{top: c/o tailor and stylist}

{scarf: c/o chapter one and co.}

the three of us had the best day today.  we headed to one of our favorite towns for breakfast (real purpose was to get the sewing machine serviced so lindsey and i can start using it!).  and... old habits die hard... we didn't spice up our routine with a new place (one day, one day!) but kept with our old standard: friendly toast.  now, let me take a moment to talk about my breakfast.  it deserves it (deserves its own post, i tell you what).  it's approximately seven hours later and i am still thinking about it.  do you have those meals that you keep thinking about hours and days later?  that's how you know it's good.  (unfortunately, this was a special.  THAT THEY SHOULD ADD TO THE MENU IMMEDIATELY.)  okay, just listen.  listen to this.  it was three crispy tortillas.  stacked.  in between were the following layers of magic: black beans, jack cheese, and fresh tomatoes on one, corn salsa and jack cheese in the middle, and then on the top were creamy scrambled eggs, sour cream, and cilantro.  hot damn, it was amazing.  explosion in my mouth.

moving on.  there is some major sand-moving-crane-bulldozer-truck-freighter action (you like that description?) going on down by the water and parker was enthralled.  i mean enthralled.  i might've even gotten teary eyed when a trucker smiled and honked just for him.  who knew i'd find such pleasure in both learning the names of such machines and seeing him enjoy them so much.  i'm a sap and it's the best.

dude, portsmouth is really a fabulous town.  this isn't new, but i fall in love with it a little more any time i visit.  steve and i even toyed with the idea of moving there.  i so would.  and the drive on 1a that takes you along the water is incredible too.  it's east coast's version of the pch.  bear with me.  maybe a little less cool but we have more history so take that california!!

this is the end of the sling diaries for me and my littlest man.  it has been so nice... documenting his last several weeks through this series.  i'm always snapping pictures of him, but with me in them?  that is a more rare occasion so these entries are special to me.  thank you for the gorgeous slings, sakura bloom... but thank you too for forcing me to get these pictures with me and the rapidly-changing parker.    i love them.  (and thank you steve for taking these pictures along the way!)

now, beauty.  doing the sling diaries through the winter months in massachusetts was not always easy.  there was no fun sunshinin', frolickin' in the beach waves opportunities.  for me, anyway.  (bron has been doing the sling diaries this round as well--in australia!  so... different story.  sometimes i was a little envious of their temperatures + bare skin!)  

here in massachusetts, the winters can be downright dreary.  but after experiencing several of them now, i consider myself a full fledged new englander (complete with sorels and a down jacket and, you know, the various winter accoutrements that fill in the gaps) and with that comes an appreciation for this season, for each season.  for some perhaps it's especially a hatred for this season, but really.  i mean it when i say that i have come to appreciate it, accept it, and, often, embrace it.  maybe i'm forcing myself to because, fighting it... what's the point?  but take a few days ago for instance.  we were first supposed to get a foot of snow, and then as the time neared the reports tapered down to a few inches or so.  we always get the essentials, just in case... some milk, eggs, butter.  but, with a snowblower at the ready, we're not usually trapped for too long.  anyway, the snow came at night and continued through the night so it wasn't until the morning that i really saw the scope of our latest fall.  it was gorgeous.  and i don't mean gorgeous in a way that you just have to say to make it seem as though you are appreciating it.  i mean, it was stunning.  it nearly took your breath away.  it was a heavy, wet snow so it sat on the branches longer than its fluffier sister (you know, the light and airy snowy sister).  add to that, the sun was shining so brightly and, well, it was a masterpiece right outside my front window.  and no matter how hard you try you can never get a good picture of that.  it just never works.  so you have to remember it with a bit of awe and sadness knowing that it won't last very long--the snow on the branches never does, blame it on the wind or sun or its very own weightiness--and that you really can't capture it accurately.  but, beautiful it is.  in the dead of winter, the beauty is there.  you don't only find it in the fresh snow, but it's other places too.  in a long stretch of icy, crackly, snow-patchy marsh.  or the red birds (cardinals, are they?) that find their place amongst the frozen branches outside our window.  or a snowman built by snow-eager kids.  or in parker's face, always in parker's face, as he discovers it all. each and every season.  even you, winter.

i wear parker in the pure baby sling in organic maple.

thank you so much for following along with us on this sling diaries journey. 

here are all the posts we've done since the beginning.  

please visit the sling diaries pinterest page to see everyone's entries!

and!  they're looking for participants for their next round.

go here to find out how to enter.

{i would highly suggest it.  leigh + lynne from sakura bloom are incredibly sweet and generous women who were a pleasure to work with.  not to mention, baby-wearing is about the greatest thing ever!}

the kids had all of last week off from school.  massachusetts' public school thing.  it's kind of torture, every single year, because the weather isn't really nice, and steve never has off this break (can't college and public school get on the same schedule?!), so we end up doing little things here and there, but mostly trying not to spend a ton of money, and to still be home for dinner when steve gets home.  and now, with parker and one wonkin' midday nap (respect the nap!!), well, enough with my saga... needless to say, we needed some diversions.  

i have so few apps, outside of some photo ones, on my iphone.  so, when lindsey came home from a friend's house telling me about the imovie app they were playing with, i was interested.  it sounded seriously fun so i checked it out and, indeed it was.  they spent, all told, probably a good four to five hours using this app throughout the week and they made some hilarious movie trailers.  they took turns as director, and (shocker!) hardly fought at all.  i'm chalking it up to the imovie magic!  parker even got to star in some of them.  they would run downstairs to show me different scenes and we would laugh and laugh.  it is such a fun app.  i recommend downloading it immediately.  

there'll probably be more of these trailers to come on the blog.  they're still loving this app.  but back to school they go, so their stint as director and writer and producer will have to be on hold a bit.

(they totally asked, "will it be on the blog?!"  william's psyched that the one he directed made the final cut.  it is pretty darn funny, to us anyway, though they might've lost a little steam towards the end.  trying to direct an 19-month old proved challenging i think.)

these are undoubtedly my favorite pair of sunglasses these days.

they're the ray-ban round wayfarer which is a 

bit of a feminine twist on the already awesome classic wayfarer.

{check out all the ray-bans sunglasses shop has here!}

these classic frames will be with me a good long while.

and when the sun does happen to peek through the 

massachusetts winter clouds, you can bet i put 'em on.

sunglasses shop is offering one of my 

readers the exact same pair.

they flatter nearly every face shape... so you best enter.

to enter:

{open to ALL ADDRESSES!}

+ visit sunglasses shop on facebook,

like, and comment that it's a hunt life sent you over.

+ then come back here and comment with your email!

OPTIONAL:

+ tweet/blog/pin an image (above or from the 

sunglasses shop) to spread the word.

(and tell me what you did!)

giveaway closed.

lia thomassian is the winner!

Yep.  That's about right.

Lindsey asks at least once a week when she can wear make-up.  I tell her, every time, that she can start wearing (some, a little) make-up when she's in 7th or 8th grade.  Or did I say fifteen?  I guess she's trying to find a weak spot in my argument.  Which can't be that difficult to do since I can't remember exactly what I told her.  When it feels right, Lindsey!  For her, that time is now.  The last time she asked I said I'd add a year if she kept asking.  That was yesterday.  She hasn't asked in 24 hours.  She did, however, come home from a sleepover with mascara on.  She and her little friend probably swiped the Mom's mascara in the wee hours of the morning to get themselves all Honey-Boo-Boo'd up.  I noticed as soon as she came home and she was all, "HOW DID YOU KNOW?"  It's good to let them know every once in awhile: Mom knows allllllllllll.

William.  William's sprouting dark hairs along his upper lip.  Steve and I have this conversation, weekly at this point, shave or bleach?  It's not such a conversation, really.  Steve could care less.  Me, however, I'm in the bleach-camp.  If he starts to shave, he'll have to keep shaving! Bleaching is the answer, it's not growing fast!  Steve says no one bleaches their son's upper lip hair.  How does he know?  Can you see men, shooting the breeze in the lunch line asking, "Hey Bob, so uh, you bleach Jay's upper lip hair yet?  Nah?  Shave?  Ok."  NO.  And furthermore who says it's wrong just because, as he claims, no one does that.  So far, we've done nothing, but I routinely want to take a magic eraser to his upper lip.  They work on nearly everything, why haven't I considered this as a viable third option?  Either way, it's remaining at this point.  Just this dirty little upper lip that I have a hard time not focusing on when we talk.

And attitude.  We've got attitude.  The other night we had a movie night.  Steve had brought blankets and extra pillows in and everything and made the room all cozy for movie night.  Once the movie ended, he asked that they grab a blanket, a pillow, whatever, and put it back where it went on their way out.  Lindsey exclaims, "EVERY TIME I HAVE TO DO SOMETHING WHEN I'M REALLY TIRED IT TAKES ME FOREVER TO FALL ASLEEP."  It was emphatic, dramatic... lunATic (I'm really trying to make lunatic rhyme with the other two.).  It was hilarious.  And William.  He acts all aloof if he's being disciplined sometimes.  Which makes you want to scream, you know?  Oh, he DOESN'T CARE DOES HE?  Well then let's take this crazy train UP A FEW NOTCHES.

Body odor and hair growth and makeup-requests and drama aside, they are really funny and cool and still, praise be, think we're pretty funny and cool too.  They still want to hang out with us and go places with us and I know those days are numbered.  You know, we've seen the other side.  The side where they turn into a crazy-person-grump also known as teeeeeeenager.  NOT NAMING ANY NAMES.  But, we pray and hope and wish that they will come out on the other side... alive, mostly unscathed, and hopefully, most of all, still loving us.

It's a journey, ain't it?

(And, I feel like my days of being able to write about William and Lindsey on this blog are dwindling fast.  You know, besides the boring stuff.  So, I need to get it all out while I can.  Make-up and mustaches lead the charge!)

i'm not a "house tour" kinda gal in part because a) my house isn't amazing (i love my house, but it isn't house tour amazing, i mean.) and b) i don't know... privacy maybe?  something weird about putting my house on my blog and showing you "here is the window placement should you want to break in."  i know i'm a little overboard with that.  but, it is what it is.  i gots to sleep at night.  and i get sweaty palms if i feel like too much of my life is out there in the internet abyss so having a blog in and of itself is, at times, already a bit 'out there' for me. 

and, on that same note, if you've ever left a comment on instagram along the lines of, "oh!  you're at such and such!" and it got deleted, it was me who deleted it because i like my anonymity.  there, i said it.  (but, along the same lines, if you happen to see me out and about i would seriously love for you to introduce yourself.  put a face with that name.  buuuut that is not to suggest that i'm some big blogger who's getting recognized all the time, no.)  ok, this is heading a direction i did not intend.  moving on!

lindsey's room.  i'm branching out of my fear of showing you where our windows are because her room is really lovely and it's reeeeally high off the ground so chances are we'd see or hear you before you  got all four limbs inside the house.

i am a notoriously sloooow decorator (and a cheap one too) so, we didn't get here overnight.  but rome was not built in a day, my friends!  i wish we had a before picture because it was just blahhhhh.  wallpaper border, greenish blah walls.  in time, it came to be what it was and she loves it.  so do we.  and props to my main man steve for doing any painting and heavy lifting.  and for installing branches from our own backyard as the curtain rods.  now THAT is thrifty.

(not shown: closet to the left just past the bookshelf that steve built shelves in and all, and another bureau/vanity to the right along the wall you can't see.)

really (really, really!) trying to learn manual and the tulips were my subject.  

there are about a million more pictures like this one...

taking william out for ice cream when he made honor roll!  

go william!  we're really proud of him.

super parker?

we've had this chess set forever but william just brought it down from the third

floor so now it's been in regular rotation with these two...

daffodils to remind me that spring is on its way!!

(and a floating head)

these three made 'movie trailers' this weekend and i can't

wait to show some.  hilarious.

our v-day dinner spread.

we had sweet potato burritos.  soooo good, recipe to come.

{shirt: c/o eshakti}

{pants: windsor store}

i had a friend on facebook recently question in her status, "why are bloggers always looking down in their fashion posts?"  when i read it i knew right away... GUILTY.  and while i would like to say it's because of some legitimate reason--dog poop on my shoe, lindsey's painting my toenails and i'm checking that she's doing a good job--all completely valid reasons, i'm afraid, for me, it is merely this: i'm awkward.  it's awkward!

so, hats off to you fashion bloggers who pull it off way better than i do all the while staring that lens smack in its face.  

(and thanks for bearing with me and my small attempt to contribute something to the world of fashion blogging all while looking down.  it's a ruse but it's a fun one.)

{a note about eshakti before i go: it's pretty crazy, but you can customize every piece to fit you perfectly. and i don't just mean length/width but also--oh, that dress has a cap sleeve but you don't want a cap sleeve?  okay, customize, boom.  it's pretty cool.  i gave my measurements before getting this shirt and it fits so well.  i mean, it's a blousey shirt and it's supposed to be but length wise?  torso and sleeves?  it's rare to have those things long enough.  eshakti, you done good!}

and some of my fave eshakti pieces since you asked: this striped skirt, this blouse, and this dress.

a valentine's day giveaway: $1500 gift card, ya'll.

hey everybody.  happy, happy, happiest of valentine's day to you and yours.  today brings something a little different here.  a giant giveaway with a million blogger hosts (hostesses?).  the first of its kind--on this blog anyway.  and while these aren't something i typically do 'round here, a gift card of this size ($1500!  contributions from everyone below!) was too awesome a prize to pass up.  so, here it is!  a giant giveaway for a giant prize.  

the winner will be announced on the widget below on february 21st.  

and, that person will get the card mailed to them!

(i'm sort of hoping that the winner uses the card to buy a much-needed vacation to some fabulous place.  greece!  turks + caicos!  but, if you need it to buy a couch for your bare living room, or fix your broken down car, i'll understand that too.)

Gussy Sews | Living in Yellow

The Shine Project | The Wiegands | JustLove.ly

Saturated Canary | Sugar & Dots | La Vie Petite 

ohhhhhh dowager countess.  how do i love thee???  let me count the ways!

(also: spoiler-free post!  and comment thread too--please!)

let's start at the beginning: steve and i have watched it all, straight up until the end of season three.  it was our second attempt because after one episode a few months ago i was all, "booooring."  luckily we gave it another try because i was wrong!  i admit it!  i fell hard for downton (downTON.  TON.  TON.  do you know there are still people out there calling it downTOWN!  lord grantham would never allow it!  we must make it stop!)

and so, we watched it all.

i have a lot of favorites.  favorite moments, favorite characters, favorite scenes.  let's talk about them, shall we?

anna is one of them.  oh, i love that anna.  she is salt of the earth, i tell you what.  and are her and bates not the sweetest couple on that side of the atlantic?  and sybil, oh sybil.  an english girl with a good dash of rebellion but not too much to make her obnoxious.  she's just the sweetest.  and the relationship between carson and mrs. hughes?  i can't decide if they're like a precious brother-sister duo or if they'll eventually fall in love.  but, i love them just the same.  and the way mr. carson talks about watching mary grow up?  that man.  he's such a stickler for keeping things the way they are and always have been but at the same time has this sensitive side that surprises you.  and the opening credits??  the song, the camera work through the house... i just sit back and think, "ahhh downton.  bring it," every time that familiar tune begins.  

i know, i know.  i'm talking about it all like it's real.  in my mind, it is.

but dowager countess!  she might just be my favorite.  she can make an episode.  her voice, the inflections, the tone, the facial expressions.  she nails it every time.  maggie smith, you genius you.

i can't say i have a favorite dowager countess moment.  every time she opens her mouth, i brace myself for another gem.   when sir richard carlisle says he's leaving and may not see her again and she says, "do you promise?"  TEN POINTS.  or when she turns to lord grantham to order a drink when he wasn't in the right attire, "oh!  i thought you were a waiter!" TEN POINTS.  they're all tens.

she's witty and quick and clever.  serious when she needs to be and has a surprising amount of liberalism in those bones for an elderly english woman.  

basically, she's perfect.

just watch it.  ok?  if you haven't, of course.  which, at this point, is probably very few of you.

{it's all here -- free and through the end of season 3!}

so, we can really get away with categorizing this weekend under one word NEMO but gosh so far you've got, what, six hundred and fifty two new posts in your google reader that have to do with the blizzard that was?  well!  make it six hundred and fifty three!

i'll try to keep it fresh and simple.

we had a blizzard.  it kept coming and coming.  and it ended up being super fun because a) we didn't lose power--this being the chief reason b) we have a snow blower and thus are not trapped by the never ending snow c) the kids already had the day off.  steve had the day off too which had him mostly hemming and hawing about how he could've easily taught his morning class because the snow really didn't start until after that and blah blah blah STEVE IT IS A DAY OFF ENJOY IT.  we started friday morning on the right foot... with a roaring fire, watching seabiscuit (horse movies that make me cry for the win always), and popcorn.  and then it began to snow and basically didn't stop for 24 hours.

william and jordan, always the adventurers, decided at about 8:30 pm friday night (mostly due to william's prodding) to walk to a nearby gas station in the crazy winds and snowy swirls to get the really crappy hot (lukewarm?) chocolate that was undoubtedly awaiting them despite the fact that we had whole milk and starbucks hot cocoa mix in the house.  it makes perfect sense and so i didn't question it.  what can normally take about a half hour took them about two but, like i said, i didn't question it.

meanwhile, i sat by the fire, sending my wishes up to the power gods that we would keep ours and contemplating... should i shower now in case we lose power?  should i just do the 'ol dry shampoo routine if my hair gets nasty and power's gone for days?  that is, until steve informed me that he already filled the bathtubs in case of a power outage and so... last-chance cleaning was thereby thwarted.

what else?  well, we went sledding, of course.  and after a day of snow-play had us coming in the house too late to think about a gourmet dinner, i threw some frozen pizzas in the oven.  which brings me to my next point.  i consider myself a bit of a, oh, foodie?  i mean, i'm not a foodie like some people are foodies, but i'm like 70% foodie.  and i eat frozen pizzas?  is that even ok?  they're red barons which, by frozen pizza standards, is pretty good if you ask me but still.  it's embarrassing.  and even more embarrassing when i saw this pizza that ashley threw together that had my mouth watering.  (still too scared to attempt it.  but!  fascinated by the fact that some pureed san marzanos and salt is it as far as sauce goes!)

alright, moving on.  i said fresh and simple didn't i?  the kids made a crazy snow maze on this tiny frozen pond by our house and, i tell you what, if i were a kid i would've thought it was crazy fun.  i did think it was crazy fun and i'm not technically a kid any longer so, you can imagine.  excited kids.  steve, parker and i visited for a bit and slid around.  it had little forts and everything.  they stayed all day and came home famished after a day of that good old-fashioned fun makes a parent happy.

that about sums it up.  thanks for the fun weekend, nemo.