happy birthday to me

Today I woke up to find these gorgeous flowers (and a very sweet letter) from my husband on my bedside table.

And when the mail came, it was full of sweet cards from friends and family:) I am so blessed!

Now I'm off for a surprise evening. My husband has something up his sleeve but won't tell me what it is. At first I thought he was cooking for me, but now I'm thinking I was wrong. I have a very strict no-surprise-party-for-Mary-Grace-EVER policy, so if you're my friend and you live in San Diego and you've been invited to a surprise party for me tonight ... DON'T COME! Haha just kidding ... kinda ..... :) Have a great night, everyone! xoxo

all you need is love (and flowers)

Hi everyone! Hope all of you had a wonderful Valentine's Day full of lots of xoxoxo's from your loved ones:) My day started with these gorgeous flowers from my hubby. I'm afraid this OOTD business is bringing out the worst (i.e.: vanity) in me! I decided to show off my Valentine's OOTD by "modeling" my flowers, and I got a little carried away...

Some might say that it's not very fashionable of me to wear a white dress before Easter, but I haven't worn this dress in a few years, and when I ran across it in my closet I thought it looked just like a white doily, perfect for Valentine's Day!

Maybe this is weird, but whenever I get a bouquet of flowers, I always break them up into several arrangements right away ... as you can see in the picture above. I'm no Eddie Ross, but I do enjoy pretending to be an expert in floral arrangement every now and then:)

Dress: Mango

Bracelets: Assorted bangles

Shoes: H&M

Earrings: Vintage - they belonged to my Gran:)

Here's a close-up of the shoes. 

The best part about turning one large arrangement into three smaller ones is that you get to enjoy your flowers all over the house! Here are a few of them sitting in the adorable hobnail pitcher that my little sister Lizzie gave me for Christmas:)

I saved a single rose to put on my desk.

And this little bunch has moved to the kitchen window since I took this picture. They looked so sweet and cheery in the morning sunlight today:)

HAPPY (belated) VALENTINE'S DAY!

the fate of these plants rest in your hands

These are by far the least attractive photos I've ever put on this blog, but if there's a way to make dead/dying plants look attractive, I'm yet to figure out how to do it! In September SoCal suffered a maaaaaaajor heat wave, as in record-breaking heat wave. I had the good fortune of being out of town visiting my parents during said heat wave, but my plants were not so fortunate. They were left in the care of my husband, who did not go to quite the extreme measures I might have taken to keep them from suffering. I guess he thinks he's "too busy" to go out and buy 25 umbrellas and lovingly, carefully string them up over each individual plant;)

Out of my 18 plants, only about 10 lived to tell the horrible tales. Almost immediately, the big plant in the top photo began to brown. This picture was taken about 3 weeks ago, and since then, all but about two of the large leaves have browned and/or fallen off. So my question is, do I put it out of it's misery? Is there any chance at all that it might somehow spring back? Is there some sort of test I can give it to see if it still stands a chance of being resuscitated? If I should put it out of it's misery, is there a way to save the impatiens? Is there a way to plant a new large plant in there without damaging the impatiens?

Also, the little purple flowers in the second picture have somehow not only survived, but thrived, am I supposed to be trimming and pruning them? They've grown at least two inches since this picture was taken.

Any and all advice is most appreciated! 

PS I realize that the porch looks filthy, and I apologize. I took these photos one morning after several days of rain, so there was no way to sweep it clean for the pictures. I do sweep it, I promise!

PPS I have added a "videos" button up at the top, and a "thanks for the mention" section on the right. It's a work in progress, so if you have ever written about me or my blog on your blog, and you are not included in this list, please email me with the link at whitewaxflower@gmail.com so I can add you!

this might be the most random post I've ever written

There's a chance that my neighborhood library might be shutting down soon, and I am really sad about it:( I LOVE the library, all libraries, and one of my fears is that one day all the public libraries will be deemed outdated and unnecessary and they'll close down. There's only so much I can do to keep that from happening, but I can start by encouraging people to go to their local libraries more often, right?

You can make it more fun for yourself by buying this Overdue Book Calendar from etsy. I've blogged about it before, but this is the 2011 version! It's fun to fill out, and the design is adooooooorable. Seriously, go to the library! It's fun and nostalgic and gives you that I'm-a-kid-again feeling. Plus, it's much cheaper than buying every book you want to read. By the way, if you're really observant you probably noticed that I wrote that all the books are due back on 10/3 when it should say 11/3. I noticed my mistake, but I can't find my white-out:(

Secondly, this is a picture from my wedding day of my little sister holding my bouquet. Do you see what I see? I see white wax flowers! To be perfectly honest, I had completely forgotten that they were in my bouquet, and hadn't thought about it since my actual wedding day. I picked this blog name because I read once that people used to give white wax flowers as gifts to couples to wish them a happy marriage. I thought it was such a cute and sweet sentiment to go with such a cute and sweet flower, that it became my blog name.

So when my sister sent me this picture in a text message, I was shocked. It's a newspaper clipping about my wedding day. It's just one of those sort of serendipitous things that happens that just makes you smile, you know? Here I thought I had picked a totally random blog name, and it turns out I had white wax flower in my wedding bouquet.

And since I'm already talking weddings, I'm gonna throw in a bridal shot of me, my mama, and one of my bridesmaids (who is getting married in March!)

And last, but not least, I wanted to say thank you, thank you, THANK YOU for all the great feedback I've been getting on my upcoming video series. I think the videos are going to be a lot of fun to make, and I hope you enjoy them! Here's what I'm working on:

• House tour video
• Sanding/painting/distressing/upholstering video
• Craft-making video - I'm thinking something Halloween or Thanksgiving related? Then maybe I can follow it up with something for Christmas.
• Something with Jemima. She'll be just thrilled about the idea. She loves the camera almost as much as I do!

Hope you were able to hang in there through all the randomness. Happy Thursday!

A few weeks ago I had a bit of an illness, and during that time I neglected to bring my houseplants in from getting some sun, or water my outdoor plants, for about a week. This was regrettable, as three or four of them roasted! Poor things. Yesterday, I finally got around to replacing the ones that passed away.

It's funny what a social event shopping for plants can be. Around here, it's always elderly people that run the nurseries, and they always seem so pleased to see a young person interested in gardening. I made lots of friends while picking out plants yesterday;)

Also, I enjoyed having one little flower in a mug so much, that I decided to get three more! Don't they look sweet? 

And now I'm going to shamelessly brag. My mother came to San Diego to help me settle in to our new home back in March, and while she was here, she planted impatiens around this palm. There were probably about 10 or 15 blooms when she planted them, and now look at them! There's probably about 100 blooms! I am so proud of myself. 

flowers and fonts

I have made a few little changes around the townhouse lately, and thought I'd share! The previous lampshade in the guest bedroom was a shade that I'd covered myself, and it didn't look horrible, but it didn't look too great, either;) I love how this new shade is a bit oversized for the little aqua base, and I love having the extra splash of color.

I also changed the font on my library dresser. That's how we alphabetize our DVD's, and because we'd bought some new ones I had to redo the labels anyway.

 I thought I might as well change up the font on the labels while I was at it! I changed it to - what else - American Typewriter. My favorite! That's the same one as you see in my banner up there.

I've added three plants in terra cotta pots to my front door welcoming committee:) Jemima even sort of matches them in her purple, tan and red polo shirt!

life is too short to go without flowers

One weekend when I was in college my mother visited me, and brought with her an arrangement in this rectangle glass/jute pot. Isn't it adorable? It's so white waxflower:) The arrangement is long gone, but I've held on to the container for years. These cute yellow marigolds were just 6 for $2.50 at the hardware store, so I snatched them up.

Didn't it turn out so cute?

Amazing how much flowers make spaces feel happier.

I had one little marigold plant left, so I plopped it in a plain white mug. It makes me smile every time I wash my hands (or a dish)!

Over the weekend I finally made a decision: the portrait is now hanging in the landing. Thanks so, so much to everyone that gave an opinion! You guys rock. I'm happy with the decision, because it's out of direct sunlight, but still in a place where guests will see it when they come over. Because what's the point of having a cute picture if you can't show it off without acting like you're showing it off, right? :)