Centerpieces

I just bought these amaryllis bulb kits (WITH beautiful red pots!) at Target in the 75% off aisle. That's right--I saved $180 and only spent $2.50 per centerpiece. Does that mean I can turn around and use that money to buy those $200 shoes I'm still lusting after? In my eyes, they're only $20 now--the price of their Payless counterparts!

Want to know where I get my flawless logic? Life with Father, of course!

Sonnet

Last night, I boasted that I could write Pete a poem any time I wanted to. He demanded one instantaneously, and "not a limerick or haiku either. A real poem, like a sonnet." So I obliged. I stole from Shakespeare a lot, but who doesn't? He's pretty much fair game at this point. William, think of it as a remix, okay?

Oh dear. I've just remembered what Elizabeth Bennet says about sonnets in Pride and Prejudice:

"I wonder who first discovered the efficacy of poetry in driving away love!"

"I have been used to consider poetry as the FOOD of love," said Darcy.

"Of a fine, stout, healthy love it may. Everything nourishes what is strong already. But if it be only a slight, thin sort of inclination, I am convinced that one good sonnet will starve it entirely away."

Oh, what have I done????

PS Yep, I've been rewatching it. You should too!

Emma

I think it's time to reread some Austen. Part of the reason I survived last week was the new Emma miniseries, which I watched whenever I had a spare moment. As soon as I finished it, I had the urge to begin it all over again. (That happened with North and South as well.) Instead I grabbed the book to see if Frank Churchill was really as big an idiot in the original text and to remind myself if Jane was as (deservedly) impertinent to Mrs. Elton as they made her out to be.

But when Pete visited this weekend, he suggested (I KNOW! I can't believe my incredible good luck either...) we watch it, as we started it months ago and never got far. So we did, and it was lovely.

I never thought I'd like watching my precious miniseries with a guy, because, well, they don't shriek with joy at the gushy bits, but it's actually more fun this way. I still do get a little silly, I must admit. But unlike Frank Churchill, who decrees that, "One cannot love a reserved person," I find I do. And so did he, for that matter, that dirtbag!

our house!

Not one, but TWO bedrooms!

While Pete was there, the tsar stopped by for a spot of tea with his doppelganger.(Apparently the seminary museum is using our future home as a storage unit. I kind of want to keep them!)

A WASHER AND DRYER! Seriously, I am thrilled about this photo. Who cares if it's bedazzled with duct tape? We won't have to wash our clothes in the lake and dry them in a tree! I can't wait to see it all in person.

Just in case you wondered...

I found this photo in a slideshow of a real wedding on Martha Stewart's wedding site. In the caption, the designer is listed as Stuart Weitzman.I searched through the whole website and couldn't find them. Zappos has a listing for him, but the elusive shoe was not among them.

But!

He makes them in white (~$200-250). The bride in question must have dyed hers.

But if it's red you're after,

Kate Spade makes a similar red pair for (sit down, quick!) $325.

...or you can just buy the Payless version for $19.99!

As it turns out...

We were wrong about the little green hovel. Our future home is right next door. Pete's checking it out tomorrow and has promised me better pictures than Google maps has provided.

New project

I bought some tulle and feathers on etsy and with the help of this amazing tutorial, I've begun experimenting with birdcage veils.I'm a little afraid of how easy it is to make these things look silly. At one point I looked decidedly like a beekeeper, at another, a fencer. File it under "maybe..."

In other news, MY DRESS ARRIVED.