what would i do without her?

sometimes i think.... i would have so much fun blogging about diy stuff. or beauty tips i find around the worldwide web. or maybe wardrobe tricks and styling secrets. or maybe i should just start taking more pics when i am out and about thrifting my life away... and then showing what i end up doing with my finds at home. i think it would be good for me at this point in my life, to start blogging more regularly and scheduling it into my weekdays. simply because maybe it would help me in organizing my time better. which probably sounds weird but it all makes sense it my head. but also how adorable is my trudy baby? this age is sooooooooooooooooooo fun. the more she understands, the closer i feel to her. i love it. i could do without the messes though. today she dumped an entire canister of oatmeal all over the kitchen floor. and then instead of cleaning it up we both just decided to leave the house.

i love instagram. i think phone pictures are so great. taking pictures on my phone gives me the opportunity to catch moments that i normally would never pull out the camera for. in fact i created this just the other night and love looking and remembering what was going on in each picture. i love postalpix. one of my favorite apps. i have a list actually. maybe i should share... do you have any favorites? i love finding fun apps.

follow me @brittanymbarnes

cleaning house

so i've haven't been blogging for awhile. i'm very excited to start blogging again, especially to READ blogs. i have found that whenever we travel or decorate for holidays... i get really behind on everything. i've been trying to tackle my to do list lately. i promised myself (totally cheating right now) that i could get online when everything was done. i struggle to keep things tidied up (really working on this), not to be confused with dirty. grant and i are both pretty clean people but i think messy is a better word. our bedroom is messy. things get messy because unfortunately i am an extremist. my mom used to joke that my room (in high school) looked like a tornado hit it or it was immaculate. so right now i'm working on getting everything immaculate and then keeping it that way. now just to describe how ocd i can really be when it comes to cleaning.... i'm not just talking dusting, vacuuming and laundry. i'm talking cleaning the couch, armchair and anything upholstered (i got a carpet cleaner/hard-surface cleaner/upholstery cleaner thingy for christmas.... BEST THING EVER), cleaning out the vent of my blow dryer, cleaning out all my kitchen cabinets, my closet, my bathroom cupboards, trudy's wardrobe, medicine cabinets, fridge, under the bed, re-organizing our books, cleaning out the garage, cleaning the inside and outside of our cars. going through my makeup, steaming anything in my closet that needs it (no more being late to church), anyway i could keep going but i'm kind of getting discouraged. ha. sooooooo i'll hopefully be done with all this by the end of this week? not making any promises. 

one thing that has been keeping me from getting all of this done is my phone. a few years ago grant and i bought droids. it was an awesome buy one get one free deal and since grant most definitely needs a smart phone for his job... it was perfect. well my droid screen broke and we were due for an upgrade and so i got an iphone. first i have to say that as far as droids go... i don't really have too many complaints. the droid makes it easier to personalize much more than the iphone but the iphone is amazing. i love it. i feel like it's my little toy. i just got a case that i ordered for it in the mail and i love it! i jumped on the instagram wagon and haven't regretted it since. the photo a day challenges are such a fun and easy way to document things in every day life. just another version of a journal. here is mine for the month of january. (everybody interprets things differently and that's what makes the photo a day challenges so fun. a few of mine that may be confusing... #3- i adore color, #4- what comes in my letterbox, #6- bath time with trudy makes me smile, #16- that morning i woke up to a beautiful bouquet of organic greens, #28- a quote that sheds light).

follow me @brittbarnes04

i'm a mom.

and it is the best. i love hanging out with her all day. 

she is so funny and always making me laugh. i feel so blessed.

stenciled napkins

we've been out of town for the last week and i'm slowly getting back on top of things. i'd probably be caught up on laundry and cleaned toilets if i wasn't distracted by trudy and her smiles. i can't help but spend hours just looking in her eyes and smiling. i think i've said this on here before but i really can't say it enough... she brings me an everlasting joy and it feels so good inside. it doesn't even compare to anything else that could bring me happiness. in fact she makes everything else seem like it's just instant gratification. does that make sense? anyway i'm trying to get a good balance of everything in my life. mommy time, wife time, cleaning time, blogging or britt time etc. i haven't read anyone's blog in forever. i feel bad too but i know i will get to it all soon. i just love being a mom. when i take trudy out and about, i can't help but talk to her. i am totally one of those moms who pushes their kid around the store in a cart and stops ever 5 seconds to say "trudy... i.....love..........YOU!!!" or "peek-a-boo!" or "bleh de bleh de BLEY duh" (don't worry about it, it's just something grant and i say when we stick our tongues out at her). she is just so cute and i can't believe she is all mine!

as usual i have lots of posts that i need to get done. especially in the project zone. we did this a few weeks ago and i love it. one day when i was browsing tj maxx, i saw some plain cream napkins. i've been wanting a very plain and neutral tablescape and i've always loved the emersonmade stenciled napkins. since we already had these stencils and paint... it was easy peasy. i'm loving all the project ideas that come from pinterest too. i think it just lights a fire of inspiration and motivation under our bums. agree? it all reminds me of one of my favorite talks, here is the mormon message from it. his words just make my heart beat fast. he is my favorite. linked up here.

birth story

i'm feeling this weird pressure to keep this story all peaches and cream and edit out quite a bit. mainly because nothing really went the way i imagined. and while i'm so full of gratitude for our trudy (and the huge blessing that she is healthy), i am a bit frustrated at how things panned out. i just don't want to sound whiney or complainy. with all the reading and talking about birth stories i did and then even watching many deliveries (on tv or online) (i know i'm weird)... i thought i was prepared with the fact that all deliveries are completely unpredictable and anything can happen. but now i think that there just wasn't a way for me to truly prepare.

it all started on wednesday june 1st. i woke up around 6 am with contractions coming fairly consistent. luckily i had my 39 week appt that same day around 1 pm. at my appt my midwife told me i was 50-60% effaced and dialated to a 2. she asked me if i wanted her to strip my membranes to which i replied a big YES because i figured that since my contractions had already started.... we should just get the show on the road. after she did that really fun rigorous exam, we left and in no time my contractions were 2-3 minutes apart. with having pretty horrible periods over the years and then a miscarriage last year... i knew this kind of pain. i can think of a handful of periods that i had where i couldn't do anything to ease the pain. no medicine worked and i just had to moan and moan for hours. my miscarriage last year, according to my doctor was a "mini labor". and man oh man, there is just no way to describe that kind of pain.

i was kind of getting stressed out because the house was not up to my cleaning standard and if i was going to have a baby anytime soon... that meant that my family would be at our house in less than 24 hours. i wanted it to be so perfect and pretty because... well.. i'm just so proud of it. we are so proud of it. we have no family here and so nobody had seen what we've made with our home. for the next four hours my contractions started really intensifying. it seems like most stories begin with contractions happening every 10 minutes and then 8 and then 5 or whatever. ya know? well i remember telling the nurses later that night that if i just could have had contractions farther apart (as opposed to every 2 minutes) i could have gotten so much more done every 7 minutes! but i just felt like i had 30 seconds to pick this or that up before another one would come. it was really frustrating. the midwife told grant to push on my lower back to apply counter pressure to help ease pain during a contraction, so we would split up and i would make the bed and he would switch the laundry and i would be yelling "GRANT!!!!!!!" every minute or so before he would run in and push against my back with all his might. with not wanting to go to the hospital and be sent home, we did this for four hours. by the time we got to the hospital, i was dying. unfortunately i was not impressed with how we were treated at all. there was no room in triage so we waited and waited. then when we finally got a room we waited another 2 hours before i was checked. this entire time my contractions were so horrible and only getting worse. none of the nurses were friendly and it just didn't make anything any easier, we were just left alone and needless to say... not very happy. finally when the midwife on duty came in to check me, i wasn't dialated enough and so she gave me two options. they were to either stay at the hospital, walk around and have them check me again in 2 hours (NO WAY I COULD HAVE DONE THAT. EVER. EVER.) or get a shot of morphine, go home, sleep and hopefully wake up in active labor and come back. of course i chose to get the morphine. the nurse practically promised me that the dose she gave me would definitely take care of the pain and that i would be in heaven within 15 minutes. she was wrong. dead wrong. morphine did absolutely nothing for me. we went home and stayed there for another 3 hours. then we decided that we both had had enough and went back. before the midwife could even check me, i threw up everywhere. a lot. she checked me and i was at a 3. then they gave me a room. with some more suffering and some IV fluids, 1:30 a.m. came and so did the anesthesiologist. grant had to leave the room due to the new epidural rules. she hit a blood vessel the first time and had to poke me twice. and then heaven. heaven heaven and heaven came. here is a little video of when i finally felt relief. i am a little bit out of it...

the next part i'm just copying straight from grant's journal because it was just all a big blur.

6/2/11

hours went by and britt was able to relax and rest a little. not really sleep (too many tubes, monitors, beeping, nurses, and blood pressure cuffs). come morning she had progressed to a 7, we were amazed! we all were prepping to have a bouncing baby by noon. meanwhile britt's family left orem around 6:30 am. i had the feeling they would come meet their granddaughter when she was 4-5 hours old. noon came and britt was a 7-8. not getting to a 9 for another couple hours. those hours from 7am on were fraught with epidural weening off and britt in bad pain for 30-40 mins till the anesthesiologist would come and give britt something to smile about. because it was taking so long for her to progress, the midwife broke her water and then a little while later... also gave her pitocin. everyone was getting a little concerned at this point, the baby had a bowel movement in utero, britt now had a fever and the baby's heart rate was very high. about the time the epidural was wearing off, the anesthesiologist was in an emergency c-section and couldn't come "top off" britt... she was fully dilated! while the nurse made a call or two for more drugs, jennifer (our midwife) informed us that there would probably be no help on the way and that it was pushing time. i could feel britt's apprehension but i must say that so far BRITTANY HAD DONE SO PERFECTLY! i told her so many times during hard contractions how proud i am of her. she really is my hero- she is so strong. 

things got so so painful for britt as the last of her drugs wore off and as the baby lowered. she just grabbed her legs and pushed through each contraction- i knew she was in so so much pain and it crushed me so badly that i couldn't do anything to help. she had pushed for so long now without much visual progress and just pain. when jennifer pointed out that we could see the baby's head... i was so excited but britt was (and had to be) in a bit of her own world in order to deal with the pain. i didn't get/expect much of a response from her. she was excited, i know it. but also scared and dying in pain. next the baby's hair could be seen- so exciting. each contraction would come and the nurse would grab one leg, i'd grab the other and britt would grab behind her knees and push like hell. front row seats for what was the most miraculous show on the planet. p.s. britt's parents were on their way and because she was at a 9 for so long, with each hour that passed, the glimmer that they would be here became larger and larger. i thought they had no chance of making it but it was definitely getting closer. 

time crept on as britt was superwoman and pushed and pushed regardless of EVERYTHING in her wanting to just die. i was so incredibly proud of her, i hated HATED seeing her in more pain than ever before and i couldn't help but admire her and love her so much. the jones family was an hour away when i could see baby's hair and i thought "no way". as britt kept pushing, i soon was able to see the top of her head. i remember thinking how tiny it seemed and how excited i was. her head would come down and back with each push- little by little it crept down the birth canal- to the absolute agony of britt. i could not believe what was happening. she was actually coming. britt's fam was getting off the freeway and would be here in a few mins. for the last 10 mins or so it seemed that on the next push she could pop out. maria (britt's mom) popped her head in during one of the last horrific pushes before the end. i, at the request of britt, asked her to just wait in the waiting room. it was just too crazy to jump into that horror movie mid climax. two contractions later and after extraordinary effort on britt's part, baby's little head popped out. i distinctly remember her skin color being pale and darker than i expected. since she had a bowel movement in utero she had a greenish hue due to the meconium. we were told, sadly, that because of britt's fever, baby's increased heart rate and the meconium, that she would be taken to the NICU for an automatic precautionary 48 hour period where they would administer proactive antibiotics and do blood tests while monitoring her closely. we were told they would take her right after she was born. that made us so sad. everyone reassured us that it totally seemed that she would be 100% okay and that these were just precautions but we were still so bummed. not necessarily because we were afraid she wasn't okay, we both really felt she would be okay, it was mainly that she would be taken immediately and then for the next 2 days we wouldn't have her in our own room and we would have to go visit her in the NICU. back to baby... i also will never forget how lethargic she looked. as i mentioned, we both had a feeling she was going to be totally healthy but this was actually a bit unnerving. she looked almost drugged and her eyes were open and were moving so slowly and almost rolling back into her head. and not crying. jennifer (midwife) and nurse were hoping to bypass NICU protocol for the baby and instead of instantly letting the dr take her, she wanted to let me cut the umbilical chord and then place baby on momma for a few mins prior to them taking her. that was the plan but when she came out looking so exhausted and not crying... plans changed. she apologized to me as she quickly cut the chord and then passed off our little girl to the docs. i was both nervous for our new baby and concerned for my dear sweet wife who had just gone through the most painful and arduous experience she had ever had. i stayed with britt trying to console her while tearfully expressing my utter joy at baby's arrival. britt was still in her "dealing with the pain of labor & delivery zone" so she wasn't quite able to just let go and share in the joy at that particular moment with me. especially because she couldn't hold or even (at her angle) see her new baby. not long passed and continuously emotional, i and the docs noticed that our little girl was pink and moving. this helped to confirm our hopes of her being healthy.

after they suctioned all traces of meconium from her mouth, nose & face and cleaned her up a bit, i was able to go over and meet our new little angel. she is perfect. absolute perfection. i took a quick video and talked to her briefly then went to show mom and make sure she could see baby from where she was still sprawled on the delivery bed recovering from the agony of delivery while not letting her defences down so as to be prepared for the delivery of afterbirth still to come. she is so smart and amazing. after the initial craziness died down, i went out to the waiting room and informed the jones family that mom and baby were fine and reported how well britt did and showed pictures/video of our angel. they were so thrilled. when i went back in britt was still on the bed pushing, a sight that after the last number of hours both her and i are ready to not see for a long time. i went to hold her hand and help her through it. it must have been horribly painful- the midwife was struggling to get it to release so when all was said and done, her entire hand to the wrist was inside my wife and then making a fist and coming back out. that happened a few times. i was way shocked, it looked so painful. britt later confirmed (not that i needed her to) that it was. FINALLy britt got to hold little baby girl (still no name). i was elated. i snapped a few pictures of the big moment. at this time of joy, jennifer had begun sewing up the many small tears that britt had suffered during the ordeal. we were told we'd probably get 30 mins with baby before NICU would come for her but not even 5 minutes went by before a lady came with a cart asking for her. we were so sad. baby girl was already searching for something to latch onto so we made the plea that she was hungry and to let mom feed her. hesitantly, she agreed. what i have learned so far from pregnancy, labor and delivery is that it is one form of absolute HELL after another. britt has always been really scared of breast feeding due to her extremely sensitive skin but has always insisted that she would do it regardless of the pain because of how important we feel it is. her first experience with it exceeded her expectations... in a bad way. after just a short feeding, on one side blood blisters had formed and she was once again enduring agony. even though it seemed like britt wasn't even in pain and just enjoying our baby. after that most unpleasant ordeal, they took baby away to the NICU. britt, who had torn quite a bit during labor, finished getting sutured up. (end of journal entry)

the NICU is a sad place. NO ONE wants to be in there. the nurses were right, our baby girl did stick out there because she wasn't 4 1/2 pounds or a crack baby. we absolutely abhored the idea that she couldn't stay with us. as we went back to our room we marveled at the miraculous events of the past day. not even 24 hours later they moved our baby girl up to a newborn nursery on our same floor. still considered a part of NICU but much less critical. we were thrilled. this meant that she would only be down the hall from us. we spent the next two days in and out of the nursery for feedings and figuring out a name for our little sweetie pie. we had a list of names that we loved and constantly discussed through out my pregnancy. i feel like explaining why we chose the name "trudy" in another post. as far as her middle name... no the name "emerson" is not in either of our families (at least not that we know of). we both liked the idea of a more boyish name for the middle name since "trudy" is so girly. plus i liked the sound of the 2-3-1 syllable pattern. tru-dy e-mer-son barnes. we were both discharged on saturday (june 4th) and eager to get home.

as i look back now, i always think of the moment when she came out. and i guess that is what is so disappointing for me. because i was so checked out (due to pain), i never got to really marvel at what was actually happening. it was almost like i didn't know what was happening. i'd be lying if i didn't say that i wished she could have been placed on my chest right after her birth. i wasn't able to hold her for almost 40 minutes and that felt like forever. i guess i just didn't know how important those first bonding moments were to me. while these things do make me sad, it's not like i'm pondering them every day and wishing i could go back. there is nothing i can do about it now. as i finish this huge longest ever post, trudy lies here next to me so peacefully. i'm so grateful to finally have her in my arms. i am amazed at how healthy she is and i love this new chapter of life that is taking over. recovery is not fun. at all. but i am filled with everlasting joy when i look at trudy's sweet face. i'm grateful to god for trusting me to raise her and i'm determined to do my best.

what a druzy

ever since going to the natural history museum in dc a few years back, i have had a love for rocks and stones. especially pyrite. this beauty is what grant gave me for my birthday this year. it's perfect and just the way i like it. i love how raw and rough it is. plus it has just the right amount of sparkle. do you have a favorite gemstone? 

blogger has been frustrating this week. agree? i hope we can get the comments back from the last few posts because i really wanted grant to see all the compliments on the table. but i'm sure those behind blogger are doing what they can.

i am just a day away from being full term (37 weeks) and definitely already googling ways to go into labor. i am just at the point that every one talks about. feeling uncomfortable and huge. i'm still nauseous and wondering if it will truly go away after delivery. i know it will but i just don't remember what it's like to feel normal. 

this little girl inside me is so active that sometimes i just want to cry. i can only imagine how uncomfortable she is but her poking and kicking and whatever else isn't really fun to feel at this point. sometimes when she is going crazy in there, i get mad at grant because i feel like it's his fault. i mean it is his daughter.

i have a question for mothers out there, what did your baby sleep in before transferring to a crib? in those first few months? and does anyone have any advice for me? since i am about to have one of the most amazing/crazy/painful and beautiful experiences of my life?

oh and my list of things to do before she comes? we're down to 30 things now.

back to jewelry, i love alyson brown's taste. her love for classics, clean lines and naturalness in jewelry helps me to realize how beautiful the simplest pieces can be. here is a good example.

still wasting lots and lots of time on my pinterest. IT IS SO MUCH FUN!!!

they're on drapes, wall hangings, the doormat and canvas

my grandma loves roses. i'm not sure if the love is for actual real roses though, especially closed buds. it seems that the love and obsession is for open roses. big open roses. my mom has the same love too. it's like anything with a rose print just tugs at their hearts. and lucky me, i love them too! i painted the one above. i was thinking about how many roses or just red flowers there are around our house and it made me really miss both my mom and my grandma. i wish they could come and see all of them. i wish they could just come on over and we could eat yummy food and watch some westerns. like true grit (which i loved by the way, jeff bridges did a great job... i'm not sure who else could attempt to live up to john wayne). living away has not been hard for me at all these past few years. i have thoroughly enjoyed living in new places and learning different cultures etc. but now that i am so close to bringing another person into our family, i really miss mine.

anyway one of my friends told me about the rug company "dash and albert". as soon as i checked out their collection i fell in love with the rug below. that was over three years ago. i just never wanted to put that beautiful piece in an ugly apartment. i've had the rug as my background on my phone forever. it's just so perfect! i feel so lucky to finally own it. it makes me smile every time i come in the front door.






oh and the "B" is for barnes. just wanted to clarify that for shalynna. she once thought a different "B" in our house was for brittany. i was really embarrassed. i would never do that!

home

been outta town and leave tomorrow for another trip too. i'm behind on all things that involve the computer, however i'm doing pretty good with projects. one day i'll be daring enough to open my google reader. right now i'm just afraid of it. i'm in the third trimester with a very curvy body, i can embrace the baby bump... but other curves? i just try to ignore. this baby is healthy and keeping right on track. hope everyone is doing great and getting excited for warmer weather. here is something that makes me smile. 

p.s. also, our hearts go out to the people of japan, i can't imagine the devastation there. we're keeping them in our prayers.

october is here!

man it's been pretty busy around here. i haven't done an update on us in a while. a long while. grant is now in his fourth year of selling and his experience working here far exceeded his expectations. because it is a year round company, we've decided to stay here for at least another year. we've been treated so well. plus the company is opening an office in hawaii soon and i guess they'll have to fly us out there and we'll have to check it out. :) 

since we will be here for another year we are saying GOODBYE to living in an apartment. we aren't buying a house since we aren't sure how long our stay will be but we will be moving into a rental home. soon we will have all of our stuff from our storage unit here and our massive collection will be in one place! hallelujah. i bought a door mat yesterday and i can't wait to put it on our porch. it will be so nice to spread all of our stuff out in rooms! i am ecstatic. other than that grant stays very busy and so do i. etsy is time consuming. it takes a lot of work. i try to stay up with all that and recently i received a job offer to be a buyer for a consignment shop. exciting. 

so that is our update! i look forward to catching up on blogging. i've been a bit out of it and more sucked into the world of etsy. so far i have made two purchases on etsy since i started getting more serious about selling my flowers this past summer. i have been more than happy with both sellers that i bought from and had a great experience. one of my purchases were a pair of ruby earrings. i love gemstones, especially rubies. the earrings are gorgeous and around the ruby is crocheted gold. AND they are from ISRAEL! the earrings in my ears traveled to me all the way from ISRAEL. i feel pretty cool about that. so remember, if you are looking for anything.. try out etsy first. buy handmade! 

a falling star fell from your heart and landed in my eyes

can't stop listening to florence and the machine. cosmic love specifically. it is the kind of song that makes me want to scream the lyrics in the middle of the street. with my arms flailing in the wind. like if i were doing it in a music video, the camera would be circling around me. getting the picture? i love music so much. i love instruments. i want to play in a symphony or be the conductor of one. i dream of it all the time. anyway and it's really just the way this song sounds that makes me feel so free and encourages me to live more lightly. without worry or stress. to just trust in god. i'm listening to it right now. it's impossible for me to keep my arms down in the chorus... "THE STARS! THE MOOOOOON, THEY HAVE ALL BEEN BLOWN OUT!"

 today i am feeling  

so blessed. i saw an ad on craigslist that made me feel sick. i'm so determined to help. have you ever had people help when you really needed it? i have. sometimes knowing that people care just makes everything seem easier. which is the very reason why serving others is so important. i need to work on serving more. time to pay it forward.

p.s. where in the world did august GO? 

learned my lesson

so a couple weeks ago i went swimming with my girlfriends. when we were all done at the pool, i was tired and ready to go straight home. while driving home, i remembered that i needed to pick a few things up at the grocery store. i was still in my swimsuit and coverup (a seafoam green romper that just barely covers my bum). so i started debating about what to do in my head, i wanted to go home and put some more clothes on and then come out and run some errands, but i also did not want to go all the way home and then come out again. so i told myself to just stop at the store real quick... i convinced myself that it was totally fine because a lot of people outside of utah walk around wearing a lot less and i would just blend in. clearly i'm not very comfortable showing a lot of skin. a lot of that stems from my personal beliefs, how my parents raised me and where i grew up. 

so when i pulled into the albertson's parking lot (only store that carries blue bell ice cream), i saw that there was a marshall's next door. i decided to just run in there and see what they had. as i was thumbing through the blouses, i noticed a woman near me with two daughters. the youngest looked like she was about eight years old and the other looked like she was in junior high, probably 7th or 8th grade. because we were so close to each other, i could hear almost everything they were saying. when i understood what they were discussing, immediately my heart sank and i was wishing so badly i could run home and change. the mom and older daughter seemed like they were not getting along. i sensed a lot of tension. the mother held up a shirt to the daughter and said, "ya this might be okay, we will just have to see how low it is" then i heard the mother again, "what? what is wrong?" and the girl replied "nothing! i just have something in my eye"... while she was rubbing her eye. then they moved away and i was really trying not to look at them, i didn't want to make them feel more uncomfortable. i glanced over real quick and saw that the girl was crying now. i couldn't get in full sentences but i got the gist of it. yes i was totally eavesdropping. her mom said "listen the reason why is because you have no self esteem" "you need to understand that boys should not like girls for that reason" "i'm not going to let you.... " "i'm sorry you don't like me very much but i have to show you what is important" "you will thank me later, i promise". they kept on arguing and then i heard them talking about each woman that entered the store. "okay do you like that? because that isn't low" "that's not low" "that's cute, do you like that?". so the first reason i was embarrassed was because even though i'm still searching for the right niche in wardrobe styling for me... i'm still a walking billboard for my chosen "career". it's not like i could walk up and say "hey, i'm a wardrobe stylist and i know i could help your daughter find trendy styles while still achieving modesty". no. i mean i'm sure they both would have looked at me like "your a what?" my clothes were just not communicating anything about who i am and what i'm about. what made it worse was not just that i wasn't in a pulled together and polished outfit, but my romper really was short. which i feel fine wearing to the beach but not to go shopping. i was next to them in the aisles forever and i know that they noticed me. especially since they were discussing everyone's clothes around them. 

it might seem silly to others but to me... this was a situation that would not stop bothering me (hence me blogging about it). in a weird way i felt so connected to them. i think that was mostly due to the fact that my own mom did the exact same thing with me when i was about that age. i wanted so badly to tell the girl that her mom was right! and she probably will thank her later! and most of all i wanted to tell her that you can feel good about yourself without having to show off your body. once i just got over the fact that i wasn't going to say anything to them (i wanted to soooooooooooooooooooooo bad), i felt such a strong  amount of love (you can think i'm weird, it's fine) for the mother. it was so refreshing to see a mom try to teach her sweet daughter what's important and what isn't. when i was her age i think i thought my mom was just dumb and didn't know anything about what was cool. thank the heavens for mom's who go through that phase where they are trying to teach important lessons to teenage girls who basically hate them and want nothing to do with them. and it's all just because those mommies love them so much. 

i learned a lesson that day. i learned that for me, i want my clothes to communicate a lot about who i am NOW MATTER where i am. the end.

shoes

i was thinking about shoes earlier this week. i remember the days when i thought i just couldn't possibly look good unless i was in heels. i used to walk all over campus in heels. i was obsessed with stilettos, dare i say... maybe even dependent on them? ha, makes me laugh now. the other day i had to run a quick errand, i threw some clothes on walked out the door in less than 10 minutes. then i was thinking about how comfortable i was in my clothes. i was definitely wearing flats and i went about my business not thinking twice about what i was wearing after that. which is great. that is when you know that you've not only figured out your own personal style, but you know what works for you too. nothing i was wearing was restrictive or uncomfortable and i was still expressing myself. i feel like i always talk about personal style. the reason why is because i just remember so clearly getting dressed (back in the day) and never knowing what to wear. just being so confused. wanting to look like her or her. but my adventure of paying attention to what i like and mainly just who i am, has lead me to where i am now. i can proudly say that deciding what to wear takes just a few minutes. (this is also because i've learned to only buy what i love) 

on another note, shoes are funny. they have stories (as well as other items of clothing or accessories). at least mine do. i can name where all my shoes are from (unfortunately some are still in storage... wishing they were all here), how much they were and even special places i've worn them. for example... my sperry's (3rd on 1st row) that i blogged about awhile back... those have been worn in the bahamas. my tommy shoes (2nd on 2nd row) were worn almost every time i went to the eastern market in d.c. mmmm i love that place. my sandals (5th on 2nd row) have been a great investment. i remember thinking $30 was too much for those. but then thinking about how much they've been through... so many florida rains storms, which means pools and pools of water. gosh i love those. my open toe, camel colored, perfect heel height shoes (1st on 2nd row) were $0.25! and i've worn them SO much, the cost per wear? practically free. my eco-friendly shoes (2nd on the 3rd row) i wore in haiti. they have walked on sacred ground. my tennis shoes. well those i've worn lots of places. but really i think of my dad when i put them on. to him there isn't a cuter outfit on me than tennis shoes and a baseball hat (dodgers). ha

the polaroid trend is totally overdone but hey... it's still fun to me

on our drive to utah we listened to "the hunger games". audio books have just become a necessity for our road trips. as long as its a story... i really like it. however church talks or any self help books, i'd rather just read so that i can study and remember them better.  i definitely recommend this book though. we were very into it. and since monday, i've had dreams every night that i'm fighting in a forest and sleeping in a tree. the story made me so happy and SO mad at times. we are looking forward to reading the next book.

our friends (the brown's) introduced us to pepper turkey recently. now every grocery shopping trip includes me visiting the deli and almost eating a half a pound of the pound i usually buy. i love it so much and it makes me really look forward to making sandwiches. mmmmm. so yummy. we are also still obsessed with blue bell pistachio almond icecream. it NEVER gets old. NEVER.

the last two nights we have been watching "gone with the wind". grant had never seen it and it is a classic that everyone has to see. right? i really hate that scarlett o'hara. i wish i could jump into the movie and tell her off. i do think it would be fun to be her for halloween. can't you just see grant being a perfect rhett butler?

grant and i are doing a lot of pondering these days. trying to figure out our future. my full time (and i do mean full time) job is thrifting. it's the perfect job. very flexible. i do my own thing and whenever i feel like it. the only problem is that i don't get paid. no really though, i go practically every day. i choose to do that instead of making flowers or figuring out what i want to do with my life. i'm really good at choosing to do something fun over what i need to be doing. maybe i should do another thrifting post. i keep saying we need to do more on haiti on this blog. it is difficult because grant's journal is a lot of writing and it is not organized in what we did each day. which is because everything was just so smooshed all together. i look at our pictures often and wish i could just go back tomorrow and play with all those kids. remembering them helps me to be humble and more grateful.

i get my hair done in a week or so. looking forward to it too because i haven't gone to a salon to get it done in probably..... five months? and i absolutely love that. i hate being tied down to hair appts every 8 weeks or whatever. ugh. yuck. i keep wearing pants every day because i only have two pairs of shorts. i just need to get some more skirts because i am dying. really. i just want cheap stuff. i don't need anything expensive when i'm just gonna sweat to death in them. i'm trying to still figure out how much of this or that my skin needs because i truly am living in a desert. which i still like. it's funny how different each state can be. even if they are next door neighbors.

easters

a really old picture.

we had a fabulous and relaxing easter today at my parents. i'm a meat and potatoes kind of girl and my mom makes the best. apparently my youngest brother cameron is pretty cool. for april fools day he told all of his 5th grader friends that he is related to nacho libre (jack black). hilarious. then while driving home, we happened to have grant's easter bunny costume in the car. we were stopped at a stoplight and noticed a big easter egg hunt with little kids running around everywhere. so what did grant do? he put the mask on (which looks exactly like this) and started honking. before we knew it all the mom's were pointing to the easter bunny driving our car! the kids loved it and basically i peed my pants. 

watching conference was great. i try very hard to keep both eyes open. i do okay. dieter f. uchtdorf is my favorite. after it was over we watched a little documentary on truman g. madsen. he is absolutely fascinating to me. i am buying this tomorrow. i am so excited. this is the church i belong to and here is a clip of what i believe.

so april is going to be so busy. i can't believe it. we will only be here for the month and then we are off to albuquerque, new mexico. we are finally getting rid of our apartment which means in the next few weeks i will be getting a very detailed inventory of everything we own. and even though it will be quite the job, i can't wait to just get in there and go through it all. we will be having a yard sale this saturday too. more on that later. i remember doing this post about needing to put everything on ebay or craigslist. which we did, we put a few things up and made some decent mula. but for all the things i didn't get to put on... now we have the yard sale. see i just get really excited for this kind of stuff. earlier tonight we were talking with my dad about people who buy estates and then have the estate sale themselves... amazing. i want that job. i would love that. anyway... check out bijo for another fabulous announcement and have a great week!

standing for what i believe.

well, i really can't get this off my mind. lately i've been thinking a lot about image. i think it started in february when grant and i were spending a lot of time in airports. naturally, i would head to the magazine/book store and check out what looked interesting. i remember waiting in the fort lauderdale airport to head back from the cruise. we spent like 12 hours there. ya. it was a really long day. grant had lost his phone on some caribbean island and so our only form of communication, if we separated, was to use our walkie talkies. i left to go get us some food and while waiting for it to cook (chili's to go, chips and salsa + their yummy cheese dip), i headed over to check out some magazines. i counted over 15 magazines. that had at least something on the cover that went something like this "how to get a celebrity body" "3 minute abs" "2010 bikini body countdown" "lose weight without even dieting!" "a sexier body in just 30 minutes a day" "how to get a sexier body". i mean i really could go on and on. that isn't even the half of it. i immediately paged grant, "hey babe, can i tell you how GAY the country we live in is??", he laughed and said "of course", i then proceeded to read every cover i saw that had any featuring article relating to how to lose weight quick or how we can be sexier (because obviously those are hands down, the most important things we need to achieve in this life). i think everyone was wondering what i was doing but i definitely didn't care. my desire to make a point completely overrode any embarrassment i had. i mean it infuriates me. and then it was just last week, i was taking a small break at work in the back. i was finally able to pull out my instyle for the month and feed my brain. because fashion is the career i chose, my passion and hobby. anyone who reads magazines knows that the first 20 pages are just advertisements for designers. as i was flipping through, page after page with the usual.. michael kors, then guess, calvin klein, gucci... etc. I COULD NOT BELIEVE MY OWN EYES!!! every single spread was absolutely disgusting and offensive. the calvin klein ones were definitely making me the most upset, with eva mendez laying on the ground while a man's hands looked as if they are about to pull up her mini skirt. i mean it looks as if he is practically going to rape her. yes that sounds a little dramatic but that is really what it looks like. i sat there thinking about the kinds of messages the image was projecting and i wanted to cry. i'm so sick of the media for this reason. not just because of the obvious facts:

it crushes the value of women and completely demoralizes us and even encourages men to love us for only that reason. but the reason why it makes me so upset is that WOMEN ARE SO NOT AWARE OF HOW LOOKING AT PICTURES LIKE THESE AFFECTS THEIR SELF ESTEEM TO THE VERY CORE. i have seen in my own life, friends who are immediately depressed after watching or reading something ("why don't i look like this? why can't my legs look like that")(i mean who doesn't do that? especially when we see fake images like this). i guess the point i want to make is that very rarely do you just happen to be in a bad mood. thoughts create moods. THOUGHTS CREATE MOODS. thoughts create moods! now to expound on this a little more let me just give you a math equation. i have learned over the years that....

equation-
pms + brittany marie barnes = no self esteem.

hypothesis-
surround myself with positive things when my spirits are low.

experiment-
on our way to haiti, i had pms. i went to the magazine store. looked at marie claire, instyle, lucky, shape, vogue, blah blah blah. noticed my thoughts and predicted future mood. grabbed real simple instead.

results-
i finished the magazine with a kiss on grant's cheek. i felt inspired to budget my money, try some new chicken recipes, cherish my relationship with grant (loved the fabulous article, "secrets of staying happily married"), try yoga this month and organize my crafts and tools. moral of the story? stop reading things that you know will make you feel sad afterwards.

i was talking to a dear friend of mine and i was explaining to her that i feel self conscious about how passionate i am about this stuff. i expressed to her that sometimes i feel that i am from a different generation, nobody my age seems to get as upset as me about this stuff (okay, there are a few). she said to me that she thinks it should be something that i am proud of. it is something that makes up who i am. it warmed my heart to hear that and i think writing this post is another step in accepting it about myself. i love that i have very intimate feelings about a woman's worth. i chose to be a wardrobe stylist not because i am just oh my gosh like so obsessed with like juicy couture but because i believe that every woman is beautiful and i want to help women and show them that. we are worth so much. and to end my testimony, i read the following on this blog yesterday and couldn't stop thinking about it. it really gave me chills. and since i do believe in giving credit where it is due, let it be known that i copied this straight form her blog.

for you women, here is something to ponder:

if i were satan and wanted to destroy a society, i think i would stage a full-blown blitz on women. i would keep them so distraught and distracted that they would never find the calming strength and serenity for which their [gender] has always been known. 

satan has effectively done that, catching us in the crunch of trying to be superhuman instead of striving to reach our unique, God-given potential within such diversity. He tauntingly teases us that if we don't have it all- fame, fortune, families, and fun, and have it all the time- we have been short-changed and are second-class citizens in the race of life. as [women] we are struggling, our families struggling, and our society is struggling. drugs, teenage pregnancies, divorce, family violence and suicide are some of the ever-increasing side effects of our collective life in the express lane.

too many of us are struggling and suffering, too many are running faster than they have strength, expecting too much of themselves.

and my favorite line--

... we must have the courage to be imperfect while striving for perfection.

read more here.

chloe ashby and why i love her

i just wanted to do a quick post on a girl who continues to make me smile. chloe and i went to high school together but unfortunately did not know each other near as well as we do now. i feel like i really missed out on not being closer to her sooner because she is such a great person. i love reading her blog, she inspires me to be better and most of all helps me to accept myself for who i am. which i am very grateful for. you will know what i mean if you read her blog... she is so real and i really really love it (and sometimes i feel like i'm reading about my own life when i read some of her posts). she is such a down to earth girl, very humble, absolutely HILARIOUS, gorgeous... seriously- she is flawless, she is accepting of everyone and she can always pull herself out of an annoying, frustrating or just yucky experience with a fabulous outlook on life. i really just love having her as my friend.

sayonara

thankyou everyone for being so proud of me, i have the greatest friends. i want to express my gratitude to everyone for all the sweet comments in my last post, but especially our sopudep neighborhood post. both grant and i were concerned about sharing that story online. it was so special and we didn't want to tarnish it at all, but being that most of our donations came from the blog we felt it was appropriate. we look forward to sharing more stories from haiti (and plan to as soon as possible!), i mean grant has written like 20 pages in his journal about the trip and he still isn't even done.

lately i have been so overwhelmed by crafts and projects. last night i spent an hour talking with shawnee (my bff from high school) about everything from making necklaces out of old necklaces to organizing our closets and wanting to de-junk our houses a thousand times. we discussed shoes and sweaters while our husbands chatted about welfare and construction building regulations. love that girl!

on another note, we are really enjoying the olympics. today we watched a special on the 1980 usa hockey team, but i guess i can refer to them as the miracle on ice. i think i saw miracle once but don't remember it at all. anyway i fell in love with the story. i love sports. athletic ability is absolutely fascinating to me. however, does anyone else feel that sean white is a little too full of himself? ugh.. yucky. i guess he has reason to be.

tonight we leave on a company cruise and we can't wait! i am really feeling spoiled, it is a bit weird to visit a third world country and then go on a cruise to the bahamas in the same month. but granty poo worked hard for us again and so we are off to celebrate the fruits of his labor. i asked him to shave his caveman look but he told me that there is something wildery about running in the ocean with a beard.

mexican riviera cruise 2009

disclaimer

we are back from vegas and ready to roll. this week is so busy and we are just trying to stay on top of everything. i really want to post on haiti, especially while i have many emotions from the trip still fresh on my mind and even in my heart. i've realized that there are some people who choose simply to not get involved when there are huge tragedies like this because their hearts just can't hold that pain. and i definitely don't judge anyone for wanting to distance themselves from sadness. but i think that it's important that all of us understand the gravity of the situation down there. there will be no quick fix. it was a complete disaster in haiti before the quake. i just wanted to put out a little warning before our next post, it won't be a very uplifting one. but hopefully it will help everyone to have a more intimate understanding of what life is like down there.

n'ap boule!

well here we are back in our apartment. it seems so crazy that yesterday we were in haiti. i miss it. while i uploaded all our pictures today, i just cried and cried. i know that this trip will not be our last, we both are really looking forward to going again. soon. i can't wait to tell stories and share pictures that will no doubt bring tears to my eyes again. our trip was awe-inspiring. life changing and just incredible. please keep haiti in your prayers, just because the media moves on to something "bigger and better", it doesn't mean that haiti is okay now or that they have enough help. no. no. no. my heart is still in pain, thinking about how long it will take them to recover. it is a war zone down there. war zone. one blessing that they have, is that they are such a beautiful people. so positive and just a joy to be around. as much as i cried, i laughed more. i just love them all so much!!!!!!!!

grant posting

we found this gem back in the summer. it was living at an antique shop in winter park, fl. 
the best part about it is that we figured out from the GE logo... that this old thing dates back as early as the 1930's. oh and it's bright blue!

So, My awesome wife won't say it but she has been a craftaholic lately (I'm sure you have noticed). Besides the amazing flowers that everyone should own (if you don't already, email Britt and get one or seventeen--email in the sidebar) she has made/added custom ruffles to the neckline of a few shirts, and she even made the bib necklace that a number of you commented on a few posts ago. She has really been exercising and improving her talents lately and I freakin' love her. 

- A Proud Husband 

P.S. I have recently decided to add a bit of masculinity to this blog. So in case you start to see posts that don't have the style and grace of Britt's posts... don't be surprised.