puppy love!

this past Sunday we drove 7 hours (RT) to meet and bring home our new little girl Luna. She is a corgi/husky mix with big paws and full of love! our first little lady Ruby who was also a corgi mix passed away almost 4 months ago, she was the best pup in the whole wide world! even though we wanted to lay low and not get another pup for a while we couldn't stand it anymore, we are "dog" people, we need a pup in our lives to feel like our family is complete. so i went onto petfinder.com and found 3 1/2 month "Bella" (now Luna) through Adams county Pet Rescue, an amazing group of volunteers who keep the animals at their homes until they are adopted. because they are a no kill shelter some families have had their foster animals for over 2 years, such amazing folks!
after going through the adoption process (and a few emails back and forth) we went out and met her and then..... we fell in love and knew she was ours! the long drive was worth it, she is a sweet, smart, calm-ish, happy little gal and we can't imagine our lives without her! Isn't she adorable?!

ps ~ remember to be a responsible pet owner and spay or neuter your pets.

little miss ruby roo. we miss you sweetie, xoxo mama

arrow & apple giveaway!

Now here's a bonus gift any bride & groom would love, over at A Beautiful Mess she is holding a lovely giveaway given by Arrow & Apple a super talented duo that photograph weddings (and other engagements) and design pretty awesome stuff(ps they are from the Seattle area too!). Now this giveaway isn't for everyone but it's a good one if you happen to fit the bill ; )

"Here's the fine print: 

This giveaway open for every bride & groom getting married between now and December 31, 2012. The iPad will be given after the wedding, and fully loaded up with all of your wedding photographs! This giveaway is available with each of our wedding packages. To receive the iPad giveaway, contract and deposit must be received by midnight of July 30th. Arrow & Apple is based in the Tacoma, WA area, although most of our weddings are spread out across the United States! We love traveling to photograph all of our exceptionally fun, unique and crazy-about-eachother couples. We hope you'll not be a stranger and send us an email, even just to make friends! To enter and find out more about our wedding packages, email hello AT arrowandapple DOT com with your wedding date and some fun details, and mention A Beautiful Mess!"

via A Beautiful Mess

Even if you aren't getting married soon you should check out Arrow & Apples website anyway, they have some pretty darn good packages for photo shoots any couple, family or person would love.

Hmm... I wonder if I can pull together a quick little "renew our vows" wedding before the cut off date? ; ) This August 12th is our 11 year anniversary and 20 years together date and we are still madly in love!

all photos via arrow & apple.

ze o ze modular shoe

now these are pretty inventive shoes but i wonder if they are strong enough to not flex under your weight? i go through my shoes like crazy so i'd have to test these suckers out before deciding they are the most brilliant shoes invented ; ) find out more here.
via design milk

TATTLY

Tina Roth Eisenberg over at Swissmiss just launched this super fun and designy temporary tattoo shop Tattly. She's collaborated with a bunch of designers to bring us some pretty awesome tats, and hey if you can't decide on just one you can get the Launch special everything pack but hurry that ones only available for a short time!
via design milk.

Salsa verde with a good for you twist!

Hello friends, I hope you had a lovely weekend. Ours was pretty low key but we did have a chance to finally lounge around and relax... so needed.
Now I can make a pretty kick ass salsa verde that everyone loves but here's a recipe I found for one that uses spinach!? As a vegetarian I am always looking for yummy ways to add a little more iron to my diet so this salsa really sparked my interest and that photo just makes me drool! I haven't tried it yet but I hope to before the week is over, if you make it please let me know how it turned out.
via today's nest.

Have a happy weekend!

i know the post have been a little spotty these days but i'll be back to normal at the end of summer vacation. we have had a lovely few weeks of camping, hiking, boating and many a road trip and play date. i hope you've had a lovely summer too!

Office sneak Peek

it's been a slow and sometimes frustrating process mixed in with a lot of fun and now we're closer to being done with my hubbies office makeover. we have a very limited budget at the moment but in a few months we'll be able to add a few additional touches that will really make the place pop! we decided to make the conference table ourselves (well almost), we ending up finding a large 4' x 8' slab of bamboo at ecohaus and then commissioned a local welder to make the legs. now we just need to cut a foot off the width and assemble everything. we have the chairs for the conference table and i'll be hitting ikea for the storage shelving even though i soooooo wanted to have kerf make our shelves (waaayyy out of our budget). i also need to pick up some more bamboo slabs so we can make a tall pony wall for the little "lounge" area and another book shelf to match the ones currently in the space even though i am not a big fan but i do have a little makeover in store for those too ; )
anyway let's get to the fun stuff..... a sneak peek at the design inspiration! can you guess what we went with? ; )

images are from the web and just gathered over the months, please let me know if you are not okay with me posting your image

Elding Oscarson

I am loving the magazine wall that architects Elding Oscarson designed for a graphic design agency in Stockholm. You can even see them assembling the wall here. I'm also gushing over the conference room table and mustard chairs! Everything looks so fresh and cool.
via apartment therapy

Embroidered canvas portraits

These embroidered portraits by the talented Daniel Kornrumpf are flippin' amazing! You are able to magnify the image on his website and every delicious detail pops out at you! Could I gush anymore over these portraits, yeah I probably could and his other amazing art too ; ) I've been wanting to embroider a thing or two but now I may need to sit back and rethink this idea because nothing I do will come close to this. I did receive two sweet embroidered gifts from my darling little neighbor and her lovely mama, a horse on a handmade pouch & an owl on a home sewn tea towel. Thank you ladies I love them so!
via the Diversion Project.

The anywhere tub for two or four

Weltevree makes so many fun and innovative things but I have to say this bright Dutchtub2/4 made me want to take a soak right away. I love how it uses wood to heat up the water and that it is portable enough to take anywhere your heart desires. Now you just have to decide on a color!
via i can't remember, Mrs. Lilien styling house

they also designed this wheelbench!

DIY for under $10

this was a fun easy diy, i bought a blouse for $2.99 at goodwill, it's a nice simple flowing rayon. I had a bottle of rit dye waiting to be used but if you need to buy some it's only $3.99 a bottle, then started dipping and dying! so easy and it looks great but i do think i may dip the bottom, what do you think?

 

homemade decals made from contact paper about $3.99 - $5.00 a roll. again super easy, just draw your design, cut and stick up! this design used very little of the roll so i had enough left over to contact paper a few more things.

i thought about doing this but just never got around to grabbing a million paint chip samples at my local hardware store ; ) but hey it's a free diy! i love the soft colors and the no commitment to any one color, and did i mention it's free!
via cozy little cave.

diy eco friendly art, i love this one because it's pretty much free and it's really pretty sculpture art made out of toilet paper roll ends. i'm going to have the kids help me with this one, i think we'll paint the inside white and then have a few pops of color here and there or maybe just the pop of color kind of like the one below via the rockin' diy'ers over at chezerbey. i think we can call this one free, right?
via here