(Unexpected) Snow Day!

I accidentally had a snow day today!!  It's kind of a long story, but basically all of my patients cancelled and I had enough paperwork and other things to do that I didn't have to come in!  Do I have the best boss in the world or what?! (It helped that today was my commute-to-the-suburbs day and a start late/end late day, and that the snow was way worse in the suburbs).

After I did everything I could think of work-wise, I took Bailey outside to play in the snow. She LOVES the snow, as you already know.  We think maybe she is secretly from Chicago and somehow ended up in Alabama as a 4 month old pup.  (Sidebar: Recently we've seen 2 other dogs on the way to work that look exactly like her!! The one is definitely a boy - we've nicknamed him "Bailey's Brother" or "Scraggly" as Tom calls him. We're hoping they will cross paths one day!)

Anyways here's some pics of Miss B enjoying the snow!

Waiting "patiently" at the bottom of the stairs

Chasing snowballs

Attacking my feet - one of her favorite things to do outside

Goodbye Parties and Welcome Brunches

We had a great weekend last weekend.  Valentine's day was great. I came into work to a few pleasant surprises from a coworker.  She loves to bake so she brought in some delicious treats for everyone.  She also has been trying to get rid of a few of her grandmother's items that are no longer in use, and one of them was a pin cushion.  With my new found obsession of sewing, my ears perked up to this. A vintage pin cushion WITH pins!

Flowers from Tom :)  They are so pretty!

Tom's Valentine's cupcakes from Molly's


Saturday night we met up with our friend Jess and a bunch of her friends at Brownstone Tavern.  Sadly Jess is moving to New York this week.  It's a great opportunity for her, but we're going to miss her a lot!

Bye Jess! We'll miss you!

Sunday we met up with my cousin Laurel and my Aunt Shirley. We are so excited to be welcoming Laurel to Chicago!!  She found a great apartment in the South Loop with a killer view.  We met up for brunch at The Bongo Room, where initially they told us the wait was going to be 60-90 minutes!  We walked around to a few other nearby brunch hot spots, put our names in, and eventually walked back to the Bongo Room.  Good thing, too, since they called our names soon after.  I would definitely recommend checking out the red velvet pancakes here if you are ever in the area for breakfast.  And since pancakes are a breakfast food, I'm sure they are healthy ;)

Laurel's killer view of the lake!!



Happy Valentine's Day!

Here are a few pics of our simple Vday decorations! Hope everyone has a great day!

AW! I did it again! (More pillows)

I made another pillow! Two to be exact! Well, technically I made pillow covers. They are amazing and I love them. I can't wait until it gets warm outside because they're going to be part of my new outdoor oasis.

I had my eye on some fabric that I had seen at JoAnn's last month, but was waiting until I had a good coupon to get it for 50% off.  I figured out how much fabric I would need (or so I thought) and went to buy it.  I was disappointed when she unraveled the bolt and it was 6" short of what I thought I needed.  She checked in the back for me, but they didn't have anymore. I asked if they were going to get some soon and so she checked the warehouse, out of stock there too.  While I was contemplating what to do, she offered to give me the "end of bolt" discount, which would basically be 50% off (the same as my coupon). Except for some reason, it was only ringing up at $10, so the total price came to $5!!!  I was so excited that I figured I would just make smaller pillows than I had originally intended.  (And later I looked it up online and saw that it is priced at $40/yard! Holy cow!)

Anyways it turns out I had exactly as much fabric as I needed, because for covers you are supposed to make them 2" smaller than the pillow insert size (who knew?)  I pretty much followed the tutorial from this website.  Here are a few pics of my progress along with the final product!!

Wordless Wednesday: Bailey's hats edition

Rope

Beaver

Half eaten tennis ball

AW! I made a pillow!

I *Big Puffy Heart* my sewing machine!!!  Why have I waited this long to get (back) into sewing? I sewed non-stop all weekend.  I made our rags all fancy, fixed a few dish cloths, and made a pillow for our future outdoor sanctuary!  I'm most proud of the pillow. And surprisingly, it only took like 20 minutes to make! And cost about $4.50. And is made of "outdoor" fabric so it will stand up to the elements! 
It's actually my starter pillow, or practice pillow.  I have my eye on some sweet outdoor fabric at Joann and I plan on making big, comfy pillows with that fabric. With zippers! Of course I'll let you know how that turns out!

I think it's all kinda frumpy because it hasn't been "used" yet. I'm hoping it will look more uniform over time