crestwood spring festival

thanks so much to everyone who came to the show last night! i'll post a few pictures asap. right now, though, i'd like to announce:

this saturday, april 3 is the crestwood spring festival at girls, inc. in crestwood!

this is a FREE event including art, crafts, live music, photobooths, face painting, inflatable bouncers for the little ones, and an egg hunt at 10:00.

i'm excited about all of it.

handwritten letters will be performing at 12:00 noon. jamie & i will have artwork and mr. fox brand products available for sale -- money made from these sales will be donated to not forgotten, a nonprofit for orphans in peru.

visit www.crestwoodspringfestival.com for more info.

for directions, visit girls, inc. hope to see you there!

weekend report, first steps

isaiah has been pulling up, scooting around, and walking around the house with the help of push-toys and boxes, or leaning against cabinets and walls... for the past six months. when he was seven months old, i was fairly certain that he would be running by the time he was a year old.

14 months

but he waited to take his real first steps, unaided, this weekend. when i held out my hands and encouraged him to "come here!" he simply forgot to make sure he was holding onto something first. during my celebration of those wonderful three little steps, he just had a look on his face that said, "what just happened?"

one of his lastest tricks is unclasping the various instrument cases lying around the house.

guitar case

we had band practice this weekend... and by band practice, i mean we had friends over for dinner, sat around and watched the babies play together, cleaned up after them, prayed that i didn't forget how to play the banjo because it had been so long... and played through the set list quite successfully in between everything else going on. it was a really enjoyable evening.

hope to see you at the show tomorrow night!

shopping

back in november, i shared a little about my shopping habits and what i'd like to change about them. in a nutshell: instead of buying only sale items that i'm not really crazy about, buy fewer, quality items that i really love. and if it happens to be on sale, that's icing on the cake.

the goal is to refine a healthy dose of "pickiness" -- actually saving money by only buying what i truly love. and so far, so good: during the past several months, i feel like i've become more choosy and conscious of how i spend money. even on small things like buying ground coffee beans and a canister of loose leaf tea instead of forming a habit of grabbing tea and coffee to go.

well, this week, i snagged a lovely cupcake -- icing and all.

it started with a little window-shopping at anthropologie. typically, i walk away empty-handed. friends, my budget simply doesn't allow for anthro impulse shopping.

fate

but this time, i left with a most excellent dress. it was simply meant to be. love at first sight to be sure, but i didn't expect it would actually fit. much less fit perfectly.

fantastic fabrics

the icing on the cake: originally $288, marked down, three times, to $69. i'm looking forward to getting lots of wear out of this dress.

pashmina from charming charlie

oh, and the scarf i mentioned from the weekend? seeing as i've worn this thing 3 out of the last 5 days, it's already proving to be $14 well-spent.

show with chris staples

at the risk of tooting my own horn...

i'm in a small folk-ish band called handwritten letters. i play guitar, banjo and happily play a piano if there's one around, and some flute. i write the songs with jamie. he plays guitar & flute. our friend josh plays mandolin and guitar and makes the rest of us sound lovely. we all sing.

handwritten letters

photo by steven devries

we haven't gotten to play much over the last year. it turns out, it's kind of hard to juggle booking, practices, performances etc with work and a less-than-one-year-old baby. but nowadays, isaiah contentedly spends the night with family. suddenly, we have the opportunity to play again.

so! i'm excited to announce a really fun upcoming show:

tuesday, march 30 at bottletree -- chris staples & hwl

chris staples

source: myspace/chrisstaplesmusic

chris's band/solo project is called discover america. he's just released a full-length album called badlands. click here to listen to discover america . click here for even more music, which sounds particularly lovely. he's also a super nice guy, originally from birmingham, now in seattle.

click here to view the bottletree event.

click here to buy tickets.

hope to see you there.

weekend report

bubbles

this weekend, i finally had the opportunity to introduce a dear friend to isaiah. we had a lovely rainy-day lunch. here's to hoping lauren & joel move back to birmingham.

i also had a girls-only shopping trip... just for the fun of it... without isaiah... for the first time, ever. it was lovely. i bought a scarf.

i'm looking forward to announcing some upcoming events involving art and music. stay tuned.

less house, more isaiah

thanks for being patient as i feel like i've written 15 boring posts about our house and pretty much nothing else for the last month or so. the listing process has consumed a lot of my time and energy, but, i'm excited that we've reached a turning point: as of today, our house is finally listed (here) on FS-BO.

i'm really happy with the results. i feel like we've priced it well. seriously, it's the best deal in the neighborhood. this sunday is our first open house!

moving on.

today, isaiah and i spent a good part of the day at my grandparents house. it. was. great. we ate, we lazed around, we chatted, and we watched isaiah play with everything. i'm determined to visit them much more often.

horsey ride

pickup truck

also: isaiah now has a "big boy" carseat. we have not yet installed it, which means it's sitting around in the house... so, isaiah uses it as a tiny la-Z-boy.

this picture is so ridiculous... i love it.

he will sit and play contentedly in that thing for almost an hour. if the novelty doesn't wear off, i may never install it and just keep it around for entertainment.

have a fantastic weekend, friends!

weekend report, FSBO v. FS-BO

yesterday, a photographer from forsale-byowner.com -- not to be confused with forsalebyowner.com with whom we've already listed -- came over to take pictures of our immaculate house. for the shoot, they had sent us a checklist of things to do ahead of time: de-clutter, hide soft soap dispensers, area rugs, the toaster... in some ways, make it look like no one actually lives there.

so, we spent the weekend hiding things in our closets and cars... and taking multiple breaks to watch the office. two weeks ago, we were working our way through season 2. now we're in the middle of season 5. do we have a problem? i digress.

actually, it was pretty easy to get ready for the pictures. i mean, we've been de-cluttering since january -- getting rid of piles of things we don't need, cleaning, taking our own pictures for the blog about our house, gearing up for open houses, etc.

but, do pictures really look that much better by hiding the toaster?

we shall see. our house will be up on their website by the end of the week. i'll keep you posted.

my owl barn -- a giveaway

i just stumbled upon my owl barn, a lovely blog "for owlovers."

noel ILL owl tote

source: my owl barn

my owl barn is hosting a giveaway -- this cute owl tote by noel ILL... and it's not too late to enter!

weekend report

it's starting to feel like spring around here.

strawberry plant

we did a lot of yard work this weekend, and it was nice to get out. after the work was done, we treated ourselves with a few plants.

sweet basil and romaine lettuce

i've missed you, basil.

diana update, roll three

i'm happy with the results of my third roll of film using the diana. i was particularly excited about this one because i got to use my new wide-angle lens. i've been enjoying the large 12-shot format, too. here are a few of my favorites:

a typical breakfast for me, with the best boy ever.

birthday lunch. (the wide angle is pretty evident on this shot, no?)

playtime.

isaiah, in his usual spot around 6:00 pm, refusing to let us dress him.

i'm now working my way through my first roll of color film. i'll keep you posted.

mini weekend report

this weekend was super-lazy in the best possible way, and i have no pictures to prove it.

we nestled in, worked a little, played some music, had a couple of lovely dinners with friends and family, and...

the office season two

source: amazon.com

watched a. lot. of the office season two. jamie & i have kind of started a marathon of watching it in excited anticipation of season six picking back up this week.

i know. we are complete nerds.

our house is for sale!

jamie & i have put our house on the market!

i've created a blog at 2815southwoodlane.blogspot.com with lots of pictures and details that we weren't able to fit on the for-sale-by-owner listing.

click HERE for the blog with lots of pictures.

click HERE for the official FSBO listing (#21131300).

we will have open house every sunday from 1:00-4:00.

thanks for checking it out and passing it along to anyone who might be interested!