How I Wore It :: A New Spin On Khaki

First: my giveaway is still going on! See the end of this post for how to win YOUR CHOICE of clothing from my Spring 2011 Collection! 

Now, this is my take on khaki shorts. Un-ironed khaki shorts at that ;) They don't have to be reserved for baseball games and camping trips! Paired with a crisp white shirt, shimmery capelet, devil-may-care heels and fun accessories, a classic wardrobe staple is instantly ready for date night. {And don't be scared of red lips! They always kick an outfit up a couple of notches.}

 Love these heels. I got them for the Marchesa show in NYC last fall. Click here to see! I was 5 months pregnant with Munchkin in the picture actually...it's a little ways down the page and I paired them with Georgina in Sugared Emerald.

Capelet - Badgley Mischka :: Shirt - Theory :: Shorts - Gap :: Purse - Vintage {my great grandmothers, I think} :: Belt - Miu Miu {men} :: Shoes - Miu Miu :: Earring - Vintage {my aunt's...? Leslie? Is this yours? Have you been looking for it? I am keeping it!!} :: Necklace - Pearls from Biz :: Aviators - RayBan :: Lipstick - Revlon Super Lustrous Lipstick Creme #654 Ravish Me Red

Remember to enter my current giveaway to win YOUR CHOICE of clothing from my Spring 2011 Collection! Click here to see my website, here to see my lookbook, and here for rules on how to enter and let me know which one you want hanging in your closet!

Also I have I great guest post up over at the cute blog A La Mode Maven today where I share my Three Secrets of Style. I LOVED putting this together so head over there and check it out! Preview...

{Secret #1} :: Mix high end and low end pieces


Head over to see the rest! And ps can I start calling you all my snuggle cakes?? Mkay thanks glad that's settled. Snuggle cakes. Kisses.

Favorite Room Feature :: Sadie + Stella

Happy Wednesday! The sweet ladies over at Sadie + Stella asked me to participate in their Favorite Room Feature series. How fun!! I originally thought about sharing my living room, but I have talked about it on here a few times before and have never really looked at another room in our home in depth, so I decided to focus on our...kitchen! Here is a sneak peek:

Head over to Sadie + Stella today to see the rest of the room and tons more photographs!

Remember to enter my current giveaway as well to win YOUR CHOICE of clothing from my Spring 2011 Collection! Click here to enter!!

Gender Neutral Nurseries

Lots of exciting things to post today! First up: Remember to enter MY CURRENT GIVEAWAY to win your choice of clothing from my Spring 2011 Collection. Click here to enter!

Next: A friend of mine from high school asked me over a month ago {maybe even two months...soz Kelley!} for ideas on gender neutral nurseries. I finally had time to get some images together and am thrilled to post them all! My favorite is the one above - obviously I love the eclecticness of it...mixing modern with traditional with vintage. J'adore. Given that it might not be to everyone's taste, I compiled my favorite images I had stored up below. And y'all, these were from my personal interior folder on my desktop, not my blog folder, so I did not make note of where the image came from and cannot give proper credit - terrible, I know, but please forgive! I feel like 99% are from Andrika of Nursery Notations so I will give credit to her for the majority. She has the BEST nursery design blog out there any day of the week and twice on Tuesday.

The Jonathan Adler zebra rug is an all-time personal favorite of mine, especially now that they came out with new colors. Squish has an orange one in his room. Sometimes I go sit on it all by myself just to tell the rug how much I love it. We have some nice pow-wow's and girly time. And tea parties.

Ok LOVE. I believe this home is in Austin, actually, from what I remember. 

Whenever we move I am going to FOR SURE do a wall of books like this. The shallow shelves are perfect for displaying books so none get lost as so often happens in typical deep book shelves. Ideal for playroom, nursery or young child's room. For some reason I am thinking the image with the diagonal striped border on the drapes is from Pink Wallpaper.

I MELT. Want to move in now. This is nicer than my own bedroom for crying out loud. As pretty as it looks, however, it is not practical if there are mobile children in the house. I would definitely fall and stab my eye out on that peacock figurine, and I would be scared that those sunburst mirrors would fall and impale the baby.

These below are children's rooms obviously, not nurseries, but I think inspiration can be taken from them and translate well into a nursery setting.

This is quite sophisticated and would be beautiful in nursery form if the walls, crib and carpet were all the same color or close to the same shade. 

Chevron is one of my all time FAVE patterns {as you can see from the sides of my blog} and I love this milky aqua color mixed with as bright as you can get orange. The toned down headboard is a nice touch as well. Great color combo for a nursery, and would translate well into the toddler room. Another option would be to paint a thick chevron pattern onto one wall in the nursery.

I totally love this. How great to just paint a huge massive stripe behind the crib against the wall??! I think I need to do this in our next home. Easy and chic and CHEAP!

Most of you have seen these photos before of our nursery:

We did not find out the gender of Squish or Munch, so this was my answer to gender neutral. I knew the rest of our house would be crazypants color, so I wanted to keep a very classic, soothing baby environment as more of an escape. I love it, but at the end of the day it's not very "me." When we move and I get to do another nursery for future babies, I will be more adventurous and make it more in sync with the rest of our home. Here is my take on a gender neutral nursery as I would do today {pretending that a budget does not exist....ha....} 

You know if this whole clothing line thing doesn't work out I think I am going to make my interior design hobby official. This is fun!! Sheridan French Interiors? Sheridan French Crazypants Color Design?? Oh ps I really wanted to find a great old-fashioned trunk to use as a toy chest, so that an older child could play in the nursery while mom is in there with baby and not feel left out...but didn't find a great one. If anyone has a good resource for this please share! 

{1}Love Pillows {2}Child's Sofa - for when an older child wants to be in the room with you while you are feeding the baby {3}Red Side Table {4}Stool that could also be used as ottoman for glider {5}Painting {6}Sports Car Pillow {7}Wasp pillow {8}Crib {9}Rug {10}Prints {11}Changer {12}Elephant Lamp nice to have a touch of baby-ness somewhere {13}Paint {14}Night Light {15}Ikat Pillow  {16}Table for setting bottle, etc. on while you burp baby {17}Glider

Head over to Nursery Notations tomorrow to see my guest post as well - a mommy/child outfit combo. Very cool! 

Featured on Quadrille!

Lookey lookey! My friend Andrika of Nursery Notations pointed this out to me...our living room is up on the Quadrille website! How cool is that?! Makes me all warm and fuzzy like inside. FYI, I plan to use your fabrics in every room of our house once we move so let's make a habit of this mkay? :)

A lot of the design credit needs to go to my mom as she helped me out. {Terri Elizabeth Interior Design. If you would like her contact details for design services, shoot me an email and I will pass on her information.}

Remember to enter my current giveaway to win your choice of clothing from my Spring 2011 Collection! Click here to enter!

yes. get excited. it's GIVEAWAY TIME!

{if you sign up for my newsletter - here - you get pretty things like this}

I know I originally said I would not do another giveaway for a few months, but something of paramount importance has come up. Allow me to explain.

So basically I am not looking forward to Bentley coming back onto The Bachelorette tomorrow night. Hands up for who has watched this season so far? Bentley is a gem. And by gem, I obviously mean the devil incarnate. To Ashley and the other men in the house he is all, "Moonlit walks on the beach are my fave and I would loooove to sit by the fire and talk about feelings for hours and braid your hair" but when it is him one on one with the cameras, he is all, "I make the Marlboro man look like Shrek and would rather swim in pee than marry Ashley." All joking aside, he is actually a snake that should be kept underground for breeding purposes only and men like him are the reason Munchkin is never allowed to date.

Bentley does not get heartsies from me.

Long story short: Ashley fell in love with him after like point 2 seconds, then he decided to leave, which crushed her, yet three weeks later is now returning. Cue. The. Drama. He is pretty much going to - once again - rip out her heart and do the Mexican Hat Dance on it, and I really do not want to see history repeat itself because I like Ash and it gives me the sads to see her cry. Obviously I have to watch it though - curses to you producers for tugging on my heart strings and reeling me in like this!! - so to cheer me up in preparation for the train wreck that will ensue tomorrow night...

I have decided to do another giveaway from my 2011 Collection! View here or here to get excited about what you could get your hands on.

Oh I feel better already :D

Rules:

Become a Follower of The Southern Eclectic {easy peasy. Just click the little follow button over near the top right column just below "My Style Gurus" and lucky you get to be a guru, too!}

I also came up with ways to submit additional entries after you become a Follower {or if you are already a Follower}:

{1} Subscribe to my Sheridan French newsletter via my website - at the top of the page here or via the contact page here - to be the first to know about special promotions, discounts and any fun behind the scenes tidbits of photo shoots and things like that! I will send out no more than one newsletter per month, so don't worry, your inbox will not suddenly be flooded with all things SF.

{2} Follow me on Twitter: @sheridanfrench

{3} Like Sheridan French on Facebook - link here

{4} Write about and link to this giveaway on your OWN blog! This might end up being worth several entries since you would be soooo sweet to promote it...Maybe I will just send you cupcakes as a thank you?? Or would you rather have extra entries? Three? Five??

{5} Subscribe to The Southern Eclectic via email {type your email into the little box at the top of the right hand column}

Then, leave a separate comment for each of the things you did so you are sure to be counted for the proper number of entries :))) Go ahead and tell me your very favorite piece that you would love to have as well as your size, and though I am much lower on stock now than I was with the first giveaway, I will do my darndest to get you your first choice. Please note: I am completely out of Georgina in Sugared Emerald and Electric Orange, Neve in Cosmo and the Petra in Cupcake!

This will run for one week with no entries being taken after 6pm Texas time on Sunday, July 3rd and the winner will be announced next Monday, July 4th! Oh that just became a WAAAAY better reason to do this giveaway!!!!!

I hope everyone is having a wonderful Sunday and here's to a fabulous week! Now please excuse me whilst I prepare my torch and pitchfork for Bentley.

Honey Bee Tees

Images courtesy of Fly Through Our Window

After I joined the blogosphere I fell in love with oodles of fashion and decor blogs, but one that stood out from the pack and really captured my heart was Fly Through Our Window on which the lovely Darby {bonus points for amazing name} documents life with her husband and three breathtakingly beautiful children. She is an out-of-this-world photographer and every moment captured sucks you right into her blissful world of joy and love. It is still a daily read, and just look how gorgeous her babies are!!

One of Darby's adventures has been to create a line of children's tees with the cutest name ever: Honey Bee Tees. I truly LOVE their look and have been meaning to blog about / order some for aaaages. {Proof!...here is my "To Blog" list....} 

In a world of seriously over the top graphic designs on children's t-shirts these days, Honey Bee Tees are simple classics that feature iconic childhood admirations such as tractors, fire trucks and bicycles. You instantly want to make a new memory around every single one:

...set up an old-fashioned lemonade stand on the corner...

...visit the local fire station and see your boy's eyes light up as bright as the moon...

 ...spend a day on a farm learning about animals...

I finally got around to ordering a few and selected those three above, though make sure to check out the online store as there are so many more options that really cover every adventure a child would want to have...and then some. I cannot wait for them to arrive in our mailbox! I will post pictures as soon as Squish has one on :)

A word from the wise, {yes, I am calling myself wise...haaaaa} set aside a good five hours before you head over to Darby's blog. You will be head over heels in no time flat. 

OH and, Darby's twin sis runs the blog Urban Grace, a permanent fixture on my sidebar to the right. I mean, really?! Talk about a seriously talented fam. Huge neon pink heartsies for these gals.

Making Me Melt...

Happy Saturday everyone! HAD to share these photos...

I can totally hear her saying "hey y'all!" with a teeny tiny Texas twang in the top one, and the best part about the second one is that they are watching.......golf. 

Finally, Biz has a girl in the house who is interested!!

 I can't stop looking at these.

My heart is butter.

Summer Bags That Won't Break The Bank

Sorrrryyyy it took me so long to get this up. In all honesty I was just completely overwhelmed with all the great choices available right now! Should I focus on clutches? Satchels? Beach bags?? It was extremely difficult to narrow down - even to 16 - but I decided "shopper" bags were the best way forward given that they have the most flexibility. Everybody loves a shopper :) All but three are below the $200 mark, and seven are sub $100! 

{1}Emotional Baggage Tote $85

{2}Thursday Friday Together Bag $59

{3}SR Squared Tote $74

{4}Harveys Seatbelt Bag $104

{5}Nine West Petal Shopper $76

{6}Big Buddha Bahama Shopper $95

{7}Roberta Roller Rabbit Beach Bag $89

{8}Cole Haan Jitney Collection Logan Tote $198

{9}Marc Jacobs Pretty Medium Tate $188

{10} Juicy Couture Beaded Owl Drawstring Tote $128

{11}Banana Republic Patent Satchel $250

{12}Missoni Quilted Faux Leather Tote $249 75% OFF SALE!

{13}Kate Spade Quinn Tote $228

{14} Lilly Pulitzer Hooked Up Clutch $138

{15}The Sak Floral Satchel $59

{16}Trina Turk Aphrodite Tote $138

Have a great weekend everyone!

Big Squish's Spoonful O' "Smooooobie" Recipe

In honor of my special birthday boy today...

One of my favorite things to do with Squish is to make smoothies, or SMOOOOOBIES!!, as he says. {I melt every time...and always snicker to myself that it sort of sounds like boobies...and then wonder when my maturity level will kick in. Maybe around 30??}. It is such a fun and easy activity to do with toddlers, and clean up is a breeze compared to typical craft projects...not to mention you get to eat the final product so in my book it's a win-win!! 

This is what we typically toss in the blender. I did not put quantities on most as we just throw in whatever is in the fridge :)

Raspberries
Blackberries
Strawberries {green parts still on}
1 or 2 Bananas
1 container of Coconut Milk Yogurt, usually Strawberry-Banana, Vanilla or Blueberry
Ice
Orange Juice
2 heaping scoops of Coconut Oil
1 scoop of Delicious Greens 8000, found here

Blend away!

...and Happy Birthday! to my darling angel...

{our very first picture together}

You are the most wonderful, precious son that we could have ever dreamed of having, and now you are a great big brother! Mommy and Daddy love you sweet boy!!! 

xxxxxxxxxxx