shirt - anthro, purse - kate spade, jeans - ae, shoes - h&m

It's pretty much impossible to hide those dark circles under my eyes. I have not slept well in a week. See babies like to do this thing where they start sleeping real good, you're getting like ten, maybe twelve hours and you're thinking - life is GOOD!! And then just when you get used to sleeping like a normal person they start cutting teeth... Birdie has been cutting her two top teeth since this weekend and night time has been real rough for her. Then on top of it she got sick on Tuesday. My poor sweet babe, got sick for the first time on the eve of her nine month birthday. But she's such a trooper, still smiling, even laughing occasionally and I guess my mama's right - she had to get sick sooner or later and she's building her immune system. It's a necessary evil.

...

Also, a quick note about my outfits. As you may have noticed I will feature the same bag, shoes, jeans, etc., more than once, more than twice occasionally! My outfits are what I actually wore it's basically "we were out, I liked my outfit, so we snapped some photos." I'll be honest with you I used to be a culprit of the "dress up for outfit photo" post and it was the worst. It always felt so forced and I was never sure after it was all done if I would even wear anything like that. I get inspiration, I get creativity and perhaps some people find that fun but I always gravitate more towards people with real, every day style. Because let's be honest I am not wearing four inch heels and a $1,200 bag every day. What you see above is my idea of "dressy" because my shoes of choice are my hunter boots and the bag I use most often is my big old diaper bag that I put everything but the kitchen sink in. And you know what? This feels so much better, so much more true to myself. It's not fancy, it's not "on trend," but you better believe that it's me, it's real and sometimes it's even cute :).

Here's to not boring y'all to death!

^ that's Russian for sugar ^

My husband, who knows me very well, knows that if I ever want anything at Starbucks it will always be a latte and madeleines. Madeleines are the perfect dessert - delicious, cake-like and they lull you into a false sense of non-gluttony. I've made them before and though they turned out good I spent way too much time on them (I prefer to spend more time enjoying my food rather than making it). The original recipe I used involved the use of the stove, pots, the food processor, and a two hour fridge wait time. Not cool friends, not cool. Well do not fret!! I have found the perfect madeleine recipe, it's easy and they are just perfect! Unsurprisingly I found it over at Bon Appetit!

• 2 large eggs

• 2/3 cup sugar

• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract

• 1/2 teaspoon grated lemon peel

• Pinch of salt

• 1 cup all purpose flour

• 10 tablespoons (1 1/4 sticks) unsalted butter, melted, cooled slightly

Powdered sugar

Preheat oven to 375°F. Generously butter and flour pan for madeleines. Beat eggs and 2/3 cup sugar in large bowl just to blend. Beat in vanilla, lemon peel and salt. Add flour; beat just until blended. Gradually add cooled melted butter in steady stream, beating just until blended.

Spoon batter into each indentation in pan. Bake until puffed and brown, about 15 minutes. Cool 5 minutes. Gently remove from pan. Repeat process, buttering and flouring pan before each batch.

Dust cookies with powdered sugar.

In the words of the great Jim Gaffigan I had "like one or... twelve."*

*I apologize for my rampant overuse of Jim Gaffigan quotes but I'm kind of on a JG kick right now and I kind of think he's the funniest man that ever has lived. 

Have I ever told you how much I hate lawn mowers? Or the act of mowing a lawn. It always reminds me of being a teenager and my leisurely thirteen hours of sleep on the weekends being interrupted by my mum telling me I have to go mow the lawn. I mean I kind of get it now, it's like "I spent ten years of my life cleaning up after you, feeding you, not sleeping, etc... now it's payback." And I'm not going to lie I am greatly looking forward to the day that we can introduce Birdie to the wonderful world of chores, mwahahahaha... It's all a crapshoot with teenagers anyway right?? Those really were the worst years. It's such an awkward moment in development, you just can't say it better than Miss Britney herself "I'm not a girl, not yet a woman..." You don't feel like you belong at home anymore but you don't really know where home is either.

And then you fall in love, for real, you make memories with a person that you'll giggle over for the rest of your life. You marry that person and together you begin to discover what home means again. You get a puppy that chews all of your beloved (insert sarcasm font) Ikea furniture and a few priceless books. You learn to "be someone someone would want to be around." You grow up a lot. You make mistakes, together. You cry on the bathroom floor and for the first time you only want that person, not mama, not daddy, not your friends but him. You make a big mistake. Then you fix it by taking a big risk. You clean out/strip a thirty year old cabin and move your stuff in all within the same 24 hour period. You drive around a brand new town all morning long looking for any blessed soul that will take four old mattresses (turns out nobody will). You go to return that twenty-four foot Penske truck and beg the owners of the shop to allow you to dump the mattresses in their dumpsters. It starts pouring down buckets of rain. You find yourself soaked, tired, hungry and tired, and some more tired. And yet you just know you've finally come home. 

Two years ago this month this little blue cabin was where our family truly blossomed. Belle was finally free to roam around leash-less to her heart's content. We created traditions and made memories. On Sundays I like to make pancakes and fresh whipped cream while papa bear plays dj at the record player. On cool crisp autumn mornings we take walks down the hill deep into the woods until we reach the beginning of the stream. We sweep the roof before the frost comes in. We go apple picking up the road so I can bake a new pie every week (sometimes from scratch and sometimes I cheat and just buy the good old Pillsbury crust). And then our family got a bit bigger and our house got a healthy dose of happy. There's bath time in the evenings with rubber duckies and bubbles. And lazy pajama clad mornings in bed. And dinner time is always a circus, food flying every which way, Belle catching what she can as it lands on the flood and laughter all around. When it's just the three of us and the doors are closed we are us, we are home. 

And yet the clever north wind blows again. There are many changes in store in the coming year. One of them has already taken place as papa bear has left the little school and farm where he taught for two years. It was an incredibly difficult and heartbreaking decision but the right one for our family at this time. He will still be teaching though mostly online. The changes to come have reinvigorated us and we're bursting with excitement over what the future may hold for us. These two years we spent nesting and bringing stability to our life have been wonderful and so needed. But we're different now, we're older and we're parents, and life is calling us on a different path and it's a wonderful feeling. We love a good challenge in this family and everything that goes into it - the fear, elation, anxiety and promise. 

Here's to a new year of changes, challenges and growth!

^ we sort of matched our shoes ^

^ that would be a walrus. on a building. bam^

^ "I hope I diiiieeee heeeeeeaaaa" ^

We were looking to shake up our weekend routine a bit this Saturday so instead of the usual (farmer's market, bbq chicken, etc) we packed up the circus and headed for Charlottesville. Our usual style of entertainment sounds exactly like this Jim Gaffigan joke (his stand up is A+) 

"Us eating in a place we’ve never been. ‘Well, why don’t we eat something… then we’ll go and get something to eat. Then we’ll see that thing we’re supposed to see, they’ve probably got a snack bar there, right? After that, we should probably get something to eat, though.” So we made a promise to actually attempt to do something other than stuffing our faces. Monticello? Been there, done that, three times actually. And then papa bear got a glorious idea to tour UVA. It's one of the oldest campuses in the US and since it was designed by Thomas Jefferson you know that place would be beaut. 

So here we are happily speeding towards that famed rotunda until we're met with an ocean of cars and police in spiffy orange vests on the street. Game daaayyyyy... Duh. So whats a fam in this situation to do? I tell you what. You find the slow jazz station, recline your seat and take in all the orange and navy. And those little car flags. I love those car flags, they're so.... festive! 

Anyways we finally get downtown and now it's not cars bedecked in the token colors its humans!! Y'all I have never seen so many orange shirts and jerseys in my life! Also, ladies of Charlottesville lets give Jack Rogers a break, they're probably working over time trying to fit every lady foot on campus with their eyelet sandal. I did love all the little kiddies in their game day best rockin jerseys and orange bows like nobody's business. 

Did I mention it was approximately 100 degrees that day? Needless to say there was a lot of sweating going on all around. Thank heavens for deodorant, lord knows we all needed it. So sweaty backs and all we zig zagged all across campus and it did not disappoint. I get all weak in the knees for good architecture and UVA - you simply make me swoon. A sweet boy inside let us use the secret elevator to get to the rotunda and we had the whole magical room all to ourselves. We took in the history and the significance of that room, building and people. Birdie just loved it too, she kept craning her neck to get a better view of the sunburst window that poured the brightest, whitest light all over us. 

Outside it was all about football though. The game was about to start and red solo cups abounded on the lawn. Families were playing their own games of pigskin and young girls were getting chatted up. Speaking of young girls... It's somewhat strange to be surrounded by so many young people all at once. It's enough to make one feel self-conscious! You can smell the carefree life on their breath, the electric chemistry between the guys and gals and all that lankiness!! What I wouldn't give to be that size again... And yet ironically all I did was obsess over "Am I too thin?? Are my boobs big enough??? My skin looks horrible!!" I would give my twenty year old self a stern talking to these days. As they say "youth is wasted on the young." 

Sooooo.... After our grand self-directed UVA tour it was finally time for the eating portion of the evening. We had quickly grabbed some Bodo's Bagels when we first got there (do not miss out on these, they are the real deal!!) so now we were on the hunt for a sit down place. We first picked the Horse & Hound Gastropub only be told they were closed for a private event (whoever was baller enough to pull that off, my hat is off to you and also can we be friends???). Sad face. We considered crashing it al la Vince Vaughn and Owen Wilson in Wedding Crashers: "We are Uncle Ned's kids. Uncle Ned. Uncle Ned, the brother of Aunt Liz?? Well, Dad kinda putters around the house. Hey, Aunt Liz sends her best. She couldn't make it." But then we thought better of it and remembered that we've always wanted to try Fry's Spring Station and headed over there instead. So, so good. Fantastic pizza and I can't wait to have that seafood bisque again!

We had a wonderful time. We returned home sweaty, full and smiling. I love discovering awesome cities. Can't wait to see it in the fall, I have a feeling it's going to be extra pretty!