Another bun

Chase had on a new shirt when he, Kevin, and Jenny got to Charlotte on Friday.













The McHusband always said they'd probably have their second before we had our first.

Jenny's due at the beginning of September, a few weeks before Chase's second birthday. Everyone please send her potty-training vibes so she can hopefully only have one kid in diapers at the end of the year.

Congrats, you guys!

It's, uh, 4:00 somewhere

The McHusband went to Charlotte this weekend for his mom's birthday. He headed down there on Thursday so he could go to a concert with a friend that night. That's why I ended up staying home rather than also being in Charlotte this weekend.

The McHusband and his mom went to IKEA for me on Friday. I'd found chairs I wanted for the dining room, and the shipping costs almost doubled the price so I figured I could wait until our next trip to Charlotte or until someone came up to see us to get them. Thank goodness for the McMom's birthday.

The McHusband had driven the Cobra to Charlotte. To say the car was packed to the gills when he came back is an understatement. The white squares are the seats of the chairs.


























Just cuz I'm excited about them, here's a sneak peek at the chairs.

















See the brown stripey thing? That's a dog bed that the McMom picked up for us from Costco.

















It's supposed to be for Tucker. But don't try to tell that to Morgan and Emma.


























We actually had quite a productive weekend in the laundry room. There was painting, and nail-gunning, and there might've been some cursing. Let's just say that when one of these

















shows up on the counter around 4:00, you know the project's probably not going quite as smoothly as hoped.

Embracing the muffin top

I saw this headline - "Woman says her love handles saved her life" - and had to read the story. I'm all about some positive press when it comes to love handles. Here's the story:

ATLANTIC CITY, N.J. — A Florida woman said her love handles saved her life when she was shot entering an Atlantic City bar. Samantha Lynn Frazier said she heard two pops when she walked into Herman's Place early Saturday. The 35-year-old then felt pain and saw blood on her hand after she grabbed her left side. Atlantic City police said Frazier was an innocent bystander.

Detective Lt. Charles Love said the gunman was aiming for a man who escaped with a bullet hole in his down jacket.

The suspect remains at large.

Frazier told The Press of Atlantic City that "I could have been dead. They said my love handles saved my life."

Frazier also told the newspaper that she had been "hollering" that she wanted to lose weight. She now said "I want to be as big as I can if it's going to stop a bullet."

And now for the icing on the cake - a picture of Samantha and her life-saving love handles.











As you can see, she certainly couldn't rely on her bra's underwire, like this lady from Detroit, whose bra deflected a bullet.

Can someone please educate me as to when love handles turn into plain old-fashioned fat rolls? Also, does anyone else see the irony? Maybe her so-called love handles wouldn't have been in the bullet's way had they not been so, er, lovely. And now Samantha thinks she should GAIN weight as a protective measure?

Maybe I need to move to a bad neighborhood so I can quit working out and embrace my hips as the lifesaving parts they could prove to be.

Costarring my clothes

I've seen two of my tops on HGTV. The first was on Get It Sold with Sabrina Soto.

















(Sorry it's not the best quality - I took a picture of the TV.)

I got that shirt from Ann Taylor Loft the summer before we went to Vegas.

And remember my favorite shirt back in November? Well, a local real estate agent was wearing it when she was on Bang For Your Buck, one of my favorite HGTV shows. This past weekend, the new episode was about $75,000 kitchen renovations in Raleigh.

There she is! (And by "she," I mean my shirt, of course.)













I'm definitely not the trendiest person, but it's nice to see that a few of my choices pass muster and are camera-ready.

I just got a black scoopneck sweater from the Loft last week - for $9.88! I wonder who'll be wearing that...

Versus

Last weekend






























vs. this weekend:













Last weekend













vs. this weekend:


























Spring fever has definitely struck us all here. The dogs couldn't get enough of the sunshine and warm temperatures, and the McHusband was working very hard to find something, ANYthing, to do outside. Good thing cuz I might've had a small project in mind... But you'll have to wait and see what that was because it's not quite done yet.

Tucker couldn't get enough of the Frisbee yesterday.

When he did finally decide he needed a break in between fetches, he headed straight for the shaded area by the storage building and plopped himself down as if he were in the middle of a certain doggie 3k.




















































Morgan stayed in the yard with us for a little while, but she was happiest soaking up the sun on her bed.













All that sun can really take it out of you. This is how the dogs spent the afternoons.











Tucker hopes our next house has a bigger landing.













I know Mother Nature's playing a cruel joke on us by giving us this little taste of springtime. Right now, the forecast for the week has rain tomorrow and lows in the 20's most of the week. But that's okay because this is NC and springlike weather will be back.

Then it'll actually be spring for about, oh, two and a half weeks before summer weather starts.

Gotta love NC!

Condo living

My company developed a building in Chapel Hill that has two floors of office space and one floor - the top one - of residential condos. We took a field trip out there yesterday to see how the newest condo is coming along.

First, a little background. This one condo is actually three condos combined for a total of a little over 7,000 SF. The people buying this condo are doing so because their son will be attending UNC-Chapel Hill. This won't be their primary residence, but you'd never know that based on the amount of money they are spending to make this place liveable (by their standards).

We'll go back when the condo is more done so hopefully I'll have really impressive pictures at that time. In the meantime...

A ironing board drawer. Love it!

I think this hallway was longer than the width of my house.

It's hard to discern, but that's a barrel ceiling. Check it out with the lights on.

The best parts of this condo were the bathrooms. How would you like this for your powder room?

A view of the guest bathroom from the hallway.

The master bathroom was really neat. The shower wasn't too crazy (I've seen more showerheads in bathrooms from "Bang For Your Buck"), but it was still over the top.

Apparently, the rain showerhead isn't enough. See the metal square on the ceiling? That's actually four more showerheads.

This picture gives you a little bit better idea of how the shower and tub wall are situated.

The tub will be placed a few inches off the floor on this platform. I have to admit, I really liked this feature.

Anyone else sense the theme in their bathrooms? These people really LOVE their mosaic tile.

We went into another condo, one that's occupied, and I had to take a bathroom picture in there, too. I don't know if you guys could've adequately picture this if I told you, "The tub fills up from the ceiling." I know it looks like a stripper pole in my picture, but I promise, it's a stream of water coming from the ceiling.

Notice the edge of the tub? That's an infinity tub so you can overflow it like those fancy-schmancy pools.

Okay, end of tour. Thank you for joining us today and please watch your step as you exit the bus.

Tucker lovin'

We love to love on Tucker.






























We just don't always appreciate when he returns the favor.













He doesn't understand why. I mean, who wouldn't want a kiss from this mug?

Valentine Weekend 2010

I hope everyone had a nice Valentine's Day. I feel like my Valentine's Day actually lasted most of the weekend. The McHusband gave me flowers on Friday, we had dinner and a show on Saturday, then we had gifts, cards, and dinner at home today.

My flowers:













The lavender spider mums are hiding in the back.













I actually didn't get the flowers cut and in a vase until Saturday afternoon. I was watching TV shortly after I took my pictures and I heard a noise and saw the vase on its side with the water pouring out all over the table, chair, and floor. Oh, and a certain black cat was not-so-surreptitiously leaving the scene.


























The flowers now reside on top of the hutch in the dining room. Non-conventional, yes, but very practical.

That night, we went to dinner at Gravy, which is, contrary to what the name may imply, an Italian restaurant. A while back, the McHusband got us and Rick and Sabrina tickets to a live performance by Bill Maher. If you get HBO, you could've watched the same show we did last night. Guess it would've been nice of me to blog this in advance so you could've planned ahead, huh?













I had to take a picture of what Sabrina ordered at Gravy. She got the Fettucine Nero, which came with black linguine noodles.













I can't say it looked all that appetizing, but I tried it and it was good. Book, cover, you know how it goes.

Our tickets said the show started at 9:00. We didn't realize how late it had gotten at the restaurant, but we finally left there at 8:45. We were in a hurry when we were exiting the parking deck via the stairs and I slipped on a step and went down pretty hard. I didn't get hurt, not really, but I do have a couple bruises to show for it.











I also skinned my thumb knuckle.













You'd think maybe there was ice to blame for my slip, or maybe even the three rum and diet Cokes I had with dinner (I made it to my goal night following my self-imposed sobriety and definitely celebrated), but you'd be wrong. No, the culprit in this case? See Exhibit A below.

















It was the boots. I think last night was the third, maybe the fourth, time I've ever worn them. Sadly, I am not on a Carrie Bradshaw level when it comes to moving quickly in high heels.

Today was pretty lowkey. We did cards and gifts - Best Buy gift card for him, a candle and Dexter Season 2 (cuz nothin' says "I love you" like a serial killer DVD) for me - then the McHusband worked on his car shelf, and I ran some errands in Cary.

What car shelf, you're wondering? Actually, it's more of a tower.

















The good news is that in transferring the cars from the old shelf to the new one, the McHusband actually dusted all the cars. This will be a very memorable Valentine's Day indeed.

Well, I'm off to cuddle with my hubby on the couch until it's time for bed. He has to work tomorrow while I have the day off (President's Day). And since I was a slacker today, "day off" means "do all the household chores I should've done today."