Site Title

I can’t believe it’s been 9 whole years. It’s
been the longest 9 years of my life, I’ll tell you that much. Not
really. It’s flown by. Want to hear how it all started? Imagine this..

It’s July 20th, 1990 (I had to google this
today because I had no idea of the actual date). I had just turned 14
and my brother & I had tickets to the "Depeche Mode: Violator" tour
at the now defunct Salt Palace in Salt Lake City. We were too young to
drive so our parents drove us 40 miles north to the show. There I am,
just to the left of the stage, rocking out when I turn around to see a
very dreamy boy a few rows back. He’s there with his twin brother & a
bunch of friends. My little 14 year old heart is skipping a beat and as
any 14 year old can attest, it only takes mere seconds of seeing
someone to know you are completely and utterly in love. So, I keep
turning around to see him throughout the show and now it is time to
leave. My 14 year-old heart is breaking. Who is this
person? If/when will I ever see you again? I’m too shy to talk to him,
besides he had hair down to his shoulders and looks like a caveman. He
could have been twice my age. Too scary. So I go home, lay in bed, and
am very very sad. We were soulmates, didn’t he know?? I vividly
remember thinking, "Whoever gets to marry that boy, will be the
luckiest gal in the whole world. She will never know how
lucky she is" (I now get reminded.)  So that was it. He never saw
me, I never forgot him. Six months later I’m walking in the mall, as
most 14 year olds do, and there he is. He walks right past me. "Keep it
cool, KEEP IT COOL" I keep thinking to myself. This is fantastic news.
He must live somewhere around here. He again doesn’t see me, or my
braces or any of my teen glory. Fast-forward another year, I see him at
the movies, again, no loving. Not even a glance. But I haven’t
forgotten him. About 6 months after that, I am driving in the car with
Mom and I see him sitting on the grass in front of the Dairy Queen…
with a girl. A GIRL for crying out loud! A girl who is the complete
opposite of me. A girl who has long, long blonde hair AND no braces.
"Well, if those are the kind of girls you are interested in,
I’m OVER YOU!" I was very sad. It had at this point, been nearly 2
years since the Depeche Mode gig.

It’s now early May of 1992. I had just turned 16, and my girlfriend
calls to say that while she was driving home the night before, a
carload of boys tried picking up on her while she was driving down
State Street. They want to get together & go to the Drive-in and do
I want to go? "Sure, I guess I’ll go. It’s a Saturday night, I’ve got
nothing going on." So I put on my OMD shirt and go. I get to her car,
and there HE IS. I am fah-reaking out inside. Screaming like a crazy
person. For reals? It’s really YOU?? "Keep it cool. KEEP IT COOL! "Um,
hi, I’m Morgan." The only thing I really remember that night was going
into the bathroom by the concession stand and just dying inside. I
couldn’t believe it. I needed a moment to compose myself. No one knew,
not even my girlfriend. I call her the next day to give her the juicy
details and she says, "Oh my gosh! You have to tell him!" "What
are you, a complete looney? I can’t tell him. That’s like the creepiest
story ever!" I tell him. He thinks it’s like the coolest story ever. I
mean, I was borderline stalking him for like 2 years. Who wouldn’t be
flattered? (He loves this story, by the way). So we date all summer
long. I break up with him at the end of the summer. We were only 16 ,
it was too much. We don’t talk again until the following April. We are
17. We decide to go to Prom together. As friends. We go to the Symphony
to see Beethoven’s 9th, and take a horse-drawn carriage ride. It was
one of the most romantic dates ever. Too bad I wasn’t interested. We
keep talking, and date again, all summer long. Then, I break up with
him. I just need my space. Chris refers to this time in our life as
"The Cold War."  No talking, no getting together the next the summer.
We are both dating other people. At this point, we are 18. A whole year
goes by. He turns 19- and goes on his mission to Russia. We kind of
start writing on & off and patching up our past. There was a lot to
patch up and just a lot of overall growing that needed to happen.
Anyway, he comes home in Sept of 1997, we get engaged on New Years Eve
in San Francisco (an unfortunate story which deserves it’s own post)
and are married May 15th, 1998. That was 9 years ago. Thanks for the great adventure, sweets. It was meant to be!

Happy Anniversary!

(the pics are from Prom, 1993, we were 17)

xoxo

Poor Henry, the lamps kept falling over on him. He was such a trooper. He spent most of the week crammed in the car with home dec. items surrounding him. Pillows, curtain rods, lamps, you name it. The Parade of Homes opened yesterday (Saturday) and we are all pretty exhausted around these parts. Mom & I were there until about 3:30 a.m. early Saturday morning getting the finishing touches done. So, with no further ado, here are some of the pic’s:
Mom made all the curtains:

I just love the white wood beam/thingys on the walls (I have absolutely no idea what they are called.) It was Mom’s idea to put them up and I think they pretty much rock.

I love the master bath. Mom picked out the amazing claw foot tub:

and she picked out these wonderful basin sinks:

After a very long, exhausting week, I’m glad it all came together. Mom has been working so hard on this project and I think it turned out wonderfully! The home is gorgeous and now it’s time to pack up as Henry & I are flying home on Monday. If you live in Utah, the Parade of Homes is running for another 2 weeks so come by & check it out.

In the midst of the Parade of Homes, I was able to plan a small family
party for Henry who will be turning 2 next Sunday. "Henry, what kind of
cake do you want?" "A blue cake. A Thomas cake. A James cake. A coal
car cake.  A Gordon cake." It was so crazy that I had absolutely no
time to make a cake (that will have to wait for his actual birthday
next week) so I did what anyone would do. I called Costco. The cake
masters. They have yummy cakes. Too much frosting? Absolutely. But it
was a good second option. It was a carrot cake with apricot mousse
filling and cream cheese frosting. They didn’t have any Thomas stuff, so I found a cake topper
that was a track with a Thomas engine and I made some flags. I think it was a hit.

I think the birthday boy loved it. It was nice to have so much family there to celebrate. We’ve lived away for so long, I sometimes forget how wonderful it is to have all of our extended family together. We just don’t get to have enough of those opportunities. I really, really love it. I have 7 mosquito bites on my left arm to prove it.

So the hair-do? Here’s a before shot, and a very out-of-focus pic of the new do:

100x better, no? My sister…she’s just a scissor genius. And she never gets mad when she discovers that I have yet again taken the craft scissors to my bangs. It shorter & choppier in the back which I’m really grooving on. If you live in Utah, definitely check her out. Her salon is in SLC and called Aerolab. Her name is Annika & she is the owner (and the fuzzy person in the background : ) Thanks, doll! I LOVE it!!

Well, I am pretty much completely & utterly exhausted.  I’ve had a total of 7 hours of sleep over the past 2 days. We fly home tomorrow, have our wedding anniversary on Tuesday and a birthday to celebrate next weekend. Wish me luck. My head is already spinning….

xoxo

There is a great quilt shop in Salt Lake called Pipers that I try to get to at least once everytime I am here.  They always have the stuff that I see online that I can’t ever seem to find in stores. Plus, it’s in this adorable old house with a big porch, so you kind of just feel like you never want to leave. But, with Henry waiting for me in the car, I just bolted in and made out with the top 6 fabrics (ha ha, not bad for just ‘bolting’ in). You should of seen me, quickly scanning the fabrics like I was on the Amazing Race looking for a clue.

My Mom is in charge of decorating one of the Parade of Homes this year (an entire 3,000+ sq ft home all by herself!) and so we’ve been running around like chicks with our noggens cut off. It is exhausting shopping when 1) You aren’t buying anything for yourself (not entirely true as shown in the photo’s) and  2) It’s not so spontaneous. Things have to go together, match, and you need a lot of things like curtain rods, pillows, bedding, furniture, curtains, etc.,. Matt watched Henry for the day and said he almost threw up twice when he had to change some of Henrys stinky diapers! LOL!!  I think we’ve just about got everything and now she has 2 days to decorate the whole house! I keep thinking this should be a tv show or something. Oh the insanity.

Chris forwarded me an e-mail this week entitled "The Worst Video Ever." All I have to say is nay. nay, nay. I mean it could take a gal years to try to perfect those kind of dance moves.  It just gets better each and every time I watch it. I caught myself humming it  to Henry this weekend. I am such a goober. Have a look for yourself. Here’s "I wanna love you tender" an awesome Finnish video from the 80’s (thanks, Mike for forwarding) I especially love when they start swinging towards the camera. I just wanna be your love defender.

The aforementioned haircut is scheduled for Tuesday, hallelujah! And I wasn’t throwing Chris under the bus by quoting what he said. He’s been listening to me for ages complain about how much my hair is a complete & utter drag. It’s bad news bears. Your comments made me laugh though.

Happy Sunday!

xoxo

I’m such a last-minute-er. I can’t believe I eeked this thing out just under the wire.  Phew, I barely made it. Apron submitted to Tie One On: check. I found this jumbo ric-rac that I completely flipped out about and was so happy it was the theme for this month.  The apron strings  are  a tad long, so we tried tying them in the back and then the front:

The bow tied in front, reminds me of one of Ms. Olive Juice’s aprons. I  can’t decide which way I like best. The pink fabric is Alexander Henry (which seems to make up a lot of my fabric stash these days), and the turquoise is something I picked up about a year ago.

My sister came into town last Friday and we are having a great time. In fact, I think she is 99.9% going to move here in the next few weeks! Hooray! We just got back from another taping of Dancing with the Stars and had a super time. It will be so nice to have her around (or an hour away). Henry keeps calling her ‘Nessa (Vanessa) and true to form, my refrigerator has been completely re-organized. We have a crazy next few days ahead of us including a last minute trip to Utah that I just booked yesterday for about 10 days. My other sister owns her own hair salon there and I can’t wait to have her take a good 4-5" off. As Chris says about my current hair-do "It’s not doing you any favors." I couldn’t agree with him more.

xoxo

I know you’ve all been sitting on pins & needles wondering how our "Day out with Thomas" experience went. I kid, I kid. It was good. The actual train ride, a bit lame. It was marketed as a "25-minute train ride" which in my mind conjures up images of rolling hills, frolicking, horses, etc.,.  Not so much. It went in a straight line, and I guess when you are only going 2.5 miles an hour, you really only have to travel about 1 mile before you have to go back. Our "Honorary Jr. Engineer" (as his certificate stated) didn’t seem to mind. And we thought he was pretty adorable glued to the window. Everything else about our "experience" was a lot of fun. I would definitely recommend it.  I am sad to report, however,  I had to make an executive decision to bolt out of the rather long tattoo line, and make a b-line for the Sir Topham Hatt line. Henry didn’t mind (something tells me there’s no way in H-e-double-hockey-sticks that he’d let those tattoo people get near him). Fun was had by all.

If you have any Thomas lovers in your home, you can view our set of pictures here. Maybe they’ll make your kids hyperventilate, like they make Henry do.

 

We went to the most incredible exhibit at the San Diego Museum of Art over the weekend. It was the last day of the: Annie Liebowiz: A Photographers Life exhibit. It was amazing. I have been a long-time admirer of her photography and it was incredible seeing the real thing. She had this amazing collection of magazine photo’s mixed in with her own personal collection of family photos. There was a gorgeous series of her parents in swimsuits (I think they were in their 80’s?) and a lot of pictures taken at the beach under a big striped umbrella. If you click on the above link you’ll see a wonderful photo she took of her brother & dad. The thing that I thought was the most amazing was the contrast between the professional & family photos. I think I  liked the candid family photo’s better. There were a lot that were out of focus and natural and just dreamy in that non-perfect way.  It just made me realize that all my photos don’t have to be perfect (not that they are anything close to that) but it was so endearing to see the other side of Annie. I loved it.

 

I had never been to Balboa park before, which is where the museum is. It was so gorgeous there. I must make another trip down for more photos.

I need to get my rear in gear… the deadline for the this months "Tie One On" apron club is on Monday. The theme is Rickrack (or Riff-Raff as Chris seriously thinks it’s called). Have a lovely week!

xoxo

Hi Friends! Coasters are now available in the shop. They would make a darling Mother’s Day gift (nudge, nudge) or a weekend splurge. Sorry for getting this posted so late today. Henry’s molars are coming in and all he keeps saying over & over is "Hugs! Hugs!" Lots of snuggles, not so much progress on the switch-plates, but I will have them in the shop next week. We are taking Henry out tomorrow for an early birthday present to a "Day out with Thomas" train ride, or "experience" as they say. We are all very excited about it. I hear that tattoo’s will be involved. Good times.

Happy Weekend!

xoxo

Diet Coke that is. It just seems to make the afternoon complete. And it really does taste better if you can sip it out of a fancy glass. There is some leftover chocolate birthday cake too, that is calling my name. An afternoon of coke & cake. This could be deadly. I hope Chris doesn’t come home to me face-down on a plate of half eaten chocolate cake. He made my most favorite chocolate cake for my birthday. It’s killer. If you like chocolate cake (does this question even need to be asked?) you really, really must make this recipe. You’ll need Hershey’s cocoa and the recipe can also be found on the side of the container. It’s the only cake I’ve ever made that calls for 1 C of boiling water. It makes for the most wonderfully dense and moist cake you’ll ever eat.

I’m making the above coasters for my shop update this Friday. They are made from my absolute favorite linen fabrics that I picked up last year in the fashion district. Also making some very cool switch-plates. I’ll let you know when everything will be available on Friday.

Happy Wednesday!

(Does anyone else have the song "You’ve got to move it, move it" stuck in their head from last nights DWTS? Now I’ve got Henry saying "move it, move it!")

xoxo

I was digging through some old photos and found this one of my 5th birthday. I miss you, Strawberry Shortcake. I’m only 3 years older than Henry is now. Crazy. I’m officially in my thirties. I’m no longer thirty. I’m a thirty-something. Wow.

I’ve recently discovered this great Flickr group called "365 Days". You have to take a self portrait for 365 days. By self-portrait, it can be your ear, your toe, any part of you can be in the photo and you have to take the photo. That means, I’ll need to get a tripod and figure out how to use the timer on the camera. I’ve been debating and have decided to start today, on my birthday. This is going to be a good year, I can just feel it. Lots of changes. What better way to document it. I’ve been following EllaDog’s photo’s in the 365 Day pool, and she’s completely inspired me. Her photos are just amazing. They completely tell her life story. So there you have it. I’m committing. The first photo will go up tonight. You’ll be able to view all the photo’s on my Flickr page in the 365Days folder. Wish me luck!

Well, we’ve officially been invited to take part in Root beer Fest ’07. This is what we have to contribute: Bulldog, Hansen’s (is sarsaparilla even a root beer? I blame Chris), Dad’s & Berghoff’s. Our friends birthday is tonight and he didn’t want a "birthday party" so instead, we are having a root beer tasting. From what I understand, scorecards will be involved. I am scared. I’m no root beer connoisseur. Maybe I should start drinking now….

My brother came into town on Wednesday and we are having a ball. Henry absolutely adores him and I’m sure that Matt’s enormous contributions to Henry’s ever growing Thomas the Train collection has absolutely nothing to do with it. We took Chris to work this morning and Matt couldn’t resist hopping out of the car for a pose on Ryan Seacrest’s parking spot. We are laughing at the ridiculousness of it all. Oh Ryan Seacrest. Oh you. I did see him on Tuesday after the shows taping getting into his black Bentley. Mr. Jackson was there, too. But in a black Benz. Why am I sharing this? I don’t know. I never watched American Idol before this season and even then, I’m no AI die hard. But if I have to see Sanjaya one more time, I might just…….

Things here are good & busy. We are going to a Dodger game tomorrow (Matt’s got to get in as many as he can) and I’m shipping out the last of the orders from Etsy, which let me say a huge THANK YOU for all your support last weekend on the pin-cushions. It was so fun to see them sell out. Those of you who got them, you won’t be disappointed!  I won’t have more for a while,  but I am working on some other fun things that will be in the shop next Friday.

My birthday is on Monday and I think we’re going to The Tree Show. I was dropping Chris off one morning at work and drove right by the Michael Kohn Gallery and decided right then & there it’s where I wanted to go. I’m very excited and so happy to support local artists (and all you non-local artists, too!) I love art gallerys. In fact, when I found out that we were pregnant I broke the news to Chris at the Boston Museum of Fine Arts. Very much looking forward to it.

Have a happy weekend! Here’s some Scissor Sisters to get your weekend going! There’s just no words  for the skin-tight purple ensemble. You’ll love it. I promise.

xoxo

I know, I already wished you Easter greetings, but I wanted to post some pics from yesterdays Easter egg extravaganza which was so fun (thank you, Jean!) We had to wake Henry up a little early from his nap, so he was a bit disheveled and confused at this whole egg in the basket game, but decided he would  just go along with it to please his camera-ready parents. Thanks, Henry. The sacrifices you make… The kids were all gathered up and waited very patiently until every last child was there, basket and all. And when it was time to go, well, they  all  ran like crazy people…

Henry loves playing in the dirt, so I thought that’d be a surefire place that he’d go looking. And I was right!

And finally, all that hard work paid off! Just look at it all!

We are slowly coming down from  yesterdays sugar-high…

Happy Easter…again!!

xoxo