Happy New Years

Oh New Years, always a joyous evening full of fun and mischief. We're headed out to and with friends and I hope you are as well. I thought these silly pictures from last New Years might tide you over until I can share what we're doing tonight. I have lots to planned for you tomorrow and in the coming weeks so prepare yourself for an awesome intro into the newest year. Happy 2012 everybody!

Kiss someone sweet, I know I will (wink wink). big kiss, bekuh

A Tale of Many Christmases

I mentioned in yesterday's post that Ryan and I have four Christmases this year, let me explain. We have his parents', my mom's, my dad's, and we decided to have our own private little Christmas at home too. Easy enough, but when you add traveling, holiday schedules, people's availability etc. you've got pure Christmas chaos. 

This year we decided to go to Ohio for the actual Christmas holiday and spend it with my Dad and his family. We went to Ryan's parents' on the Thursday before, and had our little celebration together that night too. That leaves my mom, we have celebrated Christmas with her on New Years since my parent's divorce, a tradition that carries on even today. So you can guess where I'll be tomorrow. I wanted to give you a pictorial representation of three of our four Christmases today, so hold onto to your seat belts because this was one wild ride. 

This is a very picture heavy post, you know you love it.

These four pictures are perfect examples of or holiday madness, our families are so loving and giving and I'm pretty sure Ryan and I both got almost every item off our Christmas wishlists. The bottom two pictures are our Dads, JB is Ryan's Dad on the left and Greg is my Dad on the right. They're both as jolly as Christmas elves in these pictures.

We'll start with the Browning Christmas. We had lasagna for dinner, laughter for dessert and a whole lot of gifts exchanged. JB got new art supplies and everyone got pictures from the wedding to hang at home.

Layla was so worn out by our gift giving she just passed out at Ryan's feet, and on his new drum sticks.

Next up Ryan and I decided to have a private little Christmas celebration at home and each exchanged one gift. We left the rest of our gifts unopened until Christmas day.

We both decided to give each other clothes to open which was total coincidence and kind of cute. I love my new red wool skirt!

Finally we headed north, to rain and not snow, but had a merry little Christmas with the Powers clan. We ate way too much, hugged a lot and opened presents until we were all blue in the face. We all received so much! I felt very blessed.

After all was said and done I have to say I'm super thankful for all of the holiday madness. We've gotten to spend a great deal of time with family in the last week or so and we'll get to spend more time with family tomorrow. All the gifts are just icing on the cake, but what would icing be without the cake to put it on? big kiss, bekuh

Signs of Good Fortune while Traveling

Ryan and I are home, settled, and ready for a long winter's nap. We got back from Ohio in the evening on Tuesday and we've been unpacking, celebrating friends' birthdays and just generally trying to get back into the normal swing of things. You're probably wondering why I titled this post "signs of good fortune", well on our way home it rained pretty much all the way until we got just outside of Beckley where we saw a rainbow. I snapped a picture of the beauty and had no sooner uploaded it into instagram when we saw two rainbows side by side in the sky to the left of us. I tried to capture them but it's kind of hard in a moving car, so I hope you can just imagine our awe with me.

One rainbow happy in the sky.

Two rainbows, the one on the right is very faint but in person it was crazy. We thought we could actually see where they hit the ground. I said we should play the lottery (we didn't). Have any of you ever seen two rainbows side by side?

We had a lot of fun on our adventures. I'm editing Christmas pictures right now and I'll be able to share not just one, not just two, but four Christmases. No, not like the movie. I can't wait. big kiss, bekuh

Sparkly New Years Drink Tray (DIY)

Today I wanted to share a sparkly DIY for all you New Years party throwing revelers. You'll only need a few supplies so you should have no problem whipping this bad boy together before the ball drops late Saturday.

What You'll Need:

A cheapo tray you don't mind painting over (I found mine for fifty cents at the Goodwill)

Cream or White spray paint

Metallic Spray paint (Gold or Silver are best)

Painter's Tape

Sandpaper 

Drop Cloth

Step One: Sand your tray lightly to remove any film build up and to make it easier to spray paint evenly. You'll want to wipe down the tray before you begin painting

Step Two: Go outside or at the very least go to a well ventilated room! Lay your drop cloth down on a flat surface and place the tray right side up on the drop cloth. Spray your tray with the non-metallic color first. You may need a couple of coats so be patient.  Let the paint dry for at least and hour, flip to the back and repeat. Once both sides are painted let the tray dry over night.

Step Three: Once you've let your tray dry for 24 hours you can apply the painter's tap to the surface. I decided to make a chevron pattern on mine, similar to a tray found on etsy here. Make sure to press the edges down firmly, you don't want the spray paint to leak through. (Sorry the tape is so hard to see, I wasn't thinking about the fact it's the same color as the spray paint, oops)

Step Four: Using the same drop cloth and ventilated space as yesterday, lay your tray down and spray the entire surface with the metallic paint. Let this sit for one hour.

Step Five: Remove the masking tape carefully and let the tray continue to dry for another hour or two before using.

You now have a pretty tray to serve your favorite cocktails on this New Years Eve and any eve that you feel needs a little sparkle. I hope you like it as much as we do. big kiss, bekuh

Crowds at Weddings

A good friend of ours, Thomas, recently got married to a sweet little lady named Ashley and Ryan and I had the honor of attending said nuptials. It was one of those gorgeous winter weddings, with fires blazing in fireplaces and couples bundled up close. Though I couldn't take pictures during the ceremony (bad seating) we did get to snap a couple of pictures with friends before and afterwards.

I got to wear my brand new Red Velvet, Rosemary Velvet Bow. Katie got it for me for Christmas and it couldn't have come at a better time! I want to wear it with everything.

These lovely ladies are Caroline and Christine, two good friends who always make ordinary occasions inexplicably wonderful. Not that this was an ordinary occasion, but I felt like the deserved an introduction.

Thomas and Ashley gave out chocolate mustaches as favors and so Ryan doubled-stached it for the afternoon. The handle bar mustache was my favorite.

We had a great afternoon and couldn't be happier for the beautiful couple. Our first wedding as married couple, we can check that one off the list. Fun! big kiss, bekuh

Holiday Baking

Before we left for our holiday adventures Ryan and I baked up a storm, making some of my favorite christmas sweets. We made mounds bars for my Dad, Mamaw's ginger snaps for Ryan, and peanut butter free puppy chow for me. 

Ryan was a big help, cleaning each bowl for me when I was done. My favorite was when he had both hands in the puppy chow mix eating all the chocolate.

I substituted soy nut butter for the peanut butter so it still has a slightly nutty taste but it won't hurt my tummy. I was really happy with the results and we had plenty to share.

I'm enjoying a litte relaxation with the family right now. I'm probably still in my pajamas as you read this. Man I love the holidays. Enjoy! big kiss, bekuh

Merry Christmas

All of our wishes, and prayers, and happy thoughts are with you today as we celebrate Christmas with our own family. Merry Christmas to all. big kiss, bekuh

Holiday Bits Before We Go

Just a few holiday bits for you to enjoy before the holiday weekend:

Image 1. Katie gave me the gorgeous Rosemary Velvet hair bow from Red Velvet for Christmas. I got to check off another Christmas Wish List item!

2, 3, 4. Katie and I had a craft night last week and made some fun felt ornaments. We even tried our hand at a Skunkboy Creatures' Ice Skate Ornament. 

5. I've been happily attending holiday fetes and snapped a picture as I got ready for one. I'll hopefully have a few full outfit posts from other holiday affairs soon.

6. On my way to ship Christmas presents to family afar and friends semi-close.

 Ryan and I are off to Ohio today to visit my Dad and Grandparents for Christmas. Our trunk is full to the brim with presents and I'm happily bringing along a few presents already unwrapped. Are any of you driving or flying to a totally different climate this Christmas? What do you pack for the journey? big kiss, bekuh

Our Tree All a Glow

I am so so so very excited to be sharing the first ever Bekuh & Ryan Browning Christmas tree. We're two big kids at heart, and decorating for Christmas, and all the crafting that has ensued because of it has made me giddy with delight (and Ryan really happy. He's never giddy). He came home after a meeting the other morning to me sitting on the ground in front of the Christmas tree all lit up, like a kid.

We spent a lot of time figuring out what to do with decorating the tree, because we're a little short on ornaments. I have this thing where I don't want to just buy a bunch of so-so ornaments but collect precious ones over years of Christmases. That being said we still wanted a "fully" decorated tree. Ryan had the genius idea of using some of my scrap fabric garlands in the studio to wrap around the tree; it added that little touch of homemade that I adore in everything.

As our engagement gift my Aunt Dana gave Ryan and I a gift card to Hallmark to pick out our first Christmas ornament together. It took us months to decide and I'm happy to share the silly Snoopy and Woodstock ornament we chose for our tree.

My mom was gracious enough to bring over some vintage ornaments from my grandparent's collection and a few of my childhood ornaments too. The pretty little elephant on the right was a Christmas gift from my friend Lauren last year and I cherish him. When we had all the ornaments on the tree and vacuumed up the needles I grabbed a couple of old linen tablecloths to use as the tree skirt. I like this all so much better than store bought anything.

Here's our tree all a glow with ornaments and garland. big kiss, bekuh