It's time.

I'm leaving this blog/name behind and starting fresh. Still working on getting my vintage/handmade etsy shop set up, it's so close to being done! The name of the shop and (possible) blog will be "Little Larabee" if you are interested. I'm not sure when it will all be set up but hopefully very very soon! Thank you all for following along here and I hope to see you around my new blog and new shop!

xo Laura

I'm alive so here is a bit of an update!

Woah, I'd like to apologize for not posting on here in what seems like years. Thanksgiving was nice. We spent it with Cason's family and of course, his mom sent us home with loads of yummy goodies (i.e. this pumpkin pie featured below that has since been devoured)

Things have been stressful and busy around the house and I have had no time to post. Well I suppose I'd have time to post but I haven't had time to do anything to post about! That is changing soon. 

Cason has to take a test for work so that has been taking up most of his time and lately, I've just been trying to get the house back in order. Basically it's a cause and effect type problem we have. We haven't had time to fix our disaster of a closet and therefore our clothes are still in suitcases on the floor. Our kitchen is full of stuff for my Etsy store and I haven't even had a chance to set that up yet and even when I do, who knows how long it will take to sell so we are still looking at the kitchen space problem. Until we get room in the kitchen, I don't have room for a sewing machine, which means I can't make half of the things I'd like to for the store. I'm still trying to learn to crochet...well actually I'm trying to decide if it would be easier to learn to crochet or knit but once I learn one of them, I plan on, hopefully, making cute little things to put in the store also. But that is IF I ever learn how. So you see how things are looking right now. I don't have a car up here so I have to wait until the weekend for Cason to drive me around to craft stores or fabric stores. But usually on his weekend, he has to study or is too tired to do much of anything so I feel bad asking him to drive me around just to get craft supplies, ya know? And I'm so indecisive that I never want to buy something because I don't know how long I will be interested in it, or if I'll buy all of the stuff to do something like say, knitting, and then I won't be able to get the hang of it.

So if it seems like I'm terrible at this blog thing, it's because I am. ha! I follow all these blogs who have tons of time to do tons of things BUT they already practically have a craft...arsenal. I'm just now starting mine so stick with me will I learn things and stock up on supplies, and hopefully you won't be disappointed.

xox Laura

The Dark Side of Giveaways

Giveaways. They are awesome ways of giving away cool stuff or getting the word out about your store or blog. But they can also go very very wrong and give your store or blog a pretty bad reputation.

I semi-recently won some adorable vintage drinking glasses over at one of my favorite blogs. The owner of the blog contacted me right away and told me that the store owner would be contacting me in one or two days to get my mailing address. After about 4-5 days I asked if I should have heard from the store owner by now or was I just too excited to get my glasses? She seemed a bit shocked and finally got the store owner to email me. We had a light and friendly conversation in 1 or 2 emails all while I sent her my address and she said she would send me a tracking number as soon as they were picked up and on their way. Well that was on June 27th.

Now I am not one to trust email fully. I always have a fear that something didn't send or I did something dumb like saved it in drafts instead of sending. So I sent a follow up email, probably a week later, asking if I had missed her email including the tracking number. We had been having internet issues all week, so I figured I just didn't receive it and I need to be looking out for it (since it's being mailed to a different address than my home- history of stolen packages there. Whole different story)

no response.

Well now it's August 19th and I still haven't heard back from the store owner and I've seen her host a lot of giveaways and she has a well established store. So it's not like sending things out is new to them. I didn't pay for anything so if I don't receive them it's not the end of the world but it's just the principle of the matter.

I am not one to bother people. My thought process has been "I'm sure she is busy with actual customers", "maybe she has been on vacation" etc but I mean, too busy for an update? Just a quick email? Should I be more persistent since it's been 2 months? Anyone else had this problem or have any advice?

A Poppin' Saturday night

We recently acquired a Poppin' Pete from Cason's parents. It was originally in the "sell this in your store" pile but VERY quickly turned into a "we are never getting rid of this" pile...(which I've found is probably the biggest problem in having a vintage store, wanting to keep everything you find). Well anyway, we documented my first non-microwave popcorn experience and I must say it was delicious!

ignore the orange tint to the pictures. It was night time and our kitchen light makes EVERYTHING look orange. We are never getting rid of this Poppin' Pete!

Cars and bars

There was a car show downtown near our house we decided to check out. I loved seeing all of the old cars fixed and shined up looking straight outta the 50's. Then we spent our night with friends at our favorite local bar listening to local music. It's the little things. Enjoy your Friday! xo

Perfect moments

Don't you just love these perfect moments?

Possibly heading to the lake this weekend, working out the details as we speak. If it all works out, I'll share some of the lake atmosphere with you when I return.

Enjoy your Thursday and go see The Dark Knight Rises! xo

Don't get your hopes up!

Well I had this delicious post for you all today. I have been craving some of those no bake chocolate oatmeal cookies for the longest time. You know what I'm talking about. So I gather up all the ingredients and my trusty cookbook from my mom. Now this cookbook has been around...for a while. I'm not sure if they have them everywhere but this one is just a bunch of recipes from people all over Alabama. It probably has any recipe you could ever need...if it's unhealthy of course! These are your grandma's recipes. These are your chicken and dumplings, bourbon balls, buttermilk pie and fried green tomatoes recipes. We obviously used it a lot, because it is currently being held together by duct tape (my dad taped it years ago and made a little pocket out of duct tape on the front and back cover for recipe cards. How sweet!)

Anyway, so I've made this recipe a million times and I was mixing and boiling and doing my thing. Well we didn't have oats so I opted to use some extra shredded coconut that we had. Sounds good, right? Well I'm not sure if it was the best idea, perhaps I should have added more coconut than it called for oats? Well, you don't get a yummy recipe post for a reason...

So there's that. Enjoy that chocolate soup mess on my counter. I'm letting them set hoping that maybe it will turn out edible, but don't get your hopes up!