Keys, please.

Vintage keys. Love them. I want to eat them up. But first, I want to use them all over my wedding. Like this from Ruffled.



Or this from Style Me Pretty.



Or perhaps like these "key cards" from Nonpareil Magazine. Or even better, combining the "keys to a successful marriage" idea with the seating card like these from 100 Layer Cake. This one might take the cake, so to speak.



Oh how I love weddings!

Instead of wedding crafting...

I have been refinishing my floors with my fiance. Chris is trying to fix up my house so it is less ghetto when my parents have to sell it. (I rent from my parents and I absolutely LOVE my house, but it *is* ghetto.) Sad. I don't want it to be sold, but sometimes in life we have to do things we don't want to do, or so I'm told. It is my grandmother's house where my entire family grew up, so there are a lot of memories there. Unfortunately, my grandma and Gunnar (step-grandpa) renovated the house in 1980. Yes. Ew. They did lots of bad things, including carpeting over beautiful 100+ year old hardwoods. But, we tore out the carpet and refinished the hardwoods! Here are some floor before and afters...while not perfect, the improvement is amazing! Yay! So much prettier! (Please excuse the terrible photos. I'm not photographer, and taking decent pictures of a floor is exceedingly difficult, so I discovered!)

Dining Room Before:

And After:

World's Ugliest Tile(TM) in the Hallway:

Aaaand after:

There used to be some built in shelves with leaded glass doors, but my grandparent's removed those (*sigh*) and we were left with this mess:

But after refinishing, it's hardly noticeable(now that doesn't mean that I don't want to have Chris rebuild the built-ins. I'd love for the house to have some of its original charm back.):

We also did the living room, for the record:


We still have to buy/stain/install baseboards and new doorway thresholds, but the improvement is unbelievable. Oh, and clearly we'll need to repaint or at the very least touch up the walls. The walls were a serious casualty of this process. And, just so you know, I never want to undertake this process again! (Did I mention there are still 2 bedrooms waiting to be refinished. Ugh.)

Now if only I can con someone into helping Chris put all my furniture back...I'd really like to have my house back (and cleaned - ack!) so that I can get a move on with some crafts! I feel so behind!

Love this...

I feel like I should use this blog as this year's Christmas list because it's filled with so many things I loooove, but I don't really have the money to buy all of them. Anyway, here's more to adore:



I found this here on etsy, custom made and reasonably priced at $25 (so, ok, I could probably afford this). I love the idea of having a pretty hanger for the gratuitous 'pretty dress on the hanger' photos and also as a keepsake! And, even better, it doesn't involve bows or puffy hangers like the hangers I had when I was little. *Shudder.* (This is when you all realize I'm a little judgmental...)

Accessorizing

I've been missing in action and have accomplished absolutely nothing wedding related in the last week due to sanding, sanding, sanding, staining, staining, staining, and cleaning up cat barf. (Yeah, Raya has made her displeasure at being locked in the kitchen known. Clearly known.) I think a post about pretty accessories is in order just so I can get that image out of my head.

I'll admit it, I'm kinda bummed that I have to wear flats on my wedding day. There are some amazingly sexomatic wedding pumps out there, but with even a small heel I'll be at least as tall as Chris. And let's be honest, if I'm going with pumps, I'm going all the way with some 4-inchers. But, I don't want to be taller, so flats it is. Sigh. (Perhaps this is why Chris told me that we almost didn't get matched on eharmony since I was almost outside his range of acceptable tallness. I countered with the fact that he was almost outside my range of acceptable oldness. HA! I crack me up. I like to tease him for being old-he's in much better shape than me, so I have to find something tease him about!)



I like flats well enough, but they really aren't very formal, and a lot of them tend towards being something my grandma would wear, or worse, something even my grandma wouldn't wear. I decided to try to find a peep toe to at least add a little bit of interest to the shoe, so I settled on these from The Dessy Group.

They're very wedding-y (meh) and a lot of my friends have said they are "adorable." I'm not sure I'm going for adorable, but it'll have to do as they have the nicest shape I've seen from a wedding-appropriate peep toe in a decent price range.

In an attempt to make the shoes more sophisticated, I'm going to replace the grosgrain ribbon with something a little more grown up. (And by "I'm" I mean my awesome friend, Chelan.) Perhaps tiny yo-yos, or, more likely, a giant ruffle all the way around the peep toe like the kiss pleat ribbon in this photo from here. It's a bracelet here, but I've seen it on some amazing wedding shoes as well, like these from here:






Mmmmmm pretty! Guess I'll have to visit the ribbon room at Nancy's Sewing Basket to find the right ribbon! Oh no! How awful! (Someone please come get me out before I spend my entire pay check. I love that place!) I am glad that the shoes are only $30. That seems like the right amount to spend on shoes I'll only wear once. Plus, I know me well enough to know that I will *never* stay in my shoes. I don't really "do" shoes. I get home and I take off my shoes. I get to work and I take off my shoes (apparently that's "weird" in a law office. But, whatevs). I get to dance class and I, you guessed it, take off my shoes. So, spending more than $30 for shoes that I'll likely only wear for about 2 hours really is silly, so I'm glad to have found inexpensive, appropriate shoes with a nice silhouette.

I also bought this awesome 5-strand vintage milk glass cuff bracelet from ebay. It's old and slightly discolored in places, but, that's part of its charm. I also love that it looks ok on my ridiculously tiny wrists (thanks, Grandma). Oh, and I also love that it cost me all of $8, and that included shipping. I think I'm going to have someone fashion a clip on it so it will actually stay in place - seriously, my wrists are tiny. It is something like this one one from etsy, but with 5 strands and without the black rhinestone studded bands (phew!).

I'm still necklace hunting. I bought a 2 strand milk glass necklace from ebay as well, but it's just way too chunky. Super cute for every day, though! I'd like a multi-strand vintage milk glass necklace to match, but the beads need to be exceedingly small and delicate-looking so as to not distract from the dress. Something like this, perhaps, but maybe with fewer strands and tad shorter so it is more of a choker. I don't know.



I'm also strangely picky when it comes to earrings. I want something dangly, but thin and streamlined. I have this bizarre hatred for chandelier earrings that are wider than they are long. Gah. Seriously, what's my deal!? I don't know, but I think I'm going to try to find something like these from Tiffany's, except, you know, not real and not $325. More like $20...

They are thin and interesting and matchy matchy with the bracelet, but not overwhelming. I hope I can find something like it, or have them made by someone.

I also love this hairpiece I found here.



With a little bird cage veil? Yes, that'll do. Now I just have to figure out how to make it!

Yay for pretty!

For the love of hardwoods...

But, first, a progress report on the wedding planning. I'm extremely happy to report that we hired our photographer! Her name is Abbey Hepner. I love her work and I think she's great! Click here to see her website and amazing work. I think she will be the perfect person to capture our day in photos. I'm very excited!

We are still working on a band, and I hope I can report more here soon!

But, this weekend will be not at all about wedding planning. In light of the fact that I like pretty things, we are going to spend the next weekend (week!?) refinishing my hardwood floors to transform them from ugly to pretty. The floors have been covered by nasty, completely usgusting carpet for the last thirty-plus years, so they are begging to be redone. I can actually hear them at night - it's a bit creepy. :) This is going to be quite the project, and the part I am looking forward to most is it being over. Chris, however, is very excited to use large power tools. The living room floors are in decent shape, except that a couple of missing boards had to be replaced, and there are a few areas where someone cut a square in the floor - luckily in areas that the floors will likely be covered by furniture. This seems to be common all over the house - I don't know what someone (step-grandpa?) was thinking. More attention will have to be paid to the areas that used to be covered by charming bookshelves dividing the living and dining rooms. The floors there are covered in plaster, and I won't lie, I almost hope those areas don't come out too well and need to be covered so we can rebuild the shelves. I love the idea!

The cat knows something is up (hmm...all the living/dining room furniture being stashed in the various bedrooms around the house is her first, best clue) and is going to be sooooo irritated when she realizes in a few hours that I'm locking her in the kitchen for at least a week. Luckily, she can get to the basement from there and cat around in the spooky, cobwebby grossness down there - she likes that; what cat wouldn't?

Here's the "before" photo - hopefully I'll have a lovely "after" photo to share soon! Oh, but we also have to buy, cut and stain baseboards, because apparently my grandparents thought that replacing baseboards wasn't really necessary, so instead they threw them out. Sigh.



Here's the thing - I already love my house in all it's ghetto/needs so so so much work glory, but once it starts to really look nice, I'm going to have that much harder of a time leaving...

Dang tempting food blogs!

Ok, I'll fess up - I love Molly Wizenberg and her blog (Orangette). A while ago,* Chris surprised me with a trip to Molly and her husband Brandon's restaurant, Delancy, and he asked to have her come over to the table to meet me. He even grabbed my copy of her book from my kitchen to have her sign. I was completely star struck, turned bright(!!) red, and was too embarrassed to have her sign the book. (Please don't ask where Chris hid the book so I wouldn't know where we were going until we got there. Ok, it may have been in his pants. I think he needs smaller pants...) :) So, when your food-blogger crush has a post that starts "Because there was a bag of plums," and you happen to have exactly 4 plums waiting to be used, you call it serendipity and make her plum tart. And then you eat half of it for breakfast because you have no will power. And also because you haven't gotten your wedding dress altered yet, and you decide that maybe you'll just get a little fatter and you won't have to. I won't lie - the tart is delicious! And simple! And Chris likes it too. :)



*Ohmygeezy, could that have been a whole year ago? Before I knew of the lactose intolerance? Wow, time flies! But my Molly obsession has stuck. Yes, I call her Molly - she's a regular name in our household, she just doesn't know it. :)

Yes, please.

Enough said. (I found this project on Design*Sponge, of course.)

Photographers, Musicians, Officiants, Oh my!!

Well, it seems like a whirlwind, but I found a photographer I love for almost half the price of all the others that I love. (I apparently have expensive taste when it comes to photos!) We haven't met with her yet, so it's not confirmed, but I'm certain I'll talk her up here soon enough. We're also in the middle of putting in a bid for an incredible band - one that we shouldn't even be able to afford, but the lead singer is a good friend and she's ahmahzing. (However, they are a big-time vegas band, so I'm not sure if I can make this happen...fingers crossed!) This is really going to be a wonderful day (and a fabulous party!) if I can pull all this good stuff together. But I have to say that with 355 days left until the wedding, I think we're pretty on the ball thus far. This is because of Chris - he's a "get it done" kinda guy. This may irritate me on Saturday mornings around 7:30 am, but it's really working well for the wedding planning. Now we just need to discuss ideas for an officiant and we'll have all the "big" things worked out! It's all very exciting! More to come, I'm sure.

And, on a random note: I decided last week that the blog I should be writing is one where I post the crazy stupid things that parties, and especially their lawyers, write or say on public record. Oh. My. God. It's entertaining, funny, sometimes tragic, but always true. I'm just worried that mocking the profession may look, um, unprofessional at best, and perhaps violate the rules of professional conduct at worst. (Yes, believe it or not, folks, there are rules of professional conduct that lawyers are obligated to follow. I know, that in and of itself seems blog post-worthy.)