1 com

99 MILLION Balloons.

It always catches me by surprise.
The remnants of childhood that still lurk within us.
Like the sense of girlish excitement I still get from seeing a big, bright, bouquet of balloons.

Given the terrible weather right now, I wish I could just grab onto the strings like a cowgirl grabbing the reigns and ride the wind (because--dear God it's windy here right now) away from this place.

But that won't happen for a few more weeks. And sadly I wont be traveling on anything so whimsical as a bunch of balloons. No no, I'll do the adult thing. I'll take a plane.

But don't be surprised if you see a little girl (in stature not in spirit) heading down the Champs Elysses followed by a trail of sweet bouncy friends. Only about a dozen or so, I promise.

from vi.sualize.us
Ah Miss Dior Cheri, Mon Ami

from Oh, So Darling
The movie Up
What do we think of Lauren Conrad's new line? I love the name and this ad!

For my wedding (in the far & distant future) I'd love to release balloons like these with little *best wishes* notes on them as opposed to throwing rice. Gotta get biodegradable balloons & plantable paper! :)
3 com

A Little Love Shack. DIY.

Few blogs are as consistently inspiring to me as Design Sponge.
I was over there getting my daily fill a bit ago when I came across the mother of all romantic-DIY-Valentine's Ideas.
A. Love. Fort.

Yes you read right. There, in front of my face, lay one of my greatest fantasies come true.
An adult fort, eclectic, fun and just plain super-cool looking. I was brought back to the days when I would drape blankets across the dining room chairs and make a fort under the dining room table. It was so fun--on the rare occasions my mom was willing to sacrifice her dining room table for my whimsical games.

A plan immediately began to form in my mind. The bf and I are on the tightest of budgets right now trying to save money for fun in Paris. This love-fort seemed the perfect solution: sweet, different, and most importantly free!
Now the original version is pretty professional, meaning it involves hanging a dowel with hooks into your wall.

As you guessed I couldn't do that. It would break my "takes-under-20-minutes" rule of DIY.
But I realized that I could do something similar by just arranging a few pieces of furniture in our giant bedroom nook. I knew there was a reason I buy so many blankets and pillows!

Check out the before and after.  I just used that tall standing lamp as my center "support" pole for my tent, and stretched a sheet over it, and closed it between our nook's two side windows. (I opened the windows, stuck the sheet edge underneath, and closed the window down on it to hold it up!) I stuck my little "stove" heater in there and turned it to " display flames" only, so it looked like a real fire (but no heat)


The bf loved it surprisingly enough (what little boy doesn't love a good fort?). And our bedroom nook is perfectly placed to watch our bedroom T.V. so we snuggled, watched Netflix movies, and ate some chocolate covered strawberries. I HIGHLY recommend this for anyone looking for a sweet simple Valentine's gesture.
Our bedroom with the my fort's support pole. Aka the lamp :)
Based on the above picture you should have an idea of the scale of this, the upper right of this picture is our left window frame.

Happy Valentine's Day! I hope yours is super sweet. I'm off to enjoy some home cooked Filet Mignon made by the bf (best V-day present, EVER)