedding will be a little more conservative :)

I better take a nap today...coverage here on the west coast begins at 1:00am...it's never too early for a cup of tea!

Cheers!

Happy Easter {reflection on my lenten sacrifice}

Wishing you a blessed Easter~

I also want to take a quick moment and reflect back on my lenten sacrifice...

So..my 40/40 comes to a close this week, and I did pretty well.

I admit I did not cross everything off my list, nor did I purge a bag a day...and we never made it into the garage, but that will still happen.  

It felt so good to get to the spaces I did, and it motivates me to finish up the last few biggies, like Powell's room before he leaves for college :(, paperwork in our office, and of course, that garage.

I will definitely do this challenge again...it is such a great way to really evalutate what you have and what is important!

Day of Silence~

Fashion Inspiration

I came across this picture recently and LOVE this look!

So much in fact that I would love it for myself :)

(I could not find the source, if you know please share!)

So...my little fashionista and myself decided to try and duplicate this look with what Lucy already has in her closet!

Now this is {repurposing}...LOVE

??Got Pallets??
Stumbled across this on another blog...

I LOVE this idea....so cool

it is from HERE

{jelly roll pans function as drawers!}

Ciao Bella Italia!

I have been blessed with two trips to my beloved Italy~

Both trips were at almost the exact time of year...the end of October.  So every year at this time...my heart aches for this beautiful place...the history, the people, the food!

Our first trip was in 2002, and we toured the Tuscan Countryside, wine tasted, had cooking lessons, olive picked, went to many wonderful cities and stayed in countryside  Villas...a dream come true trip.

My second trip was in 2005 with my sweet Mom.

I encouraged my Italian Mom to go see this beautiful country.  She had never left the U.S. before, so this was a very exciting trip for her.

We decided to stay in Roma (Rome) for the whote 8 days and make a day trip by train to Florence, one of my most favorite cities~

The Coloseum, the Vatican, the Parthenon, the Trevi Fountain, the Spanish steps...

be still my heart♥

Oh David...how I love thee!

Oh my sweet Italia...we will see each other again one day~

♥Ti amo Italia♥

Earth Day!

This picture is from a very cool book that we own Earth From Above

So...today being Earth Day, I thought it would be fun to find out what each of us do to be green.

~Do you use "earth friendly" cleaners?

~Do you recycle?

~Do you take your own bags to the grocery store?

~Do you garden naturally?

~Do you still use paper towels?

There are so many more things...share how you are"going green"!

Green Cleaning~

Kristen over at My Uncommon Slice of Suburbia did a post today on one of my favorite books...

It reminded me of this post that I did awhile back.

Since then I have fallen in love with Mrs. Myers Dish Soap and All Purpose Cleaner, but never really switched over any of my other cleaners. Kristin has inspired me today to make a couple of changes! This also came on the heels of this post that I read from a new blog I found 320 Sycamore about making my own granite cleaner (is alcohol a "green" product??)...I made a batch and it works great!

Now that we have a 5 year old little Lady in our house who LOVES to help her Mommy clean, I feel better having cleaners under my counters that I know she can use to help and that are safe.

So...today I will get out my book and take a refresher course on

"Green Cleaning"

Pottery Barn Inspiration~

Angie...this is for you!

I had seen in the Pottery Barn catalog a cool idea of adding nuts into glass vessels, placing a candle in the middle and then taking old black and white photos and tucking them around the side. I loved the look...so here is my version~

I really love the way this looks, so I will definitely be doing more of these in my house for Thanksgiving....

This is the photo I saw in the catalog~