Big Obsession with Tiny Prints

Have you ever checked out Tiny Prints? For the price of many store-bought cards, you can make modern, personalized greeting cards, invites & more.

I remember stumbling across the site back when I was planning my wedding because they are affiliated with Wedding Paper Divas, but just recently I came back to the Tiny Prints site and have been so impress with the quality and creative options available.

Our first set was for Father's Day, both for first time daddy and the grand-dads:

Grandpa L's Front:

Grandpa L's Inside:

Grandpa C's Front:

Grandpa C's Inside:

Daddy's Front:

Daddy's Inside:

And then they had some great options for my husband's birthday, as well:

Daddy Front:

Daddy Inside:

Dave Front:

Dave Inside:

They even let you personalize the back with a tiny little photo and phrase:

Once you create your cards, you can either send the card to yourself if you are going to give it to the recipient in person, or you can have them send it directly to your recipient. For me, it's more convenient than picking one up at the store, addressing it, finding or buying a stamp and stopping by a post office myself. Each of these designs was just $3.99 and well worth the extra touch!

Special Delivery

Today our baby girl received her first international package in the mail :-)

It was a gift from our friends, Christian & Verena, who live in Bremen, Germany.

It came in brightly colored gift wrap that even coordinates with her nursery...

With a sweet card which says: "Hurray, Hurray...our little sunshine is here!"

And the gift itself was a set of red & white baby towels: a hooded towel, bib and bath mitt adorned with gingham hearts, sent "with love" from abroad.

Thanks for the thoughtful gift and special delivery, C & V!

These are a few of my new favorite things...

This Christmas Dave gave me two of my new favorite things...

First, is this great vintage Mele jewelry box from etsy seller happydayvintage:

I just love the pretty pumpkin velvet lining and the character it has; also I do feel pretty lucky to have a husband "man enough" to have an etsy account ;-)

My next surprise was something I've been coveting since our trip to Italy in September... an espresso machine!

Dave found a great deal on my/our new Krups Espresso Machine on Amazon so I was the lucky recipient of it under the tree this season. At first I was intimidated by the thought of being my own barista, but it is incredibly user friendly and shoots out two perfect little cups of espresso in a matter of seconds. Now that we've mastered that feat, Dave has been reading up on how to properly steam & froth our milk and we had our first few test lattes today; I have to say they might even give Starbucks a run for their money in a blind taste test!

Hope your holidays also brought you a few of your favorite things :-)

Tea Inspired Bridal Shower Gift for "T"

First, of all I don't think that my coworker Tonya reads my blog, or even knows I have a blog, but T if you are somehow reading this, please stop now or you'll ruin your bridal shower surprise!

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Ok, now that that's settled, I want to show off the cute little "tea themed" gift that I put together for my friend Tonya's bridal shower. Not only does she LOVE tea, we also call her T so I think it's fitting.

First, T registered for this Bamboo Tea Bag Box from Crate and Barrel so I picked that up off her registry:

Then, I added two of these cute little Teapot Teabag Rests from Crate and Barrel:

Next, I ordered this great book on Amazon, called All the Tea in Chicago . It is basically a super-cute Zagat style guide to all the tea spots around town:

And last but not least, I couldn't complete a personalized gift without heading to Etsy to see what I could find. And low and behold, I found this adorable high tea stationary to complete the gift from Etsy seller Three Wheels Design + Paper :

I can't wait to wrap it up for T and give it to her next weekend!