sheppard girls

I am thankful that...

Neil Diamond has recorded a cover of Adam Sandler's The Chanukah Song.

I am thankful that

even when your washing machine breaks during the Thanksgiving holiday and you have company, and then you go to your inlaws house to use their washing machine and set off the security alarm and the police come and noone knows the password, and then their washing machine makes a weird smell and you freak out, there are still neighbors who will let you come over to their house at 9:47 pm Sunday evening to do a load of laundry.

I am thankful for...

people who give you Gurley Thanksgiving pilgrim candles and then don't think you are tacky when you buy vintage Native American candles off of EBay to complete the set.

I am thankful for...

a dad who will stand outside for over an hour to get me a copy of the Cities 97 Sampler Volume 21.

 

Autumn vegetables

I bought sweet potatoes to make this recipe from Bon Appetit for autumn hash.  But the review that it took hours to chop all the vegetables kind of worried me, so I went looking for other similar recipes.  Surely someone is thinking the same way, right?  Smitten Kitchen to the rescue, with Swiss chard and sweet potato gratin.  Gratins are even better than hash.  Plus the dad came home from Costco with a giant block of gruyere yesterday.

Ina Garten's spinach gratin has become a Thanksgiving tradition.  The recipe seems to come and go from the Food Network website, and I usually spend a good hour or so, digging through all my Barefoot Contessa cookbooks to find it.  (It is in the party book.)

Serve it up

I clearly have a problem.  A few weeks ago I bought these trays from Ikea.

Then I saw these on Design Within Reach.  Gingham!

Then today I found this.  Technically it is a cutting board.  But I love it too!

 

 So if you come to our house anytime soon, don't be surprised if we bring you something on a tray.

One more time

Enough with the bathroom right!?  We made it on to the second round of voting in the Apartment Therapy color contest. Thanks so much for all your kind notes, well wishes and votes for our little project

I know it was a huge pain for some of you to figure out how to vote, so don't obligated, but please do send out your kind thoughts tomorrow, as we go up against a living room from Columbus Ohio.  

Special thanks to my friend Suzanne who stayed until midnight in Los Angeles to be the first person to vote.  Suzanne, you can totally do your business in our bathroom whenever you are in town.

Also, I would like to point out how perfectly the packaging on my beloved Mrs. Meyer's hand soap matches my wallpaper.  Certainly that is a sign!

Time

I just wanted to check out the Facebook page for the Maiden Minnesota event that I am participating in November and I somehow found myself with a Facebook page.  I don't have time for that.  I have been wearing the same yoga pants for three days straight!

OMG!

and the "G" is for "goodness"!  Our bathroom is a northern finalist in the Apartment Therapy Color Contest!  Do you think this counts as having someone I don't know think my decorating is fun?  There are only 48 hours to vote for us, so please check it out and if you like it, vote for us! 

October 12

In between getting ready for the school carnival, which I co-chair and preparing for this exciting opportunity, I worked quickly to get all the fall decorations up.

I even made a cute "Boo" pumpkin.  Although once the dad found out it was a fake pumpkin, he didnt' think it was as cool.  I still MADE it.

Then it snowed!  "It is pretty, in a bizarre way" says the big one.