One part vinegar

Spring is here!!!

 The azaleas are blooming...

 Vespa has been having fun exploring the back yard and all the chirping, buzzing, squawking noises it has to offer...

...and looking just absolutely lovely as always...

I've recently received my Real Simple and Martha Stewart Living magazines within a week or so. Both of them featured some pretty in-depth tutorials and tips on doing a good, thorough Spring cleaning for your home. And as not fun as that may sound to most, I do enjoy the satisfaction I get from finishing a good, thorough house cleaning job the right way.

I was ready to get started on this deep Spring cleaning right away. These magazines really did their trick--I was motivated!

I started in our master bedroom. I had Carlton help me move the bed out away from the wall, where I dusted and vacuumed and... wait... what's that???

As I dusted the baseboards on the wall that our bed was against (I strongly recommend you check that spot out in your room--you'll be grossed out!), I discovered that our walls were dusty. Like, grossly dusty!

The couple that lived here before us has a pet cat with long, luscious, thick fur. Her name is Libby and she's soooo sweet and cuddly and beautiful. I desperately wanted her to be a part of the bargaining in the contract for the house. Carlton did not concur. So, she still lives with her owners who are good friends of ours (so I get to see her often!). But her fur? It's still floating around here every now and then. For instance, it was stuck to our bedroom walls! Along with dust, eyelashes, and Carlton's awesome man body hair, our walls were practically furry! From this picture below, though, you can tell why neither Carlton nor I ever really noticed how dusty the bedroom walls were. They look normal and... normal. While the walls are a peculiar shade of washed-out pea soup--something I never would have personally selected--I love the color and I'm planning on keeping the walls the color they are.

But when I got up close to the walls and actually looked at them really well, I discovered how disgusting they were! The picture below was taken in one of the corners of the room, where the most dust, etc. had accumulated. Prepare yourselves to be totally grossed out!

And if that didn't set in well enough, here's a picture of two of my dusting cloths. They both started out like the one on the right. The one on the left is what cleaned the walls in my bedroom with 1 part vinegar to 4 parts water.  Aside from the wet balls of dust bunny carcasses that I removed from the rag before taking this picture, this rag on the left should be a testament to the grossness that was my bedroom walls!

Oh! As an added bonus, that pesky can't-seem-to-get-rid-of-it dusty scent in our bedroom is gone now!

I had a conversation with a friend a few months back about the hair and fur on her bedroom walls and I was grossed out! I remember asking her what she thought the problem might be. She said she had a feeling it had something to do with her ceiling fan running along with pets (and a husband) who shed like crazy. I've taken a close look at the other rooms in our house, and there seems to be a theme going here: while our master bedroom (complete with ceiling fan running a lot of the time) had dusty walls, our kitchen and living room do not have that problem.

My advise is this: inspect your walls! If they're furry and dusty and can be wiped down (aka not flat paint), wash them NOW!!!!!

A BFF weekend for the books

This weekend was just maybe perhaps possibly the best weekend I've had in years. I finally, finally, finally got to see my best friend in the whole wide world after what feels like years! In fact, I think the last time I got to see Chelsea was last year in July (!!!) for a shower we co-hosted in honor of my sister. July? Really? Had it really been that long? Can real BFFs go that long without seeing each other (or hardly even talking) and still be BFFs?

Chelsea and I sure can. We have before, we did this time, and I'm certain we will in the future. It happens just like other people who have true BFFs say it happens: when we finally, finally, finally see each other again, we run to each other, embrace, sway a little, shake with excitement, tear up a little and wipe it away so the other won't see, embrace and sway some more, stomp our feet to get out all the extra energy, and then pull away, look at each other, and sigh with relief; the wait is finally over, and we're back together at last. Well, okay, another enthusiastic hug or two. And then for real this time. It's out of our systems.

Now what trouble can we start?!?

Chelsea and I had planned this Ree Day & BFF Weekend for months. Seriously! We schemed and made lists, and even took an entire vacation day away from work to make this weekend as magical as it actually turned out to be.

Ree Drummond, known out here in the blogosphere as The Pioneer Woman, was in Atlanta this weekend. If you know me, then you know that I'm a huge fan of hers, as is Chelsea. When Chelsea broke the news to me that "P-Dub" was going to be in Atlanta for a book signing, we immediately made a set of "Ree Day Rules & Such" (which we have decided to keep strictly to ourselves for fear of utter embarrassment or even a restraining order if Ree herself ever read it!). We worked up plans for an entire BFF weekend that included meeting Ree, shopping at IKEA, dining on tapas, enjoying cocktails, listening to great music, resting at my sister's house, cooking recipes from P-Dub's aaaah-mazing cookbook, and who-knows-what-else. I had a countdown on my calendar at work. I purchased a flattering, flowing, flowery, flouncy blouse because a) it's flattering, flowing, etc., and b) it's Ree's favorite sort of blouse. Why not coordinate for the photo op, am I right?? And yeah, I was totally shopping for a compliment.

So our countdowns finally dwindled down to 3, 2, 1!!! and so I packed my bags, drove to up Macon, and Chelsea and I hugged like BFFs hug after not seeing each other since last July. It was pretty awesome. Then we loaded up her car and headed for Atlanta! Of course, our Ree Day schedule worked perfectly, so we made it with a few hours to burn. What's a girl to do besides shop in a two-story Target complete with escalators for people... and buggies, too??? That's right, an escalator for your shopping cart. We stood there and waited for someone with a buggie to come along so we could see how it worked. And it was really cool. After we exhausted our will to shop anymore we headed to a little place next door to the Borders book store where Ree Drummond was scheduled to make her appearance just a couple hours later. What was next door to Borders?

Pinkberry.

Not familiar with Pinkberry? Well, it's only pretty much one of the best things to ever eat for a snack. Ever. It's fat free yogurt mixed with fat free milk and flavored with natural stuff to make some freaking amazing frozen yogurt. Oh wow, it was so good! I immediately checked out the floor (paved in tiny pea-sized pebbles), furniture, lighting, and color scheme. What fun!

Then Chelsea and I were educated on Pinkberry--how it's made and what it's made of--and then we got a tour of all the amazing toppings (as long as it fits "comfortably" within the rim of your bowl, it's included in the price of the yogurt!). I was so pumped to look at the menu and read Blood Orange as a yogurt flavor! That's one of the Lamberth ladies' favorite flavors. On top I opted for something rather simple: fresh, handmade blood orange syrup, pineapple chunks, and raspberries (on the right). Chelsea went for a double flavor bowl of coconut and mango yogurts and just about every fruit there was (on the left)!

Then the time came to wait our turn. We were in group "E" which meant there were groups A through D ahead of us. Bummer. We camped out in the childrens books section and watched Ree stalkers and judged wardrobe mishaps and hairstyle don'ts, and once our letter of the alphabet was announced, we stood in line with letters A through E. 

While we waited in line, Chelsea found this really cute little hedgehog finger puppet perched on a 

book shelf:

Then we found a stack of PostSecret books and left our own little secrets for someone else to discover and read for themselves. I know PS is supposed to be anonymous, but we signed one of them anyway:

 And then the time we had been waiting so long for finally came! Chelsea and I met Ree Drummond, aka Pioneer Woman, aka P-Dub, aka our new BFF. She was absolutely delightful. She had a sort of Midwestern accent. Her dimples were totally cute, and her red hair was just red enough. And did you notice her blouse? Well, she surely noticed mine. That's right, people, Ree loved my flattering, flowing, flowery, flouncy blouse and totally told me she loved it. Then we talked for a couple minutes as she wrote little notes in our cookbooks. Chelsea and I asked her if her face had gotten tired of smiling yet, and she replied that that's just kinda how her face is, and we said, something like "how lovely to have a smile stuck on your face all the time!" and then we snapped this picture. Can you see how nervous we were? Well, we were totally nervous, and we felt so stupid for being so nervous. But we were nervous anyway. And then, as we finished up our little nervous and giggly conversation with Ree, she said, "It was just lovely to have met the two of you! Oh, and can I borrow your blouse?" And then I melted. And exploded. And then I melted again.

(Oh my goodness, I still can't believe we met Ree! She was divine and lovely. And so pretty! And those dimples. And that red wavy hair. Ah!)

Oh! And did I mention that her utterly studly husband was there as well? Well, he was. Marlboro Man, dressed down to the boots, Wranglers, and--yes, even he cowboy hat, score!--was there. Here's the picture that Ree herself posts on her blog all the time that defines what she thinks of her husband, Marlboro Man:

Chelsea and I were determined to get our own shot of this famous behind, chaps or not. He was surrounded by women who were fawning all over him, gasping and giggling and groping and taking all sorts of pictures and hogging all the time he had while lots of other women waited and snapped pictures from a distance. But what did Chelsea and I do? We staged a Photo Bomber session. And for those of you who don't know what the art of Photo Bombing is, it's basically standing in the background of a picture that's currently being taken and doing something funny. They person taking the picture, as well as the people in the picture, don't see what you've done in the background until they get home and relive their memories of groping on Marlboro Man's sweaty chest at the Borders Book Store in Peachtree City! I've got to say, I really hope it was as successful from other womens' cameras as it was from mine!

Then, after we cooled off from that fun little game, we went around the corner to a tapas restaurant called Twist and enjoyed tapas, a fun and noisy atmosphere that neither of us was used to anymore as old and grown adults, and some outta-this-world delicious cocktails. Before we knew it, we were coming down with a serious case of the sleepies. Maybe it was the cocktail that got us just warm enough to want to snuggle up to a cool pillow. Maybe it was the fact that our Ree Day adrenaline was finally subsiding. But we were ready to settle down and get out of that noisy restaurant, so we headed for my sister's house.

After a couple glasses of "hello, we're here, and thanks for letting us crash in the guest room" wine, we all went to sleep without an alarm clock set! And oh my goodness, that felt sooooo good to wake up without an alarm screaming at us! We played with the pups, watched My Girl ("And don't come back for five to seven days!!!"), ate orange-and-cranberry muffins along with sausage for breakfast, and just basked in nothingness for a whole four hours.

And then it was time to IKEA. Do you IKEA? We sure did! For some reason, we decided to take a picture on the way OUT of the massive superstore. My apologies for the dishevelment! OMG I'm looking rough. Those big yellow letters always blow me away. How tall do you think they really are?

Bless my little sister's heart for shopping with us that afternoon. I don't know if she meant to or not, but she kept me and Chelsea moving at a (somewhat) acceptable pace. I'd get caught up in the gadget kitchen drawer organization section and Chelsea would come to a standstill while admiring random coat hangers and storage shelves. But Kristen would always remind us that there was something else more interesting just around the corner. And thank goodness for that, because even with her guidance (towards the exit door) and perseverance (aka constantly walking about two steps ahead of us with our shopping cart), we shopped at IKEA for over 4 hours! While that does include a delicious lunch of Swedish meatballs and mashed taters, the shopping just dominated this IKEA visit. To the max.

That being said, IKEA did us in. Chelsea drove herself and me back to Macon like a champ where Andrew greeted us with copious amounts of wine (yum, shiraz!), salmon, ribeyes, potatoes, mushrooms, and a few other accoutrement. Morgan and Larry, some of their great friends there in Macon, met us at their house where we ate a lot, drank a lot, laughed a lot, and played a lot of Phase Ten... until a lot of wine was spilled all over the playing cards!

(Yes, that's my bendy straw in a glass of red wine. I didn't want PLS (Purple Lip Syndrome) from sipping on that wine all night, and that's my brilliant solution for it, okay?)

After a long, long, loooooooooooooooooong night of playing "Watch That YouTube Music Video and Remember When That Song Was Awesome" with Andrew and Chelsea, we retired for some well deserved and much needed rest.... at 4:30am!!! Needless to say, sleeping until 12:00 in the afternoon was an accomplishment for me, and I woke up rested and ready to get home to take a nap in my own bed... after some steak and eggs prepared by the Ray Household resident chef, Andrew himself! 

Like I said, this weekend was just maybe perhaps possibly the best weekend I've had in years. And it's definitely one for the books. Thanks to Chelsea, my Very Best Friend of over 14 years. May God bless us with at least 14 more!!!

Makes me wanna nom nom nom nom nom

I've discovered a new marinade that I'm crazy about. Sure, it's a salad dressing, and I'm positive it's really good on some crisp, sweet butter lettuce topped with Kalamata olives, cherry tomatoes, and fancy sliced radishes. But I'm loving this dressing because I've just used it as a marinade for dressing our meat for dinner twice within a week.

On Thursday night Carlton fired up the grill and I whipped out a gallon size ZipLoc bag. I put in four little 1/4" thin sliced bone-in pork chops that were BOGO (buy one package of four and get another free, woohoo!) at the grocery store with a generous squirt of the dressing and let it sit while the coals got themselves all hot and ready. I've gotta say, those pork chops were soooooo delicious! The dressing/marinade charred around the edges, caramelized in some spots, and got tangy and zesty and salty and all sorts of rich and delicious on those pork chops! I'd say that if you're cooking anything over open flame that takes more than 8-10 minutes to cook completely, I wouldn't marinate the meat first, but rather baste it onto the meat after it's gotten started cooking on the grill because it was cooked just right for our skinny little 1/4" pork chops. I served the pork chops with something I've only recently discovered in the freezer section of the grocery store, and Carlton and I both agree--they're delicious! Alexia Sweet Potato Fries. This time I bought the chipotle flavor and they were soooo good along with the pork chops! (This is the one and only way I will eat sweet potatoes thus far... they must be oven fried and Trisha loves them!)

Then tonight I took those individually frozen chicken tenders you buy in the big bag from the frozen meats section of the grocery store, and I put them in a baking dish, frozen, straight into the oven for the 20 minutes of recommended baking time. Once the 20 minutes were up, I took the baking dish out, squirted my dressing over each of the tenders, and turned the oven onto high broil for about 4 or 5 minutes... just long enough for the dressing to start to caramelize around the edges of the chicken. Delicious! We had some starchy sides tonight--no veggies because I wasn't in the mood for any. Some herb baked potato wedges and Sister Schubert's Dinner Yeast Rolls. What a delicious and easy meal! I dirtied one baking sheet, two dinner plates, two forks, one butter knife, and two drinking glasses! Carlton was lucky that his "doing the dishes chore" (aka put the plates in the dishwasher) was so quick and easy.

So, if you're tired of the salty zest of Dale's Seasoning and you're not up for Spicy Buffalo or Sweet, Smoky Barbecue flavors, go Greek! Feta and oregano? Yes, please!!!!

213 Gardenia, Part 3: Sofa, So Good

Until about August of last year, we were still living off of Carlton's sofa from college.

I know. Gross.

It was a good ole fella with a strong back, a tough exterior, and the ability to practically force you to lie down and sleep. The gunmetal gray upholstery never showed a stain, never ripped, never showed stress or wear. The tough hardwood structure underneath it all was sturdy and--one might think--made of a boulder. And you'd understand that if you ever tried to move the thing. And we did... multiple times!

But the cushions. Oh, those terrible, terrible cushions! Now, the seat cushions were just fine. They stood the test of time and college-aged boys like the rest of the sofa. But the back cushions just about disintegrated into a sad amoebic state, all wobbly and irregular and squishy and mushy and deformed. A person with intentions of sitting on the sofa like a normal human being would either a) have to sit and lean forward towards the coffee table as if he was eating a floppy slice of pizza, or b) turn sideways, curl her legs up underneath her bottom, and prop her elbow on the arm of the sofa as if she was knitting or reading a handy home decorating magazine. Either scenario was not conducive to comfortable TV watching or any sort of social interaction whatsoever.

And then the cushions, or the fabric, or the something just started to stink. They didn't stink like they were old, or like they were dusty, or even like we'd burried an entire dead animal in the sleeper mattress which was folded up inside the sofa. They stunk like there was some sort of fungus or mildew growing inside them, and it was overwhelming. The smell would just waft up to my nostrils and I'd smell it on again and off again. Have you ever left a load of laundry in the washer and forgot about it for a month? Well, neither have I. But I have forgotten about a load of washed laundry in the washer for about 2 days or so. And that yucko smell when you open the washer and suddenly remember that there are rancid clothes awaiting your return? The college sofa was just about like that, times 10! It wasn't constant. It would just suddenly waft up and surprise you like a slap in the face. So you never knew when it was gonna come around next. I was particularly paranoid about having our friends over at the house. Dinner would be served and everyone would enjoy the meal, and then conversation and full bellies would lead us all to the living room to lounge and joke around. But what hostess wants to risk a stinky sofa catastrophe when she's entertaining? Not this gal! Nobody wants the Jenga bricks to topple because of a sudden sofa stink.

And Febreeze, baking soda, Lysol, and other stink stomping remedies never would permanently work. Okay, so you get it--it stunk.

I got the OK to shop around for a sofa only a few months after we'd moved into the house. But actually following through and purchasing a new sofa was going to be a difficult task for me to complete! I had a very specific list of requirements I wanted to check off of my list before I was going to dish out the cash. First and foremost, I must have a guaranteed buyer for the Athens condo sofa before a new sofa is purchased. Then my new sofa must have: two seat cushions (because I like the look of two longer cushions as opposed to three smaller cushions), a tight back cushion (no loose pillow cushions like the Athens condo sofa had, no loose looking cushions that are sewn onto the back of the sofa), nailhead trim, heavy linen woven fabric or something that looked similar, and a sturdy composition. Nothing flimsy, nothing too fru-fru, nothing too traditional or contemporary. And I must be able to test the sofa out before purchase.

Then Pier1 came to the rescue. I'd never really paid much attention to their upholstered furniture, but as I browsed through one afternoon on a day off work, The Cameron Sofa just caught my eye and I knew it was the one! It had two seat cushions, a tight back cushion, a square back profile, nailhead trim, and the upholstery was a lovely taupe color. Even though it's a very short pile chenille fabric, it has a thin line pattern in it (sort of like the matrix has that line pattern), so it gives a nod to that linen look I think. So, a few weeks later, when the sofa was on sale ($100 off the floor model price!), my parents came to town and we borrowed a friend's pickup truck to drive the sofa from Valdosta's Pier1 store to the house. AND IT'S PERFECT!!!

I couldn't be happier with this purchase. It's a beautiful addition to our furniture and a very sturdy and heavy duty piece of furniture that works great as a focal point for the room.

The rug in the picture is also new! It's the Chevron Rug from West Elm in the charcoal color and it couldn't be more perfect in our living room. With these strong neutral permanent fixtures, I have had fun changing out seasonal throw pillows on the sofa. Over the holidays I had some bright red and green pillows. This spring I've got some lemon yellow, gray, blue, and green pillows to brighten things up a bit. Over all, it's great!

The two lamps were wedding gifts from my parents that were originally topped by beautiful bright teal dupioni silk shades which sadly died in one of our many moves. I replaced them with some pretty woven mini-twine shades from Target. The end tables are from Carlton's mom and Grandmama, and the coffee table is the one remaining piece of furniture from Carlton's college days (besides his "desk" which we will cover in a later post). I absolutely love the color, shape, style, and ability to withstand bangs and dents and glasses without coasters and just about anything else in the world. It's staying because I love it! It has three drawers to hold just about anything you might need to hide when company is coming over in 2-and-a-half minutes. And it's the perfect size for our living room. The picture on the wall over the sofa is a blown-up picture of one I took inside the Cathedral of Notre Dame in Paris in 2006 during a photo taking contest with Carlton. It's beautiful and I love looking at the low light by candle, the stained glass in the background, the strong stacked marble pillars, and the blurs of praying patrons below. It's peaceful, colorful, quaint, and lovely. I got lucky when this shot came out so perfectly. Wonderful!

So, that's the sofa and her surroundings. I love everything about it... obviously!

(Please forgive the picture. I took it at night under lamplight, which is the only light our living room gets. Fortunately, when I got up to take the picture, Vespa decided to ask me nicely to open the front door so she could "go outside" and her little pose was a perfect photo op! I couldn't trade this picture out for one I took during daylight because of her opportune vogue.)