Monica

Liam’s Nursery Reveal!

It’s been a process… Liam’s Room is for all intensive purposes complete and we are ready to share it with the world!

We like to think it’s a space for Paul and I to be able to share time together with our little man, so it’s definitely a room we can enjoy as “adults” with touches of baby here and there! It was also super important to us that it would be a room he can grow into! We were going for a more modern car/sign feel! And I definitely feel like there is room for more personal touches like pictures of our little man and maybe even more fun car stuff!

So we start with the process with… PAINTING! The room was previously a milk chocolate color and we decided to go with some neutral yet cool colors!

We purchased the paint at Sherwin Williams, and it turned out awesome! I love the Light French Gray and White Stripes!! We also updated the ceiling fan to a more modern clean feel of stainless steel! Perks of the new fan!? Multiple speeds on a remote and a DIMMER too! YAY!!!

So now for the big reveal!!!

Now here’s the low-down!

Crib: Babyletto Mercer Crib
Dresser/Changing Table: Childcraft by Sauder Shoal Creek Double Dresser – Matte White from Target.com
Ceiling Fan: Don’t know brand – bought at Home Depot
Closet System: allen + roth 8-ft White Wood Closet Kit at Lowes (FYI – “white” is off white – kind of a bummer, but that’s what doors are for!)
Closet Doors: KVARTAL – Triple curtain rail, aluminum color from IKEA. We bought three panels the Grey Twill Color and the stop and bottom metal pieces too! (all pieces sold separate! including the wall mounts!)
Sofa: Was my grandmother’s and we had it re-covered. It’s a sofa bed! Great for guests!
Rocking Chair: Paul’s family’s and that was re-covered as well!
White Side Tables/Storage-Toy boxes: Paul made those! With a bit of help from Kevin! (email us if you want to know more about that!)

And of course the accessories and decor!
LIAM and ROUTE 66 Sign: Purchased the Route 66 Sign on eBay and had the same vendor do the custom Liam sign! www.theelectricmoon.com
Glass Shelves: LINJAL - Glass shelf, clear glass – from IKEA
Curtains: Eclipse™ Fairfax Thermaweave Window Panel from Target
COOL Car Walker: Combi All In One Activity Walker – Black GT on Amazon
Dachshund Light: MyPetLamp Dachshund Accent Lamp (online)
Quilt: Made by me! Email me for details about fabric – here is the tutorial!
Sofa Pillows: Made by me!
Mobile: Wimmer-Ferguson Infant Stim-Mobile (FYI – the arm didn’t fit our crib so I had to buy an alternate mobile arm!
License Plate Map: All Metal U.S. Map with License plate design – on eBay
Jingle Jugs: Compliments of Paul’s friend Shane White! Paul got these a couple Christmas’ ago from Shane and is now insisting they stay in Liam’s room… we’ll see how long that lasts! But he did get them in the pictures!
Sock Monkey-Dachshund: In honor of Chunk Master we had to get Liam a “Sock Chunky!” from SockMonkeyFarm on Etsy!

If there’s anything else you’re curious about don’t hesitate to ask!

And finally, to set the mood – check it out in the evening lounge style all lit up!
Stay tuned as Liam will be arriving very soon!

Our Mustache Bash Baby Shower!

I can’t believe it’s been an entire month since I’ve posted a blog, but I guess that is par for the course when you are preparing for a baby on the way! And we couldn’t be more grateful as we had an awesome baby shower! It was a mustache bash for our little man Liam!

We had such a great turn-out I was super overwhelmed with everything our little man will have to make life that much easier! We couldn’t be more excited and thankful for everything everyone gave us! We had some fun games like word scramble, baby bingo, guess the m&m’s in the bottle and my favorite “Guess that Stash”. Paul designed the invitations as well as the games, and it was a lot of fun! Then it was onto opening gifts! It was mostly the ladies for the event, but the men came back toward the end and Paul got to help me open a couple of the last presents.

I want to thank everyone that came out (from near and far ) and were so gracious to give all these wonderful gifts and I of course want to thank my mother-in-law (Marty) and sister-in-law (Elizabeth) who did an awesome job hosting and pulling things together, my friends Kristin (Storey) and Yarden for helping to set-up, clean-up, and MC… not to mention paint mustaches on mugs with me! And of course I also want to thank Elaine for taking all these awesome pictures!

If you’d like to seem more fun pics from the shower, click here! It won’t be long before Liam will be here so stay tuned!

Our Maternity Shoot

This past weekend Paul and I, with our good friend Elaine Hoyt, decided to knock out our maternity shoot! We are always trying to think outside of the box and with some awesome props like Paul’s new Challenger and some adorable cowboy boots that were Paul’s as a baby we got some awesome original shots!

We did everything in Buford, but started in a wide open parking lot in the back of an industrial park nearby. Starting off pretty safe with some cute shots of the “three” of us with the Challenger, Paul wanted to switch things up by doing some donuts in the Challenger behind me! While I wasn’t originally for that idea, it turned out AWESOME!

After that we headed to downtown Buford where we were able to get some cool rustic shots. And oh my was I shocked to see how big my belly has gotten! Check it out!

Thank you so much to Elaine and Paul for making this first baby and Maternity Shoot so absolutely memorable and beautiful!

Paul’s Mid-Life Challenger

Paul turned 35 on January 20th, and this will be a big year for us as we are expecting our first little one. But 2013 is the year of more than one “baby” coming into our life!

The day of Paul’s actual birthday, we didn’t have much going on. We met up with his Mom and sister at an Antique Mall in Cumming, and from there didn’t have much planned. SO, Paul wanted to go test drive some cars for fun. We decided to go over and look at what Curtis (one of Paul’s best friends) was working with at Rick Case Hyundai in Duluth. I think it was a pretty quiet day for Curtis anyway, so we were able to check out a couple of cars! We started with the Hyundai Genesis Coupe – a small sporty ride. While it handled nicely it just didn’t feel like it had the comfort and quality we were expecting. We both have Hyundai’s and LOVE them, but this was nothing compared to our XG350L and the Santa Fe. And, yes I know, the Genesis Coupe is a sports car so it’s not got the kind of luxury of the other rides,  we wanted it all!

Next we test drove a 2011 Dodge Challenger… a sexy white muscle car with power, handling and surprising luxury! It’s a sports car yes, but it’s big and ironically quiet! Both Paul and I drove it, and we were absolutely enamored! It’s comfortable, yet handles well. It’s quite the looker, and quite spacious too!

Now I know what you are thinking… “They are about to have a baby and they are buying a sports car?!” Yeah, we thought about that too, but the backseat is roomy, and we already have my car which is a perfectly good “mommy mobile!” And after our little man arrives, what are the chances we can enjoy a vehicle like this?! We took an extended test drive, and literally fell in love!

Monday, Paul called the insurance company to see what we’d be looking at there, and you know what? It was actually less expensive than our 4 door XG350L because it has better safety ratings! Another sign we were leaning towards moving forward with the purchase!

Later that evening we headed to the dealer and a deal was made! We couldn’t be happier and we’ve already gotten a lot of use out of it! I’m hopeful this baby could be a collectible we can give to our baby one day!

Kindness… as Interpreted by Ze Frank

During the election I came across some hilarious commentary by Ze Frank about the debates and ever since I’ve been enjoying my Youtube subscription to his channel and the video I came across today just stuck with me and I needed to share! It’s about KINDNESS! And during this time of fresh starts with the New Year and resolutions I think it’s such a great message!

Check it out below!

While the entire message stands out to me, I did pull an awesome quote that I’d love to share and hope you enjoy whether or not you watch the video!

“Kindness – It’s like little rays of light that emanate out from the interactions you have with people, maybe little candles that light inside them…You can tell the people that have had a lot of experience with kindness, they glow like they do have a lot of tiny little candles burning inside of them.” – Ze Frank

Pass on the kindness and start glowing and seeing others glow!

2012 In Review | What an Awesome Year to Blog!

The WordPress.com stats helper monkeys prepared a 2012 annual report for perdueosity.

Here’s an excerpt:

4,329 films were submitted to the 2012 Cannes Film Festival. This blog had 35,000 views in 2012. If each view were a film, this blog would power 8 Film Festivals

Click here to see the complete report.

Christmas Breakfast 2012 | CRAZY FUN!!!

Well, we are catching up as usual! But I definitely wanted to be sure to post about our 2012 Christmas Breakfast because it seems to get better and better every year! So last year we ran out of Mimosa’s, so we made sure to stock up on the beverages, but this time around we ran out of food (this was a first)! We did a Breakfast Burrito Bar – sorry no pictures, the food went fast! But it’s not surprising when we had such an awesome turnout with probably 15 more friends than last year! We had to have had 45 people or so at our house for this awesome holiday gathering!

The food was delicious, but the company was even better! We had a blast visiting with everyone and of course the White Elephant game was an even bigger hit! Lots of great gifts to choose from and people were stealing left and right!

Check out the fun pics Paul caught! Santa even came out!

It was such a fun event we are already scheming for plans next year! We may even have to move locations!

Hope everyone had a wonderful and Happy Holiday!

Bagel Bash 2012 | A “Legendary” Event!

With the exception of 2010 (when Paul and I were married), we have done the Annual Bagel Bash Cruise every year. Our good friend Matt has put this together for years as a celebration around his birthday and in several occasions others birthday’s as well! This one was Matt’s big 35th birthday and I could only dream about having a gathering of this magnitude!

The Cruise set sail on December 6th, 2012 on the Carnival Paradise with over 20 friends on board for Bagel Bash! Matt was not only surprised by the turn-out this year, going from an intimate gathering of 6 to 8 people to over doubling in size, but he also came to find a lot more planning went into this as we all had our Bagel Bash shirts on board as a surprise and there was even a tribute video! Gloria, Kristy and Paul did a lot of work putting together these special pieces to make Matt’s 35th Birthday one he will never forget!

We were on the boat for 4 nights with 2 full days at sea and one day in Cozumel Mexico! It was a blast! Check out some of this great adventure!

The ship left port and we had our first sit down dinner! It was absolutely delicious and so much fun to embark on this awesome trip with so many friends!
Being that I am pregnant (no alcohol for me ) for this trip, I was off to bed earlier than others and excited to relax for our first day at sea. Paul on the other hand was ready to party and that he did! He partied so much that we got a very late start on our first full day at sea – honestly we didn’t get many picture other than formal night because of that! Paul really enjoyed his black suit with black tie for formal night though! He thought he was a “secret agent!” Hahaha

Everyone looked great for formal night and we were ready for a day in Cozumel! The boat docked at 8AM, and we were off the ship by 9 or so. This was definitely the best time of the entire cruise (at least I thought so)! Matt, Gloria and a hand full of others went on a sailing excursion while Paul and I decided to roam the island! We rented a Chevy convertible and had a blast! First we drove all the way to the end of the island (where the road turned to dirt) and stopped off to visit with some local wildlife. Raccoons! I think… Then we were off to Senor Frog’s to meet with Matt and the crew for lunch. We got there early and actually didn’t catch them until we were on our way out – Next Stop Paradise Beach to meet up with Curtis and Natacha! The beach was beautiful and the water was clear and refreshing! It was such a great day! After leaving Paradise Beach, Paul decided he wanted some authentic Mexican food… we stopped at this place and they said they’d make us food… it actually turned out to be a whore house! We didn’t stay long enough to get the food! From there we worked our way back to the port where we did some shopping (Paul and I got a little sombrero and maracas for our little one on the way! ). Then it was back to the ship for Matt’s official Birthday and festivities!

One last day at sea! We took this time to relax and enjoy what was left of our vacation! What a great time! And a Happy Happy Birthday to Matt (and Erick)!

Next vacation I’ll definitely be planning to have some adult beverages!

Perdue Vision Pecan Pies – Just in Time for Thanksgiving!!!

Paul has been on a pecan pie rampage! Several months back Paul took the liberty of making a pecan pie for our neighbors. They moved into the neighborhood and neighbors all around were bringing them cookies and candy and all sorts of stuff, but they were surprised having moved to the south that no one brought them a Pecan Pie. And that was Paul’s queue!

Paul decided since he had never made them before to make two! One for us to test and the other for the neighbor. And they both turned out AWESOME! Absolutely delicious! We scarfed that pie down in no time! And got some rave reviews from the neighbor as well.

Now with the holiday’s approaching Paul decided he wanted to give thanks to his clients and close friends and family with some pecan pies! What started out as a client gift for a few turned into 24 or more pies for many!

So Paul decided to make this into a project, and what better way to share the love then to share the recipe and début Paul’s first cooking video! He definitely had fun with this one! Check it out!

For detailed written directions, see below:

Perdue Vision Pecan Pies

Prep Time:  5 minutes
Bake Time:  60 to 70 minutes
Chill Time:  2 hours
Yield:  8 servings

Ingredients:

• 1 cup Light OR Dark Corn Syrup
• 1/4 cup of Jack Daniels Tennessee Honey
• 3 eggs
• 1 cup sugar
• 2 tablespoons melted butter
• 1 teaspoon Vanilla Extract
• 1-1/2 cups (6 ounces) pecans
• 1 (9-inch) unbaked deep-dish pie crust
• 1 pie pan

Instructions:

1. Preheat oven to 350°F.
2. Mix corn syrup, eggs, sugar, butter and vanilla using a spoon. Stir in pecans. Pour filling into pie crust.
3. Bake for 60 to 70 minutes. Cool for 2 hours on wire rack before serving.

TIPS: Pie is done when center reaches 200°F. Tap center surface of pie lightly – it should spring back when done. For easy clean up, spray pie pan with cooking spray before placing pie crust in pan. If pie crust is over-browning, cover edges with foil.

Our 2-Yr. Anniversary Couldn’t Be More Sweet!

We are so excited to announce (on our Two Year wedding anniversary) that we are expecting our first little one! He or She will be gracing us with their presence on or around Cinco De Mayo!

This second year of marriage has been even better than the one before and I anticipate year number three will be that much more amazing as we go from a family of 5 (Chunk, Tula and Sophi included) to a family of 6!

Happy Anniversary Paul Paul! I can say with unconditional love and absolute certainty that I love you more and more every day!

Check out Baby Perdue!