My childhood flashed before my eyes

I can't wait!

(It is in wide screen on YouTube so a small portion of it is cut off on the right.)

Anthropologie, or something like that

If you know me at all you know that I LOVE Anthorpologie!  It inspires me to be a better person.  Seriously, when I leave the store or finish looking at the catalogue I am a happier, more creative person.   Just walking into the store and seeing how they decorate their displays with honey bottles or lollipops or crumpled paper I get tingles, it is magical.  I have been in love since I was in high school when I surprisingly got my first catalogue in the mail.  It was an absolute treat.  Before that, I was blessed with only the pages from J.Crew to read and dream over, and let's be honest, J.Crew is a great store, but it doesn't hold a candle to Anthro.  I love it!  

But I digress.  My love has always been a hard one due to the cost of Anthro.  I know you have to pay big for big style, but come on!  The sales room is great and the online shopping helps me keep on top of what goes on sale (btw, the sales items are updated every tuesday.)  However, it still doesn't feel like the best deal when you buy something on "sale" that costs more than $50.  Luckily, my amazing mother-in-law just sent me to a site that is so very Anthro like, but way less in price.  It is a vintage inspired store with some handmade stuff as well as other things that really made me excited to look at.  Here is the link to Ruche.  I know there are so many other stores like this, but I just don't know about them... yet.  After enjoying the awesomeness of this store, let me know of any other online stores that you love.  

Until then, my heart will always belong to Anthropologie.  I will always wander around the store trying not to drool, while Lincoln sits in one of their many beautiful chairs reading one of their uber trendy book about Audrey Hepburn or birds.  As I dream of one day purchasing without guilt.  Ah, dreams.   

NEW YORK CITY

Ah, New York. It is such a wonderful exciting city. Lincoln and I took a trip up there to visit my sister Nikki, her husband Cameron, and their amazingly adorable son, John. It was Lincoln's LAST spring break so we knew we had to do it in style. Here are our (out of order) pictures from our trip.

This picture is dedicated to my friend Kate who loves taking pictures of random signs. This is in SOHO (is that how you write it?) where we did some great shopping. I am now in love with a store that you can only find there in the US. It is called UNIQLO. My friend Jon gave us a heads up about it, and Nikki confirmed that it was awesome. We were not let down.






The entire gang at a museum called Cloisters. It is beautiful. It is right off the Hudson River, it is really pretty but we didn't witness any miracles on the Hudson that day.










Lincoln in the M&M store getting "scanned" to see what M&M color he is. For the record, he is silver. I don't know what that means, but it was fun. I really wanted some cinnamon bears so we went into all the candy stores in Time Square. Unfortunately, we didn't want to spend $10 on a small bag that wouldn't curb my craving. So we went to the ever dependable Duane Reed and purchased a box of Hot Tamales. It did the trick.


These are a few pictures of our many adventures on the subway. It is a must when going to NYC. Luckily, Lincoln is a great navigator and we only had to stop one time to look at the map. I had total faith that he wouldn't get us lost. We also saw a little critter on the tracks one day. Lincoln had to take a picture, and if any of you know me at all you can only imagine how freaked out I was. I had to really concentrate on my breathing so I wouldn't pass out. I HATE RODENTS!!!






















Beautiful Central Park. We spent tons of time in Central Park. It is so close to Nikki and Cameron and you can't help but want to spend time there.














We had a great time. We are so happy to have such wonderful family who will let us stay with them and show us around their city.

Color Me Mine

A best friend, Sarah, and I were talking about our New Years resolutions back in January, when she gave me a great idea. One of her resolutions was to plan every other month to have an activity date with her husband. It is so easy to go to the movies and dinner, but there are only so many memories with a dinner and a movie date. I was so excited to try this that I quickly thought of a million little activity dates for Lincoln and I. However, they all had to do with being outside and since we live in freezing Ohio, my ideas didn't seem to be all that great. Luckily, a friend of mine, Maria, mentioned that on the last friday of every month there is pajama day at Color Me Mine and the studio fee is only $1.00 if you wear your pajamas. I have some pretty serious rules about wearing my sleeping clothes in public, and Lincoln didn't think wearing his underwear would be a good idea, but we figured something out and met our friends for our activity date.
Here we are being ever so serious in our "pajamas" trying to concentrate on our bowls.
Here is the finished product. Try and guess which one is Lincoln's.

We had a great time. I look forward to all the other activity dates in the future. If you have any ideas or suggestions, I would love to hear them.

Client say the darndest things....

The other day I was taking one of my clients back to my station to cut her hair. This is how our conversation started.

me- (cough, cough)
client- "Are you sick?"
me- "I have a little sinus issue. I'm getting over it."
client- "Oh, cause you look awful."
me- "Um, well enough about me, let's talk about how you are doing."

This reminds me of another client who always has some wonderful things to say to me. This conversation seriously happened more than one time. She just couldn't get over it.

client- "I am so happy you went back to blonde. You look so much happier."
me- "Yeah, I do like my hair better blonde."
client- "You were just so depressed with that dark hair."
me- "I looked depressed with the dark hair?"
client- "No, you were depressed with your dark hair. I just don't think the goth look works for you."

Keep in mind that my "dark" hair wasn't all that dark. I also rarely wear black and I don't wear makeup to make me look at all gothic. But for some reason this client mentioned her feelings about my dark hair on multiple visits with me. I'll let you be the judge, this is me as a "depressed" brunette.

I also had one try to give me marital advice before Lincoln and I got married. My friend overheard her and just about died.

client- "What will your new husband do for a living?"
me- "He is in law school."
client- "Oh, get ready for a tough life. Most men who get a higher education are unfaithful to their wives."
me- totally shocked at what she said, "Are you saying that because Lincoln will be a lawyer he will cheat on me?"
client- "It could happen."
me- "Well, you don't know Lincoln."


Another jem of a conversation was when one of my clients wanted to know what I was doing with the rest of my life. No joke, this is what she said.

client- "What do you want to do for work."
me- "What? This is where I work."
client- "I mean, what do you want to do for a real job? When you are all done with this, what do you want to study in school?"
me- "I did go to school, and I studied cosmetology. This is what I want to do for a living."
client- "I don't think you are understanding what I am asking you."
me- "Yes, that's probably it."

Needless to say, we didn't talk much the rest of the service.


I love my clients. I have really easy ones, really high maintenance ones, clients that talk the entire service and ones that only say a few words. They are what make my work day complete, literally. I just think that sometimes they say the darndest things.

Christmas in February

Since I am WAY behind on writing I thought I would just throw a couple pictures on here from Christmas and fill you in the with what we did. I would skip it all together, but it was Lincoln and my first Christmas and I need to write something about it.

We went to my grandparents in MI about 6 hours away. I have been there almost every year of my life, but I still get lost on the drive up. Since this was only Linc's second time he still wasn't sure about the drive. After the huge mess up with the map (totally my fault) and the horrible snow storm we finally made it there way off schedule, but we made it. We had a great time with the family that could make it. Almost everyone was there, but we were still missing a few. We kept busy playing in the snow, shooting some guns (very Christmasy don't you think), eating tons of food, having Wii competitions, and much more. It was a great long weekend. And thanks to Lincoln getting me a navigation system, we made it home in record time.


My grandma, bless her heart, always hires some local guy to come and play santa. She really wants to keep the dream alive with the kids. It usually goes pretty well. Unfortunately, this year "Santa" got his minivan stuck in the driveway and the guys had to push him out. My little nephew David, who is six, noticed right away and said, "Santa got his car stuck in the snow." Oops. I still think he believes, but I think my grandma almost had a heart attack over that one.




The "shooting range" was about 100 yards from the house. My grandparents live on enough land that we just went out back to have the fun. My grandpa has a small arsenal of weapons. He doesn't mess around. We believe in the second ammendment.



Lincoln is a great shot. He was very natural with a firearm.




This is me looking obviously very unnatural with a gun. I don't think letting out a little scream after each shot makes me all that tough.




It was a great time had by all. I think we need to have guns at every family gathering.

What facial hair can do to a man

Lincoln recently got the bright idea that since he didn't have any interviews in the near future he needed to grow a beard. I was fine with this since his facial hair is reasonably even when it grows in and it doesn't make him look amish. Not that there is anything wrong with that. Anyway, he had the beard for a few weeks and by the way he was reacting to it, I thought I was stuck with a bearded man forever. He loved to talk about it's growth and thickness. We compared the color of it around his mouth to the color of it around his jaw. I honestly can say that the focus of our conversations revolved around the beard. It seemed like I was going to have to get used to kissing a hairy face. I can't say that I had that much of a problem with it. How can I expect him to be ok when I chop my hair off and color it all different colors, if I can't handle a little change in his hair too. Even if it is his facial hair. I thought he would have it forever, until one day when I was at work minding my own business and this guy behind me taps me on the back and says, "sugar, um, sugar." I turned around and found this.

A totally trashy looking guy with dip in his lip and a big bunch of flowers in his hands. It seriously took me a few beats before I realized it was him. He had tried trimming the beard, but got a little carried away. And true to everything we stand for he had to dress the part and pull the entire thing together with the vest, hat, shirt, even the three pieces of gum in his mouth to look like dip. I about died. My client loved it. It seriously made her day seeing my husband come to see me in costume. I had to remind her over and over that it was a joke and that he really doesn't look like that.

So, what has the facial hair been through since the horrible chops and goat? Luckily he decided to cut the chops, I HATE huge sideburns, but kept a mustache for a few days. It felt like I was cheating on Lincoln with a high school football coach from the 70's.

His dad loved it... I think he was the only one. Lincoln tried to keep it for another week, but just couldn't hack it.  

I have to say that I am happy to have my Lincoln back.