November 23rd

Since I had taken a shower tonight after working out (yippie for me!) I decided to try and attempt the perfect blow out on my hair. This was a big fat fail with less than desirable results. My hair was completely dry before I could even get the round brush in my hair correctly. How does anyone accomplish this task with only two hands?? After the attempt I ended up using my straightener to get out the kinks.

I've always lusted after celeb hair. I know they probably have stylists around them 24-7 but I can't help but thinking maybe, somehow, someway, I could have hair like theirs. Here are a few of my ultimate favs:

Jennifer Aniston

Lauren Conrad

Audrina Patridge

Gretchen Rossi

On a side note...I've lost 5 pounds! Hooray!

November 22nd

Today was cold, rainy, and all around nasty outside which makes for an excellent lets-stay-in-bed type day. Danny and I finally managed to drag ourselves out of bed only minutes before noon. It felt fantastic to sleep in that late. After some lunch and puttering around we decided to make a trip to Garden Ridge.

Along the way I noticed on Facebook that our friend Brandon was in town from Chicago. He and his parents happened to already be in Greenville so we made some quick plans to meet at Haywood Mall and have a quick chat to catch up. It was great to see him.

While we were at the mall Danny noticed that Rack Room Shoes had tons of boots on sale. I love it when my husband likes that same fashion trend that I do. Meet my latest:

Camden by Limelight

Another adorable pair of boots for my collection and on sale for $30! Too sweet of a deal to pass up. We also went to Belk but neither one of us were really in the mood to try on clothes.

When we actually made it to Garden Ridge I felt like I was in a shopping funk. I adore this shop. It's one of my all time favorites. I also adore Christmas. Why was it that I had no desire to want to buy everything in sight? The only thing we ended up purchasing was another covered trash for the bathroom (the dog loves to pull out all the tissues and tear them into a bazillion little pieces).

I hate to say it, but I think it's still too early for Christmas even for me. Danny and I have plans to put up our Christmas decorations this Friday. I'm hoping since Thanksgiving will be officially over I will have the Christmas spirit stirring inside of me.

November 21st

Today was a good day in college football. Boston College lost their game against UNC and Clemson won their game against UVA which means the Clemson Tigers are officially the ACC Champions! It was a really fun game to be at and the crowd was definitely pumped up. After the game, Danny and I went to the Sloan's and Stapleton's tailgate to celebrate with good food, great friends, and champagne of course!

the start of pregame

fly over during God Bless America

senior twirlers during their last home game

Tiger Dancers

honoring the fallen

halftime show

us

dancing after a touchdown

the Tiger

me and Candie

hooray!

November 18th

I love shoes! What truly girlie-girl doesn't? With that being said I now introduce you to the newest member of my shoe family:

Tribeca Now and Ten

Aren't they adorable? I'm always a little weary of ordering shoes online because I have so many issues (car accident which led to surgery on my ankle, blah blah blah) but with Zappos you get free shipping and free return shipping if they don't work, so what's the risk? I'm completely in love. They have the elastic sides so the shoe doesn't fall off my heel. There's enough room for my orthotic inserts. They're closed toe so I can wear them on the production floor. Perfect!

November 17th

I want to be that wife. You know the type. That wife that always has a home cooked meal on the table. That wife that keeps a clean house always, and does it in pearls. That wife that always looks fabulous and polished. The wife that is the ultimate housewife. How's a girl to do this and have a nine to five job at the same time? It's nearly impossible. What happened to the period of Doris Day? In her movies she was that wife.

How can you not adore her? The answer is -- you can't.

I whole heartedly believe that not only was I born in the wrong part of the country (I know I was always meant to be a southern girl), but also I was born in the wrong time period. I would love to live during the 1950s when the husband brought home the bacon and the wife cooked it. I've never been interested in having a career or climbing the corporate ladder. I want to be a wife and a mother. What's so wrong with that?

Unfortunately we now live in a time period where women are treated as equals (although I don't believe in that hoopla) so into the working world I must go. Even if Danny wasn't totally against me staying at home I never could because we can't afford it. These days the husband has to be a doctor or a lawyer (or something like that) to afford to support his wife and family on one paycheck. One word for that...lame.

Since I wasn't born in the 1950s I can just live vicariously through my favorite movies...Pillow Talk, Please Don't Eat the Daisies, Lover Come Back, Send Me No Flowers, and this list goes on....

November 14th & 15th

This weekend was very laid back and relaxed. Since Danny didn't get home from work Friday night until 2 in the morning, I let him sleep in on Saturday. I tackled more of the mess in our hallway (that has now spread itself into one of the guest rooms). I nearly have everything organized. I now need to hall it all up into the attic and bring my donate pile to the shop in town. It took much longer than I wanted it to, but I feel a relief to purge all the unnecessary junk.

Saturday afternoon we went to a baby shower for my coworker and his wife. We ended up scooting out early because we were offered USC/Florida tickets last minute. I felt a bit guilty for doing this, but I knew keeping Danny at the shower was torture. Since the tickets were spur of the moment, I wasn't dressed properly for a football game. I had worn heels, cute heels, but heels nonetheless and my feet were not happy. We ended the day with dinner at Olive Garden, yum!

Sunday we went to one of Danny's favorite shows ever, the gun and knife show at the Jamil Temple. His latest gun lust is a pistol for me so we looked around for what I'd be comfortable with. This is what we found:

As far as guns go, it's pretty darn cute. Looks like I might be getting a pistol for Christmas.

November 13th

While my plan to continue to organize and clean tonight totally backfired, I'm completely ok with that. Instead I turned the tv to Bravo (First Wives Club and now Legally Blonde), made a fire all by myself (the hubs is still at work), put on my favorite VS Pink Clemson sweats, and starting looking at blogs. Ahhhhh sounds like a pretty good Friday night to me.

made by me!

My night was made even better when I received this email:

CONGRATULATIONS! You've won the $50 credit to One Kings Lane! :) Please let me know what e-mail address you are registered under and I will put the credit in your account right away. Have a wonderful weekend!

I will most definitely have a wonderful weekend!  For those of you that don't know about One Kings Lane I highly suggest signing up. It's free and as a member you have access to daily sales on uber cuteness! Check it out.

While perusing some of my fav blogs I came across this Ethan Allen style quiz. Below are my results:

The verdict is in—your style is Estate. Estate is an eternal American summer. Sporty. Charming. Breezy yet cultivated. A union of antique inspiration and geometric clarity. Civilization in peaceful coexistence with robust outdoor life. In the main house or the guest cottage, effortless elegance.

I could not agree more with the results! I adore all of these inspiration rooms. Also Danny and I are starting the search for a house of our very own. I get to decorate all over again! Phrase of the day, "decorating is fun!" (since that's the phrase that won me the $50 to One Kings Lane).

November 12th

I love organizing! I do. I really enjoy separating, throwing away, donating, repacking, labeling and simplifying my things. With this being said, the mess of stuff in my hallway at home is driving me insane. As you know, Danny and I cleaned out my parents' attic of all of my childhood toys and mementos and stacked everything into our hallway. Ugh! Can you say pack rat?

As I've begun to open all of these boxes I can only laugh at the things I've kept. Why in the world would I keep some of this stuff?

high school art projects: I didn't like these "masterpieces" when I created them in the first place - trash
old clothes that have paint all over them: trash
left over notebooks from middle school: they only have a few unused pages in them - trash
winnie-the-pooh window clings: they have faded and melted into one big ball of goo - trash
candles: they were in an attic in South Carolina for 6 years - trash
pocketbooks, book bags, totes: from middle school days - donate
yard sale trinkets: I kept nearly every trinket my grandmother and I had ever picked up at a yard sale - donate

Our garbage is going to be overflowing this week, but it feels so good to purge all of this stuff. Now that I've gone through and separated into trash, donate, and keep I'm repacking all of the keep.

Barbies: I had forgotten just exactly how many I owned!
American Girl dolls: I have Molly and one you got to name yourself (I named her Christina if you're wondering)
stuffed animals: enough to fill a huge rubbermaid plus some (mom called and said she found two more boxes full of them)
children's books: my grandparents gave me all the classics
porcelain box collection: I need another china cabinet just to display these
my grandmother's china tea cups
a few figurines that have sentimental value

I'll be so excited when all of this is done. All of this organizing makes me want to dig into other closets and boxes and purge. I just hate having clutter!

November 10th

After work Danny and I went to one of my favorite places right now, Hancock Fabrics. Ever since I got my sewing machine last birthday I've been a little obsessed with sewing. I adore all the projects. I had vowed not to buy anything until I transformed all of the stacks of fabic, buttons, and patterns into items of clothing, but Danny is such a horrible influence.

This is my newest project:

I'm going to make vest A with this fleece:

I'm having second thoughts on the color but it's too late now since the fabric was cut and purchased. Luckily it was on sale for $3.99 a yard and I only needed one yard for the vest. If I absolutely hate it I only invested maybe $7 total into the whole thing.

We also purchased black out material to cover the windows in our gameroom. We're turning it into a temporary photo studio. Danny's high school friend Kris is coming over this Sunday for Danny to take belly pictures (she's eight months pregnant). He's always been interested in photography. It's hard not to be when your father is a photographer. Recently Danny purchased studio lights off ebay. Hopefully we can get things going and have our own little photography business on the side. I have the creativity and Danny has the skills. I think it could be a fun hobby for the both of us to do together.

November 10th

I've been looking at the J. Crew website and I'm falling in love with nearly everything. It's all so gorgeous, but so expensive. So I got to thinking...what if I could take the things I love at J Crew and find them somewhere else?

Here is what I've found:

J. Crew $98

NY & Co.  $39.95

J. Crew $178

Old Navy $26.50

J. Crew $58

Old Navy $26.50

J. Crew $68

Old Navy $24.50

So it seems totally possible to have the look of J. Crew on a budget. There is one particular tab on the website that I'm loving though -- the instant gratification tab. Everything on this page is under $100.

I'm also drooling over this coat... (totally not on the instant gratification page)

Anyone want to go shopping at the J. Crew outlet??

November 7th

Holy amazing football, Batman! The Clemson vs. FSU football game could only be described as unbelievable, because that's what we kept saying after the game -- "I just don't believe it!" It was a 7:45pm kickoff which left plenty of time for tailgating and fun before the game.

Danny and I started off the day by going to The Tiger Sports Shop because I was having a bit of a meltdown. I had forgotten to pack a belt and my pants were not staying put (the perials of having no booty but lots of hip). Thankfully I found a really cute Clemson belt to fix the problem. Now that the crisis was averted, we could continue our day. We also stopped at the Ace Hardward to brouse around before going to campus.

The weather was just beautiful during the day. It was a day made for football. Without a cloud in the sky, the colorful leaves on the trees sparkled in the sunshine. We set up our tailgate with Neil, Jason, Jeff, and Ferrell then about an hour later Shannon and her family, Martha, Mickey, and Kelly, added on. We had quite the spread and enjoyed eating, drinking, and playing some games. Ferrell and I spent about the first 30 minutes sewing together bean bags for corn hole.

Last weekend when Shannon and I went shopping in downtown Clemson she fell in love with a vest from The Tiger Sports Shop. Apparently it had been on her mind the entire week so we made the hike from the corner of Perimeter and Cherry all the way downtown to get her vest. It was a nice the little walk that I'm hoping helped out with all of the food I ate. It's a really cute reversible Columbia vest that I'm pretty jealous of. This would be another good Christmas gift (size small). *hint hint*

Once the sun went down the temperature quickly followed. Good thing we had brought plenty of layers as well as hand warmers. I was also wearing my Uggs and luckily my feet never got cold. It was probably warmer in the stadium than outside the stadium just from the sheer volume of people crammed into the stands. The game was very exciting although we couldn't kick a field goal or the extra point to save our lives. In the end the Tigers pulled out a victory and we are still in the running for the ACC Championship. My fingers are crossed.

me and Alisha

Shannon making the coleslaw

me and Neil

Mickey and Martha

my bestest Shannon and me

Danny and Jeff

me and the hubby

Kerri leading the parade to Death Valley

twirlers Kelly and Savannah

Clemson welcomes you to Death Valley

the most exciting 25 seconds of college football...the only part I miss about Tiger Band

the final score!