.chillin'.

It's Saturday night, and I'm on our bed with my new laptop (my way early birthday present, which I LOVE) trying to stay cool under our ceiling fan. You see, Hubs is a rational, penny-pinching conservative who doesn't believe we've hit that point in the year that the a/c should be turned on. Although we did have a day or two in the past week where the high was only the lower 50's, today and tomorrow boasts highs in the 80's! I hate sweating in my own house. A spoiled American is what I am...

Some things on my mind are:

* Summer vacation...it's so near I can almost taste it. My Summer will be spent doing more for the local magazine I work for, including more writing assignments. I am also super excited to have more time to devote to sewing and crafts. (And on a side note, can I just say that "crafting" really has come a long way and totally isn't associated with nerdiness anymore. Crafting is actually the hip thing to do right now! Who would've ever thought?!)

* Shopping...more specifically, bargain hunting. Lately, I've been hitting the jackpot at the local consignment shops and scored some really sweet Summer clothes. The thought of paying retail for something just makes me cringe now.

* Levi...my soon-to-be-here nephew. I bought him a second batch of clothes today while I was out and about. Now someone needs to have a girl because I have been seeing some of the cutest little baby girl outfits and am just waiting for a reason to buy some!

* Prayer requests: My sister's job. My friend Sarah - her Dad has an extremely rare form of cancer and will be going through surgery and chemo soon.

Thankfully, I am feeling much cooler now after sitting under our ceiling fan. My eyes are so tired, and I am looking forward to church tomorrow.

Oh, and to Bethenny Frankel, if you are reading this, the dude you hired to edit your website is definitely a good writer; however, I couldn't help but notice a pretty big grammatical error in the blog post by him that you read outloud. If you really want to hire a proofreader for your website, you should really think about hiring me. That dude may be a good writer, but you need me to edit his stuff before you post it to your site. Thank you.

Goodnight for now!

.one worth remembering.

Tonight's GNO was one for the books! Here's why:

* The evening started out with a quick dinner at Chick-fil-A, where I got hit on by a gray-haired employee who asked me what fragrance I was wearing because it was 'frantastic.' Awkwardly, I answered him - to which he so creepily replied, "Mmmm. That's nice."

* Not long after we arrived for dinner, the tornado sirens started going off and our phones started blowing up with texts and calls about hail, tornado touchdowns, taking shelter, rotation in the sky....

* We finished our meal then packed in my car to drive to the theater, where we watched Soul Surfer. Old dude cuts in line at the ticket booth to demand his money back on his tickets since we were under a tornado warning and he didn't want to stay for the flick. We mosied on into the theater, with a warning from the ticket clerk that our safe zone was the bathrooms if things got bad.

* Soul Surfer was so good. I mean...like, really good. I left feeling thankful, blessed, inspired and wanting to work-out because that girl has an amazing bod!

* After we made it out of the movies with our lives still intact and a diminished storm warning, we started feeling frisky and ventured out to TCBY. Can you say...delish?! I had a little bit of the strawberry kiwi, plain strawberry, orange sorbet, and ruby red grapefruit, no toppings. Every flavor was da bomb!

* We then went to Keri's house to watch the Girls Night Out country concert that had been recorded. We ooh'd and aww'd over Miranda Lambert and Blake Shelton, talked about how Reba's mouth annoys us, puked in our mouths a little whenever the Judds were shown, and sat in amazement at Carrie Underwood's version of 'How Great Thou Art.'

* We giggled A LOT. Exchanged high-fives (and missed most of the first attempts). Watched silly youtube videos. Played with Keri's dog. Acted really goofy and girly.

It was the perfect night with girlfriends!

.a shower for abby.

Yesterday, I co-hosted my sister-in-law's first baby shower! The theme was "Showers of Blessings," and the main colors were blue and yellow. We incorporated as many rubber duckies, umbrellas, and fake raindrops as we could. Oh, and the insane amounts of balloons floating around the room added just enough "whimsy" to the decor. Abby was surrounded by family, friends, and co-workers as she opened gifts for baby Levi, and there were lots of smiles, laughter and pictures taken. I picked just a few of my favorite pictures to share on my blog.

We ordered the cake from Harps grocery store. The top layer was white cake and the bottom was chocolate.

This is the mobile I made for the shower. It displayed six pictures from some of the biggest moments of Abby and Lawson's life together, cut into the shape of raindrops and hanging from doily clouds.

This is Abby's silhouette matted with a message board for Levi. It's going to travel to all of her showers and will include hand-written messages from each guest!

This punch was yummy! The funny thing is it was supposed to be blue with the foam on top resembling a bubble bath but red kool-aid was accidentally bought and we tried to make it blue by adding food coloring. It turned out purple, and all the little duckies that were supposed to be floating on the top...well, they didn't float. :-)

When the festivities were over, Abby and I were heading outside to release the balloons into the sky.

There they go! (Notice how someone's bundle of balloons got stuck around the light post? LOL)

It was a fun day that left me even more excited than ever to meet my little nephew! Only about 3 more months to go!

.spring so far.

It's been a while since I last blogged. Even though I check my followed blogs nearly every day, the desire to update mine just hasn't been there. I worry sometimes that what I'll have to say won't be interesting or I won't have any new pictures to upload, but today I reminded myself that those are not the reasons I blog. As simple as my life may be at times, it's mine to document; therefore, I've decided to recap my Spring up to this point.

Hubs and I took a trip to Little Rock to visit my sister and her husband back in March. It was a little getaway for the two of us (well, 3 of us, since we brought Simon along). Simon isn't allowed on the furniture at our house, but he is at my sister's house. Simon loves "Little Rock" because it's total vacation mode for him. He jumps up on the couch every chance he gets to be by his people, and he even got to sleep with us! Fun times for our little family.

Recently, my sewing "hobby" has turned into more of my sewing "job," and that is an exciting thing. In the past month, two different business owners have contacted me about selling/consigning in their shops. Not just that, but I've been receiving steady orders from not only friends but strangers as well -- people who stumbled across my blog or facebook page. I feel like God is blessing my sewing business, and really showing me he wants me to focus more time on it. I'm itching for Summer to get here because I'll have so much more time to do just that. I plan on making a work-at-home schedule for myself this Summer on the days that I don't have to work my other jobs. I want to not only sell locally but open my etsy shop as well. God has shown me that something great could really come from my dreams of selling the fruition of my creativity. I want to cultivate Shabby Threads into a legitimate business because I know when I have kids it can be a source of income that will allow me to stay home with my child.

I am highly considering getting highlights in my hair again. I have been natural for a while now -- over a year for sure and possibly even close to two years. My hair looks dull to me, and the awkward I'm-growing-it-out length is not helping any. I also know that I need to get on a regular workout regime, but I'm having a serious problem getting motivated. I weigh more right now than I ever have in any point in my life, and I'm not liking how certain clothes are fitting. I want to devote more time to taking care of myself, and I'm praying for motivation.

Really thinking more about how my 28th birthday is approaching in June and when Leslie and I should start "trying" for a baby. I'm praying for God's timing on all this and that Leslie and I will decide together when to start the process.

Speaking of babies... I'm going to be an aunt to a little boy! Levi William is due in late July, and I'm growing more and more anxious to meet him. He is already such a loved little boy, and poor thing is going to be spoiled rotton. He is the first grandchild for my parents, and I'm excited to see everyone get to interact with him.

I'm sure I'll think of more later that I could've included in this little recap, but for now I'll call it good. I'm going to go pray for some motivation to get some intense Spring cleaning done on this house! :-)

.forever 21.

I went shopping this morning, mainly to hunt for more tunics. I have fallen in love with wearing leggings but only have a couple of tops/dresses to wear with them. I knew Forever 21 wouldn't let me down, so I headed there first. Not only was I met with an array of tunics to choose from, the prints were so Spring/Floral/Vintage, I was in love with nearly everything I saw! This is the one I ended up taking home with me:

I did not see this pink one in my store or I probably would have taken it home with me too:

Another trend I'm seeing everywhere is the floral mini skirt like this one from Forever 21:

I don't wear "mini" skirts, but I would consider wearing the right one with leggings underneath. Well, after leaving the mall, I went to my tried and true consignment shop. I was ecstatic to find a similar skirt to the ones at Forever 21, only this one reaches to about an inch above my knees (I can handle that!) and has the same vintage-type floral print. Bonus: It was only $5! Welcome to my home, new Springy skirt!

I would call today a successful shopping day! I found a few pieces for my Spring wardrobe at what I consider reasonable prices. Don't you just love when you finding a desired style of clothing at a resale shop?! It really, really makes my day. :-)

.my 'ruffle around me' top.

I love coming across great sewing tutorials on blogs. I have a whole folder saved under my "favorites" tab full of links to great tutorials that I can't wait to try my hand at. A few days ago I came across a tutorial for this "Black Ruffle Around Me Top" from Sarah's blog, Welcome to the Good Life.

I have a pretty good collection of solid, fitted tees so I couldn't wait to make one of these cute shirts for myself! I went into my closet and found an old white tee from Old Navy. I can't even remember the last time I wore it. I wanted to use supplies I already had on hand, so when I found a long roll of white lace in my sewing stuff stash, I was excited to create a top with the same loopy design as Sarah's but with my own twist added. Here is how mine turned out:

I love the results! I also love how a neglected shirt from my closet has immediately become such a versatile must-wear piece of my wardrobe. I can't wait to pair this top with skirts in the Spring. I wore it this past Sunday to church with dress pants and a cardigan. I even got to wear it to Olive Garden for my husband's and my V-day dinner.

Imagine all the different embellishments you could add to your plain old solid tees to give them a new life! I can't wait to make more like this.

Click here for Sarah's Tutorial

.epic.

A few days ago I posted about a blizzard. Today I have experienced even more epic awesomeness: more snowfall than this part of Arkansas has seen in 80-90 years!!!! I haven't been out to measure it because I don't own a yard stick; all I know is it came up to my knees an hour or two ago. And it's still coming down!

Hubs even got released from work around 8:30 this morning. He almost didn't make it out of the work parking lot with his 2-wheel drive truck, but by the grace of God he made it home safely and is now parked comfortably on the couch with his work laptop and all that jazz.

I couldn't let this epic snowfall pass without a fun mini photoshoot taking place. So I grabbed my colorful umbrella and matching red rain boots (which were unfortunately hidden by all the snow) and threw in a funny pug for extra accessorizing. Husband stood inside and took pictures through the window on our back door. LOL

A huge bonus to this day is all the time I've been able to spend browsing a few of my current FAVORITE blogs. These are my top 2 right now:

Ruffles and Stuff: So full of creative inspiration and amazing tutorials. I have had this blog open for hours because I can't stop looking at it. I don't want to miss anything! I'm getting so many great ideas for new sewing projects.

House*Tweaking: This girl's decorating style is right up my alley! Her home is awesome and her posts are always fun and informative. I can't get enough of this one either!

Well, I'm off to... do exactly what I've been doing. Absolutely nothing and loving it!