Weekend Recap! + I Need To Stop Buying Stuff For The Baby's Room

So I achieved three of my four goals this weekend, and I feel pretty darn good about that! The only thing we didn't do was put together that circuit candleholder thing. Indeed, we took naps instead. Priorities people. That's really what it's all about.

Basically I did all of the FUN things I had planned for the weekend. Friday night we had fondue and it was amazing! I was a skeptic at first, but Joel is the Fondue Master, and handled the whole thing. He definitely brought The Melting Pot to us :) :)

Hurrah!

Saturday I went out and got those prints framed for the baby's room. I'm really proud of myself that I just DID IT, and didn't talk about it for a fortnight first. I have trouble pulling the trig on home projecty type things, but thanks to my friend Olga at Michael's I was able to get it done in one sitting. Let's pause and talk about Olga for a second, shall we? She is the lovely Russian lady who works in the framing department. I seriously wish I had taken her pic. I totally could have because we bonded.

I've never really framed anything (at least anything legit) before so I walked up with a total "deer in the headlights" look on my face. In her sweet ass accent she asked me what I needed. (Sidebar: Is it me or does everything said with a Russian accent sound scary? She was commenting on how cute the lamb in the picture was and "What a cute little lamb!" said in a Russian accent literally sounds like, "Boris and I will break your knee caps, and pour vodka in your eyes.") I told her I needed white frames, and to save money. Obvi Olga understands me because before I knew it everything was picked out, framed and beautiful! And not too costly.

I said her, "OLGA!!! You are seriously the best! Has anyone ever told you how awesome you are?! Do you know what she said? "Yes." Word, girl. Word. No need to be modest...let that confidence flag fly.

Long live Olga! Prints from Etsy found here and here

I kind of want to squeeze that little rabbit. He is so damn cute.

On Saturday night I wasn't feeling so hot, but we (we as in Olga and me. Just kidding. She is way too cool to hang with me.) managed to reward ourselves with a batch of funfetti cupcakes. No pics were taken because we made them and literally inhaled them within 4 seconds of being taken out of the oven. Joel got a serious sugar rush right before bed and totally had these wild funfetti eyes. I'm pretty sure there is nothing FUN about them, and I'm pretty sure I saw them in my nightmares that night. Sweet.

On Sunday afternoon, while I watched The Rachel Zoe Project and other fab Bravo TV, my loving husband put the crib together! Go Joe-L!!!

Hard at work. With Renard's help, of course.

The finished product!!! (I'm sure these pictures are super boring for everyone but me. Sorry.)

Crib + mirrored closet + yellow walls= GREAT SUCCESS!

We are on our way, my loves! It sure is coming along nicely. Can't wait to see how it all comes together!

P.S. Just got these for the room too...

In grey, white and yellow. Via

That is my last baby room purchase for awhile. (I've gotten other little items I haven't mentioned. Woopsies!) This is getting crazehhhh!

-Charlie

Restoring Honor 8-28-10 by way of restoring highlights

We went to the Restoring Honor rally at the Lincoln Memorial today:) It was "a tribute to America’s service personnel and other upstanding citizens who embody our nation’s founding principles of integrity, truth and honor."
Good times...I thought of the blog while I was there drinking it all in....exercising my constitutional rights, making a statement, making history...I was thinking of you. That's right. I was thinking of you and good thing I have mad photography skills...feast your eyes. Make a little game of figuring out which pics I took and which are from the news..

OK, I'll just say that from this pic- the sign below could be mistaken for just an "ing honor rally" (they doooo have a great automatic saving account system, and we could stand to honor that, no?) but uggh, Lulu always leaving the new digital camera at home and firing away with the iPhone. No zoom on my iPhone camera.

But seriously, it was waaaaay cool to be with so many happy, like minded, patriotic people today.
The United States of America is the BEST country in the world.

Mr. Lulu, looking like a stud, doing his part to restore honor at the rally.



"Our freedom is only possible if we remain virtuous."

Sarah Palin: "say what you want to say about me, but i raised a combat vet.
you can't take that away from me"

And I say hooah to that.


So, I ALSO had another duty today. That was to fix my terrible hair situation. A little background, I have brown hair. Nothing special so I highlight it, duh. But the highlights have been fewer and farther between since I moved so far (30 minutes) from my awesome stylist. I know you can relate. So, here's the devious part to the story and to this you may or may not relate at all...last night, for the first time in about 6 years I went to the store and bought a box of hair dye in an attempt to take care of the highlights myself. OH MY, this was a baaaaddd idea. I was like sooo light hearted and oddly super confident about doing it. But once I set the timer, got that bag on my head and it started feeling really warm I jumped up and quick washed it but ALAS it was too late. I had the tell tale ORANGE tint of the botched box hair dye. And I went to the rally in DC like a little carrot top so 100,000 perfect strangers could stare. Whoopsie!

No, the story doesn't end there.

Color correction at a new salon at 4pm. Whhhewwwwww..Deep breath out.

Remind me to not take any more "after" pictures in a bar. Bleh.

But the hair is now fabulous.








The end.

xoxo,
Lulu

Goals of the weekend

Charlie's Weekend Goals

1.

Make fondue!

The only time I ever fondue was at my friend's birthday party in 8th grade. Considering that was MANY MOONS ago, I think it's time to give it another try. We got two fondue sets for our wedding, so Joel went out last night and got all the ingredients for us to make a fondue dinner and dessert! The idea of melting chocolate makes me really nervous (I've had a bad experience or two in the past), so hopefully this time will be successful. Truthfully Joel will probably be running the show on this one, while I sneak chocolate covered strawberries! ;) Yippee!

2.

Crate and Barrel Circuit Wall Candleholder

We bought this months ago and it's been sitting in our garage waiting to be loved.  Sitting and waiting for a few reasons. A- It's intimidating looking, and the thought of putting it together makes us want to take a nap. B- I don't know where to put it! Ideas? We have TONS of wall space, and I was thinking maybe the entry way? It's definitely a cool way to welcome guests.

3.

White Frames

Mat and frame the pics for the nursery. I'm thinking Michael's will be able to get the job done for us. I need 4 white frames with grey matting. And then I'm going to hang the pics! That's where the rubber meets the road, my friends! And TAKE PICS. I always forget to take pictures of things. (I need to have my blogging brain ready at all times!)

4.

FUNfetti, indeed!

Make funfetti cupcakes. Eat funfetti cupcakes. Everything is better when funfetti is involved!

So hopefully I'll have some fun things to report on Monday! Have a nice weekend! Fall is starting to come around, and I'm SOOO happy about it!!!! :)

-Charlie

Oh Etsy, You Keep Me Young!

I don't know about you ladies, but I just adore Etsy and everything it represents. I feel like Etsy makes all my creative dreams come true, without me having to do any work. You know? Like if I have a vision for something unique, and funky for my house I go right to Etsy. Why do things like sew, and paint and create when you can just have talented Etsy artisans do all of that for you! Genius.

Here are just SOME (I say some in caps because it literally is just a few of the things I've gotten recently. Thank goodness Joel is also an Etsy Believer. Otherwise this relationship would be a horse of another color. Heyooo.) of my recent Etsy purchases.

Honestly, who doesn't have one of these? Via

Everyone needs a Keep Calm and Carry On poster somewhere in there house, right? The simplicity of the message totally speaks to me. FRANKIE SAYS RELAX! (Or in this case, the Brits say relax?) Either way it works for me and I adore it. I got mine in black, matted it in white and framed it in black. It's in our downstairs bathroom and looks pretty bad ass. The color scheme of the bathroom is fuchsia and black which I am pretty much obsessed with.

I got this little guy in Storm Grey. Via

This cute wittle birdie is going in the baby's room. I'm thinking perched on the crib? Personally, I'd always feel happy knowing a bird as cute as this one is staring at me while I sleep. The best part of the deal is his bargain price of $4. This shop has the cutest wall decals. Can't wait to see how it looks!

Pillows for the glider. Via

These pillows will also be going in the baby's room. Keeping with my yellow/grey theme, my stomach literally started to get butterflies when I saw these! (Or maybe it was the baby kicking because he/she could sense I was looking at something glorious? I'll go with that.) I won't lie, at first my heart was pulled toward this pillow:

Is this the cutest thing ever? Yes. Via

I mean I still might get it because it's so darn perfect for a nursery!! But after much deliberation I ended up going with the more mature choice. Plus it was two covers for the price of this one Koala (although this pillow may be priceless)!

What tailgating season would be complete without these? Via

My husand is a die hard 'Skins fan. His whole family is actually. They have season tickets and take the games very seriously. (As in-- he just surprised me last night with a maternity McNabb jersey. And yes he asked me to wear it for the rest of the night. And yes I did.) Recently, I ended up doing a search for Redskins on Etsy and came across these badboys. Beanbags for corn hole! Joel's brother painted really cool Redskins corn hole boards last season, and now they will have the bags to match. HAIL! (Lulu LOVES when people say that!)

King of the lambs! Via

This is just one of the three 8X10 prints I picked up from this shop. Again...for the baby! (The baby is seriously going to have the best room in the house. Too bad I'm not joking. ) If you have time, I highly suggest visting this shop. They tons of prints to choose from that are reasonable, unique and soooo precious. Plus right now they are having a sale. I'm going to mat these in grey, and hang them in white frames. Against the yellow walls, I think they will look really good. Hooray!

So do you have any favorite shops on Etsy? Any fav purchases? Let me know. Clearly I'm in the business of giving my money to Etsy people. I'm practically a guaranteed sale!

Enjoy your Friday!
xo,

Charlie

Three Things Thursday

Hello all! Yesterday's doc appointments went well. They took forever, (the glucose test and the RhoGAM shot), but I lived to tell the tale. Unfortunately, we had people over for dindin last night and since the appointments took so long I ran out of time to make anything. BOO!  So I ended up buying a frozen lasagna which was good, but there's nothing like making a meal for your guests. Word? Wahhh anyway, all is well that ends well because I think everyone had a good time!

Now on to Three Things Thursday.

1. I really really want a dot.mine planner. These planners are seriously THE BEST. There are three types: Life_time.mine, Family_time.mine, or just Time.mine. I had a time.mine planner in college and I have never been more mentally organized. The planners are so colorful and lovely and they have week/month views. AND they are inexpensive! (Who doesn't love a good deal!) With a babe on the way, I've decided I need to [wo]man up and get the family planner.

This is the one I want!

Look at some of the cute designs!

2. I think we've finally come up with The Name.

After much debate we may have finally settled upon the baby's name. Hurrah!!! Rejoice! It's not totally set in stone yet (and I guess won't be until the baby's birthday?), but we love it. I'm pretty sure Lulu was the one who threw out the name to start, and I kinda forgot about it until Joel the other day was like, "Hey remember when Lulu suggested [redacted name]?! I LIKE IT." and I was like, "Oh em goshhhh, Joel, I LOVE IT!" So that pretty much means it's been decided. It does lower my blood pressure considerably just knowing there a name we both really agree on. But you'll have to wait two and half more months (not that long ahhhh!) to find out ;)

3. This is what I did when I got home from work:

Before

After

And now I have the will to live again. THANK GOODNESS FOR ORGANIZATION!

OK tomorrow is Friday, I've just eaten a corndog, and Real Housewives of DC is on in 20 minutes. Things are lookin' good my friends! Enjoy the evening!!

-Charlie

Things I Learned Last Week: People Think I Can Stop a Moving Bus. With My Stomach.

Welcome to  another addition of Pregnancy Opinions with Charlie Nixonsleeve!!!

This weeks Opinions are just an extension of last weeks, because I cannot help the fact people continue to say absurd things to be whilst I am with child.

So last Friday I was walking out of work to my car. As I was crossing the street a bus pulled up at the light next to me. I knew the bus would stop (as the light was already red), so I stepped out and started walking. I was just minding my merry business when I hear a voice behind me. It's a man (Really guys? REALLY? Unless you're offering to carry me to my car just keep it movin'). So he says, "Wow! I hope that bus stops!" Pleasant enough. Harmless enough. So I say, "Haha! I know right!!" and then he says, "Well actually it's good that you're closer to the bus because you would be able to stop it a little, being, you know...." And gestures TO MY STOMACH! No sir, I don't know. Please clarify. Do you and your friendskis sit around making jokes about preggo ladies getting hit by buses? Nice. And wait-- getting hit by buses to stop said bus from hitting you?! Was he implying that because I'm big and pregnant I could stop a moving bus a la Superman?!?! YES!  (For all the skeptics out there. I am tots not overreacting. This is TOTALLY what he meant. Trust.) I turned around and I just looked at him with a shocked look on my face and said "Oh noooo!!!!" (I admit- that wasn't my finest work in the reaction department, but I honestly had no idea what to say. I mean it had a little ghetto flair which was effective. It could have easily transformed itself into a nice "Oh noooo you did-intttttttt!" had I been more prepared.)

I could tell he felt bad for what he said so he just looks down at the ground and totally reverts back to being like 12  years old after his mom scolded him for playing too much Duck Hunt. "Sorrrryyyyyyyy. I just..." I mean it was so weird. It was so weird to be having such an odd conversation with a stranger when all I wanted to do was get home to watch The Holiday, and eat my body weight in slice-n-bake cookies. He tried to make up for it with some more banter, but the damage was done. He had altered the course of history forever. He had solidified a place on A Tale of Two Sisters, for the rest of eternity.

In conclusion...it seems to me that when some people see a pregnant woman, they aren't totally sure how to react. Similar to a wild animal charging them. "What do I do? Do I run? Do I fight back? Do I try to throw treats at it to appease it? [editors note: throwing Pringles, Chick-Fil-A and/or cupcakes at me would have changed everything...]  Do I make awkward comments on it's weight and ability to stop two ton vehicles? Yes I think the ladder is my best choice. Good thinking brain!"

No brain, not good thinking.

-Charlie

p.s. I will get baby room pics up later today! I am off to my doc appointment where they give me that glucose test. Hurrah!

call me on my land line but don't leave me a message

I've been doing a lot of thinking.

Uh-oh.

It's come to my attention that talking on the phone is no longer a national pastime. When was it, the 80's-90's? Like people don't really want to speak anymore in the year 2010. Voice mail makes many people (ahem, me and Charlie) cringe. I read an article in the Washington Post about 2 weeks ago that was about this very topic; one college student was quoted as saying that he doesn't call his friends without texting a 'pre-appointed conversation time' because calling unexpectedly would make him feel awkward and he doesn't want to be rude! I DO love texting, but when did an actual call become rude?

And cell phone companies are selling us a bill of goods that your "fave 5" or "friends and family" minutes are free because reality check: we only talk to 5 people EVER on the phone. And they ARE our friends and family. We chat in the car while we commute and that's pretty much it. Done. Next question.

I'll admit, I am on the phone a decent amount of time because of my job, but I like talking on the phone. And I can't imagine giving up a land line in my house. Weird? Charlie already went cell phones only & our Brother NixonSleeve did too.

Now, I distinctly remember longing for a phone in my room in high school. Maybe that is where the intrinsic value of the land line was formed for me. I felt like that would solve all my problems-if I could only have access to my OWN phone, on my night stand 24/7. Do you remember that feeling too? It's because it was BEFORE cordless phones. Take a walk down memory lane with me. All of these phones were the object of my affection at one time or another:

The Swatch Phone-very cool choice

Cabbage Patch phone-not so cool but available at Spencer's Gifts I'm sure..I went thru a Spencer's phase. Lava lamps, magic 8 balls, fake dog doo, you know, the usual.

I really wanted this phone...there was a model that lit up when it rang. Convenient.

Always a classy choice.

We had this phone. It was in my room right before cordless phones became the norm.
I called it the banana phone.

I think I wanted this one too. Who didn't love Garfield?

Classic 80's look. Reminds me of a Robert Palmer video(s).

And why not think pink?

If you had any of the above phones, you need to stand up be counted as a child of the 80's!!!

PS- the word "texting" is always caught on spell check. FYI spell check is old school too.

After all this, I will admit that I loathe checking voice mail. I never signed up for the delayed 'to-do list' when I lost my heart to the Garfield phone, ya know?

A plug for today's technology: Do you all know about Google Voice? You can pick your new local phone number, forward the calls to any number you want and your voicemail is transcribed to an email. OBSESSED with it. And it's FREE. Who loves you now?

Night all!
Lulu

Calling all Chefs/Bakers/people who have a lot of recipes!

I need your help! I just realized I have three things coming up in the near future that require me to make something. And see I have no cooking skillz to speak of (and I'm a slow learner).

False advertising.

Tomorrow night we are doing a wine tasting with Joel's family. This is how it works: each couple was assigned a country (we randomly chose out of a hat) and we are to bring a red and white from our designated country. We got Australia/New Zealand so the wine picking part is easy. But we also need to bring an appetizer that sorta matches the country. I can't really think of anything that screams Australia though. (Yes I've already considered getting a bloomin' onion from Outback and calling it a day, so don't even try that.) At this point I'm not as concerned with the app matching the country, so much as it I want it to be delicious!

Our wines are a Shiraz and a Sauvignon Blanc. Apparently smoky meaty items are good with a Shiraz, and seafood/fish is good with Sauvignon Blanc. Any app ideas?! Talk amongst yaselves.

Sunday night and Tuesday night we are having friends over for dinner. (Don't ask me how I got roped into entertaining for people in general, let alone with only ONE night break in between. I am a novice homemaker, OK?! The thought of this makes me want to take a nap.) But I'm looking for something easy, hot, delicious and meaty (something about that sentence sounds sorta fresh. And I like it!). Like a casserole or something. For my laziness factor simplicity's sake, whatever I make Sunday night I'll also make Tuesday night. Heyooooo.

So...ANY IDEAS?!?! Please just post links to recipes if you don't feel like typing them. I greatly need your help. The Waspy Redhead I'm lookin' at you!

T.A.I.F.,

Charlie

p.s. Guess how many thank you notes we did last night? Oh wait. None. Laying on the floor of the baby's room and trying to get our cats to eat our hair seemed significantly more productive.

Thanks but no thanks, thank you notes.

Oh heyyyy guysssss. Sorry I took a few days off (this is the blessing of being a CO-blogger). You see, I've been recovering from feeling like I have FREAKIN' CARPAL TUNNEL SYNDROME FROM WRITING SO MANY WEDDING THANK YOU NOTES!!!!!!! Woah. What happened there? I blacked out.

Carpal Tunnel glove. My new best friend?

Don't get me wrong, I am TOTALLY grateful to everyone who got us something for our wedding, but hot damn! Thank you notes are WORK. And they are especially terrible when you've waited ohhhh sayyyy, six months to write them? I suck. And honestly? We didn't even have THAT many to write. Maybe 100-110? In my defense-- when you become with child  after like 2.5 days of being married (yes. days.) your brain completely shifts gears into what I call S&S mode. Spaz and Stalk. I pretty much ran around town spazing about being pregnant, and stalking the internets to find every available resource on babies. In the whole universe.

So I've been pre-occupied. Luckily, Joel was sweet and offered to help write said notes. This has been great, but with the two of us at the helm it's been more of a blind leading the blind kinda experience...

For starters, we literally have to pump ourselves up to do them as though we are competing in an Olympic sporting event. Lots of chest bumping...we may even get the Space Jam soundtrack involved.  I mean we talk about it weeks in advance before we actually break down and do them. There's a lot of, "So when do we want to finish the thank you notes?" and some, "The next full moon is in like 24 days. That's usually when my creative juices are flowing best. Let's take a stab at it then."

Once we pick the day, there is some fuss (on my end) about location. I am the princess and the pea when it comes to location of penning these notes. Can't be my house. (Too many distractions! Enter the game: "harass the cats with the lazer pointer". Otherwise boring, it becomes SO appealing when thinking about thank you notes). Can't be anywhere too loud (I am nosey and I'll listen to people's convos), and it can't be too crowded (what if they're nosey and read all the profound things I'm writing?). We settled on a Starbucks near our house. This is not just any old Sbux however...it's the double-decker Starbucks. Two levels. comfy couches, [decaf] lattes, and a fireplace (clearly not in use now. But it comforts me knowing it's there). Sighhhhhhhh.

We decided to help our cause, and break down the writing process into two parts. Do half one day, and half another day. Genius right? Well what's NOT genius is waiting about a month or so between phases and totally forgetting who you wrote to. This one probably falls on my shoulders as I am The Woman Of The House. I'm usually really good at being organized and neat with my items, but I tots dropped the ball on this. The first phase had gone pretty well (read: minimal whining and hand cramping), and we had gotten through about half. The second phase (earlier this week) was not as awesome. I had put little boxes next to the names of people we hadn't written to yet, with the intention of checking them off as we wrote them this time around. Expect I guess we forgot to check some boxes, and checked others by mistake. Woopsies! Go-go gadget CONFUSION!

Joel was convinced he had written notes to some of the people with unchecked boxes. But what if he was wrong? I mean he is super hot and awesome. But alas, he is only human. It is here we happened upon a Fork In The Road, my friends. Do you write notes to these peeps anyway? With this you risk doubling up and sending them TWO. Awk-warddddd. Or do you just move on and pray that's not the "you-never-sent-me-a-thank-you-note-for-those-spatulas-you-ungrateful-hussie" stink eye your cousin is giving you at next family gathering? Decisions, decisions. We went with doubling up. Joel started every note yesterday with "We can't thank you enough..." just in case we had already sent one. He said this made it sound like he loved the gift so much, he just had to send TWO notes. (This is why I married the man. He is both gentleman and scholar.) ("We love the crockpot! No really. We like LOVE it. SO MUCH. If the crockpot had little crockpot arms I would be forcing it to embrace me all day. We love it a lot, a lot. And we wanted to let you know. Again.) (Just kidding. No one wrote that one.)

The only redeeming factor of this whole thing is just how stinkin' cute our thank you cards are. ( Made by Lisa Marie at Sweet Tea Photography ).

The front. I'm bias, but I would be happy to get this card.

The back. Oh yes, my name is Charlotte!

And here's the kicker...we still have 18 left. So now the writing process is THREE parts. What is WRONG with us?!?! I am going to finish these today if it's the last thing I do. In the mean time if you need me, I'll be silently wheeping wilst doing my Carpal Tunnel prevention exercises.

She seems happy to me.

Adios,

Charlie

Wordless Wednesday 8.18.2010