Vintage Dresses for Anniston Ruth

I was so excited to find out we were having a little girl, which we have decided to name Anniston Ruth. (The "Ruth" is after my great-grandmother, or "Ruthie" as we called her.) I was ecstatic for it to be a girl so I could dress her up in all of the beautiful smocked dresses my grandmother made for me when I was a little girl. I am so glad she saved them all! I have so many pictures of me wearing all of them and now I can pass them down to Anniston. How special! Most of them are still in great condition for having been made in the early '80's:) Here are some pictures of a few of them:

Me and Allie 1987

This one is adorable. I'm giving grandmom a sweet kiss on the cheek. The dress I have on says "Kelly" on the front with balloons around it. I still have this one- made specially for me!

Allie gave me this creative idea from a blog she had read: I bought a frame at Hobby Lobby, some cute material for the backing, and pinned one of the dresses grandmom made when I was itty bitty. How perfect that it matches the colors I'm doing in the nursery. It's going to look so cute hanging on the wall!

January Favorites!

1. SHARPIE PENS- I am so picky about which pens I use at work. They have to have a fine tip so I can write neatly and they ABSOLUTELY cannot smudge! These types of pens are hard to come by! The sharpie pens are amazing. I feel my handwriting is so neat when I write with them. I get ill if someone takes it from me at work; everyone knows they are MY pens:)











2. Origins VITAZING- this stuff is AMAZING! It's a moisturizer that is slightly tinted to even out your skin tone. When I put this on before I put on my Bare Minerals foundation, I feel like I get such a better coverage. I even wear the Vitazing by itself some days with just a little face powder and blush on top.

3. KASHI GO LEAN PROTEIN BARS- This has been an old favorite of mine but I recently started eating them again. They are pretty low in calorie for a protein bar and taste so good! My favorite is the caramel:)

4. P90X- It has been a couple of months since I was consistent with my weight training. I am so glad I've gotten back into it though. I still like to go to the gym and lift weights or use the machines there, but this is great to rotate in your workout schedule so you can mix it up!

5. AHHHH: MCDONALD'S CARAMEL FRAPPE- I need rehab to wean myself off of these! I have recently downsized from a medium to a small so I feel that's improvement. I try to only get them a couple times per week but it is HARD! They are so delicious. I never eat the whip cream with the caramel drizzle so I can justify that it's fewer calories that way:)

Photo Project!

A couple of weeks ago, I purchased a couple of hanging photo trays from Archivers. They had all different sizes to choose from and some really great project ideas for them. I decided to use pictures from mine and Brandon's trip to Boston in 2008. I LOVE the way it turned out! Here are some of the things I did:

I took a map from a book that we used on our trip, photocopied and printed it out on resume paper, then inked the sides to give it an "aged" appearance.

I used my wonderful Cricut for the letters in "Boston."

I used themed stickers that had famous Boston landmarks.

I found some cute bronze hardware in the shape of a suitcase, antique-like ribbon, and really fantastic buttons to add a little flair!

I can't WAIT to hang it up!!!

Favorite Things To Do When it Snows!!!

It's SNOWING! This is the first significant snowfall of the year here in Memphis and it's looking VERY white outside right now! I'm off work for the next two days, so to avoid getting out in this mess I stocked up on food for myself and Ruby when I left work tonight. So what am I going to do with myself while I am snowed in? Here are some of my favorite things to do on "snow days"-

1. Work out! Forget using the snow as an excuse not to go to the gym and workout- I have a stationary bike and my P90X DVDs.

2. Curl up with Ruby by a fire! We have a real fireplace, but I think I'm going to cart my little "fake fireplace" around the house with me! This little heater that we bought at Lowes has flames made to look like a real fire is burning in the stove. I love it!

3. Take a hot bath and read my NOOK! So what if I didn't have time to stock up on books! I can just download whatever I want from Barnes & Noble, and poof! It magically appears on my NOOK in no time!

4. Watch Ruby play outside in the snow. Ruby loves the snow! She has so much fun jumping around it it and getting it on her nose:)

I've got plenty of stuff to do- SO BRING ON THE SNOW!!!

'Tis the Season

I'm a little behind on my blogging! I meant to have this post up a couple of weeks ago but, better late than never. We had a wonderful holiday season this year. It was busy- but that's the way I like it. By New Year's, Brandon and I were just ready to spend a night at home in our pjs. Here are a couple of pictures from Christmas I wanted to share!


This year, we declared our first ever "Grandkids Day." Us grandkids wanted to spend a little extra time with Grandmother around the holidays so we all decided to come together and make a day of it. We listened and sang along to Christmas tunes, decorated a fabulous Gingerbread house, made homemade pretzels for a snack, ordered pizza for lunch, and, most importantly, spent some time with Grandmother. We all voted to have "Grandkids Day" be an annual event!

Since I did not decorate a tree or put up any Christmas decorations this year (I know, I know- I'm a Scrooge!) I realized I did not have to match my wrapping paper to my decor. This gave me the opportunity to be really creative and outrageous with my color choices for wrapping paper- so I was! This is a picture of my "Who" (as in the Grinch) presents. I got bright colored paper and ribbon and decorated them just like all the Who presents in the movie. I thought they turned out really cute!

Brandon and I on Christmas Day at Nancy's.

I think Ruby got more presents that I did. I just could not resist giving her some gifts early, which meant I kept having to go back and buy more presents for me to wrap up! I did give her a Christmas scarf early so she could look festive on Christmas Day:)

St. Jude Marathon Weekend!

What a FUN weekend this was! The Brandons, Allie, and I all decided to participate in the annual St. Jude race in downtown Memphis. Thousands of people are involved in this event every year and it felt so good to be a part of such a great cause. Mom, Dad, and Will all came down to cheer us on, which made it even MORE fun!

Allie and I started training in October for the 5K run. After what my body had gone through the past couple of months, it was quite a challenge getting back into shape. I used to run quite often, so thankfully my body remembered that! This however, was my first real organized run, so I was very excited. I was so proud of myself and Allie- we finished faster than we did in all our training runs. Brandon C ran the half marathon, and we were all waiting at the finish line to cheer for him. This was so much fun and I can definitely see us all participating again next year!

Life Goes On

I've been procrastinating with this post. I almost skipped it completely because I knew it would be hard to write about everything that has happened in the past few months. But then I realized that just because this is not necessarily a "happy" post, it doesn't have to a negative one. I didn't want to not address the past few months, because it is a part of mine and Brandon's life, and this blog is dedicated to just that.

Around my fifth month of pregnancy, Brandon and I learned that there were several complications associated with the baby. We were sent immediately to a high-risk pregnancy physician to get more information on his condition. After extensive tests and ultrasounds, we learned that our little man had what they refer to as a Trisomy 18. This means that he had 3 chromosomes of #18 instead of the normal 2. This is a very serious condition, and most babies that have this do not make it.

Brandon and I were devastated when we learned the news. Our little boy was already so much a part of our lives, and the thought of losing him seemed so unbearable. Around the 22nd week of my pregnancy we did, in fact, lose him.

After going through what seemed to be the hardest 3 weeks of our lives, Brandon and I learned that life does go on. We are surrounded by a wonderful group of family and friends. We have loving parents that support us and our decisions. We both have great jobs that we both enjoy. We are happily married, and will always have each other to lean on. And lastly, God had blessed me with the most wonderful sister in the world. Without her support through this ordeal, I don't know how I could have survived. She is my sister and my best friend- all rolled into one! So to Allie- you will never know how grateful I am to have you.

I will now move on to happier posts; ones that talk about fun events, family get-togethers, etc. I don't want to forget all that has happened- I just don't want it to be painful to remember. And, as life goes on, it will get easier.