Paris all year 'round

If you're like me, you dream about shopping in France, vacationing in France, living in France...and so on.

I wish I could be there everyday, but alas....I cannot. However, I think I may have found a good (virtual) alternative!

Voila! Paris Daily Photo: A photo blog contributed to daily by Eric, a parisien (duh), who posts the most amazing photos of daily life in the City of Light. In addition to the great pics are tips on where to stay (including house exchanges), places to visit, and tons of other information that you won't find in Let's Go France.

Mr. Peanutbutter and I are planning a trip to France in August, but Paris wasn't on the original itinerary. But, after seeing all of these great photos I think we might change our plans!

All photos courtesy of Paris Daily Photo

Happy Birthday Miss Audrey

Today we're going to a birthday party for my sweet little cousin Audrey who's now 4 years old. I can't believe how time flies.

In celebration of her birthday, I typed in 'Audrey' on Etsy to see what treasures I could find. Of course, there were a gazillion gratuitous photos of Audrey Hepburn.

But, there were also lots of other lovelies that I'll share with you. I wish I could buy them all...1. Silver Blue Audrey Dress by ChyShop
2. Ruffle Bateau Dress by Audrey and Grace
3. Audrey Necklace by MyKonos

4. Audrey silk shoe clips by floreti
5. Audrey wool wrap by Holly Bloom Couture
6. Audrey Sweater by Luna Portenia
7. Audrey bag by Rowan Tri's
8. Audrey wool bolero by Elegant Crochets

Please go visit their stores, and be sure to tell them Jelly sent ya!

There is a season...

Well Blogosphere, I think it's time for a little bit of a facelift here at Jelly's World. I'm not liking the overall layout of the blog, and I think it needs some sprucing up.

What do you think? Lighter colors? Custom graphics? A little more esprit de vivre perhaps?

I'm going to keep pondering on this. In the meantime, I found some new blog lovelies that you might also enjoy.

*French Larkspur*

Ok, what's not to like about beautiful and serene frenchy decor? Even better...she has a boutique. Si jalouse. One day blogosphere, I hope to have my own funky francophile boutique with slice of Jelly, but until then I will continue to live vicariously through all of these amazing blogs. (sigh)


All photos courtesy of French Larkspur

*The Brocantess*

I can never tire of french things.

Neither, it seems, can the Broncantess. She's relatively new to the blogging scene, but man she's like a house on fire. Can't wait to see what's next...

All photos courtesy of Brocantess

New Love

I am so wanting this watch...Can you believe it's a 'Jelly' watch? I must have it.

Do I get eggplant? Teal? Black? All 3? So many choices!Toy Watch USA makes these great time pieces.

AND they're interchangeable to match your mood or your wardrobe.

Random Photos on a Rainy Day

Views from the Draughty Manor...

The New Layaway

Remember layaway?

I do.

My mom used put all kinds of stuff on layaway when I was a kid. However, this credit free notion of paying for items over time seemed to lose favor over the last couple of decades. That is until the economy went down the toilet.

Now, lots of stores are offering this plan - including ONLINE! Yep, I recently found several online shopping groups where you can find tons of items to put on layaway - no credit issues and your monthly payments can be debited from your checking account. In some cases, you can even mail them a check. I've also found other stores where you can pay them directly (via their online store) through layaway, i.e. HSN and Sears. (Hey now. Don't pooh-pooh Sears. I did, and then I looked over the website and was pretty impressed with the furniture. Remember, they also sell kitchen appliances, too - all of which is eligible for layaway.)

This concept is so exciting that I went as far as emailing a couple of merchants to see if they would accept layaway. Believe it or not, they would! So, my dream of owning a fancy new kiln is now a reality. All I have to do is make a payment each month and when it's paid for they'll ship it to me...no interest on credit cards, no worrying about hurting my credit, and helping a company stay afloat in this crappy economy. Yea!

Check out elayaway, HSN and Sears for various layaway options. Can you believe all of the things you get?

Decorating 1-2-3 with vinyl wall designs

Whew, Blogosphere! I've been busy. Mr. Peanutbutter and I have been tackling home renovation projects and I've had no time to spend with you.

I do want to show you some really easy decorating that I've done around the house using a product called Uppercase Living. Yes, it's true that I sell the product - but what kind of representative would I be if I didn't put any in my own home?

My lastest project was updating a simple lamp using a floral design....

Lamp beforeAnd...after.

Not bad, but maybe could use a little more of the floral design to go around the shade.

Here are some other ways I've used Uppercase Living around the house...

Click here if you're interested in learning more about Uppercase Living.

Roses are...

We have the best neighbors. Really...we do.

Behind us lives an older Filipino couple. They have the most amazing garden - full of fruit trees, grape vines, and gorgeous plants of all kinds. They're always bringing us things: canned pears, pickled peppers, jellies, and various plants that they've split for us to plant in our own yard.

Today Faye brought us a bouquet of roses. Yesterday they had been to the local shrine where they were giving out loads of roses. I met her in our yard and offered her some cockscomb so that she could plant the seeds next spring. The conversation went something like this:

Faye: "Oh, yes. We have these in our country, but we cannot grow them here."

Me: "Well, take as much as you like. You can see they grow like crazy. We even used them in our Wedding."

Faye: (giggling) "Oh, in our country we take them to the cemetery."

Oh, well....life is a circle.

Old flame

Do you ever find a candle and love the scent, but hate the color?

You bring it home, and it just sticks out like a sore thumb in the middle of all your decor?

If you're like me, you then find some other little bowl or jar to put it in so that you can hide the country rose color of your new candle and burn it every day so that you can throw it out without feeling like you wasted your money.

I guess I don't learn.

I love love LOVE the smell of evergreen trees, and with the holidays approaching all of the stores are chock full of christmas-tree-smell candles. Sadly, forest green and any variation there of doesn't go with anything in our house. But, I bought it anyway.

Luckily, I had an idea to tastefully disguise my new candle...

(yawn)

I took some vellum paper and photo-copied a damask design that I had onto it. (I actually had a bunch of this left over from our wedding, which I had used for little votive candles on the tables) The sky is the limit with what you can copy onto the vellum, and I imagine you could get really creative with these candles if you had the time.

After measuring and cutting the paper to right size to fit around the candle, I glued it in place with some double-sided tape. I finished it off with some gross-grain ribbon I had left over from another project and voila...And now here is my new and improved candle blending in nicely on the mantle.

Pretty as a Picture

Well, I really don't have much going on today - that I can post about, anyway. I would only bore you with my tales of refinishing the hard wood floor, and painting some random walls.

So, I thought I would leave you with this amazing photo from our wedding that a friend of ours took. I love it so much that I think I'm going to have it enlarged and framed.

Buen Dia de Los Muertos!