Punch List

1. I love August because it is usually chock full of concerts. We kicked the month off last night with a Steely Dan concert at Merriweather Post Pavilion. I grew up in front of a record player and would often be spinning Steely Dan's Pretzel Logic.



2. On Monday, I had one of the best finds ever! Rachel from RWKrafts had suggested going to Marshalls to look for paper and cardstock. Sure enough, I found four huge stacks of DCWV cardstock! Each of the stacks were $6 or less! You know my obsession with paper, so I was super excited!

3. Speaking of paper, I recently received a shipment of cardstock from the French Paper Co. I am super excited to be using this paper. I bought the 110lb smart white cardstock. I've already used it to print some greeting cards and I am really happy with the quality!

4. Summer is nearing an end (19 days until I need to report back to school) and we're still not done with the backyard. We went to another paver store last Friday morning and found something that we like that isn't nearly as expensive as what I'd originally liked from the other stone store.

5. Despite summer coming closer to an end, it seems that it is just getting into full swing for us. We finally put up our lantern lights outside on the first floor deck. Fortunately, in Baltimore the weather stays nice until November so we should be able to enjoy them for a while yet!

6. Last week was super busy-- dinner with friends on Wednesday night, ice cream on Thursday night to celebrate a friend who had just finished taking the bar exam. An impromptu night out on Friday with friends of ours that live a few blocks down. Fun, but busy! Phew!

7. After our super busy week, Saturday was a laid back day. We ended it by getting take out from Chaps Pit Beef-- a seriously awesome place you need to check out if you're ever in Baltimore. I had an open faced beef sandwich with fries, both which were drenched in gravy. Yum! We ate on the roof top deck and listened to a blues show on our favorite radio station that comes on Saturday nights. The blues got us talking and ensued in an evening adventure to Fells Point to try to find the movie Blues Brothers 2000 at The Soundgarden because Andrew had never seen it. No luck. It wasn't on Netflix streaming either, so we finally found we could rent it for three bucks on iTunes. Not the best movie in the world, but definitely entertaining and a stellar line-up of blues performers.



8. I caved. Last weekend while at Target to pick up a few things I bought some supplies for school. I knew that if I didn't get my dollar packs of Crayola markers now, there wouldn't be any left when I actually wanted to go back to school shopping. I recently saw a statistic that said that in the year 2011, teachers spent on average $631 from their own pocket on school supplies. Sad, but true. I usually spend about that much... ugh.

9. With only a few weeks left of summer break, I've been dying to get out and do some traveling. Unfortunately, we didn't plan any trips for this summer because we're saving money and Andrew is saving vacation days for two bigger trips in the next year and a half. Next summer we're planning on a road trip out west for two weeks and the following Christmas (or maybe Spring Break 2013 depending on timing) we're planning on meeting my parents in southern France for about 10 days. It's a trip we've been talking about and planning for quite some time. But I still want to get out and about, so I'm thinking of planning a few day trips for the next two weekends instead.

10. My summer indulgence has been Honest Tea. They are all organic bottle iced teas of all sorts of flavor varieties. I was first introduced to these at my mom's bakery quite some time ago-- she would sell them along with her lunches and such. Recently I discovered them at a few of the grocery stores I frequent, so they have been my little treat for the summer. My current favorite flavor is Pearfect White Tea.

What have you been indulging in this summer?