STRAWBERRY CHEESCAKE SNOWCONES. HECK YES!

NEW OBSESSION!

This weekend was full of some great highlights such as: STRAWBERRY CHEESCAKE SNOWCONES! Friday evening Nate got a new tattoo. Of course it had to b a pirate/nautical tattoo so he ended up getting a parrot on his shoulder. =) It turned out fantastic so props to that dude! I'll post a picture when Nate gets home from work. I'm itching to get another now! I'm probably going to get my first one fixed by him before I get a new one though.We spent saturday afternoon at the Quinlan flea market. We didn't stay long due to that Texas heat, but found a great steal for $1. Can't wait to deconstruct this one and make a bit less matronly!



Nate found some awesome grilling utensils all in the case for $5. Not too shabby. Sunday was spent being lazy and taking Conrad to the little mini water park down the road. He had a blast of course. It's so easy to make that kiddo happy. =)



I'm excited that I'm enrolling in school this month. =) Go me! I'm going online. They're providing me with a new Macbook Pro so I know this school was meant to be! I can finally quit hogging Nate's macbook. I'm just ready to get this whole "degree thing" over and done with. I have a lot of experience and a decent portfolio already but I want that degree to back it all up. Everything I've done is self taught so it'll be good to brush up and smooth out the rough spots.

Here's a piece I've been working on. Hopefully it'll be in the shop when I open it! =)

So have you seen this amazing wallpaper by Pottok? Holy cow it's so beautiful. I'd be living in my own inspiration dream world if I had this wallpaper gracing my walls. I would love to have the apples or the whales in Conrad's room. How great would that be!

dirty laundry.

I ran out of dryer sheets today, and decided "Hey, I don't feel like buying dryer sheets ever again." I remembered an all DIY tutorial I saw ages ago in a magazine or somewhere where you take old fabric scraps or cloths and spray them with wrinkle release or soak them in liquid fabric softener. I grabbed an old baby wipes container and filled it 1/4 the way up with a 50/50 mixture of liquid fabric softener and water and a couple of sprays of wrinkle release. BAM! Worked like a charm! Best thing is you can just continue to reuse. When I get time I'm probably going to hem them or something to make them really cute. I'm happy I finally found another use for baby wipe containers!




Conrad's adorable suspenders I got him yesterday! It makes me smile. =)


and his cute GAP pj's I got for 50 cents :) the little pocket on the butt is what sold me.


And my little treasure: the floral suspenders. I'm in love.


AND NOW I'm going to go cuddle up with some tissues and try to fight this head cold with some netflix movies. =) ta ta guys

Kat ann

The Corner Thrift Store

I woke up to my mother leaving a message on my answering machine asking to keep Conrad for the night. (yay!) So I was excited for some "ME" time to explore and thrift and be lazy.

I fixed pancakes and gave the kiddo a bath and got him off to Nana and Pap's house. I started the morning off with NO CLEANING what so ever, and a lovely lovely movie called "Bright Star".


I've been on this binge of 19th & 18th century romance movies like Pride & Prejudice, The Duchess, Atonement etc.. So I added this to my Netflix instant queue since it was a romance about the poet John Keats. It was absolutely beautiful. I teared up a bit. It holds my stamp of approval for what its worth haha! I finally made myself shower and take a bike ride around town before coming home to meet up with the best friend.

We've been meaning to go to this place called "The Corner Thrift Store" forever but its always closed when we try. So we made it today and found all kinds of goodies. The best part is that nearly every item of clothing is $1. We spent a good 2 hours and both spent $14.08 a piece. I bought some cute pants with built in suspenders for Conrad, a few blouses, belts, scarves, corduroy shorts for the hubby and several other little things.

The best find of the day was definitely the russian nesting doll dress I found in the children's section. SO AWESOME. Luckily Jenn fits into some kids sizes haha. We hit up Goodwill after and scored some floral suspenders for myself and some more things for Conrad. Jenn and I later came to the agreement that we would trade off the awesome bag she found for the suspenders every so often haha.



We didn't get this awesome dog shirt because it didn't fit either one of us but it was photo worthy. I thought this little seat/desk was adorable. I'm hoping to talk my bearded man into getting it for me as a little work area.

We painted a few more things for the shop yesterday as well. =)

Hopefully that's the end of my excitement for the next few days.. I'm sunburned and exhausted mentally and physically. Thank goodness I get to sleep in a bit tomorrow. But I'm sure I'll still get up to savor my alone time. Yay for grandparents!

green things.

Living green is something my husband and i have been wanting to do for a long time. If we could afford it we would shop completely organic, have solar panels running our home, use organic soap, deodorant and shampoo, grow our own vegetables and fruit and ride our bikes everywhere. BUT that's very expensive and when you live in the country and have a toddler, its hard to travel by bike. haha. It's a great mental image though. Not to mention the closest Whole Foods is an hour and fifteen minutes away. Household cleaning products is another thing I'm wanting to do as well. I've heard a lot about products such as the Seventh Generation products and Green Works products. I've seen a few different DIY household cleaners and though I'd give the glass cleaner recipe a try. Most contain vinegar, dish soap and some form of lemon which most of us have around the house already. I went with this:

1/4 cup vinegar
3 cups water
1 teaspoon dish soap
food coloring



I added some food coloring because I wanted mine purple. haha. It worked perfectly, no streaks or anything. I couldn't even smell the vinegar like I thought I was afraid of. As for cleaning the toilet and kitchen sink, I'm going to stick to something I know for sure has some hardcore germ killing action involved until I find something I like and can afford. I really want to try the J.R. Watkins Natural. It had adorable packaging and is made completely from vegetables and fruits. They also have bath products and such.



I'm also excited to start my own herb garden. They're so cute and so convenient! I always start cooking something and end up needing an herb or spice from the store. It's be nice to just go to the porch and pick it! Like these:

Conrad and I are going to the water park tomorrow to spend time with my husband's family and have some fun. I'm excited. We're gonna have a blast. =) I adore the family I married into. I have the most wonderful mother in law and sister & brother in laws. I'm so blessed! Anyways expect tons of pictures! Hope everyone's week got off to a great start! Ta ta til next time!

fathers

Father's are so special. They're superheros, they're pest control when a spider or snake comes near, they're 5 star chefs when its time to cook out, they're best friends out on the boat fishing, they're an understanding ear that never judges, they're wonderful people. =) Now that I am a mommy, it's a much different experience. All of these pictures I put up have my son as a baby in them. They're very special photos. So happy father's day to all you dads out there! You don't have an easy job, but you're so wonderful at it.


My handsome & loving husband. He's such a wonderful Daddy to our little Conrad. =) He works so hard to give us the best life possible.

My amazingly strong and loving Dad. He'd do anything for me if I asked. He is the rock in our family. =)


My Papaw. Who I have such great memories with as a kid of summers spent in the country catching crawfish and chasing kittens.

My Grandpaw Nicholas who I don't have a picture of on my computer. He left us last year and is now in Heaven and is truly missed. I don't have a lot of memories with him other than remembering him picking my brother and I up from school and taking us fishing, but I do have one certain one that stands out in my mind when I think of him. And it's of being a kid and playing outside. My cousin Meghan fell down on the asphalt and scraped her knee. I just remember sitting next to her while my grandpaw was doctoring it and putting a band aid on it. =) We miss him.


This has been a quite chill weekend. We've been lounging about most of it. We cooked out last night with our neighbors and that was about all of our excitement haha. Hopefully we'll get to take Conrad to the little water park down the road. Nate is sleeping in this morning, I'm going to go ahead and say he'll wake up sometime around 1 PM haha. Well I'm off to cook a a big ol southern father's day breakfast. Eggs, biscuits and gravy and hashbrowns =)

edit: I meant to add this video sooner but am just now getting to it.

Conrad saying his father's day wishes!

I do not exist, I faithfully exist.

Last nights show was life changing. Mewithoutyou has always been my band that I go listen to when I want to sit down, read my Bible and get close with God. Their music stirs up God inside of me and it's awesome! I love it! They always put on a great, energetic, random show. One of the best things about them is they are so humble and would give you the shirt of their back if you needed it. They inspire me to be a better person in life. Unfortunately my camera broke two days ago so I couldn't take pictures. But I did get mobile photos of the husband and I waiting before the show! I got to see a lot of old friends and my best friend and that was wonderful. =) it made my month. So happy anniversary to us.

Things I love today: Kaylah's Root Beer Cookies!

I saw this post this morning and immediately rode my bike down to the grocery store to look for this root beer extract. No luck, I'll just have to head to walmart soon. They look delicious and I bet they smell wonderful baking! You can find the recipe HERE.

Anyhoo, hopefully I'll be adventuring into my sewing machine finally this week. We'll see what happens! Hope everyone's week is going lovely!

kat ann

lovliness

This weekend was full of all kinds of goodness. I helped two sweet boston terriers find good homes. =) Saturday I got to spend some great time with the best friend adventuring in an unexpected place. The big O.C. not the O.C. that you're thinking of, I'm talking about Oak Cliff. Haha. Now, I grew up in South Dallas as a kid and it got so bad that my parents moved us all out to the country, which I was NOT happy about at the time. Jenn does lots of work with kids in Oak Cliff through her church and assured me that there were some amazing parts worth exploring. And she was sooooo right! It wasn't the Oak Cliff of my childhood haha.

We got to the Bishop Arts District and they had shut down a whole street for Eno's "Brew Riot Beer Festival" and live music! How cool! There was a human size chess game going on as well as a giant version of jenga. Kids were running around everywhere and for some reason everyone had a bike. Which I like. There was even a little section where people were racing on bikes hooked up to a game. Pretty neato. Aside from the festive atmosphere the shops on the street were awesome! In particular a shop called Zola's Every Day Vintage. This place was a goldmine for us! Nothing but vintage dresses, shirts, skirts, shoes, jewelery, scarves, and even a whole wall of paint by numbers. To top it off, the coolest little cat came walking out of the back right up to me and let me love on him. The ladies were nice and turned out the owner lives right by us. I promised myself I wouldn't spend any money that night so I'll be coming back! Oh, note the complimentary wine! yum!

We swung by the Soda Gallery, which was tooooo cute.

The Voodoo Store off of Greenville Ave. is another story. I also spend money that I shouldn't there. It's a favorite of ours that I love to go to for random psychadelic things. It has everything from art, records and dishes to 1960's Playboy magazines. The owner might be the most interesting human on the face of the planet. He's a Japanese hippy. haha. He's hysterical and having a conversation with him just makes me happy.

Sunday was spent at the Quinlan flea market looking for furniture to refurnish. We scored a $5 table and few other trinkets and fabrics. We broke out the old record player and spray painted for a good couple of hours. I'm so happy to have that record player back and working.

The result was these lovely items. The cute little yellow chair will soon have a cushion made for it and sit in front of my vanity! So excited for that! I got my new sewing machine so I'll be learning from here on out!

If anyone knows of some great blogs or sites to learn to sew and with free patterns please let me know!

Have a wonderful week folks!

kathryn

God is love, and love is real.

It's been an eventful, wonderful weekend full of sucessful thrifting, adventures with the best friend and creating with the husband. I have much to post but am WAYYY too tired to try and accomplish that tonight. One thing I would like to say is that I'm stoked that I got my old record player from my parents house this morning and have been rocking out all day/evening as the husband and I worked. A good friend of ours from Missouri sent us some awesome old punk rock vinyls as well as some newer records. One of my favorites is mewithoutyou's "Catch For Us The Foxes". Hopefully the husband and I will celebrating our anniversary at their show next wednesday evening at The Prophet Bar in Dallas. Mewithoutyou was always "our" band though our years of dating so they're very special to us. This will be our second time to see them. The first was very sentimental. We got to meet them before the show and shared a pineapple with the lead singer Aaron Weiss. They're religious and inspirational music is so moving and their energy live is so intense its mind blowing. Their latest album "It's All Crazy! It's All False! It's All A Dream! It's Alright." is one of my favorites already. I did some digging on an old photobucket account of mine and after numerous username/password combinations I finally got in. The photos from the last mewithoutyou show were there to my excitement!





Anyways, I'm off to put a few more coats on the goodies we're painting. Photos tomorrow! Ta ta world.

kat ann

two years ago..

It was rainy just like today.. not the gray skies and thunder kind of rainy either. It was the sun shining and 3 rainbows in the sky kind of rainy day. That's the day that my best friend and I got married. It wasn't a bit thing as we were fresh out of high school with little money. We married in a house with a few family members present. It didn't start to rain until we were on our way to our hotel but there was a rainbow in every direction that you looked. It was very beautiful. Those kind of days are special and memorable. (My computer has since crashed so I dont have the actual photos I took of the rainbows.) I still love that sweet hairy man just as much if not more. I got the MOST beautiful card I have ever seen. I teared up as I read it. I love you Nate. =)


"Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to go on an overnight drunk, and in 10 days I'm going to set out to find the shark that ate my friend and destroy it. Anyone who wants to tag along is more than welcome. " - Steve Zissou

We'll be saving our real celebrating for after pay day, but we sort of celebrated the evening with dinner and one of our all time favorite movies "The Life Aquatic". Any Wes Anderson movie that I watch always inspires me and gives me that nostalgic feeling that I love. Most of them feature Bill Murray, my all time favorite actor, so what more could you want? If you've never seen his films its a must! It's too tough to pick a favorite because they're all equally wonderful and offer a rad soundtrack. One thing I love so much about "The Life Aquatic" is the David Bowie covers by Seu Jorge. My husband and I are big Bowie fans to begin with, so this was a plus.


Royal: "He saved my life, you know. Thirty years ago. I was knifed at a bazaar in Calcutta, and he carried me to the hospital on his back."
Ari: "Who stabbed you?"
Royal: "He did. There was a price on my head, and he was a hired assassin. Stuck me in the gut with a shiv. "

The Royal Tennenbaums was the very first Anderson film and saw and it immediately hooked me so I have a very soft spot in my heart for that movie. It's ridiculously witty like most Anderson films, but also a little bit tragic. There are many times in this movie where I just laughed and thought to myself "WTF?". Like when Gweneth Paltrow's character runs away from home and returns with half of her finger missing. Plus anything with Luke Wilson in it I'm apt to like. =) Might I add, Luke Wilson's beard is epic in this movie. I also want their house. It's so beautiful. One of my favorite parts:



"I love you both but I'm going to have to mace you in the face." -Jack
"I wonder if the three of us would've been friends in real life. Not as brothers, but as people." -Jack

The Darjeeling Limited turned out to be absolutely phenomenal for me. The three main characters Owen Wilson, Jason Schwartzman, and Adrien Brody (three more of my favorite actors) are brothers on a "spiritual quest" in India after a period of not speaking after their father's death. I may be too quick to call this my favorite, but it's really impossible for it NOT to be my favorite.

With their particular film aesthetic, each film is visual eye candy. Not to mention he's from Texas. =) Yay! The color scheme of all the films are captivating and even the fonts used for the titles and credits are so well thought out and cohesive. His most recent film is The Fantastic Mr. Fox which did NOT disappoint. It had all the usual characters and a few more. I'll be watching it with my kiddo ALL the time I'm sure. I particularly love how they say "cuss" instead of the actual cuss word. That's some funny cuss. He also directed and wrote Rushmore and Bottle Rocket a little bit earlier on in his career and both are great as well! He has a new film in the production according to IMBD, called My Best Friend. I'll be patiently waiting until then.

I wish I could live in a Wes Anderson film. =)

If you have any info about other movies of his let me know! I would LOVE to see them.

EDIT:
i just wanted to add this real quick! A friend of mine did a wes anderson tribute video please check out this video and his youtube channel!

Lily Monster!

This is what I'm jamming today..

Just a little update on our lost dog situation.

At about 12:30 am last night Nate and I were spread out on the living room floor drawing when Nate looks out the door to the porch and says "No way! It's Lily!" (this part is a bit edited since there were words I'm not comfortable repeating haha.) We went to the door to let her in and she took off down the road. So we ended up finding our shoes and Nate jumped on my bike and took off after her. I, in my pajamas and moccasins, was running after him down the road. She managed to run around half the town, through the bank parking lot and through a field before nate cornered her in someone's garage lol. So we were a site to see. I even got stopped by a cop who thought we looked a bit curious. (Remember this is a town of under 1,000 people) I can't blame him. There's no telling what he thought we were up to. So Lily's back home finally. =) She's still a bit skittish but I think she's going to warm up to us quickly. She's already at my heels every step that I take.

I'm having troubles uploading pictures from my phone, but I'll try and post pictures of our drawings. We probably would have finished had it not been for our wonderful visitor. =) But I'm not complaining one bit.

Lost Dog

It's Monday.

Most people are waking up grouchy, putting on their work clothes,getting the kids to school, blah blah... well first: its summer. Which means the kiddos in my apartment complex are all outside running around, which is lovely. BUT monday for me means that the husband is back off to work and I can get some much needed blogging and creativeess out of the way. When he's home I try to spend as much time with him as possible since he works late... but that was interrupted as well today because our beautiful little new girl (boston terrier) Lily arrived this weekend and before I even got to post pictures of the sweetheart on facebook and on he blog, she took off running into the sunset while on a walk. I tried chasing her down in my flip flops but it was a lost cause. She's in a new place and skittish so she wasnt quite adjusted yet. Poor girl. So I imagine most of today will be spent on hunting her down =(. Ive already whipped up the "LOST DOG" flyers and posted a few around town. BAH HUMBUG. Suppose I'm not meant to have a dog. We're already so attached and I was in tears when it happened. Conrad woke up and said "See puppy? See puppy?" So everyone cross your fingers that we find her.


This weekend the best friend, husband and I planned to go out to First Monday Trade Days on Saturday but due to the late start on the way we go we had to postpone until next month. I'm shocked to know that so many people who blog about thrifting and flea markets have never been! If you haven't its a must! It's "The world's largest outdoor flea market". Need I say more? I forget how many acres its on but they have a great newer section of clothing, furniture and crafts, but the old section is the part we go for. You can dig for hours and find so many great things. Trash Can Punch is hoping to start a booth as soon as the studio is up and running so you should be seeing us there soon! So everything else was closed, even the garage sales and thrift stores around town had already closed down. We found a little gift shop that was part of a salvage yard owned by an older Vietnamese couple. It was just newer knick knacks etc. It was interesting though because the woman kept yelling at her 6 pomeranians the whole time, one of which's name was "michael jordan". So if you can imagine that.. lol. So we didn't accomplish much. We just grabbed a blizzard at dairy queen and enjoyed the company. Best friend time is always good. I did find some neat shelves with potential on the side of the road with a sign that said FREE. So,SCORE! I'm always down for painting and refurbishing free things. The hubby did get a harmonica and is trying to pick it back up. So that should be entertaining. I'm excited. I'm off to get the kiddo up from his nap. We'll see what kind of trouble we can get into today. Happy dinosaurs and gummy worms. =)

over&out
kat

Introductions & All That Jazz

Hello world. I'm taking on this adventure of blogging for myself, in the hopes someone else might actually like what I have to say. So for introductions,I am Kat. As I've matured I've realized how deeply in love I am with Texas. The heat, the people, the landscape, the diversity are all here. I'm a 21 year old mother and wife. My beautiful 2 year old son's name is Conrad McCary and he is all boy. =) My handsome husband is Nate and he's been sweeping me off my feet since my sophomore year in high school. I adore them both and they are my whole world. My partner in crime (Jenn) and I (with the help of the husband) are in the process of opening our own design/boutique/studio as we speak. We aren't sure what all we'll actually accomplish with it, but the rent is cheap and our expectations are open. If it winds up being just a great chill spot and studio for art shows etc.. than I couldn't ask for more... but whatever God wants for us will happen and I will never be let down.

So above is what consumes my life, and I love it. I enjoy flea markets, thrift stores,graphic design, web design, illustration, painting, drawing, crocheting, and I'm am in the process of learning to sew. I'm ecstatic about our shop and ready to be in a creative environment not completely surrounded by diapers, wipes, and sippy cups. Of course all of those things are going to end up there anyways, but the idea is refreshing and inspiring. I'm hoping to further my creativity and become more diverse as an artist. So here we go! I hope to share with you my artwork, my life, my new found treasures, wonderful places and adventures and all of the interesting things that there are to find in this world. So go out and explore and spill something for yourself. Whether its ink, paint, music, or just plain love: do it.

You can check out my about me page for a mini biography and pictures!