the weather has been beautiful lately as we transition into fall.  the windows are open and the air is nice and cool. now's the time to take advantage of the quiet, spend time outdoors, and savor the last bits of our last summer as just dog parents.

baby girl's room is so close to being ready for her.  i couldn't resist posting a few pics of her bed.  her room has such a chill vibe that we are loving, and i'll confess we have slept in there a few nights just for fun.

 we're also trying to get as much out of the summer veggies as possible before they stop producing.  a new, amazingly delicious recipe we've discovered is habanero carrot pepper jelly.  it's easy and so tasty with some cream cheese on a cracker.  the two of us have already eaten an entire jar!  it's just the habanero gold recipe out of the ball book, but with carrots substituted for the apricots.  so good.

 i've gotten a new pottery mug every september for three years now.  i'm thinking it's a good tradition to keep going, so here is this year's pick.

 great falls!  eric shows belle some kayakers.  look at that little butt roll!  god she's adorable.

 my man from the mountains is looking very mountain man lately.

 do anything and everything outside while you can.  that's our motto.  we met up with some friends for an outdoor artjamz painting session.  eric went with an aboriginal painting, while i did a zebra.  it was a lot of fun, and now we have two more paintings to store in our basement :)

 these two are heading to iceland soon (beyond jealous over here), so mark painted a volcano.  hope you guys get to see an eruption!

we've been in our new house for a little almost three months now, but i always have a hard time figuring out where to hang our pictures.  a lot of times i end up making something because i can't find or don't want to pay for what i want.

i saw a cool idea on one of my favorite blogs that looked easy enough and also looked perfect for the big wall behind our tv. voila, here it is! 

bella even posed perfectly for the picture.  she's a stylish dog-cessory.

i love the way the painting came out, and it was cheap. which is always the right price.

i've also re-purposed these guys that i made for our old place in our new bedroom.  they are really helping with the soothing nap-time vibe we've got going on in there.

slowly but surely. i guess we'll get the house right just when it's time to move somewhere else :)

eric and i were invited to a reception following my final concert.  these things are always fun because they're usually held in cool homes with great food and wine.  this one was particularly interesting since the hosts are collectors of all kinds of things.

below i pretend i'm taking pics of eric to actually take pics of the rooms.

^^beth and her mom, dariel, hanging out^^  dariel gifted me the sacred family recipe book as a going away present.... lucky us!!!

perhaps the most interesting collectable was the elephant's foot stool.  not gonna lie, i couldn't eat dessert after seeing this thing.  thankfully we didn't notice it until the end of the night.

apart from the foot, this is one of my favorite dc homes.  it was beautifully curated with with an enormous but eclectic collection of art works, sculptures, carvings, furniture, textiles, i could go on...

we said goodbye to reilly and beth, and moving day was upon us!

on saturday, when the weather was lovely (this cold, sadd, winter hadn't yet arrived), eric and i enjoyed the day listening to music, taking the girls on a bike ride/run, and i finally finished and hung up a diptych i made. 

it was inspired by the one below i saw on sanity fair's blog (who also happens to live in dc).  it's hard to figure out what to put behind or around a tv.  i wish our dresser had less crap on it like hers... but we are a family of 4 living in 600 square feet so....

via

between this and the new bedspread eric's mom got us, i'm really loving our bedroom!

the tree is up! and it's beautiful :)

i may have been inspired by mr. noel.  either way, christmas is here!  eric and i made some hot apple cider and blasted christmas songs while we decorated the tree and apartment and danced with the girls.

it didn't start out as a pine cone tree when i bought it a couple of years back, but has somehow become that.  between my love of pine cones and all of the banksia that we brought back from australia and turned into ornaments last christmas, the tree is covered in them.  good thing eric loves them, too.

we're a little over 4 months out, so i've been working on little details for the wedding.  i want to incorporate things from the arts and sciences in what i hope will end up being a natural, comfortable but romantic vibe.

that said, i ordered 1000 test tubes and this test tube chandelier.  it turns out that test tubes make really cool decorations. 

i grouped some test tubes together and tied them with twine.  i think it just looks like a vase until you notice the test tubes.  

i've also been experimenting with paper flowers, confetti, and garland made out of sheet music, and playing with different materials to see what can be done, like burlap, twine, craft paper, and doilies.

here is a twine wrapped vase i made inspired by someone on pinterest.

oh my goodness so much stuff has to get done in the next 138 days!

fall is here, winter is coming, and winter here is depressing.  it gets dark early and is mostly just cold and wet.  no beautiful evergreens or mountains, no snow to play in, and no vitamin d.  in an effort to hold off SAD as long as possible, we have rearranged our living room to feel less claustrophobic.

it all started with the photo wall.  it's been less than impressive since we put it up.  once we started adding pictures and moving them around, somehow we just ended up moving everything.  i love our new living room so much.  it's the little things :)

before and after wall.

living room before.

and after.

breakfast by the window is the best.