Chandelier for the entryway

And to add to the uncertainty...

We bought this rug for the dining room tonight.





Thoughts NOW???

Window Treatment Help

Please, please, please give your opinion re: window treatments for our dining room/kitchen. It's one large room, so the dining room is not formal. The walls are painted Sagey by Behr. I'm going for black as the other accent color. John and I seem to have fundamental differences on what should be hanging on these windows.

WARNING: Ignore the "stuff" on the table, counters, the orange countertops, the dark wood cabinets, the yellow sink, etc...

Here's the double window in the dining room. The only potential issue with this is that the bottom curtains hang to the top of the windowsill. Is this right? Should they hang lower? I love these curtains and John likes them, too, so other than the length issue, I think we're OK on these.



Also in the dining room "section" we have a large window that slides to open. I thought the valance, bottom tiers might look silly on this because the window is not naturally divided across the middle, so I went with some off-white linen tab tops. What are your thoughts on these?



Then we have the door that is in between the dining room and the kitchen. We both feel that there should be something over the window on the door, but we're not sure what.



Then, last by not least, we have the window over the sink in the kitchen. I thought we'd just do the striped valance, tier similar to the dining room windows, but John feels that will block out too much light. Would just the valance work?

What I bought with my Christmas money!

Aside from the groovy pocketbook showcased in a previous post, I used my Christmas money (thanks Mom, Dad & Mary) to buy this amazing down coat from Eddie Bauer. It comes a little below my waist, has a faux fur(yes, I confirmed this before buying) lined hood, fleece-lined pockets, and is very warm. I tried to get a shot straight from , but couldn't. So, excuse the messy bed as the backdrop!



I also got these somewhat unattractive, but very warm/waterproof boots from EB. It's time to retire the Bean Duck boots.

Craigy's B-day Bash

Thanks to Angela, we had a lovely b-day celebration for the Man from Down Under (yup, I specifically said that to annoy you, Craig). We had beer, wine, excellent food and even better company. Here are some shots from the shindig.

Jim & Craig


Carolyn & Ben


Zoe & Craig (I think he's praying to the New Zealand Foodie God)


Teri, Annette, Ben & Craig (Can't keep his eyes open at a party, since he's so old now.)


Me, Carolyn, Thomas & Jim


Jim & Craig getting weirder as the night goes on


Annette, Angela, Katie & Carolyn


Is there a fireman in the house?

My lips are sealed

Dry chapped lips? Nothing seems to work? This stuff DOES. I read on someone else's blog that she used to look for some reviews of hand lotion. I decided to join it (free) and see what they had for reviews on lip balm. These got great reviews on there. Santa heard my plea, went to Sephora and got them, and put them in my stocking! (P.S. Don't let the old fashioned container or the word "salve" frighten you.)

My new pocketbook

I lurve it! It's so funky.