my new bedstand

today i received a most wonderful gift from my beloved.





he found these wonderfully old and rusted sewing tables, and cleaned them up. he then mixed and poured his own concrete to make custom table tops. this is table number 3, and my favorite. it has a little ledge where i can either set water bottles to quench my thirst, or place my nightly reads.

i am also very excited to place the vase with the preserved hydrangias. we experimented with table decorations for our wedding, since we really wanted to add our own touch. we came up with the covered green s. pellegrino bottles, another creation of my beloved. he is so creative! i love it!

isomorphix art

kate towers . . .

. . . is an incredible designer! i love her collection of beautiful dresses. if i could i would wear a dress every day; this has been a desire since childhood. kate towers designed exaclty the dresses that i always wished to wear. she is a self-taught designer in portland, or (katetowers.com), and some day i hope to create what she can create.

i absolutely love this white dress. as a young girl i was very fond of the movie polyanna and this dress reminds me of her. i would try to make my own dresses that would resemble that of pollyanna. i am excited to see that i still have that little girl in me.

this yellow dress would make a perfect wedding dress. wearing a white dress was not of importance to me, and i just did not come across the dress that i loved, so when i came across kate towers after my wedding, and i wish i had seen this dress earlier.

i made my own wedding dress, and it turned out so much better than i could have ever imagined for myself! the wedding preparation was a wonderful experience for me, and i am sure that the experience of making my own weding dress, added even more excitement for the big day. i wish i could have a wedding every few years, so that i could make my own dresses over and over again!

tracie faust photography traciefaust.com

with the move/job change/back to school, i am very excited to be able to dress up nicely without worrying that i am coffee staining/bleaching/grease staining my shoes, pants and dresses. working at a cafe has ruined some of my favorite clothes, as well as shoes. a class room setting sounds pretty safe. i am excited about starting a new part of my life: getting my masters, and moving to pasadena, ca. siloam springs, ar just does not offer what i want life to offer. i am very much excited to have direct access to an anthropologie. this is just one outfit that i wish i could wear to work tomorrow:


anthropologie.com

during the summer, we try to have fresh flowers in our house at least once a week. we have accumulated a great amount of vases, but i must say we always choose a pitcher instead of a vase. we received the ona vase as a wedding gift, and we absolutley love it!

we love to use it for s. pellegriono when we have guests, but we have noticed that it holds flowers very nicely. today i came across the acutal vase crate and barrel has for sale.

an aquaintance of mine shared that she uses vases for ice tea when she has guests, and even thought the ona vase would be hard to pour out of, i think it would be beautiful decoration with sliced lemons and limes in it.

i am loving all things citrus right now. tomorrow we receive our orange blossom scented candles from l'occitane (usa.loccitane.com)

we had bought the candle on our trip to chicago for a wedding of a dear friend. we drove to st louis and then took the amtrak to chicago, which turned out to be a great way to travel. on the trip home, we stopped in st. louis to eat at cheesecake factory. we walked passed the l'occitane store, and dustin smelled something he liked, so naturally we inqiured about the smell. we walked out with a lemon verbana scent candle and this orange blossom candle. we opened the orange blossom candle in the car and we had a very nice smelling ride home. every now and then the sweet aroma would reach our noses. it is the most pleasntly subtle smell. i have been watching the price and they went on sale, so i bought a bunch.

we woke up early to venture off to the fayetteville farmers market. it was a busy day for all the local farmers; it is always nice to see the appreciation and support for local farmers. we bought our week upply of fresh bell peppers, kolrabi, and squash.

this weekend was also owner's appreciation for ozark natural foods (ozarknaturalfoods.com). it is so nice to know that the steak you buy is grass fed, the laundry detergent is good to the environment, the produce is organic, and the cheese is marvelous.

we also bought materials to start the process of making our own lampshades. we bought two lovely table lamps from amandromeda (amandromeda.com) with missing shades. the day before i had been browsing designspongeonline.com and came across a diy for gold plated rocks .

i had collected some flat, black river rocks when dustin and i went to the river a few weeks ago. i did not intend to use them for anything specific, so what better way to use them, then for a lamp shade?! i am very excited to see how they turn out.