Life Lately

Sorry for the radio silence for almost 2 weeks. Whoops. 

I have an excuse this time! {i think...}

I am moving. Again! Or i did move, I suppose. Last Saturday.

After 11 months in our apartment, our lease is now up. It went by so fast! It's bittersweet, but we've loved #322. Well, mostly loved it. Minus a feeeew annoyances. Hah

Lindsey is off to live down the street...with a boy! And I am off to live down the street the opposite way...with some very fun friends. In a house! With a front porch swing. And twinkle lights.

Before Thanksgiving I took a random day off work to paint my new room. I enlisted the help of mom, dad and new roomie, Maria.

Before:

 While the blue and green walls are a nice touch, I thought it needed a bit of a face-lift before I got there.  Don't mind dad and his shoulder sling. He just wanted to help out too.

After:

More pics to come soon, after my life is unpacked and organized. Obviously. 

birthday week + smink surprises!

with a summer bday right before the 4th of july, it's usually tricky to get all my friends together for big celebrations. instead, i usually opt for dinner, or drinks or brunch. or some combination of those.

this year was no different. this year i planned a small lil birthday brunchy with some of the girls. we went to breadwinners uptown. (it's on my dallas brunchy list...of course) and it was just what i wanted - give or take several friends + sister who weren't able to make it. 

i love brunching. and i love these gals. so it was perfect!

this is my sparkly new summer bag from jamie. totally love it. 

the following photo montage is what happens when you hand a camera to ms. lauren osbourne.
gosh i love her.

brunchy brunch brunch

little did i know, these girls are birthday super schemers! after a week full of birthday wishes, my schemer friends surprised me with a surprise "smink" birthday party! (smink = small + pink. duh.) brilliance rachel, true brilliance.

i was shocked. stunned even. there were no words.

in hindsight, maybe there were a few clues. kristen was being weird and distant. my sister "couldn't make it" to brunch. i knew i had some sort of sunday night plans with rachel and kristen.

all day sunday, this was the conversation -

LJ: "rach, have you talked to kristen? what are we doing tonight? why didn't she come to church with us this morning? does she even still want to hang out? whatever." 

Rachel: "we're going to dinner. she says you can pick the spot. we'll go over there later." 

LJ: "but what are we dooooing? i'm not even hungry since we ate late lunch. and why didn't kristen or my sister come to brunch yesterday. seriously? it was 2 hours of their day. annoying." 

Rachel: "......."

when we walked up to kristen's door, there were voices inside, but just as i thought,"hmmm, that's weird, i know kristen's roommate is out of town, who is she talking to...OMG, WHAT?!?" no really. that was my inner-monologue. word for word.

and i also stood in shock for what felt like an eternity before i could process through what was happening and walk towards the door. my sister was there. and my brother. and their families. there were hilarious video messages from mom, dad, uncle jay and susan, who were all on a cruise. it was just too much.

there are no words for how very special my friends and family made me feel on my birthday this year. they are simply the best. THE BEST.

so many pink treats!

p.s. my nephew tyler is CRAWLING!! yay!

more pink treats! and a perfect handmade birthday card from julie! :)

love these girls!

oh hey, this also happened. we locked ourselves out on the front porch. whoops!

good thing keith was there to scale the fence and retrieve the hidden key.

actually! good thing KO had a hidden key available for retrieving! :)

and to my super schemer hostesses - kristen, rachel and lauren -

y'all are my favorites. SUCH a perfect surprise. you know me and my pink princessy-ness well. thanks for putting up with my brattiness...who knew you were trying to throw me off your trail?! i mean, i totally knew. just putting on a bratty act to...you know...fool ya.   :)


love y'all much!!!



*most photos courtesy of the talented miss julie. thanks friend!

painting project {the navy one}

Next up on my list-o-projects - a bookshelf refresh!

I stole this lil bookshelf from my parent's garage when I moved. I think it came from my Grandad's house, I'm not sure. But I do know it's just been hanging out in their garage for years and I could certainly put it to much better use!

I love that this shelf has really great shape. And maybe just a bit neglected. But tons of potential. Nothing a lil sanding and a fresh coat of paint couldn't fix!

I had a painting weekend with mom on the first nice weekend in February. We had all the windows and doors open to a sunshiney day and got to work right there in my apartment. Who needs a garage when you have a few pieces of wood for keeping paint off the floors and lots of newspapers? 

I decided on a dark navy blue for this piece. Semi-gloss this time around. 

However, after this first coat, it was not looking very dark navy at all. It was more robins egg blue. And I was quite skeptical.

So I decided to let it dry. Give it another coat. And cross my fingers that it got darker. 

If not? Well then I was prepared for another trip to home depot to get the color just right. I wanted navy!

Lucky for me, two coats of paint and a little time was all it needed to dry and darken.

I ended up being really happy with the color. And with the glossy finish.

I did have to let it dry for a few days before I could put anything on it though. Something about that semi-gloss finish made it pretty sticky. 

But once I moved it back into my room, I was totally in love with the way it turned out. The perfect shade of navy and the perfect size between these two doors.

Painting project #2, check! 

What do you think?! I think I'm starting to get really good at this game. 

Can't wait to share my next project! It has lots of character. And a good story. You know, my favorite kind of project!  :)

painting project {the yellow one}

This is my antique dresser.

The very dresser that my Grandad helped fix up for my room in college. I painted it guacamole green when I took it to my apartment in austin. Yeah, that's right. I had a light pink and green room. I'm so cute.

It has been living in my room at my parents house for the past 5.5 years. And I decided for my first big girl apartment in Dallas, it was definitely coming with me. 

But first, it needed a lil makeover.

A bright yellow makeover in fact!

The week before I was set to move out, I came home from work and announced that I decided on yellow for my dresser. And I would be making a trip to Home Depot in search of the perfect yellow.

"Yellow?" Mom asked. 

"Yes. bright yellow. It's going to be great."

"I see..." She was skeptical.

After living with Miss Hannah Kate at 9A, I had learned a thing or two about committing to the color. And let's be honest, this dresser was guacamole green before. Safe to say I have no fear of color.

Hannah also taught me about Behr Premium Plus paint and primer in one. She swears by it. Therefore, it didn't take me long to settle on this perfect shade of golden yellow. 

And the best part? No primer necessary. I just sanded down the edges a bit. And then got to work!

It did end up taking 2 coats to fully cover up that guacamole green. But between me and mom, we were done in a quick day.

I tested a dozen different versions of hardware. Because while I was quite decisive on the yellow I wanted, I was less decisive on the type of hardware that would give it the perfect finishing touch. 

There was also the fact that this dresser is very old. And all hardware would have to be custom cut to fit the width of the drawers. 

Small things though. Mom knows people at the hardware store. Clutch.

Just a quick trip to the local ACE for some sawing of screws and then I was good to go.

 What do you think? I totally love it.
And I think Hannah Kate would be very proud.