Ella Kate is famous...

Ok not really but her birth announcement was featured on the Pinch of Lovely blog! Go check out all of Krystal's beautiful work! Thanks again Pinch we loved them!

Show Us Your Life - Wedding Dress!

Well today over at Kelly's Korner she is doing a wedding dress show and I decided to participate. Unfortunately my scanner does not want to participate so you are going to have to bare with me on the pictures I am providing.

I got married in September of 2007 and oddly enough the design of my dress was named Septiembre. Ironic I know! My dress was by a spanish designer called La Sposa and I absolutly fell in love with it. There was not a single bead on it and that just fit me perfectly.

Here is the picture from the catalogue.

You can't really tell, but on the bodice of the dress there is what I would call a baseball stitching to accentuate the curves and I just loved it. It added just enough detail without putting any beads on it. I also LOVED the skirt of the dress. The pickups were just enough and we were able to mimic them in the bustle.


Here is the best picture I could find that was already on my computer that showed the details of the dress. Here you can see the way it was bustled to mimic the front of the skirt.

Well that is all I got. I hope you enjoyed my wedding dress, I know I definitely did! That day was the happiest of my life and I wouldn't have changed anything!

My list of DON'TS

I don't know if any of you out there follow Jenna over at Jenna's Journey, but I do and today she is doing a little Mcklinky event and I decided to participate. Today's Mcklinky is I DON'T so here is my list.

*I don't drink coffee... can't take the caffeine in it... but oh man how I love the smell of it!

*I don't know what I really want to do in life... though one day I think I will figure it out.

*I don't watch the news when Keith is not here at night... freaks me out even though nothing happens here in Tyler.

*I don't enjoy cleaning my house... but I force myself to clean at least 1 room every day. Otherwise things get way out of control around here.

*I don't use the dryer for about 50% of my clothing. We have a closet in the house that is specifically used only to air dry my clothes. I am 5'9" and if I dry my pants they all turn into capris.

*I don't enjoy carrying a purse. If I could find another way to carry my cell phone, wallet, and all of the other essentials one needs I would so do it. Seriously I feel that I am going to one day be lopsided because of the extreme weight that I carry around on a daily basis in that thing.

*I don't like to be hot unless I am working out or there is a reason for me to be hot. Then again I don't really like to be cold either. There really is no satisfying me when it comes to temperature.

Well that is my list of don'ts. What are yours? Go to Jenna's Journey and add to the Mcklinky!

Some New Blogs to Share...

I have had way to much time on my hands lately and have been spending more time on the internet than one human being probably should, but I have come across some great blogs and I thought I should share them.

First we have Big Mama. Though I am pretty sure that half the internet currently reads her blog, I just found it about a month ago and just love it!

Next we have Katie, over at Good Things Catered. I used to read another of Katie's blogs, The Happy Homemaker, but that one is not around anymore. This blog is mainly recipes, recipes, and more recipes and I just love it. I have made a few of her cookie recipes and they are just awesome!

Another I have been reading is about the crazy family of 6 (with 4 kids until 5) over at It's Almost Naptime!! I have huge respect for this woman as I could not even imagine taking care of 4 little ones like that!!!

Another is The Pioneer Woman, which again I am pretty sure half the internet world reads. I just found her thanks to Big Mama and I CAN NOT WAIT to try some of her recipes. Next week I will be making her famous cinamon rolls and will definitely be sharing!

And the last one I will share today is Newlyweds. I found this thanks to Misadventures of a Newlywed as she was featured today over there and have been spending some time reading today and just love it. She features all kinds of things from interviews with Newlyweds, recipes, and great photography!

So spend some time if you have way to much free time like me and check these out. Great reads I promise

Show Us Your House Friday - Living Room!

Well it is time for another edition of Show Us Where You Live Friday over at Kelly's Korner. I was not going to participate in this week's living room showcase A) because even though this is one of my favorite rooms to hang out in, it is one of my least favorite decorated rooms because our furniture is too big and when we got it, we were too lazy to rehang the art work to fit better with it B) because it is the room that is usually the catch all for all the junk and is usually way to messy to take pictures of and C) I wasn't really in the mood. Well yesterday just happened to be Living Room cleaning day over here so the room was clean, I got over the fact that it needs better decorating, and I had nothing else to do yesterday, so here is my Living Room to share with the blog world!!!!Here is the living room as you enter it. Our sofa is actually a sectional, but the room is not big enough for us to fit all of the peices, so the connector peice sits in a corner awaiting the day we have a hour big enough for it to join the sofa crowd. We got the rug at a sidewalk art and rug sale and we love it! The end table at the bottom of the table was actually made by Keith in his highschool shop class. I actually have a matching one of the other side that was made by his brother a few years after and he didn't want it, so now we have a matching set! As you can see, Saban is try to escape out of the door. Here is the room from behind the sofa's. We bought the TV stands at Target and I can't wait for the day we can buy a TV that isn't that large and I can buy the bottom peice to put it on. The container that is on the right stand, holds all of Keith's junk when he comes home. It was the best purchase I ever made! This way I the top of my cabinent is not covered in change, wallet, watch, keys and all of that nonsense that comes out of his pockets. Thank you Bed Bath and Beyond!Here is another picture of the TV stand area. That basket to the left holds the cat toys, and about 5 minutes after this picture was taken, all of those toys were back on my floor! The pictures above the TV stand are wedding pictures and a picture of my parents with the little guy. The pictures in the stand are a mix of wedding pictures, pictures of the nephew, and a picture from my friends wedding. One day there will be somewhere else for the electronics to go and I can get my other stand back for decorating!Here is a close-up of the right TV stand. The peices on top and the cross are from Hobby Lobby OF COURSE!!!

These pictures hang beind our sofa and are my favorite thing in the room. My dad got me these on one of his many trips to France, and I actually have two more that I am yet to frame. I really need to get on that!

Well that is our Living Room! I hope you enjoyed it. Please take the time to visit Kelly's Korner and check out all of the other living rooms over there!

Show Us Where You Live Friday...

Kelly over at Kelly's Korner is doing a virtual home tour and today was kitchen's and I decided to participate as the kitchen is my favorite part of the home as I love to cook and bake. We unfortunately live in a rental home as we are not sure how long we will end up living in Tyler, so I had to do my best in order to make the kitchen my own. If this was a home we bought oh how different it would be!

We will start with the main portion of the kitchen. This is looking in from the breakfast area.

As you can see, we have way to much clutter on the counter tops, but there just is not enough cabinent space for everything we have. It is small but it lets me do what needs to be done in the kitchen!

Here is our breakfast area. The table is a hand me down from Keith's parents, but it works perfect!
Here is my favorite thing in my kitchen/breakfast area. My Baker's Rack! My mom bought this for me when we moved here and I just love it. I love being able to display my accent peices to my dishes, and it also allows a little more storage space!!!
We have two sets of serving dishes. The set that goes with my everyday dishes which are done by Tracy Porter and is her Octavia Hill line (which has been discontinued which I discussed here). The second is a LA themed set, which I am still working on the peices too! It is hard to find as it is only sold in specialty sites or on the tabasco.com website.

Here is some artwork that is on our walls. I love the fleur de lis as you can tell... that's the LA in me!!
And here is a close-up of our dishes. The red one and the print are the Tracy Porter ones, the green accent plates I added and are from JC Penney's. They had to be added as I only bought 8 salad plates in the red and since they are discontinued and I have 12 of almost everything else, it really makes it a little difficult to serve 10 people salads!!! Next time I will know better!

And that is where we live... well more like where I live, Keith really only comes in to find food and doesn't spend nearly as much time in the kitchen as I do! Thanks for visiting!

Perfect Post...

Here is a perfect post to go along with my couponing post from one of my favorite bloggers, Erin at $5 Dinners

http://www.5dollardinners.com/2009/04/power-of-coupons.html

Ahh... Much Better

Well I have finally calmed down from my job search rant earlier and I guess today is getting better. As you can see I redid the background and header... AGAIN! I know you are probably tired of me changing it but I have too much free time on my hands with the job coming to an end and to make it worse, it is raining here so I really don't have much to do. Plus it has been ridiculoulsy quiet on the blog front today so I haven't had much reading material to tide me over! Where is everyone????

So a topic I have always been amazed by and have read so much about through blogging in the past few months is couponing and circular shopping. With the end of my job coming, we have really decided that we need to start doing some cutbacks and saving as much money as possible, and I have found that at the grocery store is the best way. I never thought I would be able to save as much as those hard-core couponers out there, but I am really starting to get amazed at how much I have been able to save. In the past two weeks by reviewing the circulars, shopping the deals (which sometimes means going to multiple stores), using my reward card and using coupons I saved $92.31. I have to say that is pretty impressive! If you also add in my 198 bucks I saved at JCPenney's this past weekend, that is almost 300 dollars that I have saved us in just a few weeks time! I am still working on stockpiling my coupons and also working on where to get the best deals on things, but it is getting easier for me to do and really doesn't take up much time at all!

If you want to read more about couponing you can go to www.couponmom.com, that is where I learned a lot about how to start. You can also go to this blog to find grocery deals in your area! I really recommend it to anyone out there that is trying to save money and has 15-20 minutes to spare in their week!

Found some other GREAT Blogs!

Did some searching on Blogher today and found some interesting blogs that I just have to share. This one is just a frugal dinner blog with great $5 dinner meals and other shopping secrets. This one is a de-cluttering and organization blog and she has some great ideas and lives by the 15 minute a day de-cluttering strategy. Just some fun reading material that I have enjoyed.

Also found this one thanks to another friend's blog and she has just been cracking me up all day today!

Had to take a drive out to Keith's office today in order to pick up his truck as he got a company truck yesterday... let me rephrase that... he got what is supposed to be a company truck but is more like a whole bunch of metal welded together with 183,000 miles on it. They have told him he will get the next new truck that comes into the office, but we shall see. But besides that, I wish I would have had my camera with me to record the interesting things that I saw during my 30 minute drive back home.
1.) A man in a truck chasing his run away cow on the side of the highway
2.) A LEMON YELLOW house
3.) A HOT PINK house... even the fence was HOT PINK!
Only in East Texas... seriously it was just too much to handle! I don't even know if a picture could have accurately recorded this though.

Well I think that is it for the evening... till tomorrow!