Another Sweet/Chic Shower

I've been to loads of baby showers in my time, and I may be biased, but I must say this: hands down, Southern girls throw the best ones. Even when they're throwing those showers in NYC.

This weekend, I attended a lovely lovely celebration for my lovely lovely friend Margaret, a fellow Southerner-in-the-city. It was an intimate, personal affair thrown by her two sisters (also transplants) and it offered up all the things I dig: fabulous food (check out that cake by Magnolia Bakery--BRILLIANT), beautiful flowers, champagne, slight Southern accents, and tiny clothing with the power to make the whole room coo in unison.

What warmer way to spend a winter's day? Congrats, Margaret and Norm!

(Yup. The bow is back.)

Awwww, nuts.

So where are you? I am currently in North Carolina visiting my family in an "extended stay" situation, thanks to that big ole blizzard in NYC. I was supposed to go back Sunday night, but after two canceled flights and several hours online dealing with very limited options for rescheduling those flights, I am now home for a few extra days.

While it's nice in theory to have additional time here, it's a bit hard when you're not prepared. There are still deadlines to make at work. I've had to play phone tag with a doctor in NYC so I could fill a medication I didn't have enough of, and I could only pick it up at a drugstore that took me 45 minutes to find. My contacts are about to jump off my eyeballs because they're dry and expired. And praise Jesus my parents have a washing machine in the house.



But, okay, let's don't lie: the positives outweigh the negatives. I mean, I don't usually have this much time time to hang with my parents, my brothers and their significant others, and, of course, my delicious baby nephew. Tonight, for example, we just did normal stuff. We ate leftovers. We sat around and read magazines. We watched football (go N.C. State!). And my youngest brother and I practiced our O.C.D.: I rearranged my mom's spice drawer (meaning, I threw out the expired jars and alphabetized the rest), and Steve-o shelled every single pecan we had in the house for no reason whatsoever. NORMAL STUFF.


To shell the nuts, Steven used this cool contraption that used to belong to our great-grandmother (it makes an awesomely loud CAHHH-RuuuuuuuNCH). The pecans also just happen to come from the tree in the backyard of my aunt's house. And since I took photos (natch) and made the obvious jokes that sisters are supposed to make when their brothers sit around cracking nuts, I felt that, in every way, this celebration of obsessive-compulsive behavior was very much a family affair. A NORMAL FAMILY AFFAIR.



But you know what? Sometimes I secretly think that I could perhaps find this kind of normal family-time stuff obsessively nice. And while I did not sign up for a change-your-flight-twice, run-around-rearranging-your-week (and your mom's spices), blizzard-y white Christmas, it's honestly been abnormally lovely.

Things My Brothers Made to Make the Holidays Great

New holiday recipes:

New holiday photos:

New reasons to start setting out cookies for Santa again:

(To be fair, I'll give my sister-in-law some credit in this one, too).

Hope your holiday was just as full of family, food, and fun!

Are you a winner?

OKay. You're ALL winners. But, hey, Kelly, Deena, Rachel, Lauren Z., Courtney, Deena, bt, Lauren B., Katie, Lindsey T., and Anne--you all just won M-Dashing's first giveaway! Congrats and thanks so much for entering. I'll be in touch with you soon to get your addresses so I can send the love your way.

This means, of course, that the ole Real Simple Pop-Up Shop has officially closed. It was a whirlwind few days, but we're all really proud of our store and all that we offered. If you got a chance to stop by, let me know what you bought. (I, personally, scored myself a pair of Echo Touch Gloves--a huge bestseller. They're totally amazing.)

Happy holidays, my friends!