First Few Photos...

Breaking my blog silence...to bring you some photos from our session with the totally fabulous Jenny Jimenez - she is amazing! These are just the first few but I had to share, it's our first "forealsies" photos together. Pearl was quite a ham, very photogenic, I'm sure you'll agree :)

Gorgeous Kids Wallpaper

How lovely are these wallpapers by Hibou Home? They might even be so cute to justify installing wallpaper! {available through Rockett St. George, via Poppytalk on Babble}

Log Cabin aka Log Recording Studio

Check out this awesome "log cabin" that my good blog tipper, Alicia, sent me! Built by Piet Hein Eek for a musician who needed an inspiring place to play music. It's also a recording studio! Alicia and I agreed though that the interior needs some decorative flair - a little Apartment Therapy love and color perhaps. I think that the monochromatic blue isn't doing much for the tiny space. {via trendir}

Bookworm Christmas

This is for my friend Josiane:

Totally adorable.

Re-purposed Horse Stall Doors

LOVE how they re-purposed these doors from a horse stall to add character to simple bar and pantry shelving. {via ApartmentTherapy}

Paper Elegance

How awesome is this and how fabulous would it be if you used glitter paper?! I'm thinking of so many different ways you could make one of these paper chandeliers: for a nursery, holiday, party, etc. I like the monochromatic look here the best - maybe you could do shades of cranberry for Christmas? And it doesn't require hardly any special materials other than jump rings, a circle punch, dowels, paper and glue. And maybe a good movie to watch while you're putting it all together :)

{from LilSproutCreations via Dooce}

Entertaining n' Stuff

A while back (before I had a job AND school on the agenda), I decided it would be brilliant to host a bachelorette party and then a ladies lunch the very next day. Hu-whaaa? Nawh, it actually all went smoothly and was a lot of fun.

Saturday night: hosting the starting line for the bachelorette party:

I made this Apple Cinnamon Sangria but without some of the fussiness (used more schnapps, didn't let it sit for 4 hours, skipped the "pisco" and honey). I tried to emulate this picture with my apples, but of course it doesn't look quite as perfect. Still cute though, I thought!

Of course we could not forget the obligatory laundry line of panties for the bride. We filed this entire line up with (mostly) impractical underwears :)

Good times were had by all. I know this, because I was a DD and have perfect memory of it all, which was delightful!

Sunday I hosted my first grown-up lunch for The Ladies. It was so much fun! I felt like a real grown-up lady. It was fun to give them all a tour of our house and catch up. It was also the perfect excuse for me to finally buy some of these French Macaroons from Le Rêve. They were a total hit...

I also got a Tuxedo Cake from Macrina and it was seriously good, You Guys. We have over half of it left so if you want to come over and have some please do so!!!

Ask MansionMogul: Sleepy?

Why so sleepy MansionMogul? It's 9:00am already! I am wearing yesterday's/no makeup and am a hot sleepy mess here but I just felt like talking to myself You Guys so I thought what the hey, let's do an Ask MM. Got some more fabulous questions from my friend Paula - she's really making y'all look bad! So thanks again P for the great questions, everybody keep 'em coming!



The Cord Solutions I Mentioned:

The Tailgate Ideas We Talked About:

Plaid makes everything classic and Fall-like.

Great presentation and easy to transport! {via loveandbutter}

KEBABZ! Love the French Toast ones - fab idea for an early morning tailgate. These antipasto skewers are classy or could be paired with a bloody mary tailgate theme...

Easy non-messy jalapeno poppers {from aisletoaloha}

Unrealistically adorable tailgate spread {via everydayoccasions}

Additionally:
List of The Essential Tailgating Recipes
and 9 Tailgating Menus

Things that made me think of...

Some of you know that I started this blog back in the day for two reasons: 1.) To kill time at my BOOO-ring contract job. It was seriously boring. You know how contract jobs go where you are on contract because basically they don't have enough work to justify hiring a full-time person, so...it's the nature of contracts sometimes. But anyway, I had to do something. Reason #2.) To share things that I found on the internet and thought were cool with my friends.

Lately I've found some neat things...

This one is for my sister:

This one's for Megan (gurl I think you would DIE for this wall art):

{via housetohome}

This one is for Kim:

(we can relate, right Kim!?) {via icanrelate}

This one's for Paula:

{via someecards}

This one's for Wendi:

Isn't this adorbs for a little girls room?

This one's for my mom:

Isn't this cute? Could fit any size and can be embroidered with anything! {via hazelnuts}

This one's for Josiane:

{Colorwheel by Jonathan Whitfill via ttuartalum}

Talkin' 'bout PROJECTS

Yes, Projects that take days and days and hurt-ey backs to complete. But I know there are people out there who just get shit done (you know these people) and I am not one of them. I take FOREVER to do anything. I annoy myself. But anyway, 3/5 of my painting projects are done right now. 3/6 if you count the headboard project I'm planning on. But let's just call it 3/5 so I get a better sense of accomplishment, shall we?

Anyway, I've had this little shelf since the day I stole it from my parents house (thanks Mom!). It came with me to college apartments, then other apartments, and it's seen a lot of coffee rings and make-up and hairspray and general abuse. So after I bought the sander, and the paint, and all the stuff that goes with a painting project, I got to it. I wish I had a better "before" pic of the shelf, but just know it had a ton of scratches (thanks a lot Door 2 Door moving!) and it was really sad.

The top of this shelf is where I always dump my beat-up purse of the moment, and in this picture is a bottle of my new favorite nail polish: Sephora by OPI's "Spark-tacular". It's like confetti on your nails! It's also housing my self-help books. Don't judge!

For paint I used Martha's semi-gloss "Tailor's Chalk" for the white and "Enamelware" for the back inside of the shelves for a little contrast.

It is soooo satisfying to see a crisp clean white shelf instead of a junky one. I also painted both bedside tables to match but they're not quite complete yet (still need new hardware for one). Let me know if you guys have any tips for quicker painting. I listened to my podcasts to make the time go by, but it still took forever!

Ask MansionMogul XI!

You Guys, the painting project I mention here has foreals been on my to-do list for OVER 4 years. Ridiculous.

And here's a link to Bunnies for Birthdays. So cute! Also: Via Tribunali.

Now I'm all outta questions for Ask MansionMogul so shoot me some more Y'All!

Sole Proprieter or Just Unemployed?

Ugh. I've been working on this "Small Business" of mine for a while now. Sometimes it really feels like I'm running my own small design shop. Most times it feels like I'm merely trying to run my own small design shop, and lots of times it just feels like unemployment. I used to hear small biz owners say all the time how hard they worked, and I hate to admit that I never really believed them. How busy could they be? They are in charge of their own schedules! Now I realize that owning a small business means you do a ton of work for free. All the details that a traditional company would have a full staff to take care of, well, it's all on you. No health insurance, no HR department, no accountant. I mean, give it time, I may get there, but for now, I'm in charge of it all. And almost all of it I can't charge for. It's still exciting, and let's face it, it's the best of my slim options at the moment. I always dreamed I would own my own business some day, but in that dream I was making a living at it. Baby steps.

"Maybe It's Time for Plan C" - interesting NY Times article about how many other people have stumbled upon this same notion as me during the recession.

"The Waitressing Life: The Honor of a Second-Class Profession" - great point of view on a profession that franky I would make a lot more money at right now, and that I miss quite often (until I remember things like never having weekends). {via GalaDarling}

"Making Sense of Your Business Finances" - helpful advice about managing your small business finances.

And just for fun, a bunch of drool-worthy home offices: