Deer Tick - Ashamed

Love this band and this song, their new records comes out next week!

Rachel Zoe Vest

Let me just state, I love Rachel Zoe.  I think her styling is fabulous and now she has moved into making clothes.  

I've been envying this vest for a long time and as a "post-surgery" gift to myself, I got it!  The quality is great and it feels very luxurious for being fake fur, the only problem is that it's consistently sold out in my size, so I had to go up a size, but that's probably more the Rachel Zoe look anyways!

From Mailbox to Entertainment Center

I found 2 of these shelves ready for the dump, they were originally used as mailbox holders for a new condominium site.  Once the owners put the permanent mailboxes up, they were going to get rid of them.  Thankfully I convinced them to let me have them and I painted them first brown, then white.  My father then created me 2 more and then a custom one for the cd's. 

Originally I had these stand vertical and hold books, but once I moved into my new house there was a nook that these fit perfectly into horizontally and fit my rather large DVD collection (and some of my books)

Can sometimes find a great treasure in the trash!

Travel & Blankets!

I love to travel and have been lucky to do some in my time.  I've only been international once (Italy! and a tarmac in Paris), but here's a (faraway) picture of all the places I've been in the good old USA!  I hope to get to the middle of the map sometime soon and you can spot the road trip route the family took as a kid

I have this weird obsession with blankets, I'm one of those people that loves to be cold with four or five blankets on top of her.  I think the love comes from my grandmother making me Afghan blankets, I was never able to pick up that skill, but I am able to quilt.

The top blanket below is one of my grandmother's and then bottom two are ones that I made years ago

Concert Memories

I've tried to save all the tickets stubs from the concerts and sporting events I've grown up going to, but have lost a few among the years.  Right now I have them all up on a corkboard, I used to be able to see pictures I took in the background but now it's fully covered.  You can even make out my 1st concert ticket from 1992! And yes, my music taste varies and I love Bon Jovi, who doesn't?

Yummy Italian

I'm still laid up from back surgery so cooking has been a bit of a no-go for me.  Last night I ordered from my favorite local Italian Restaurant Di Carlo's and luckily they offer delivery service.

I got a Caprese Salad, which the picture doesn't show, but it does come with balsamic vinaigrette sauce.  Caprese salads are one of my favorite things, mozzarella is just too good for words

I then tried Manicotti for the first time and it was equally delicious

And what's great about Di Carlo's is that the prices are reasonable and the food quantities are so large that you get 2-3 meals out of 1 order, can't be that!

My current favorite song

It's only 100 CD's......

As a baby shower party favor I offered to make a personalized CD for each guest.  Who knew the guest list would be almost a 100 people?! (97 if we're being exact)

Took a little longer then what a thought but here are some of the finished products

Early Christmas Gift!!!

I asked for a pretty specific Christmas gift this year, a microwave to go over my stove.  I don't have any venting in my home (it was built in the 1950s), this means that every time I cook I need to open windows and turn off all the smoke detectors.  The open windows in a Wisconsin winter is not to great let me tell you.  So I really wanted microwave to 1. help with the venting and 2. save counterspace (I have so little).

Christmas may be 2 months away, but lucky me, I got it early!

Thimbleberry Jam!

My father gave me this Thimbleberry Jam from Copper World and just raved about it.  I've always just been a grape jelly kind of woman, but I gave this stuff and try and I must admit, it is delicious....a must try. It comes from Michigan's Upper Peninsula area called Keweenaw Peninsula I believe.

Here's the link to where you can check this stuff out more:  www.calumetcopper.com

Flowers Always Brighten the Day

It always makes you feel better when someone goes out of their way to send you something so beautiful.  What made this even more special, the flowers were delivered to the wrong address and the good Samaritan found my address and delivered them to me.  Made for a sweet night.

Music I'm Lovin

Who You Are by Jessie J

Nobody's Perfect by Jessie J

Civilian by Wye Oak

Tiny Little Robot by Cage the Elephant

Fresh Blood by Eels

Back Surgery

Let me start this post by letting you know I'm a bit drugged right now and this post may not make since so much because of this, but here we go....

I've been off for a few days do to lovely back surgery.  I had a herniated disc that I had to have dealt with, and anybody who's had back problems can know how terrible it can be.  For the last week I couldn't even walk without assistance, but now after having the surgery so much better.  There is still the obvious pain from someone having cut into your muscles and playing with your spine, but such a big relief.   Totally recovering will take probably 3 months or so, but considering I've been sick since December 21, 2010, I think i can make it a few more months.

I made my dad take some awesome pictures while in the hospital to remind me anytime I'm in pain, that I was in the hospital before and it was much worse. I'll try to get some pictures up in a bit.

Until then, more rest and I'll be modeling the always fashionable support socks for circulation and a back brace, at least it's black and maybe a little slimming :)