eight!

you guys... this little baby just turned 8! can you believe it? let's just take a moment and consider how stinkin' adorable she was as a little bitty thing.

ok. anyway. so we had a little celebration for miss juliet for the big 8. complete with a pumpkin and peanut butter cake/pie and a present.

we picked out a fun pink flamingo toy for her and she loves it. i took video of her opening the package, but i sound obnoxious in it and i'm sure no one actually thinks it's normal to record your pets opening their birthday presents. so...

so. yeah. that's how we celebrated juliet's 8th birthday. i love that little pup!

the easter cockatoo?

just wanted to share a few pictures of our easter happenings from last weekend. it started with austin and i presenting each other with baskets. we've never done easter baskets for each other before, but i'm glad we did because a} it was really fun b} i got every kind of peanut butter candy possible and c} i also got a cockatoo.

yep. you read that right. a bird. {a ceramic one, however, because guinny rules this roost.} she was nestled right down in there with my empty calories candy. i just have to figure out where she will permanently live in my house.

and i tried to make a manly easter basket for austin, complete with trail mix, beef jerky and yes, chattanooga whiskey.

on sunday we had brunch at blacksmith's bistro downtown with austin's parents and brother. and i ate way too much french toast. and i don't even regret it.

so. yeah. insert abrupt ending here. cause that's all i got.

good things.

good things are happening around here lately. and i'm soaking it all in.

first, i finished up my clinical rotation at the rehab hospital. to celebrate, austin and i met up for drinks and dinner at big river with two other students who were at the same site as me, but from different schools.

also, i dyed my hair. and got 2 1/2 inches chopped off. kind of happened by accident, but the end result i'm pretty happy with. ready for summer, i suppose.

also, i was on spring break last week from school. this picture pretty much sums up the most of the week. very exciting.

and since i was on spring break i made plans to meet up for dinner with bri. it was super good to see her face and hang out. we also got to meet up with the guys after our dinner. so. fun.

and bri, i really, really, wanted to share the picture i took of you with tears streaming down your face from laughing/choking to death, but you told me not to. so i didn't. but i will keep the picture so i can look at it any time i need some cheering up. :)

austin and i even got to have an impromptu dub's date {with juliet in tow}. if you're looking for a peanut butter milkshake that's the definition of thebombdotcom, dub's is the place. also, they'll give your pup some soft serve ice cream.

and the last good thing i am super excited about right now is the warm weather we had over the weekend allowing my to get out in the garden and get some dirt under my nails. we mulched, we dug, we weeded, we planted. it was glorious.

i planted succulents in a colander and i just think they're the cutest.

and, of course, juliet was soaking up the sunshine. nobody can complain about the first warm day of spring. except maybe austin. because he got ridiculously sunburned. a word to the pale: coming out of winter hibernation should be a slow process.

hope you all have had good things to enjoy lately, as well!

365 days in our house!

whoa man. can you believe it's already been a whole year that we've lived in our house? it doesn't feel like it's been that long since we were arguing negotiating with the sellers on the price and then anxiously awaiting all the approval things that have to happen.

lots has happened around the highland project in our first year here. remember what it looked like before we even moved all of our belongings in?

here it is on the outside when we first moved in.

and after 6 months of living here {looks so much better with green on the trees, too!}.

back in august i updated pictures of each room of the house showing our progress so far and i had intended on doing the same for the one year mark, but really not that much has changed since august. but i do need to share a few things we've done here and there.

first, we installed a new storm door on the front of the house. check out the old metal one in the picture above. yuck, right? now look at this beauty.

you can finally see all of my pretty teal door without aluminum blocking the view. and while we were at it we went ahead and installed a peephole {so i can know who's knocking on my door} and switched out the doorbell for a lighted and prettier one.

curb appeal is looking up!

next, we did a little update to our master bathroom. most recently the bathroom looked like this:

and the first thing we set out to do was to install a vent fan and light over the tub.

ta-da!

and as you can see, we painted the room as well {don't worry about those stripes in the picture, they're shadows from the texture of the glass in our light fixture over the sink}. this picture doesn't really show the true color of the paint.

it's much more blue-ish grey, like this:

we also updated all of the accessories in the room which were mostly oil-rubbed bronze, now they're brushed nickel.

quite a while ago we finally painted some chair to have around our kitchen table. oddly enough, they're pretty similar in color to the new wall color in our bathroom, but not on purpose. you can see the chairs around the table here from when austin and i had our little thanksgiving dinner.

and lastly, we got a garage door opener for the second bay in the garage so now austin is able to park inside, too! we got it installed just in time, really, right before it started getting cold enough to have to scrape ice off the car in the mornings.

i think that's about it for changes around the house lately, but we've got big plans for once i'm done with school and working {and getting paid for it-finally!}. i seriously cannot wait to get my diy on in that kitchen!

don't forget you can check out all the new house related posts here and see an entire list of all the projects we've tackled so far and what we've got left do here on the our home page.

also, a very happy, happy birthday to austin. on thursday we celebrated 27 years of austin by going to dinner at urban stack with some of his family.

p.s. don't get the mint chocolate chip milkshake at urban stack unless you like really gross, liquidy milkshakes that taste like leaves.

20th anniversary.

last weekend, austin's fraternity celebrated the 20th anniversary of the founding of their chapter. and in order to celebrate this milestone, they had a big dinner party with a band and everything. of course, the best part about it was seeing all of our friends back in town. lindsy and rj came in and stayed with us for the weekend and it's always so much fun when they're in town.

we got to get all dressed up and take pictures, as usual.

and then, we danced. on the front porch. with the neighbors watching and all.

the dinner was held at lindsay street hall and was so fun. and we saw so many of our friends!

pretty girls {and yes, i stole this picture from facebook. thanks, erin!}

so, yeah. pretty much an awesome weekend. can't wait to do it again soon!

2013!

so, hey. it's 2013 now. has been for a day. and since austin and i actually got together with bri and josh for new year's eve i thought i would share a few pictures from the night.

and just because i never really made a post about our christmas decorations/tree/allthatjazz, a quick look at how our house was decked out for the holidays.

you can see the three ornaments we've picked out for each married christmas starting with the wedding cake ornament for 2010, the heart ornament for 2011, and our first christmas in our new home ornament for 2012. i like this little tradition of having an ornament to kind of represent the biggest thing that happened during that year.

so. anyway, happy 2013!