Another fun-filled Tyler weekend

I was born and raised in Tyler, TX which is about three hours from where we live now. People have a really common misconception that it is a po-dunk (real word?) cow town, which is pretty funny considering College Station isn't exactly a thriving metroplex (although it is a perfectly sized college town). Tyler is about 150,00-200,000 and is growing like crazy at the moment. It has pretty good shopping and restaurants, a nice mix of chain and local places, famous roses and azaleas, and is home to the Greenberg turkey. ( If you haven't tried a Greenberg do yourself a favor and order one next Thanksgiving, hey Oprah does! )

Ryan and Marissa, some friends of ours, are coming with us so it should be a really fun weekend. I hope you have a good one too!

Office Makeover (sneak preview)

So my mom came in town last Monday night for operation Office Makeover. Like I mentioned before she is the absolute guru when it comes to decoration and design, I was so excited to get her advice on how to give my office a little face lift. As my friend Patrick so graciously put it, "This is just a steel toilet away from being a prison cell." Thanks Patrick.

Needless to say things are looking up, way up. We unloaded a few large Anthropologie and Pottery Barn bags from the back of my mom's car and it was like Christmas morning. It's not quite finished yet so I can't put up before and after pictures, but I will give you a sneak peak of one of my favoritist additions...

Or a couple of them. The lamp is from Anthropologie and I want to marry it.

I have to get a few more frames and hang some things with Jared's help and then it will be finished. I know it seems silly but I spend more time in this room than almost any other place so I'm allowed to be excited, right!? Thanks again mom for all the fabulous splendigs and for making a special trip to help me, love you more than words can say.

Valentine's Goodies

Valentine's Day is the very definition of a double-edged sword, I understand this. If you're single you read about all of the romantic stories and want to barf, if you're in a relationship you want to gush over your significant other - making all the disgruntled single people barf. So I'm going to leave out all of the mushy stuff and just say that I'm very, very grateful to be married to my best friend.

We decided not to do big gifts this year since we can't find that dang money tree! But I did kinda sneak one - I made a photo book (online) of all of our pictures from our first year being married. It's called "The Adventures of Tyan and Jared: Chapter 1" and it just so happens that the delivery date was Feb. 14th, how convenient! It was so much fun going through all the pictures from our honeymoon, decorating our first townhome, our first holidays, etc. I think it's a good tradition and am ecstatic that all of those "2006 Pictures" are no longer haunting me from the computer making me feel guilty for being behind on my scrapbooking.

So tonight we are getting some Olive Garden to-go, giving each other our Valentine's cards and eating at home, I love it. Happy Valentine's Day Love!

(and thanks mom for the Valentine's day care package!!!)

I have the cutest cousins

I love my cousins, they are so cute! My aunt is 12 years older than me and 12 years younger than my mom so she feels more like an older sister to me than an aunt. Her and her husband, Dave, live in the Houston area and have two kids - Ashton and Savannah. They are so much fun and feel more like my neice and nephew rather than cousins.




A few weeks ago I made a trip down there to visit and have my Uncle Dave, a foot surgeon, look at my heel that had been bothering me. (slightly afraid that I would get a lecture on my love for high heels and the grim future of my stiletto wearing feet) He said I had a calcium something or other on my heel bone and needed a shot right into it - yikes. I don't do needles.

So I'm freaking out a little and eight year old Ashton asks if I want him to hold my hand, so cute. So he holds my hand while Dave sprays my heel with cold spray to semi-numb it for the first of three injections. Next thing I know I'm squeezing Ashton's little hand to death and he calmly says "Dad, I think she needs more cold spray".

I hope I didn't give him permanent hand damage. He sure made me feel better and laugh a little! And I'm happy to report that I'm back to wearing heels pain free! I just love living so close to them and going down to visit, they just grow up too fast! Now I sound old...

Bridesmaid Dresses 101

We all know the hideousness that can befall the innocent bridesmaid. The dress - there are endless stories and pictures to prove just how awful it can be. But amid all the stank emerges a few brides who decide not to sprinkle their bridesmaids with ugly dust - one of which is my sister, Kellye. She's getting married this summer and has been diligently searching for a dress that all seven (or so) of her bridesmaids will like, bless you my little KJ. To find such a dress we relied on none other than J.Crew (cue angels singing, light shining from heaven, laughter and happiness).



Okay, so I'm a little bit in love with everything that is J.Crew. They actually have a bridal party section that I LOVE but it is pretty expensive, especially multiplied times seven. This is from their regular dress section and comes in four colors. Since Kellye's colors are shades of yellow and orange we are going with the really saturated yellow - loves. I think it's going to look really summery and chic for the wedding (with a tan and cute heels), and since it doesn't scream bridesmaid I plan on rocking it all summer long. Love you Kel!

Old Mexico 2008 part 3

The finale. Where were we, oh yes - Tulum. What's crazy is that the last picture I posted from Tulum of the beach was straight out of my camera, no digital trickery or editing whatsoever. It's really that beautiful, loved it!

We knew we wanted to go to Tulum from all the amazing things we've heard about it and our driver, Jesus, (Hey-sus people, it's Spanish) was totally pumped to take us, and make a few other stops on the way. First a bit on Jesus - he's pretty much the coolest guy ever! He served in the Mexican army for a while but left because of the corruption (Jared was pumped to hear the Mafia bribing and snake eating stories) and then lived in California for two years working in various places. Then he moved back to Mexico and has several jobs, one of which is a private driver. He told us about his family and his life in Mexico, took our picture at every place we went and bought crackers for us to feed the fish when we went snorkeling. One of the highlights of the trip was getting to meet such amazing people like Jesus.

So when Kellye, Paige and Melissa decided they wanted to fulfill one of their lifelong dreams and swim with the dolphins we called Jesus. It was the coolest place! Not only were there dolphins, but sea lions and manatees too! While they got suited up and watched a safety video about not scratching the dolphins and such we checked out the sea lions. They reminded me of Chauncey for some reason.

Then the dolphin adventure began, in all its glory. Now we went on a "swim with the dolphins" excursion once before on a cruise that turned out to be more of a "stand in the same water with the dolphins and watch them swim by you very closely" kind of thing, but this was the real deal. They pet the dolphins, got dolphin kisses (Kellye's favorite), rode on their fins, and got propelled through the water/air with a "foot push". It was pretty awesome.

The next day Jesus asked where we'd like to eat lunch "inside or on the beach?" That was easy, "On the beach!" I don't even know if the place had a name but it was awesome. Almost everyone there was in a swimsuit and we couldn't understand a thing on the menu, my kind of place. After we ordered, Jared and I took a walk on the beach and officially decided that we love Mexico. The food was delicious and so was the lemonade (which was actually just margarita mix, I'm pretty sure.)

Jared found a baby coconut.

The last big adventure was one of my favorites. Jesus told us about this lagoon and it sounded like paradise. It is a giant pool of fresh water that connects to the ocean, so the fresh water and ocean water mix to make a crystal clear blue lagoon full of fish and some sea turtles and smooth as glass. It was like snorkeling in a freshly cleaned zoo aquarium, like the ones the otters swim in you know? So awesome.

And on the last day we relaxed, shopped the local market, and ate Guacamole until we turned green.

Dad's beach read - "The Coming Economic Collapse" - how relaxing.

Kellye showing a little love to the swan towel.

What a trip, the adventures were great and the beaches were beautiful but during that week I realized that good company is more valuable than anything. Thanks Mom and Dad for the awesome vacation and for getting everyone together, love you more than words can say.

A much needed kitchen makeover

Before

I love the town home that we rent. It's big enough for what we need and pretty inexpensive, but the icing on the cake is that they let us paint to our heart's content! We've painted just about every wall in the  place and it has made a HUGE difference. But no matter how much paint you have there's really no getting around the older appliances and ugly medium toned wood cabinets in the kitchen. We just called up our landlord and asked if we could paint the cabinets and they said they'd come out and do it for us - AWESOME! So I picked out an ivory color to brighten the place up and a week later they looked brand new! 

After

But I couldn't stop there, the DIY bug bit me last week and during a trip to Home Depot I went a little crazy. They had "hammered silver" spray paint that I thought would look great for the cabinet pulls (previously gold), and I also wanted to make a new pegboard wall to hang above the stove like this one from Design Sponge. 

So $40, two cans of spray paint, a few drill lessons later I was pretty pleased with our new kitchen. It's bright and happy and even has a little vintage feel with the green pegboard. Who knew?

   

                                               Before                                                                                   After

A little Blurbage

Everyone loves a good photo album, right? Just not everyone loves putting them together, myself included. I always envision an amazingly crafted book with photo corners on every picture and cute cut-outs that match the theme of the page, but give me a break for real - not happening. I hate those sticky corners and who even cares how cute the page turns out since you have to stick it behind plastic anyway, just not a fan really.

Then my friend and photographer extraordinaire, Megan K., showed me the photo books she makes on her Mac and I became obsessed. I have to admit that it is the main reason I've completely converted from Windows (and am so happy I did, I love it). But the only downside is that it gets a little pricey, and quick.

After a little web research I found this site called Blurb.com which uses the same ink and printers as iPhoto and other high end publishing sites but for much MUCH less. Woohoo! You just download the bookmaker software, upload your photos from your computer (mac or otherwise) and you're off. The only downside is that some of the layout options aren't as user friendly as others such as iPhoto or MyPublisher but the price more than makes up for it in my opinion. Happy digital scrapbook publishing to you all.

Images courtesy of Apple and Blurb

Photoshop here I come

So I may be the only person on earth that has no clue how to do ANYTHING in photoshop, nada. I discovered that we could order the software at a discount since Jared is a full time student (glad there are some kind of perks for paying all this tuition, besides a degree of course) so I ran over to campustech.com and snatched up the new CS3 version with grand hopes of being able to teach myself the ropes in no time. After loading it onto our Mac mini and clicking around for about 30 minutes I had made the same amount of progress I probably would have made by pressing my forehead on the keyboard for 30 minutes straight - wonderful.

So, thoroughly discouraged, I googled everything I could about photoshop for beginners and was quite unsatisfied with the loads of books, DVDs, CDs, and other learning materials I came across. I don't want to read a long book or go through online lessons, I want a download straight to my brain - I just want to know, no learning, just knowing.

After coming back to reality and realizing that I wasn't going to learn through osmosis by holding the box, I found out that the city College Station has tons of "Extra Education" classes (listed here) and Photoshop is one of them - halleluja. Yesterday was my first class and it was awesome. There are ten of us and I'm the youngest by about 40 years, it's so great. I'll never get left behind and I can ask all the questions I want! ( I'm dying to know how my senior citizen classmates even know about Photoshop considering my dad still types with two fingers - love you Dad! )


Anyways, turns out they have tons of cool classes like salsa dancing, basket weaving, critter gardening (not quite sure), guitar basics, and more. Yes, some may be a little geared to grandmas but hey, I like old people and I'm always up for making new friends so my geriatric photoshop class gets two thumbs up.

Feeling like making some stuff...

I get in these kicks every once in a while where I all of a sudden have a million ideas of things I can make/redo around the house and I don't know what to do with them all. Usually this is followed by a trip (or several) to Hobs or Home Depot and each project requires A LOT more time than I originally plan on.

Here are a few that I'm pretty pumped about:

Dark cork board display by design*sponge

Clips for hanging prints by poppytalk

Printable self-mailing notecards from How About Orange

And when I have a lot of time, and the right chair I will attempt to give it as good a makeover as this one also from design*sponge

We'll see how this goes...