Pumpkins!

Look at this cute little moppet playing in the pumpkins! Since we were unable to pick apples yesterday, we tried for pumpkins today. It was a much more successful venture. We got lots of pumpkins and interesting gourds. I love holiday decorating, as long as it's tasteful. And no, tasteful does not include those big blow-up Christmas snow globes that you plug in and they "snow" over some Winnie The Pooh scene or whatever.

So sad!

On Saturday we tried to go apple picking, but as you can see, it didn't really work out. I found some Honeycrisp apples at Wild Oats though, so the apple crisis was averted. It's still more fun to pick-your-own though. Anyway, I think this sign is so funny. Do people really call and make appointments to buy jam? Is it difficult to get an appointment to buy jam? Do they have a little jam shop or are you just supposed to show up at their house and pick out some jams? So strange.

(Saturday September 29, 2007)

Lily

This is one of the lilies from Steph's birthday bouquet. A week later and they are still blooming! I thought this one was cool because it hadn't quite opened yet and so it looked sort of like a balloon.

(Friday September 28, 2007)

Larb!

On Thursday evening we went to Cool Springs to have dinner at Jasmine. We went there because we needed to go out that way to pick Steph's car up (she had the oil changed) and because I've been craving thai food. Jasmine won Best Thai restaurant in Nashville and while I must admit I did not have high hopes, the food was actually really good, fresh, and refreshingly spicy. I was very pleased. For an appetizer, we shared some larb. Mmm, so gingery and limey.

(Thursday September 27, 2007)

Gooey Louis

As requested by Erin, I took some pictures of Louis tonight. Also, I had to include one of Winston because he is my special kitty. He has gotten so big! The rest of the photo set is on my Flickr page, so check it out!

Three Potato Four

Three Potato Four is this incredible online shop that sells interesting vintage finds. The photo of the Moss/Fern chart is the one pictured on their website...it is huge and so it was too much of a hassle to unroll it and photograph myself. We're going to have it hung in the foyer once the painters come to paint. I took pictures of the other stuff I bought, but I can't find them now...hmmm, interesting. I'll have to take some more and update this post later.

Anyhoo, I highly suggest you check out their store. The couple that runs it seems very cool (at least, from what I can tell via e-mail conversations). Tomorrow they'll be posting a lot of new things online and they will be featured in the Washington Post Home section.

(September 25, 2007)

Birthday flowers

This is a photo of the bouquet of flowers I got Steph for her birthday. Aren't they pretty? I bought them because they include all her favorite flowers-- lillies, freesia, and irises.

I updated the layout of my blog as well as some of the links, including a new link to my new favorite online store, "Three Potato Four". I received my order from them in the mail today and tomorrow I will take pictures of my loot and post them. So exciting! I think next year I will need to start a home design blog as well because so much of my time is spent decorating or preparing to decorate and surfing the web for interesting stores, objects, and ideas.

Crostata

I made an apple crostata for dessert this evening. It was tasty. I want to go pick apples, but a lot of the places I've checked out in our area say they lost their apple crop this year because of the late frost. LAME! I will still keep looking...and if apples don't work out, at least there will be pumpkins to pick.

Steph's Birthday

Yesterday (9/22) was Steph's birthday. We slept late, went to IHOP for breakfast, ran some errands, and then did some driving.

In July we bought tickets to "Dinner in the Fields", which was hosted by a flower farm that has a stall at the Franklin Farmer's market. The food was really disappointing, but the setting was beautiful and we really enjoyed the other people at our table. In fact, we enjoyed each others' company so much that we continued the party after the dinner by going to the home of one of the couples at our table. It was nice to meet new people and to discover a new area of Nashville. While driving earlier in the day, we saw lots of various animals. I spotted a Killdeer in a field, an alpaca farm, goats, horses, and lots of cattle. It was fun to drive around. I will upload all the pictures from the day onto Flickr.

(post for Saturday September 22,2007)

New kitchen light fixture

Steph was able to hang the light fixture tonight. We both love it. Of course, the people at West Elm told me that it was hardwire ready, but it really just came with a plug. Luckily, Steph is a budding electrician and she was able to rig it to be hardwired. It makes such a difference in the room. Once the kitchen is painted and the backsplash is done, the kitchen will be complete. Yay! West Elm is my new favorite store, I've decided.

Praise the Lord!

One of my wildest dreams has come true! West Elm and Anthropologie have finally opened up stores in Nashville. I didn't have time to go to Anthropologie tonight, but I did go to West Elm because I got an e-mail this morning say that they'd opened and I just couldn't resist. Everything is just as nice in the store as in the catalog! I got a light fixture for above the kitchen table that was on sale. I will post a picture as soon as it is up.

I wish I could find my old camera...I have no idea where I put it...it has a video on it that I want to upload to my blog and I also want my memory card. Argh.

Bowlful of Louis

Gooey Louis loves to nest in this bowl on the kitchen table. Over the weekend he was sick with an upper respiratory infection and I had to take him to the vet. He was very sickly, but now he is all better and very spunky! He also seems to have grown a lot in the past few days.

(Wednesday September 29, 2007)

Hmm...

What are they doing to our street? I came home and the entire curb was gone. I hope this means that they are getting ready to fully pave the street. It will be great not to have that huge gap between the pavement and our driveway.

In other news, I got a new camera today. I thought it would be more economical to have my old one fixed, but I called a shop and they said it would probably cost around $200 and take two weeks. So it seemed to make sense to buy a new one instead. So I upgraded to the Canon SD850. It's pretty sweet, but very similar to my old one. I like familiarity, so that's a good thing.

MOO cards!

Now that things have calmed down a bit around here, I am officially back to blogging. Yesterday my MOO cards came in the mail-- so exciting! I love them; they are adorable. I want to make more now! I also think I may try making some calendars for my family...gotta start planning Xmas presents, you know.

(post for Monday September 17, 2007)

pictures from around the Marriott

Here are some photos I took while at the Marriott in Nashville and around Vanderbilt. More will be posted on my Flickr page.

Andrew is my personal Geek Squad

One of the many glorious things Andrew did while he was in Nashville visiting was to put a bunch of updates on my computer. He is so awesome. He also taught me a lot of new things about my macbook. I had taken a picture of our two computers spending quality time next to each other, but now I can't find it. Oh well.

glorious nature

...Looking up at a tree in Centennial Park.

The Parthenon

Andrew and Chad in front of the Parthenon. It's ridiculous that they try to charge you $5 just to go inside the building. Whatever, I'm sure there's nothing truly amazing in there, so I'm sure I'm not missing anything.

Cardinal at the feeder

Pretty self-explanatory. Hopefully a male will come along soon too! I also saw a blue jay yesterday morning, which was pretty exciting.

I'm going to try to post some pictures from when Andrew and Chad were in Nashville last weekend. I've gotten a little behind, obviously. I will pick up again soon.

AHHHHH!!!!

Andrew, HELP! You've been gone for about 48 hours and already our computer network has gone down the tubes.

Shortly after Chad and Andrew left, our wireless router just stopped working...after 6 months of ownership! We called the Netgear fools in India and are fighting with them to get a refund. Today we went out and bought a new Linksys router, but now the network Andrew created between our computers is no longer valid. Eeek! Also, I can't figure out how to post pics from to my blog from the new iPhoto. Andrew, you have to help me. I am deeply distressed.

So, pictures are forthcoming...once I figure out how to post them again from here because once again, my desktop is being a fool. It's SOOO time to replace that sucker with a MAC.

In good news, I did update my Flickr page with help from the Uploader. It takes so much less time with that thing. I also ordered some Moo cards because I was having some serious jealously over Chad and Andrew's cards.

Lastly, and Kathy you will be happy to know this, I went to Wild Birds Unlimited again and got a thistle feeder and a suet feeder. Hooray! We love birds. When the landscape guy came yesterday, we even specifically told him that we wanted trees, shrubs, and flowers that would attract more birds. That work is going to start in 2-3 weeks, or so they claim.