the white (& green) stripes

Stripes. One of my favorite things not listed on my bow-worthy things to love list. They present endless possibilities. Seersucker. Zig zags. Nautical-ness. Simple black & white. Etc, Etc. They're girly & sophisticated at the same time. To illustrate my point:

What's the fun in cooking if you don't have a sweet little apron? My roommate has a cute polka dot one, and I've been meaning to grab one up. Maybe it'll encourage me to cook more?...Here's hoping.

Wallpaper by Jonathan Adler. Gimme. Perfect for an accent wall.

Errands? Shopping with friends? Day date? Lake, beach, pool? Doesn't matter, this is perfect for everything. And it looks sooooo soft.

I would love to learn how to re-upholster furniture. That's on my to-do list. Take a re-upholstering class. In the meantime, you can find plenty of already-upholstered things on here on etsy.com.

You can never have too much gameday attire. boomer sooner.

Seasonless and full of class...therefore maybe worth the money? (It's Kate Spade.) That's how I'll rationalize it.

Normally I'm a fan of personalized stationary, but I love these simple stripes.

Learn how to make these at one of my absolute favorite websites: design*sponge. They have new DIY projects every Wednesday - this one's from a while ago. Learn how to DIY here!

Perfect with a crisp white button down and brown sandals. Spring needs to get here ASAP.

Seersucker is my personal favorite when it comes to stripes. There's something so summery and southern about it. It's cool and refreshing and always comes in bright colors. Up until recently, though, I only really thought about it as a clothing item. But when it came to picking out pillow patterns for my new apartment, I decided to branch out. After spending hours looking at the fabric wall at Hancock's and several return trips to buy new swatches, I decided on a floral print and of all things, a yellow-green and white seersucker. Originally they were just going to be on our couch, but I had extra fabric, so my mom fashioned an extra pillow for my bed.

Buuuuuutttt I also ended up with enough to cover a bulletin board. Easiest 5-minute project ever. Simply fold it over the back like you are wrapping a present and staple it down. Done and Done.

Staple away.

bows & blogs

I think it's pretty obvious that I love bows. I also love blogs. There are only two reasons I've ever really kept up with one (and I use the words "kept up with" very loosely): 1) because I was forced to for a class and 2) in order to get my design portfolio out into the hands of those who could help me become employed. Now that I'm out of school and very happy in an incredible job, I had no driving reason to keep a blog. So I made it a New Year's resolution. One of many. I make 4 or 5 resolutions each year, some general and some specific, so that when December rolls around I can maybe sometimes say that I kept one of them. Sometimes. I also said I'd start training for a half-marathon and begin cooking my mother's recipes for dinner. It's February 4th and I've worked out once and cooked an actual meal that didn't involve a microwave or leftovers twice. Clearly, my other resolutions are going extremely well.

So to sum up: I love bows. I love blogs. So I made a blog about bows. Now this won't solely be about bows because although I can talk, I don't think I could talk about that and only that for a year. So I'll discuss some other pretty things that I come across, list some of my favorite things, and perhaps, occasionally post a recipe that I successfully cooked myself. Because trust me, if I can make it, you can. I've also recently become obsessed with room and house decor, so I may throw a couple of those gems in here.

For now, I'll leave you with a few sources of inspiration for the namesake of this blog...

The classic bow: on top of a beautiful leather ballet flat. Thank you, J. Crew.



It's fittingly called the "Americana skirt" - it's making me crave warm weather, popsicles & the 4th of July. I think it'd even melt this foot of snow we're currently buried under...



Polka dots and bows are like peanut butter & jelly. Tom Hanks & Meg Ryan. Sweet tea & summer. Chocolate & pretzels. You get the idea.



So I'm obviously dreaming about summer. Gimme this swimmy suit and a margarita.


Now this is something you could wear right now. And they're on sale at The Limited! See ya later, I'll be at the mall...


These are actually mine - they're little gold post earrings. Go with everything, not at all flashy, $12 at Francesca's Collections. Done deal.