While I trusted them completely, some all of my decorations were a little confusing and therefore needed a little explaining. So I wrote a Wedding Day Decoration Instruction Manual. Totally normal right? Inside I broke down the venues starting with the Church followed by the Reception venue. I had previously sorted all of our decorations into numbered bins which were either labeled “Church” or “Reception”. These bins were inventoried so that I knew what exactly was in each bin, and they were delivered to each venue the night before. In my manual, each “area” (like sanctuary, sign-in table, cake table, bar, etc.) had a sheet like this:

It would list which bin everything is in, what the contents of that bin were, and some bossy instructions explaining where everything goes. And for the more visual people, I drew a little diagram for each area. So for example the church decorations had the following drawings:

Which translated to:

The church was easy. There were only two bins of decorations there. The reception venue on the other hand had the other eight bins. (eight!!!) It’s portion of instructions were just like the ones at the church listing out what each “area” required and which bin to find said decorations. Like so:

Along with a picture like this:

Which then translated to this:

I also included a few general pages for how to assemble several repeated items like our paper flower vases and signage.

Because the reception also had guest tables which were a whole other mess of things to keep in order. The interior designer in me decided to include a floor plan that had each table labeled by animal and paper flower wreath color. Each table had a bin with a smaller bin inside that was filled with the moss stone place cards of each person sitting at that table and each were labeled by animal. So if someone was supposed to sit at the squirrel table their place card was in the squirrel bin. Makes sense right? Here is that floor plan.

This page was followed by a detail of each table including where each place card would go. This was a little complicated because we had several vegetarians and children’s meals which meant that their place had to be marked somehow, so rather than color coding the place cards or something, I also gave this floor plan with details of each table to our caterer. They about died out of excitement for how easy I made their job that night :)

 I included a small photoshopped diagram of how each centerpiece should be setup with the wreathes, cake stands, and ceramic animals. Which I think translated beautifully.

I also wanted our black napkins to be folded into a bow shape with a gold napkin ring for the knot, so I included this handy little diagram for my house party to use when folding each napkin, along with where to place each place card.

This was obviously taken before the china arrived.

 Here are a few other special areas and how they translated.

Some people might look at all of this and think I’m absolutely crazy for going to this much trouble for my wedding decorations. But honestly, I received SO many compliments from my house party, day-of coordinator, caterer, and wedding party on how seamless everything went together. I only had to take a couple of calls while getting ready to answer a few simple questions. My coordinator also snapped a couple of photos of the decorating progress and texted them to me which was so sweet. In my mind it was totally worth it to be at ease that day and not have to think about anything except for marrying my best friend. I was able to enjoy time with my friends and family and that to me was all that mattered.

PS: If you want someone this OCD and detail oriented helping you out on your big day you can totally hire me. I would love to help you :)

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I love the scale of it, and I especially love the sentiment behind it. I’m sure that none of the cast even knows where Marfa, TX unless they know of the art installation by Elmgreen and Dragset. But Derek and all of his best friends spent his Bachelor weekend camping in Marfa, and we plan to go there for our first anniversary (SO excited!!!)

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I had been wanting some dramatic art for our vastly empty (and tall!!) stairwell, and had planned to order a Prada Marfa canvas, but the size I wanted was $429. Oopsies. No thank you! So I did what any other cheapskate would do, and I made my own.

First I found the largest Prada Marfa sign I could find on Google Images and printed out the letters (about 1 per 8.5″ x 11″ sheet of cardstock)

I made them grey so that I wouldn’t be wasting as much ink.

Then I cut out each letter with scissors, and for the insides of letters I used an xacto knife. I freehanded my cuts because I use xactos for a living, but you can also use a straight edge to make things a little quicker.

After all of my letters (and arrow) were cut out I made my canvas. What? I know. I was feeling really cheap, and canvases aren’t 50% off now at Hobby Lobby so I improvised! I laid out four sheets of 30″ x 40″ white foam core and taped them all together with foam tape to create the thickness of a canvas.

I know the edges are ugly, but I plan to tape them off and paint them black (more on that tomorrow!)

If you’ve ever made a canvas before then you can skip this part, but for everyone else I just brushed on a coat of gesso using heavy nasty brushstrokes to create a canvas-y texture using the crappiest of crappy brushes (highly recommended for the canvas-ification process).

Then I dry brushed in the opposite direction creating a sort of cross-hatch texture (like a canvas). It’s hard to see the texture in these photos but its a very subtle cross-hatch, and looks very canvas-like in person.

Once the gesso dried I arranged my letters using a T-square to keep my rows straight and scotch tape to hold my letters in place for tracing.

Using a pencil I carefully traced around each letter. Hint: I had placed the scotch tape only on the straight sides of each letter so that I could easily fill in that gap once the tape was removed.

Once all of my tracing was complete, I began to carefully paint each letter using black acrylic paint.  I used two different sized brushes for this part. A 1/2″ brush for filling in and a 1/8″ brush for the edges and small details.

You can sort of see here that some of the edges aren’t perfectly sharp (like the arrow) so after my paint had dried I went back over each detail with a black sharpie to make everything perfect.

Okay so please ignore that disgusting sheer green drapery panel that was left by the previous tenant. Why is it still there? Probably because I completely forget about it until I’m leaving the house everyday ha! It’s coming down tonight I promise!

I just love how it turned out! The whole project only took me about 2.5 hours and was completely free because I already had all of the supplies. Tonight I plan to tape off the edges of the foam core and paint them black to create a nice detail around the border. What do you guys think?

When I finally gave it to him we all watched as he flipped through it reminiscing over each photo. When he finished he told me it was the best gift he had ever received. Here are a few of my favorite pages.

The book I chose was 8″ x 10″ hardback book that was hand-bound and wrapped in red linen cloth, and held 98 photos. I was  I was a little nervous about the quality of the book because I’ve been disappointed in the past by other photo books I’ve made from other companies, but I heard really great things about Pinhole Press, and when I received it I was totally blown away. I wish these photos really captured the quality and tooth of the paper. Simply perfect. I truly think this will be something we will all look back at over time and our children will get to enjoy one day. I think this is just such a wonderful keepsake, and I plan to make one with all of our wedding photos soon. Happy Birthday Daddy :)

1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14

Clearly there is a striped obsession happening, but I mean it’s me. Are we really surprised? Please don’t think we really bought a $50 dog bowl for little Geoffrey. I actually scored a pair of these at HomeGoods a few weeks ago for $15! And you can also get a zillion of those pooper scooper bags at HomeGoods for like $2. They have amazingly cheap pet stuff! We found that carrot at Petsmart a couple weeks ago. It was his very first toy and he is OBSESSED with it. I can’t find it on their website, but they definitely still have them in store. In fact my parents’ cherubs each got one as well. So random! But then when I googled it, apparently it was Bolt’s favorite toy too! I totally forgot about that. And Geoffrey sort of looks like Bolt. It was meant to be :) Oh and he LOVES tennis balls. He tries to bring all three of them back to me at once, so one is in his mouth and he’s kicking (and tripping) the other two back to me. Favorite.

I’m sure you’re probably looking at that car seat and thinking. Really? But it’s purely for safety reasons. Heaven forbid we get in a wreck, we don’t want our little boy flying through the windshield or getting beat up by an air bag, so when we travel we have in hooked in in the back seat with his blanket and some toys and he just lays down and sleeps, which makes us feel more at ease for such a log trip.

What are your favorite puppy items that we should know about? I feel like everyone and their mom has that little hedgehog toy.

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Aren’t these ideas lovely? I just love the impact they create in a space. I have a couple of large blank canvases I plan to attack this week, so hopefully I’ll have something to share with you guys soon. I think our dining room walls will be the first to conquer :)

Today is May 15th. 27 years ago Catharine Stevens was born to a loving family who gave her a great home and endless love. Six months ago she married me (the boy) and changed my life forever. I think her parents did an amazing job raising her and I’m lucky to share in her life. I’m so glad we were able to find each other so soon in life because we have so much to look forward to together.

Please join me in wishing the Girl a very Happy Birthday!

You will need:

1 egg

2 tbsp unsalted butter, melted

2 tbsp peanut butter

1 cup buttermilk

1 tsp vanilla extract

1 cup all purpose flour

1 tbsp brown sugar

1 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp baking soda

1/2 tsp salt

5 slices cooked bacon, cooled and chopped into small pieces
really, you can have as much bacon as you’d like

Step One:

Start off by cooking your bacon however you’d like. I pan fried mine, but you could bake yours in the oven or whatever you prefer. Let cool, then chop into small pieces and set aside.

Step Two:

Beat together eggs, butter, peanut butter, buttermilk, and vanilla.

Step Three:

Add your flour, brown sugar, baking powder, baking soda, and salt. Mix well until smooth(ish) and add your bacon pieces.

It’s going to look pretty lumpy, but smell amaaaaaazing!

Step Four:

Heat your frying pan over medium-low heat and add some oil, butter, or cooking spray to your pan for easy flipping.

Step Five:

Pour 2 tbsp of batter onto your pan. These cook up just like regular pancakes so leave them on one side until bubbles star to pop and then flip them.

Once they are golden brown they are ready to go, and just repeat this until your batter is gone.

I ended up making a double batch which easily fed four people. I can’t even describe the taste sensation with the babies. It’s ooey-gooey peanut buttery which makes them a lot moist-er than regular ol’ pancakes with little pockets of salty bacon. SO good. You have to make them!

Recipe derived from here.

Remember two+ years ago when you thought graduate school was never going to end? And we wondered how on earth we were going to get through it together with everything going on in our lives? That first semester, I was in the process of getting licensed so I was studying too which meant I was out of your hair. Good timing right? But then those next three semesters I wasn’t as busy so I was worried that I was going to bug you too much when you needed to be working on studio. But then you solved that problem and asked me to marry you. Good thinking! Then I spent that next year planning a wedding and leaving you alone (for the most part). Can you believe we actually got married the week of your finals. Who does that? I think it made our trip to Rome all the more relaxing though knowing you didn’t have to go back to school for a couple of weeks. But then I thought, “wait there is one more semester, how am I not going to drive him crazy?” But then we moved and got a puppy and I’ve been totally distracted with house projects and cuddle fests. See? You always thank me for supporting you for these past two years, but really you’re just the master of distraction.

Anyway, I am so so so proud of you for getting your Masters in Architecture (and for being offered a full-time position with the firm), and I’m so excited to finally live our lives as newlyweds without having to worry about homework or you spending all night in the studio while having to work the next morning. Here’s to trips to the dog park, aimless window shopping at La Cantera, weekend getaways, and cappuccinos every Saturday morning at our favorite spot. I love you, and now whenever we have to make stupid decisions (like where to eat for dinner or what movie to see) you have to decide because you are officially more qualified ;)

 Your Wife

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In honor of tonight’s graduation ceremony, I made Derek a little celebratory cake. Also known as the cake that took all day. It was totally worth it though to see the look on his face.

Why yes, that is an ostrich on top in lieu of a roadrunner because let’s face it. They don’t really make toy roadrunners. Or at least ones I could pick up at Michael’s on short notice. His first words were “what’s with the ostrich?” but then died laughing when I explained.

I made the layers orange and blue for his alma mater. The blue layer was actually a blue velvet cake, while the orange was vanilla.

 It was a big hit! And considering it’s two cakes combined, we’ll be feasting on this sucker for a while, which works out considering Wednesday is MY birthday! Weeee!

PS: Here is the recipe for vanilla layer (and frosting), and here is the recipe for the blue velvet layer

Don’t get me wrong, I know all of the things that have to get done, but for some reason the days can just sort of get away from me and I lose sight of some of the household items. It happens. So this cute little chart helps both of us know what to help with each day so that these items don’t pile up and start to feel overwhelming.

It’s a pretty basic system really. There are the daily items that we both do (you guessed it) daily. These include pretty easy items that should sort of just come naturally. Then we take turns (or help each other, depending on the task) to complete the chore of the day which is usually a more taxing chore like vacuuming or scrubbing the sinks, tub, and toilet (fun!). We made Thursdays our “swing day” this is the day that we complete the super annoying chores that really only need to be done monthly like descaling, steam cleaning, etc. And that’s it!

Something so silly and childish really does make a huge difference and kind of makes chores fun (???) So.. do any of you use a chore chart (and are over 10 years old)? Do you love it? Is yours on the fridge too? Is it laminated? Okay neither is ours.

Oh hey! Remember that one time that I said I was super busy and then took a 4 day blog break on accident and then decided to mess around with some of the coding on said blog last night and accidentally discombobled the existing .CSS stylesheet without saving a copy of it first which then caused me to spend hours on the phone with our tech support which ended up amounting to nothing and caused me to stay up until 2am last night redesigning the entire blog from scratch and thus writing you today the longest sentence in the history of time which happens to not have a single comma?

All of that to say that I hope you enjoy the new layout. Be sure to have a looksie, get comfortable, and most importantly let me know if anything is looking a little wonky. I am fresh out of coconut water and therefore my brain is mush.

I promise to be back to regular posting tomorrow considering one of my biggest deadlines will be completed today. Woo!