Summer Blooms!

Hope you all are enjoying your summer! I'm especially enjoying my garden this year, and the fruits of my labor are paying off. Peonies were abundant and I have several different hydrangeas that are happy and big.

What are your favorite summer blooms?

Makeup Trick I love!

Random post, but I saw this on a makeup blog and had to try it. My MAC eyeshadow cracked and I thought it was doomed forever.

All I did was add a couple drops of rubbing alcohol, mixed it slightly with a tweezer, and then stamped it with the top of my nailpolish. Voila!

Then I took my ol' trusty big fatty mascara, which was a bit dried out, added a few drops of eye drops, and it was nice and fluid again!

New addition coming

We are excited to announce we're pregnant with another girl! Coming this December. Without getting all personal on ya'll, it's been a long long road for us to get here, and we cannot be more thrilled and thankful.
I promise not to go all baby blog on ya. ( some of my favorite blogs turned into baby blogs ) The lil nursery room is cleared out, the nursery design board is finished, so let the ordering begin. Cant wait to show you the finished product!

Trends vs Going with your gut

In the last year I've learned a lot about my style. Obviously we evolve, our tastes change and a lot of us try to keep up with the trends. And this is where I gotta be honest, I've noticed that in the moments where I try to keep up with a certain trend, I end up unhappy with the product or look.

Biggest example. This moroccan rug. These have been hot, in magazines, blogs and you can find them in so many stores. This one has been blogged to death about, I feel like.

Believe it or not, I despise this room now. It's the first room you see when you enter the house, and its just NOT me. I loved the rug at the time, but in the back of my mind, I just KNEW I'd get sick of it. It doesnt flow with the house and the size is wrong. Truth be told, I want to garage sale everything in this room except my orange lamp and family piano.

So what does my gut say?
My gut says stick with the natural, bluesy, greensy look that is ME. I have other projects on my list right now ( the backyard project that has been put on hold due to weather, and another I'll tell you about next week, as well as stupid upgrades that are necessary but arent fun to buy )

So here's my inspiration. It'll help the flow of my house, and it IS ME. I'll never get sick of this look. I just need to stick with what my gut says!

So have you caught yourself regretting a purchase because it's just not you?

Lets talk about your square backyard.

I've been slowly working on a couple projects for the backyard that bring us more privacy, since we live on a corner lot. It's easy for me to problem solve for other people's yards, but just recently have I been able to finally get a vision for my whole yard.We have a fair amount of open grass space, nothing huge, but enough for us, and I'm realizing I like yards that are more broken up into sections.I'm just not one to like a square backyard with shrubbery dotted along the fence. I'll explain via photo inspirations:

Now before you go and think "I dont have that kind of budget, or that looks like a lot of work..." stop and remember what I learned. Take a small chunk of your yard and think up a vision for it. This little tree picture above is a perfect example. How many of you have a square patio in the back of your house? All you'd have to do is dig out the section you want on the corner, plant a tree, and slowly fill with perennials and annual bushes and ornamental grasses. What a huge difference that'd make, and really, the price doesnt have to be high. I'd be happy to help if you cant work up the vision. Some people need the vision, some people need ideas for WHAT types of plants to put there etc.
Hoping to have befores/afters of my lil projects up by early July.