The Vignette

Sebastian's birthday party is Friday and I've bitten off more than I can chew, of course, so back to work!

xoxo,
Rachel

Giveaway Day - Stella Bella Boutique

"Stella Bella Boutique is an online jewelry boutique that offers pieces that are dainty, bold, and everything in between. All pieces are vintage inspired and hand-made. NOTHING IS OVER $20.00!! I love doing custom orders for wedding parties and brides :) The pictures below are just a couple of my favorite pieces. Message or email me and I'd love to work with you."
-Rachel Ridd
This giveaway is for $25 store credit! All you need to do is leave your favorite piece of owned jewelry in the comment section below. Winner will be drawn and announced Saturday afternoon.

xoxo,
Rachel

Giveaway Day - Gingiber

"Hi! My Name is Stacie and I run a little shop called "Gingiber". What 3 things should you know about me and my shop?

1. Gingiber is just FILLED with happy little doodles and drawings. I hope they make you smile.

2. For one lucky reader, I am offering a giveaway of any single 8x10 print from the Gingiber shop!

3. Since I have never won a giveaway myself, I want all of the "Smile and Wave" readers to feel like winners! So, I am offering FREE WORLDWIDE SHIPPING to anyone who makes a purchase from the shop! You just have to leave a "message to seller" during your checkout saying that you are a part of Rachel's crew.




Thanks so much for participating. Please stop by my little blog, GingiberSnap and say hello!

-Stacie"
For a chance to win, leave a comment with your favorite summer movie. Winners will be picked on Saturday afternoon.

xoxo,
Rachel

Giveaway Day - Dressing On The Side

"Dressing On The Side creates limited and collectible t-shirts that make you *smile* when you wear them. You won't see yourself coming and going in these supersoft tees but you will start a conversation or two because everyone has a favorite food they'd like to share with the world. Click on over to check out some daily specials and summer sales going on: http://www.etsy.com/shop/dressingOnTheSide Giveaway winner may choose any t-shirt to joyfully wear...which one has your name on it?"
-DOTS

Dressing On The Side is offering *free shipping* to Smile And Wave readers if you mention *smileandwave* (discount refunded via paypal)!


To enter this giveaway, share your favorite flavored cupcake in the comment section below. Giveaway will close on Saturday morning!
xoxo,
Rachel

Giveaway!

We're giving away a custom blog design by MiraBelleza Web Studio! The winner will receive a custom blog based on a consultation with Patricia during which they'll discuss colors, fonts, style, and layout.

Below are a few samples of Patricia's custom blog design work (click to go to the actual blog):

La Vida Project

PlumBliss

To enter:

1. Become a follower if you aren't already.

2. Leave a comment on this blog post by 11:59 pm PST on July 15, 2010. If your email address isn't accessible by clicking on your profile/blog, please include it in your comment so that I may contact you if you are the winner.

3. To receive an extra entry, link to this post on your own blog (include the url to your blog post in your comment). It is up to you to return to this post to enter your second entry after blogging about the giveaway.

Good Luck!

Loving the Ruffles

I heart ruffles!  Do you? 

I just can't seem to get enough of the ruffled blouses and sweaters that are so popular right now.

Look at these beauties from the Talbots website.  Each item shown here is on sale right now. 

Sigh.

Wish I Was Here

(working on this one.)

xoxo,
Rachel

Domino/Brides.com: How to Organize Your Linen Closet

I'm sure this news is probably all over blogland by now, but in case you haven't heard yet, Brides.com has acquired the Domino magazine archives and will be posting them on their website. Although old Domino photos are already all over the web and there are groups like this Flickr one dedicated to containing them in one spot, I like this for two reasons: the photos are deliciously large and they're accompanied by their corresponding story {great for those of us who threw out our glossies}.

The photo above originally appeared in the Domino story Organize Your Linens. Brides.com has adapted the story and renamed it How to Organize Your Linen Closet.

There are 17 stories currently on the website and my guess is they'll be adding a few at a time to keep you coming back.

New Blog Reveal!

A quick look back....

Below is the very first header I used when I first started out...

Those of you who've been with around a couple of months will probably remember this header which I paired with the basic minima blog template and used through the Summer of 2009 and into the first quarter of this year...

In the second half of spring I started to experiment with a new blog template and designed a completely different header...

...and over the past few weeks I've worked with my website designer Patricia of Mira Belleza Studio to improve on that to create what you see today!

Among the things that are new:

• A navigation bar at the top
• Custom fonts :)
• Topics and sub-topics on the side bar
• A link to my twitter page {i recently signed up!} right next to the links to my facebook and bloglovin pages

I hope you like it as much as I do! Stay tuned tomorrow for a giveaway {that pink link at the top of the right side column will be activated}!

Summertime, And The Livin's Easy

I found my Duaflex the other day while I was cleaning my studio space and realized I haven't been experimenting with it like I wanted so I took a couple of shots around the house. I think I'm going to use it at Sebastian's party to see how it captures people. Little people that don't stand still for very long.

I know some people like to use a contraption but I'm pretty happy with the images after editing.

And here's how it looked through the viewfinder without a contraption and before editing.

And this is how I'm going to do my hair all summer when I don't have time/want to wash it. Two little buns at the nape of my neck to tame the chaos.

I saw Leigh-Ann's new favorite summer hair trick. How do you fix your hair when the temps rise?

xoxo,
Rachel

This Week

Hi everyone, stoppin' by for a quick hello :-)

image via paris apartment

I'm excited to share with you all that the revamped blog is set to be revealed tomorrow and Wednesday I'll be announcing a giveaway!

Hope you're having a great start to your week! Hasta mañana!

Let's Have Cake

Someone in our house had a birthday this past weekend (me).  You know how that goes...way too much eating. :)  The men in the house made me this Hummingbird Cake and it was to die for!  You have to try it. Of course, this recipe is from our trusty Southern Living Cookbook.

Hummingbird Cake

3 cups all purpose flour

1 tsp. baking soda

1 tsp. salt

2 cups sugar

1 tsp. ground cinnamon

3 eggs, beaten

1 cup vegetable oil

1 1/2 tsp. vanilla extract

1 8 ounce can crushed pineapple, undrained

1 cup chopped pecans

2 cups chopped bananas

Cream Cheese Frosting

1/2 cup chopped pecans

Combine first 5 ingredients in a large bowl; add eggs and oil, stirring until dry ingredients are moistened.  Do not beat.  Stir in vanilla, pineapple, 1 cup pecans, and bananas. Pour batter into 3 greased and floured 9-inch cake pans.  Bake at 350 degrees for 25 to 30 minutes or until a wooden pick inserted in center comes out clean.  Cool in pans 10 minutes; remove from pans, and let cool completely on wire racks.

Spread Cream Cheese Frosting between layers and on top and sides of cake; then sprinkle 1/2 cup chopped pecans on top.  Yield: 1 three layer cake.

Cream Cheese Frosting

1 (8 ounce) packaged cream cheese, softened

1/2 cup butter, softened

1 (16 ounce) package powdered sugar, sifted

1 tsp. vanilla extract

Hummingbird Cake is a southern favorite.  Definitely one of my favorites! 

Happy Monday!

Important Work

I wonder if he'll ever keep a blog.

xoxo,
Rachel

An Awesome Give Away!

Girls, in the last few weeks I've discovered a completely new to me kind of blog. 

 There are lots of gals out there who love fashion and love showing off their clothes. 

Classroom Chic is one blog I've been following closely.

Now she's having an amazing give away sponsored by Talbots!!

I hate to tell you about this because I don't want to lessen my chances, you understand right?

Classroom Chic is having a give away for a $250.00 gift certificate to Talbots. 

True!!  Go there now.

Invitations Are Out

We're having a small little party so it didn't take long to make these invitations. I just cut out some card stock, added graph paper with double-sided tape, layered washi tape, added my information, and addressed and stamped the backs. Post cards!

I got the inspiration from a shower my friend, Ashley, threw for her sister recently. I was able to use things I had on hand and manage to use the color scheme for Sebastian's truck party instead of something overly themed. And since Sebastian can't read I'll share with you that we ordered what we thought was an adult's fist-sized back hoe to match the little dump truck and bulldozer that my grandmother bought him on our Florida vacation. It's hard to translate scale ratios and there wasn't anything to compare it to in the pictures so we didn't realize we had actually ordered something about five times larger. Sebastian is going to be one happy little boy when he opens a back hoe the size of his little sister.

Happy weekend.
xoxo,
Rachel

Sweet Summer Time

It's a Hot Tamale kind of day today!

The kind of day when you could be tempted not to leave the air conditioning.

But the view outside is so much clearer.

The locusts are singing just like I remember from childhood.

I just love summer!!

Hope you are having a wonderful day today.

Happy Weekend!

I have multiple projects going on right now keeping me busy including the closet mini-makeover {almost done!}, the blog "reno" {trying to work out the little details and kinks -revealing early next week!}, and of course the projects that pay the bills.

I'll leave you with this shot of an inspiring office by designer Jan Showers. She always uses beautiful classic pieces and unique accessories {like that table lamp!} that add glamour and a punch of color!

Love It

source

A few late nights with work paired with sleep training have taken me to a new level of sleepy! I just want to curl up on this couch for a long nap. Except I'm going to try to go to bed instead, and then tomorrow let this whole room and house tour inspire me to tackle a fun new project.

xoxo,
Rachel

Bedroom Closet Progress

Last night I got started on painting the bedroom closet. I ended up going with Mythic Paint #034-4 as seen below:

Here's what I started with:

in person the paint color looked like a yucky peachy beige

Here's what I have so far:

As you can see, I'm only part of the way there. I still have to paint the shelves, the borders, and the edges. I realized last night that the paint brush I had was too old and stiff to work with and the white can of paint from a previous project we thought we could use, had dried up. So I had to hit pause until we were able to pick up those items from the store this morning. I think I have everything I need now so I'll continue working on it again later today!