leopard and plaid

well it's been quite awhile! i've started a new lifestyle blog all 

about beauty, fashion, design and inspiration. 

i hope you'll join me!

www.leopardandplaid.com

theme song- xx vcr (michael douglas remix)

a vintage bib collar necklace i found at an estate sale in my neighborhoodtrudy running from the scary monster "aka daddy"

all ready for church in her gold ruffle-y dress

on our road trip, at mavericks, trying some chocolate ice cream waiting to see blake for the first time in 2 years!love him so mucha shot taken for #photoaday "what i wore"hanging out and dancing at the riverwoodstrudy's first time on the trampoline. so. much. fun.playing in grandma's toy roomlots of stops for trudy. teething + diarrhea + diaper rash + throwing up + busy body= hellish road tripping.but i love her so much!p.s. here is my favorite song right now.  wash dishes? go running? change a poopy diaper? i can do it with this playing.

but all the best people are

i love pinterest. i love pinning. i love de-pinning. i love re-pinning. i love sinning.

just kidding.

what would i do without her?

sometimes i think.... i would have so much fun blogging about diy stuff. or beauty tips i find around the worldwide web. or maybe wardrobe tricks and styling secrets. or maybe i should just start taking more pics when i am out and about thrifting my life away... and then showing what i end up doing with my finds at home. i think it would be good for me at this point in my life, to start blogging more regularly and scheduling it into my weekdays. simply because maybe it would help me in organizing my time better. which probably sounds weird but it all makes sense it my head. but also how adorable is my trudy baby? this age is sooooooooooooooooooo fun. the more she understands, the closer i feel to her. i love it. i could do without the messes though. today she dumped an entire canister of oatmeal all over the kitchen floor. and then instead of cleaning it up we both just decided to leave the house.

i love instagram. i think phone pictures are so great. taking pictures on my phone gives me the opportunity to catch moments that i normally would never pull out the camera for. in fact i created this just the other night and love looking and remembering what was going on in each picture. i love postalpix. one of my favorite apps. i have a list actually. maybe i should share... do you have any favorites? i love finding fun apps.

follow me @brittanymbarnes

highchair makeover

it's fun that trudy has a jenny lind crib as well as a highchair. craigslist has really been great for me here. i love the jenny lind style and it reminds me of my childhood. i didn't want to keep her highchair brown but wasn't happy with any color for it either. everything just felt too plain and solid. i had been in love with this picture for a long time and it made me want to try some kind of a pattern. then when jenny from lgn did her tutorial for inlay on a dresser, i was ready to just go for it and paint something. 

i didn't ever take a before shot of the whole highchair but here are some older pics of it and you get the idea.

when i first started, i was VERY discouraged. it's not the type of project for anyone that is a perfectionist, that's for sure. i don't think i'm a perfectionist at all but i found it pretty difficult to let little mistakes not bother me. i remembered jenny saying that once she really just let go and relaxed, the painting just started becoming a lot easier and i found that to be the same for me. it's taken me awhile to get used to little smudges here or there but it grows on me still and i think i love that it's one of a kind and more homemade looking.

now if only i could keep this little stinker from always trying to get out!

she's one. wait what?

my family came down for trudy's birthday and made it even more fun. they all love her so much and it's so fun to watch them all interact with her. these days with all the pressure for a crazy out-of-this-world themed party from blogging or pinterest or whatever.... i started wondering what to do for her party awhile back. then i realized that i like to look at pictures of those pretty pretty parties and also admire all the creative mommies (and i do mean that sincerely) out there, but all of that just isn't me. at least not for her first birthday anyway. i was mainly just excited about watching her eat cake for her first time. i did like the idea of having a babushka/matryoshka/russian doll theme so that was my inspiration for her cake. i sort of struggled with it but i had fun. i loved using this chart to help me mix up the right colors with food coloring. we ate the babushka cake and then trudy had her own cupcake cake to destroy. she ended up being scared of it instead (totally not what i was expecting) but did eat some of it. we had her party at the park right by our house and the weather was almost perfect.... just a little windy. trudy loved her presents.

currently she loves to play with dolls, blocks, cups, pans, my makeup and most of all her food. she's been walking since right around her birthday and keeping me very busy. she is such a delight and light's up people's faces wherever we go. i will have to get a picture of her pigtails because i tried them out for the first time today and about died of cuteness overload. her spunky, sassy, stubborn but almost always happy personality is so fun. we just adore her.

everything about it was perfect

so i've really been wanting to blog about a million trillion things. especially trudy's birthday, but i can't force myself to blog when i don't want to, when i want to put time into a post i've got to be in the mood. szzsshuuuuu know? plus i wanted to move the last post down because the green paint on that stand just looks so off and it's been bugging me. so i'm taking a quick second to post the announcement of the american idol winner. i know that america was watching when it was live but i feel like it all was so memorable and i love watching it over and over. i was a fan of phillip from the beginning, he is so authentic and true to himself. i laughed so hard when he responded to ryan about some criticism earlier in the show from Jimmy, "No, I'm just being myself, dude. I'm not trying to walk around stage and touch people's hands and stuff. That's just not me. I'm just having fun, man. I'm not trying to be somebody else. I"m just trying to play music."

so my favorite parts in the clip, you can tell that when ryan announces his name, for the first few minutes... it hasn't really hit him. i think he is just going through the motions...(yay!! woohoo!! from everyone, blah blah). then ryan addresses him again, telling him congratulations and phillip just looks away and shakes his head. que the music (pry the best song choice by the way, definitely my favorite winner winning song)..... and then as he starts singing it seems as though he is completely overcome by it all, when the confetti starts falling i feel like it's all so magical. i know that i'm a nerd but i don't care. when he decides he's had enough, i really love how he doesn't follow any rule or expectation, just hands his guitar over, walks off the stage and hugs his family. i just love it!