The Help

I was invited to read The Help by Kathryn Stockett for a book club. Yay! A book club! How fun! I ran out and bought the book the next day. While reading over some of the comments people had written for the book club on Facebook, someone questioned if everyone else was reading the book in a southern accent. This made me even more curious.

I cracked open the book and the first paragraph read, "Mae Mobley was born on a early Sunday morning in August 1960. A church baby we like to call it. Taking care a white babies, that's what I do, along with all the cooking and the cleaning. I done raised seventeen kids in my lifetime. I know how to get them babies to sleep, stop crying, and go in the toilet bowl before they mamas even get out a bed in the morning." See, didn't you read that in a southern accent?

The Help chrocles the lifeof Aibileen, a black maid in 1962 in Jackson, Mississippi. She and her friend, Minny, who is a maid with a quick toungue join together to work on a project, to write a tell-all book about what it's really like to work as a black maid in the white homes of the south.

Yesterday, while reading the new Southern Living Magazine, there was an article on Kathryn Stockett. Very funny lady! I really like her!!!

I can't wait to dive into this book further. This is definitely going to be a pleasure read and is bound to be hilarious!

The Stolen Life

I have set a goal for myself to read more. I haven't picked a number just yet, because I am not willing to set myself up for failure. I WANT to read so badly, but have a hard time finding the time. I find the quietest time of day for me to read is actually, at night. Problem is, as soon as my body goes horizontal, I pass out within seconds. I am good to get through a chapter a night, but that works for me, for now.

While flipping through channels one day, I came across an interview with Jaycee Dugard by Diane Sawyer. Her story intrigued me, number one because it is an amazing story of survival, number two, from a spectators point of view, she seems rather normal. That in itself is amazing to me.

Jaycee Dugard was an 11-year-old girl in the Summer of 1991 when on her way to school, she was abducted by a man and his wife, all while her step-father looked on.

She was to help her abductor, Philip, with his sexual problems, so that he would not have to hurt anyone else. Jaycee was locked in a backyard building for three years before Philip and his wife allowed her to go outside. This after she had birthed his first child!

Jaycee eventually becomes the mother to a second child and she, her two daughters and her two abductors essentially become a family.

For eighteen years Jaycee Dugard was not allowed to speak or even write her own name. She survived an impossible situation.

Finally on August 26, 2009 she was finally rescued. This book is written in her own words, the way she remembers her very unfortunate ordeal.

The book is very detailed and graphic and is sometimes hard to read simply because I don't have a clue how this little girl survived this. So far, I can barely put it down. I highly recommend this one.

A Little Bit of This...

Emma is modeling a size S white t-shirt with our Back to School embroidery design. She is ready for a fun school year this year. Any color t-shirt available. Sizes 4T to L. $10

A Little Bit of This...

Back to school is coming up for our county in two more weeks! Go to school in style with this cute first day of school embroidery. It will welcome your friends and teachers back to what hopes to be a successful year! This design can be put on just about anything, book bags, t-shirts, dresses...you name it, the skies the limit. $5

A Little Bit of This...

Here is what we affectionately call a Sun"frock", named by my favorite kiwi. We have Emma modeling again, the Blue Leopard Sun"frock" in a size 7. The are available in many different fabrics and all sizes, little girls to big girls. $25

A Little Bit of This...

A Sundress that we have available modeled by the gorgeous, Emma. These are available in whatever length wanted and in many different fabrics. Emma is wearing Blue Leopard in a size seven. $25

The Kitchen Project

Alright, so...here is the kitchen now...Let me tell you the problem areas in this kitchen...it's small...and to add to the smallness, there is an island in the middle of the kitchen that we all dance around. I could take the island out, but I lose counter space.




Ventilation. Big problem. It gets hot in here quick. We can't keep the back door open all the time. I do love the light this door gives off.





It's hot!!! You see that stove? Barely, but I think you can see a corner of it. It's a gas stove. The oven is off 75 degrees. The gas eyes do not understand high or low and you certainly should not ask it to set on medium. If the stove is used in this enclosed kitchen you might as well just open the oven door and turn the heat to broil! My poor friends that I try to entertain have to wear layers of clothes to my house. When they step into the kitchen, they start peeling them off. Men, that is your cue to come to my house when I am cooking. I have a lot of pretty friends.





Also, to open it up, I have toyed with the idea of taking out the wall that you see with the pink kitchen aide Mixer on it. If I knocked this out, the dining room is directly on the other side and would really open it up. Don't know if the FIL is willing to let me go that far, but it is worth a shot. Then I would lose counter space also, but it is not as if I used that counter to prepare meals, it is mostly used for storage.






That is the door out of the kitchen, into the dining room. This is the one cabinet that is open. I wouldn't mind putting frosted glass in the cabinets with some lights in the cabinets. I have seen that done on Trading Spaces. I would rather not have one cabinet open and one cabinet not.




I already know that I am going to put hardwood down. Believe it or not, I had a kitchen with carpet in it at one point. Ridiculous.




Next, light. You see those two globes. They are frosted and dim. I believe we have 60 watt bulbs in them, but it doesn't matter. There is still no light in here. Also, that fan. It has got to go. I am all for a fan in the kitchen, but it has to be updated! I would love to mount some kind of lights under the counters, nothing real bright, just something GIVE ME LIGHT!!! Also, with the glassware, that I plan to use, I think it would be pretty.






Here is the dishes I know I want to decorate with, but I can't decide, one color, two colors, all three? This is Tiara Glassware made by the Indiana Glassware company. It was sold from the 70's until 99, just like Tupperware. The ruby red is my favorite, but it is rare and more expensive. Next would be the cobalt blue, which I would prefer in the kitchen if I was to use only one color. Next is the emerald. I am thinking I may use the ruby in the living room...and that my friends, is a whole nother post.




That yellow/beige color is what I am thinking of painting the walls. This is a Tiffany style chandelier that hangs currently in the dining room. I love it!!! If we open the kitchen up, this will tie in nicely and I can keep it. If we don't open the kitchen up, this will tie in nicely and I can keep it... :) Currently, as you can see, the kitchen is painted a sea foam green...or robin's egg...or vomit, as my sister calls the color, apparently she doesn't like it. You say tomato, I say tomato. Judy, my mother-in-law, had some paint chips placed up on the wall for as long as I can remember, orange and yellow, as in the primary colors. I just don't think those colors are going to work with my jewel tone glassware, do you?

While I have picked apart the things that I do not like about this kitchen, I also love this kitchen for the following reasons...we dance around the island, the back door is always open with friends and family meandering in and out to the big back porch, my MIL's recipe's are held here, her cooking utensils reside here, she cooked here. It was her favorite place to be.

The good thing about renovating her kitchen...I will still get to use those recipes. I will still get to use her cookbooks. I will still get to use her utensils. She is still going to be dancing all around that kitchen with me.