lucky...

my husband wakes me up with coffee every morning. this particular morning he woke me up with a pair of four-leaf clovers he found while walking our dogs. i am a lucky girl.

three years ago today...

i said yes. i have always been a valentine's day sap and i will ALWAYS be a valentine's day sap. this was one of the happiest days of my life and i'm so glad he's mine for keeps. i hope y'all put on your heart-shaped, rose-colored glasses today and sneak an extra piece of chocolate- all in the name of love, right? xoxo

in a snowglobe...

atlanta has been experiencing some serious winter wonderland-ness. i love it. all of it. things i am grateful for, in no particular order...

...i love that atlanta is wildly unprepared for any sort of snowpocalypse and most schools were closed all week long.

...i love that ed didn't have to go to work for half the week.

...i love walking our beagles in the snow(even though i slipped and fell flat on my back).

...i love numb noses and sloshy bean boots.

...i love walking to the grocery store for silly things like paper towels.

... i love hunkering down in my home and giving each neglected room the care it needed.

... i love making various soups for days on end(beef tenderloin, cauliflower, chicken & almond, and a hearty chicken and vegetable).

... i love curling up in my weathered leather club chair wrapped in a wool blanket, beagle in lap, book in hand.

i love being snowed in, because it gave me time to be extremely introspective and calm. it gave me incredible time to tend to the parts of my home that i had ignored. and it gave me time to be with my family in a warm and happy home, with burning cedar incense to pretend a fire was blazing. and lots and lots of soup.

esquires are a good thing...

{all pics from google images}

so, my handsome husband is getting sworn in tomorrow and i'm mega proud. so proud i felt like gratuitously posting cute pics of our president as a harvard law student. smart is sexy, for sure. i'm glad i married a smart man, he keeps me on my toes.

j.press schoolboy scarves...

these j.press scarves are just awesome. i would totally buy my husband one if they made a university of georgia one... or if he wore scarves. i could buy my francophile friends the frenchy one, right? cute holiday present?

happy anniversary eddie...

my my my, how quickly time flies. i can't believe it was a year(and a day) ago that we were on a farm saying "i do". and now we just got back from a lake, freckled and a little burnt, and are sharing a bowl of year-old frozen, red velvet ("bleedin' armadillo")wedding cake with icecream. love you darling, i'm so glad i get to keep you.

i will miss y'all most of all...

today and i will always be grateful for...

last night my closest friends gathered at madam geneva for a final farewell for ed and me. i really do believe the old adage, "if you can count your good friends you have on one hand, then consider yourself lucky". well then last night i needed at least 5 other free hands! we sipped pimms cups, gimlets, ellisons, and various other delicious gin-infused spirits while laughing and gossiping the night away. and then we capped the revelry off with an ungodly amount of french fries at pommes frites.

i didn't take any photos of the night, what was i thinking?! the night was perfect. a very special speech was made. beautiful smiling faces were aplenty. an abundance of gorgeous flowers speckled the room. very dear cards and books were given. there was a healthy showing of glittery sequins, bows, and party dresses. hilarious friends belted out showtunes with gusto on the streets of new york.

peter hale cooney III. chelsea rose cook. corrie wright pellerin. lauren weinerth. haylie b. waring. savannah wyatt. amy emerson merrick. john gardner. mary ping. madeleine alder-cossitt and anton hansson. abby hasler. jamie freed. blake lewis. max shimizu-jones. sarah meyer. mandy kordal. lauren demith. brendan coleman. nick derosa. i will miss y'all so much. new york has been a real wild ride, but none of it would have been half as special if it weren't for having each and every one of you in my life. thank you for making me love new york. i will always be grateful for the times we shared in the big apple. and i promise, i will be sure to write...

*all flowers shown were styled by amy merrick at saipua.

**thank you jamie jean freed for organzing our bon voyage. you totally nailed it.

coney island...

today i am grateful for...

pallin' around brooklyn with one of my best friends corrie pellerin! i love my corrie girl, and having her in town for my last week in nyc is soooo sweet. we ventured out to coney island( my "brilliant" idea) only to find out... the rides won't be open to the public until tomorrow! i know i have made the disclaimer that i am the most hopeless tour guide, and i firmly stand by it. thankfully coney island has plenty of charm even in its semi-closed state.

all i wanted was to ride the dang ferris wheel. i need to get on this dang wheel. it is legendary!

hello handsome. i love you.

fade to black film is the jam.

i love my corrie girl.

shoot the freak.

sx-70 artistic film.

suggestion noted.

we took the bait.

i am thankful i have so many forgiving people in my life, who don't seem to mind my absent-minded tour guiding. eeps. but it was a gorgeous day with lots of laughs and colorful sights. i wanted to hijack all the hand-painted signs and sniff out the sideshow freaks. i was tempted by the cotton candy and candy apples. in the end it was lots of laughs, nathan hotdogs, and ice cream cones. yum. and oh yeah, my best friend is in town. did i mention i'm so happy she's here?

cherry-o...

today i am grateful for...

taking a detour from my spring cleaning to actually enjoy spring!! i dragged eddie out of our apartment for a little brooklyn botanic garden adventure. i must admit, i was a little too eager and still haven't adjusted to new york's spring schedule... meaning the garden was still a little sleepy, with flowers hiding beneath the soil.

but we sniffed out the blooms. daffodils and some cherry blossoms were sprinkled throughout the garden grounds.

oh the cherry blossoms, my favorite mid-atlantic treat! i can't wait for the explosion all over new york.

i had a dandy time just soaking up some sun and fresh air! and it was fun playing around with some cameras from my collection. i have yet to develop my pentax k1000, and i can't wait to see how they turn out. i love surprises! and i am loving these longer days and warmer air. yum.

secret hearts...

today i am grateful for...

our new shoe trolley, acquired from this lovely lady...

so i can organize my husband's shirts for him...

and embroider sweet nothings inside his shirt pockets, while he's at a coffee shop reading. little letters that only he can see.

shhhh... this is one of my valentine's day presents to him. thank god he doesn't read my blog. two down, twenty-something to go!

sullivan ballou's letter...

today i am grateful for...

this email popping into my inbox from my husband. i clicked to this link and couldn't stop crying by the end.

one of the most romantic letters i have ever read. or heard read aloud, for that matter. my husband devours any book or media involving the civil war. he was a history major, after all. i'm so glad he passed this dear gem on to me.

what a beautifully brave and noble man, mr. sullivan ballou. and how lucky was his wife sarah, to have been loved so sincerely by him? i want to find more love letters like this. if you know of any sources, please share!

dyker heights

today i am grateful for...

the first snowfall and a trip to dyker heights with eddie. holy canoli... this ultra italian, superbly brooklyn neighborhood sure knocked our socks off with their spectacular christmas display.

atlanta has callaway gardens, which i used to BEG my parents to drive all the way out to during the holiday season. and there was this one amazing house, across the street from chastain park, that my parents used to drive me to when i was a baby. they would drive me around to the christmas lights to help me fall asleep at night. but places like dyker heights and amy merrick's candyland are somethin' else.

it was incredible. i have never seen this much snow in my whole life. the flakes poured down on us in droves and the wind whipped our cheeks bright pink.

we threw snowballs at eachother and attempted to make a snowman together. none of course as charming as frosty and his snow lady friend.

we "sat on" santa's lap. and maybe even found next year's christmas card ;)

and ed even made a snow angel.

i ate cupfuls of toxic new york city snow and snapped away as families drove by in mini vans, oohing and ahhing . we only left when our eyelashes started to form icicles and our fingers lost all feeling. we finished the evening at our local italian joint, back in park slope. ya know, keeping with the theme, followed by hot chocolate and clementines. it was a perfect first snowfall.

i absolutely recommend making a pilgrimage to dyker heights if you live in new york. it is unabashedly, unapologetically christmasy. bergdorf windows eat your heart out. all kidding aside, it is guaranteed to make even the scroogiest, grinchiest of hearts grow two sizes.

i hope everyone takes a little time to go play in the snow... the miserable snow-shoveling can be put off til a later time... says the gal from the south, who never needed to perform such a grueling chore. not in a georgia winter, at least.

rock steady eddie!

today i am grateful for...

coming home early from work to the best news... my husband passed the NEW YORK BAR EXAM. and i couldn't be any prouder! i'm so glad i get to be his cheerleader for life.

congratulations mr. ed stelling. esquire. what a stud.

little apples on a hillside...

important fact about me...

i'm not good at following directions. giving directions. or having a sense of direction. good rule of thumb, never let me be in charge of figuring out the logistics of an adventure. so when i decided to plan our apple pickin' adventure, someone should have relieved me of the role of troop leader.

two hours later, after a subway, two trains, a bus, and a cab, we( lauren, eddie, and i) all landed at the darling country store at soons orchard, only to be told...

apple pickin' is only on the weekends.

"is it hard to get here from the city?" one well-meaning shop gal asked.

i wanted to cry. and kick myself in the pants. and the shins. with apple season ending the up-coming weekend, i was doomed to go yet another year without.

but fortune somehow smiled upon us, and sharon, the apple farm boss lady, did something truly wonderful...

she let us pick apples.

and oh how we picked...

and picked...

and picked...

the day was warm and the country 'scape was spotted with leaves changing.

lauren and i giggled and acted fools.

ed practiced his apple juggling.

and we smooched a whole bunch.

and i tried my best sweet-talking to score some wooden apple crates (to no avail)...

we each took home 20 pounds of apples( lady jean, golden delicious, cortland, jonagold and fuji).

on the train ride back we shared apple doughnuts and nursed a giant thermos of spicy apple cider. it was a perfect fall day and i can't wait to go again next year. back to the soons orchard and farm. where they take care of foolish city folks who don't read the fine print. and have the best apples i have ever tasted.

now i just need to test out some of miss jc's apple recipes...yum! and i might have to buy this, thanks to her recommendation!