It's vacation time!

Miss Bonnie playing in the sprinkler last summer.

Yesterday marked the end of Pacific NW Ballet's annual Nutcracker run.  Forty-ish shows starting the day after Thanksgiving and wrapping up two days after Christmas, with two shows on Christmas Eve.  This can be a very grueling time for the dancers in the company, as well as the production staff, directors, and even the children.  Everyone works tirelessly to put on the best production day in and day out.  But as hard as it is, it's such a rewarding time too.  The children that are in the production are students at PNB, and their enthusiasm for performing is infectious.  Every year, we get a million little notes from kids asking us for our signed pointe shoes.  The notes range from very creative to, "can I have a shoe??" They are all very special, nonetheless.  It's also such a special time because a lot of us remember starting out performing in a local Nutcracker production and hold fond memories of staring open-mouthed at the beautiful dancers before us.  My boyfriend, Jerome, is also a dancer in the company, so it's wonderful that we can support each other everyday and remind ourselves of how blessed we are that we get to have such  an amazing job--even when the body feels like it can't go one more day! Luckily, we happen to have a two-week vacation that starts today.  This will be a great time to unwind and rest our bodies before the next set of performances in January.  Oftentimes we travel during these vacation times--either to Louisiana to see my family or to France to see Jerome's-- but we decided we would rather completely relax here at home rather than exhausting ourselves with travel.  Not to mention, it gets very expensive to board our dog Bonnie!   

But even though I really want to use this time to rest up before we have to start going again, I am itching to start tiling the downstairs bathroom floor!  Right now there's gross indoor/outdoor carpet in there, and it is in desperate need of a makeover.  We are thinking of using this hex tile that's at Home Depot as it's reasonably priced and has a nice look to it.  Hopefully we will not be getting in over our heads with this project--we're not the most experienced DIY-ers, but you have to start somewhere, right?  I will be updating on our progress!  I tend to be drawn to all things vintage and rustic, and I definitely want this bathroom to have that kind of feel--even though our budget is not huge.  We shall see how it pans out!

I love so many elements of this bathroom! It totally captures the look I love.

Hex tile at home depot

If you can't beat 'em, join 'em!

Welcome to my blog!  I've debated for a while now about whether I should jump on the old blog bandwagon (I kept asking myself why anyone would care about what I have to say), but in the end, I came to the realization that I want to do this blog for myself and my family mostly, and if other people begin to read it and get some enjoyment out of it, then that's a great bonus!  I love blogs and I read a handful of them pretty regularly, so it really was only natural that I start one of my own.

Meet me in Magnolia will be a blog about many different aspects of my life--my career as a professional ballet dancer, my love for crafting and DIY, and of course my chocolate lab, Bonnie.  My hope as I begin blogging is that this will be a way to keep track of the progress Jerome (my boyfriend) and I make on our house, as well as a way to show our families what we are up to.  We plan on attempting to tile the bathroom floor in the near future, so stay tuned on how that turns out! Until next time...