Friday Five!

Happy last day of February! I am so thankful for the weekend. Is it just me or was this week busy crazy for you all too?! It's been one of those "I-just-want-a-giant-glass-of-wine" weeks over in this household.

I'm linking up again with Christina, April, Natasha, and Darci for another dose of Five on Friday!

Spring Decor 

I think its about time I take down the Valentine's Day decor, so this weekend I'm on a mission to get our place looking back to normal, clean and add a little spring decor. Stay tuned for details and a little DIY project!

Homemade Shamrock Shake

You guys, shamrock shakes from McDonalds are back! I had a taste for one this week but it was late so I opted to make one myself and it was delish! I just threw a bunch of vanilla ice cream (maybe 2 cups?), milk (about 1/2 cup?), 1/4 tsp. of mint extract, and 1 yellow + 3 green drops of food coloring. Top with whipped cream, serve in a mason jar with a fun straw, and you're set! I've also seen people crank it up a notch with protein (if you're healthy) or whiskey (if you're boozy).

New Lamp Shade... Finally!

I haven't been able to find a big, solid white shade to fit this lamp I bought months ago for our master bedroom. You can see the original shade it came with here. I never thought a lamp shade search would frustrate me so much, so hell yes for finally finding one!  What do you think, better than the original, right?

Rodan + Fields

I'll admit I was totally skeptical of R+F products when my friend Rachel asked me if I had tried them yet. It's basically an anti-aging regimen which also helps for dark spots and sun damaged skin.

She sent me a mini facial kit to try out and let me tell you, I love it so far! I use the Enhancements Micro-Dermabrasion Paste first, which is definitely the best exfoliator I've tried (and I went through a lot of options before the wedding last year). Then I use the Redefine Night Renewing Serum and Redefine Lip Renewing Serum. Now I really want to try the Eye Cream!

If you're interested in checking out their products, head here. They are on the pricier side, but last a long time and if you aren't happy with the product you can get your money back within 60 days! Also any orders placed by Sunday night (11:59 PST) will receive a free mini facial so you can try out more of the products! If you have any questions about the products, contact Rachel! She is awesome. :)

Ruby's Vet Visit

She brings us socks and underwear, you know, just in case.

Least favorite moment of the week would be Ruby's vet appointment yesterday. Our girl's little knee has apparently been popping out of place and is causing her to limp occasionally. We have to make her rest for 2 weeks, which is kind of a joke for a dog with her energy level so wish us luck! In the meantime she has to take some supplements for her joints and if that doesn't help, she'll need surgery. Poor thing! We're so glad we took her in to the vet instead of assuming it would go away! Our vet said this problem is common in toy breeds. Does anyone else's small dog have this issue?

Tomorrow I'm heading to do lunch and some shopping with Ally and Shelby! Next week is going to be really busy so I'm excited for a little girls excursion to King Street, it will definitely be a great stress reliever!

That is all I have for the week, I hope you all have a fantastic weekend!!

24

Travel Essentials for Abroad

I can't even believe that in just a couple weeks my husband and I will be making our first venture across the pond! It's kind of surreal.

Work is kicking my butt this week, and next week will be even busier, so sometimes I just get excited to have 9 whole days off to do nothing but eat food, drink wine, and explore with my husband. I would also be lying if I said I haven't considered starting to outfit plan and pull out the ol' suitcase. I'm making myself wait... until this weekend, at least.

I do have this little stash of things I've been picking up here and there to get ready for our trip. I thought I'd go over the important items in case anyone else if planning a big trip as well! Also, if I forget anything here I'm leaning on y'all to remind me!

 Tide. Cards. Neck Stash. Adapter. TSA-Approved Locks. Memory Foam Neck Pillow. Umbrella.

Canon DSLR Remote: I don't think I'm bringing the Gorillapod for space reasons so I'm depending on the remote to help us take non-selfie, selfies. Also bringing multiple memory cards and iPhone lens attachments for fun!

Notebook: While we're traveling in between cities, I'm planning to write down which restaurants we loved and any other little details that might escape me 50 years from now when I'm telling our grandbabies all about our trip!

Diffuser: I know I can't bring my hair dryer, so this weird little attachment is going to (hopefully) take the place of my normal diffuser. Curly hair girls will know what I'm talking about! Wish me luck that my hair doesn't become a total beast over there.

Between our iPad, the deck of cards, and my notebook, I figured those would help us pass the time on the train!

Not pictured: hand sanitzer and a Document Holder. I picked up a small plastic document holder from the Target dollar section and its perfect for holding our Passports, train tickets, and hopefully keeping our entry tickets to attractions safe because I love holding onto those!

I should clarify that the nerdy neck stash is for my husband. We don't want to take any chances with the pickpockets.

Also, it's been a total pain in the ass trying to figure out which plug adapters will work in Italy versus France. My sister-in-law gave us hers for Italy, so we got a second one with multiple options just in case the other doesn't work in Paris.

So for those of you who have been to Europe, what am I missing? Besides the obvious things like passports, toothpaste, underwear, etc.

17

Decor Love: Custom Acrylic Tray

Happy Hump Day! I hope you are all getting a dose of Spring like we are! Yesterday we were able to open all of the windows and get some vitamin D during Ruby's walk, and it felt so good.

After getting myself organized last night, I'm hoping I can get back into spring cleaning, organizing, and my mini office update this week. I'll just be working on a few smaller projects until we come back from Europe, so it will take a bit for it all to come together. Not that you'd expect it to be fast, given my slow progress on the master bedroom!

If you've seen my office inspiration on Pinterest, you know I have a thing for acrylic. I have a few smaller acrylic desk accessories, but I liked the idea of a tray to use as a catch-all. I get major anxiety when my desk is unorganized, so here's hoping this tray will help me keep my shit together!

This project is way too easy, especially if you have access to a laminator.

What you will need:

Acrylic Box Frame: $3 after 40% off coupon at Hobby Lobby
Scrapbook Paper: 25/cents each, I think. (I used 12x12 paper, but 8x10 also works)
Laminating for 2 pieces of Paper: $4 (I went to UPS)
Scissors, Exacto Knife, or Paper Cutter: Owned

Grand Total: $7.50

I noticed a similar (and really pretty) project on A Fabulous Fete, but I didn't want to bother with the spray paint, tape, and the clean up so I went with pretty scrapbook paper.

Craft stores have a bunch of different sizes in the box frames. It comes with a cheap cardboard insert... throw it out. Cut your paper to fit the inside of the box, making sure it is small enough that it will fit once it's laminated. Get your paper laminated, trim the edges, and place inside tray.

I didn't use anything to stick the paper to the tray, it's not really necessary. Also, please don't judge my tray styling, or lack thereof. I promise it will look prettier once I make some more progress!
 

Tape Dispenser

Cheap shadow box to pretty desk tray. I told you this was easy. Now that I see it written out, it's almost embarrassing!

Here it is with my other paper option, but I think I like the gold quatrefoil better. At least until I make my desk white!

If you want something with a monogram, you can get free printables here (though they may be a little small for this particular shadow box) or add an acrylic monogram like I did here.

It's very likely every room in our house will have one of these pretty trays, sooner or later. I mean... Bar tray. Vanity tray. So many possibilities!

24

Spring Fashion Cravings

Having some blogger issues this morning.. sorry for the delayed post! First I want to thank you all for the kind words and well wishes for my Grandfather-in-Law on Friday. You are all too sweet! He is doing better than expected with his chemo treatments and it was nice seeing him up to his usual, goofy self this past weekend!

I mentioned that I'm not one for long drives, but one thing that kept me entertained was perusing online at all of the pretty Spring fashion coming out in stores lately. I'm a sucker for pastels, neons, and nautical stripes. Easy to wear tees and basically any Spring dress are in my online shopping bag, waiting to be purchased when the price is right. Does anyone else save items in shopping bags for weeks before finally committing?

Anyway, while I try to get myself caught up and unpacked, here are some of my favorites that are sitting in my shopping bag waiting for me to commit (or hinting to my husband that I like!) Of course, they're mostly from J. Crew, since that's most of my closet anyway!

Short Sleeve Necklace Sweater. Bar Stripe Tee. Striped Dress. Chambray Popover. Stripe Flats. Tortoise Link Bracelet. Weekend Bag. Acrylic Monogram Necklace. Nautical Chino Shorts.

What are you loving for Spring?

15

Five on Friday

Today I'm blogging from up North as my husband, Ruby and I had to make a last minute trip to spend time with Steve's grandpa who is not doing so well. I'm lucky to be able to see my family too but let me tell you, this girl does not do last minute planning or traveling well. Especially when it involves 10 hour car rides.

Now that we're out of the car and I've regained feeling in my legs, I can look forward to some quality family time this weekend! But first up, I'm joining Christina and the Five on Friday crew for my favorites from the week!

Donut pan

{via}

This week I purchased a donut pan, which is definitely a terrible and fantastic idea at the same time. I can't wait to try out these apple cider donuts, but I've found lots of other options on Pinterest and think it might be a funfetti donut kind of weekend!

New Sperry Top-Siders

{via}

One of my favorite pairs of shoes are my Sperrys because they are so comfortable. I was debating on whether to take my beat up pair to Europe until I found these adorable 'Audrey' navy and gold ones! I got them for $42 on Amazon, then they went up to $77 the next day. Talk about good timing!

Computer Background

Floral Wallpaper

How pretty is this (free) computer background?! Perfect for Spring and just plain gorgeous to look at while working! Actually, there are tons of other free backgrounds for your computer or phone on this site if you're in the market!

Spring

Weather in the 70s this week made me so ready for Spring! And just when I thought I was doing well avoiding too many unnecessary clothing and jewelry purchases, all of my favorite stores had to come out with new spring lines that I'm totally drooling over! I'm really looking forward to some new spring decor (DIY project coming soon!) and lots of festive St. Patty's Day goodness! Anyone else with me?!

My Husband

Not to be too cheesy but this man is the best.ever. He drove the whole way yesterday, got me a Starbucks at one of the rest stops, we reminisced about how awesome our wedding was almost one year ago, chatted about all of the food and wine we plan to consume in Italy, and made some plans for the future! Despite the fact that Ruby and I are bad road trip companions for anything over 4 hours, I loved our quality time together and truly feel so, so lucky to be his wife.

I hope you all have a great weekend! I'll be back to regularly scheduled programming next week!

29

Crochet Coffee Koozie Giveaway Winners!

Happy Hump Day! 

Thank you to everyone who entered the crochet coffee koozie giveaway! 

{Left} Raspberry Pink Coffee Cozy by Skittish Coyote Studio
{Right} Neon Pink Heart Coffee Cozy by I Talk of Dreams

Congratulations to Christina who won the bow koozie and Jillian who won the heart koozie!  

 Check your email ladies!

And a major thank you goes out to Megan from I Talk of Dreams and Heather from Skittish Coyote Studio for the adorable koozies! If you didn't win, make sure to stop by their Etsy shops and "treat yo self!"

{Winners chosen via Random.org}

6

Spring Cleaning: Photo Organization

Being the Type-A person that I am, I have a laundry list of spaces that I want to reorganize and clean, but who the heck has time for that?! I'll honestly be happy if I finish cleaning the house before we leave for Europe... and I've got 3 weeks to accomplish that mission.

Since we do have our trip coming up and I haven't learned how to resize any of my ginormous DSLR camera photos yet, I decided to start with the thousands of photos we have saved on our computer. Literally, there are thousands. Its amazing how much space these photos are eating up!

Does anyone else have photos from 2007 still on their computer? That's 7 years ago folks. Chew on that for a minute. It feels like eons ago, if you ask me.

On top of that, there were so many photos where I must have just kept snapping away. You know, like the ones of your dog that look almost identical, but you feel like you need to keep anyway? 

So my basic strategy to tackle this pain in the ass project was:

1. Don't delete anything on accident
2. Convert ridiculous folder names like "World's Largest Cocktail Party" to something along the lines of "2007 - Fall - College Football"
3. Back up photos in 2 places, because who knows where those disks might end up after our next move
4. Be cheap about it

Here is what I did to backup all of our photos before deleting them from our computer, which by the way is kind of scary. I triple-checked all of the photo disks to make sure the photos were there before hitting the delete button! Eek!

DVDs and Kraft Sleeves {Walmart}, Media Box

Delete, rename, and reorganize.
I liked the idea of renaming folders according to the year, season, and then a more specific description. The problem was we had photos from the same year and season in so many separate folders, it took forever to sort out. I also deleted a lot of photos in this step that were similar but unnecessary.

Back up to the cloud or your choice of online photo storage. 
I started looking into cloud storage, but there are so many options out there and everything seemed to be expensive once you bypass the free space limit. I ultimately decided on Picasa because as long as files are under a certain size, they don't count towards your total free space allowance.

Back up onto a disk.
I used DVD+R disks (I think you can also use DVD-R?) and it seemed to work well. You get more space on the blank DVDs than the CDs. Another option is to back up onto an external hard drive, but I had one of those die on me and I couldn't salvage anything from it, so I'm not a fan.

Label. 
This is really whatever works for you but I put the date in the top right corner and then more specifics on the left side. It got kind of wonky when it came to our iphone photos since this was the first backup in however long it has been.

Delete.
You can do it, it will be okay!

The downside to this virtual cleanup is that our house is still dusty... ugh. Now, if we could just fast forward to our trip so I can put some pretty Italy photos on our computer, that would be fabulous!

Does anyone else have tons of photos taking up space like I did? What is your system for backing up the photos?

20

Tourists for a Weekend

This weekend my husband and I took full advantage of the gorgeous weather and acted like tourists, again!

After watching the US beat Russia in Olympic hockey (and seeing Pittsburgh Penguins players representing!) we finally headed to brunch on Saturday. Hominy Grill definitely lived up to it's reputation, even though we had a 40 minute wait. I ordered the Charleston Nasty which is a fried chicken breast on a biscuit with sausage gravy. Oh yeah, and a Bloody Mary. Yum!

We opted to walk around King Street to kill some time while waiting for brunch, and I managed to get my husband to approve my purchase of the J. Crew snood I've been swooning over and a pretty gold polka dot makeup bag from Forever 21. Actually I'm not sure my husband had that much say in the matter...

On Sunday we used a Groupon for a visit to Patriot's Point to see the USS Yorktown, the giant aircraft carrier sitting across from the Charleston Harbor. My husband and I are geeks in that we love seeing that sort of thing, but after checking out the aircraft carrier, we just did a quick walkthrough of the USS Laffey, a destroyer docked next to the USS Yorktown.

I thought I'd feel too claustrophobic to go into the submarine, so we skipped that and headed home to be lazy the rest of the night.

If you like this sort of thing, I would definitely recommend checking out Patriot's Point while in the Charleston area. It's really interesting seeing everything up close, see how huge that aircraft carrier actually is, learn the history of it all, and earn a deeper appreciation for those who serve our country. That being said, I'm glad we got half off admission. Everything kind of started looking the same once we got to the destroyer.

I hope you all had a great weekend! If you're one of the lucky ones with a day off today, I'm jealous.

16

Five on Friday: Valentine's Day Edition!

Happy Valentine's Day!

Even though the snow missed us, this week has been surprisingly eventful. On Wednesday we lost power for a good 7 hours thanks to some weird rain that somehow turned into ice but only on the trees and power lines?! Luckily the power came back on before I delved into the unopened bag of jumbo marshmallows... and I don't even like marshmallows. Eek.

So that was our excitement this week! As usual, I'm linking up with Christina, April, Darci, + Natasha for another dose of Five on Friday. These Friday posts are quickly becoming my favorite of the week!

Team Teddy

I had my assistant pose for a photo since I'm guessing y'all would rather see a cute dog than me in my yoga pants and glasses.

Today I'm joining the "5 on Friday" crew in helping to spread the word on Menkes Syndrome, a rare genetic disease that affects approximately 1 in 450,000 male babies. It breaks my heart to see what Teddy, his family, and what other families have experienced, and it truly shows that as a momma, you have to trust your gut! Read this if you don't know what I'm talking about and pass along Teddy's story!

Super Soft Cookies

You know those really soft sugar cookies you get at the grocery store? My husband loves them so I surprised him by making some from scratch! I halved the recipe since Lord knows we don't need 5 dozen of these in the house, but they turned out so good! I think I can find a better icing recipe, but this cookie recipe is definitely here to stay! You can also check out our festive Valentine's Day pancakes here.

Cheap, Festive Gifting

My husband and I decided not to do gifts this year because we'd rather spend the money on our trip next month, but I couldn't not get him something. So along with making his fave cookies, I got him some beer, his favorite candy, and a pillow. I know, random, but he needed one so why not?

Post-Valentine's Date: Brunch

Picture via Hominy Grill

I've got a hot date tonight with dinner at home and wine, but tomorrow we're heading downtown to Hominy Grill for brunch! We've been living in the South for 7 months and have yet to go out for brunch somewhere (gasp!) so tomorrow is the day!

Coffee Koozie Giveaway

This week I joined forces with some fab Etsy shops, I Talk of Dreams and Skittish Coyote Studio, for a fun, festive giveaway for all of the coffee and tea lovers out there! I Talk of Dreams is also offering a discount for all of you, bonus! Follow the prompts to enter (it's easy!) and find the coupon code here!

Also in case you missed it, I guest blogged this week on Kristan's lovely new blog, Lavender and Light. I hope you'll show her some love, and enjoy my slightly serious list of how to "survive" your first year (or two or three) of marriage!!

Now, who is ready for Spring and St. Patty's Day?! We'll be having a very Italian St. Patty's, but you better believe it will still be festive around here!

Have a great weekend with lots of love!! XO

31

Sharing the Love: Valentine's Giveaway!

Today I've got a festive giveaway for all of the coffee (and tea) lovers out there! I've been loving the crochet coffee koozies since they started popping up on Etsy and around stores, aka Target. Since Phil says we've got a few more weeks of winter, there is still time to use these adorable coffee wraps before the iced coffees and frappachinos take over!

The best part is... There will be two winners! You won't get them before Valentine's Day, but who doesn't love pretty pink colors, bows, and hearts?

{Left} Raspberry Pink Coffee Cozy by Skittish Coyote Studio
{Right} Neon Pink Heart Coffee Cozy by I Talk of Dreams

Seriously, how cute are these? I'm already totally jealous of both winners!

Make sure to check out the other items from these adorable Etsy shops, Megan from I Talk of Dreams and Heather from Skittish Coyote Studio have been awesome to work with and are the sweetest!

You can also use the code CELEBRATE for a 15% discount at I Talk of Dreams until February 23rd! Shopping handmade and small business is a total bonus in my book!

To enter:
1. Follow Home Sweet Ruby via GFC, Bloglovin, or Email
2. Comment on which coffee koozie is your favorite, the bow or heart version. I can't promise that is the one you will get... winners will be chosen at random.
3. Follow via Instagram and Pinterest for more entries!

Giveaway ends on Tuesday, February 18th at 11:59 PM and the winner will be announced on the 19th!

Good Luck and Happy (almost) Valentine's Day!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

29

"Surviving" the First Year of Marriage

Today I'm guest posting over at Lavender and Light for Kristan's 'Love, Inspired' series, so make sure you hop on over there and check it out! With Valentine's Day and our one year anniversary coming up, I shared some of my "keys to survival" for your first year of marriage! Hint: It's not super sappy! You know that isn't how I roll (most of the time). 

Thanks again for asking me to help with your series, Kristan!

5

Vodka Tasting + Festive Pancakes

One of the stops on our Charleston "to-do list" has been a trip out to Firefly Vodka Distillery and Irvin House Vineyards on Wadmalaw Island. It's a bit of a trek but we had some friends heading out there for their Oyster Festival this weekend, and despite some rain in the morning it ended up being such a beautiful day!

We did both the vodka and the wine tasting before heading over to check out the oyster roast, food trucks, and listening to the live band.

During the vodka tasting, we got to sample a Lemonade vodka which Firefly doesn't sell in stores. It was by far my favorite, you could hardly taste the alcohol. I also tried their Skinny Sweet Tea vodka, which they sweeten with Stevia to keep the calories down.

Other big hits during the tasting were the Banana Pudding cordial and Apple Pie Moonshine. I didn't think the Apple Pie moonshine was as good as our recipe, but I might be a little biased!

Irvin House Vineyards was started by a retired couple who knew nothing about wine-making after planting and producing a few tons of muscadine grapes. It's really amazing what they've done with very little training. The wines are definitely on the sweet side, but our favorite was the Magnolia white wine.
 

Apparently I don't open my eyes for photos after a wine and vodka tasting...

Ally and her husband are quickly becoming our favorite people. She is probably thinking shit just got weird, but seriously...ha!

Next stop, Coastal Crust food truck. Yum!

After a fun-filled but busy weekend, we opted to go the breakfast for dinner route on Sunday night. I took it one (or ten) steps further by not only dying our pancakes pinkish-red, but using a big cookie cutter to form them into hearts. It was a festive twist to a lazy dinner! Just make sure to use cooking spray on the cookie cutter in between pancakes or it'll be a hot mess!

I hope you all had a fabulous weekend! 

23

Five on Friday!

SO happy its Friday! Work is getting busy and I've been setting up some fun things for the blog so I'm really happy to have the weekend and catch up on things, such as sleep! We've got some fun plans in Charleston this weekend with Ally and her husband so I'm excited to get through today, have a strong cocktail after work, and relax!

As usual, I'm linking up with Christina, April, Darci, and Natasha for my favorites from the week!

Acrylic Desk Accessories

Polka Dot Notebook, Push Pins, Tabs, and Washi Tape {Target}, Gold Glitter Notebook {J. Crew Factory}

I mentioned a couple weeks ago that I want to give my home office a facelift since I basically live and work in it every day. I haven't done much yet but I did pick up these cute acrylic boxes from TJ Maxx for organizing my desk accessories. I plan to add an acrylic monogram decal on the note card holder, you know, because it's not girly enough with all of the pink and gold items being stored in it...

I also ordered this acrylic tape dispenser. And I'm wishing it was acceptable to pay $30 for this gold stapler. I'll share more photos of the office upgrade when I make some more progress!

New Phone Case for Workouts

iPhone Holster Case

A long, long time ago, I shared some of my favorite workout items which included an iPhone holster. I have since lost one of the two parts to that holster and its been driving me crazy that I have to carry my phone or stick it in the sweaty waistband of my yoga pants while working out. I finally found a new one and I'm loving it so far! There is only one part to it so I don't have to worry about losing it. It stays really snug when hooked onto my yoga pants, even when I run like an elephant.

New Wish List Item: J. Crew Silk Snood

J. Crew Silk Snood

I saw this in the store and immediately became obsessed with it. The colors are gorgeous and it's J. Crew, so of course its great quality (and pricey). I think I need this for our Europe trip. I mean, of course I'm using that as an excuse to buy it but it would go well with a lot of the items I want to pack!! I just hope it doesn't sell out before it goes on sale and I can rationalize buying it, that tends to happen to me with J. Crew!

Free Language Apps: Duolingo and SpeakEasy French/Italian

I know it's not necessary to learn a lot of the language when we go to Europe, but I am on a mission to refresh my memory on the French I took in college and at least learn the basics of Italian. I really enjoy the Duolingo app for French, its basically like a series of tests that you go through, each of which build on the last lesson you had so everything stays fresh in your memory. SpeakEasy is great too for basic greetings and words you would need while traveling, plus it works offline. I upgraded for the French but the free Italian version has been great. If you're traveling abroad I definitely recommend both of these apps!

Festive Nails

Pardon the manhand...

I've mentioned before that I'm pretty terrible at doing my own nails but this Essie color is one of my absolute favorites, it's called Off the Shoulder. It's an oldie but goodie. I'm going to be so sad when it runs out! I might try my hand at painting a heart on my ring finger this weekend... we'll see how that goes!

So what are your plans for the weekend? Anyone as excited about Olympic snowboarding and ice skating as I am?! I watched the new Slopestyle event qualifiers last night and the girls were great but the guys blew me away! I wish I could do that, I mostly just rotate from falling on my ass to getting a beer in the lodge while snowboarding. Ha!

Happy weekend, friends!

37