Hi there! I’m Mackenzie from Design Darling and I’m excited to be taking over In Honor of Design for the day! I decided to share with you a big part of my job as an online boutique owner — finding new products to roll out every couple weeks! It’s so important to be constantly refreshing my assortment and getting people excited about new goodies.
Here are some of the new arrivals for the month of May! I opened my boutique Design Darling in March and have tried to roll out a small batch of new arrivals every couple weeks. That means staying on top of potential new vendors, photographing and editing new items as they come in, and keeping track of everything once it’s here! It’s a lot of work but the satisfaction of seeing new items up on the site — and customers’ photos of how they’re using the items in their homes, parties, and weddings! — never fails to make my day. You can shop all the new arrivals here and I hope you’ll come say hi over on my blog! Thanks Anna for having me! xx
As you know, I go crazy when I find a new affordable and stylish boutique:)
You all are going to love all the goodies over at Deloom! In honor of Mother’s Day, Deloom is offering a giveaway today with prizes for TWO winners! The first prize winner will receive a $50 shopping spree to spend at Deloom.com! The second prize winner will receive a beautiful scarf and earring set! Giveaway is open to International Readers. Have fun and best of luck!
We are trying out Rafflecopter which is a new and very easy way to enter giveaways. (Should be much easier for those of you without blogger profiles. You just need an email address to enter!) You can earn multiple entries as specified below. Also, if you already follow IHOD you can still earn those entries!
I was asked to be a part of a series Monica and Whitney put together called “The Amazing Lace.” This dress is traveling from city to city, blogger to blogger, and we are all adding our own style twist to it. I felt it was time to get festive and go Cinco de Mayo-ish. Head over to check the fun crew it will be traveling to! I am sending it to Melissa next:)
Hope you all had a fun weekend! Once gain, thank you for being real with me in Saturday’s post, and all your wonderful feedback. Working through responding to each of you. Looking forward to keeping it real here on IHOD;)
P.S. Get your outfit posts ready this week! Will host the monthly TBF post next Monday!
Part of the reason I started this series was due to a few comments I had from other bloggers that eluded to the fact that they thought I must have the perfect life. What?! Hold the phone. No one has a perfect life. I realized it was time to get REAL and CHAT about real life topics. This theme seems to be floating around the blogosphere, and I was so thankful that Jess Constable wrote this post, which inspired Ez’s “Things I’m Afraid to Tell You” Challenge. I hope you can take the time to visit a few of the incredible women pulling back the curtain to some of their real life challenges.
I started this blog as a creative outsource for me, and it remains such. My goal is to inspire and uplift. I tend to think people don’t like to read about dirty laundry when they have their own to deal with. For me, I gravitate torwards friendships that leave me with a smile, uplift the spirit, encourage, or inspire creativity. Its the same when I choose which blogs to read. However, I think sometimes, as we talked about last week, there can be too much of a good thing. You start to believe crazy things like you MUST have a big bouquet of pink peonies on your table at all times, that your kids should have white fur rugs in their room, and that you should a closet full of DVF and Christian Louboutins. Sometimes, instead of being inspired, we start to compare. So now its my turn to break down some of those false ideas you might have about me and my life…
1) I am not very domestic. I tend to lean towards meals with 5 ingredients only. I am terrible at deep cleaning. My husband does a better job cleaning the kitchen than I do. I do laundry only once a week. The thought of having to fold more than a few baskets a week makes me want to hide. If you open my drawers, they are messy. I have a messy art mind. The majority of the time if you knocked on my front door, I would be running around picking up toys before I answered.
2) Sometimes as I am working, my kids are running around me in circles! I will have a little one at my feet, and my toddler begging me to play a game with him. I am blessed to be able to work at home with my kids, but it also can give me so much guilt of being home, but not being able to give them all the time I want to. I want to be able to be 100% there for them. Someday…
3) I am a graphic designer and a blogger. I love both. However, I will never love them more than my children. This is why the above can be is so hard for me at times. I actually can’t wait for the day I can be a full time stay at home mama. Many women have great ambitions with their careers. Mine is simply to pay off student loans and medical debt so that I can be closer to my children. My husband is an incredible teacher. We have decided together that it is what he is meant to do, and we make the financial sacrifice for it. We both work hard to pay our debt off, and this is why I work. We are blessed to have a wonderful marriage though, so I would rather have the struggle of finances.
4) I blog often about products and fashion….all of which I genuinely love, but in reality I am a curator for others. I only allow myself to buy a few things per month. The rest goes towards bills. As you know from my outfit posts, I get creative. I thrift, re-purpose, and pull from all the amazing clothes I still have from when I worked at J. Crew;) I buy all my kids clothes from a consignment store. By creating style boards and featuring favorite product finds, I feel as though I can get it out of my system without having to buy:) There’s my secret.
5) My house is not fully decorated….its not even fully furnished. Since the move, we are taking one room at a time, and adding furniture piece by piece. I do not have the interior design gift. It takes me forever to figure out how I want to style a room, and because of this I have blank walls everywhere but my family room and spare room. We are renting our home and hope to someday buy some land and settle near our family.
I could keep this list going, but I applaud you for reading this far. I hope you can relate in some way, and know that every person always has a struggle, and no one has a perfect life. We have that ability to encourage each other and help each other through these topics, and that is why I am choosing to be vulnerable with you! It actually felt really good to write it all out;) My blog will always be a reflection of what I love, and I will always seek to uplift and inspire, because that is what makes it worth it for me. But now you know a little more of the who behind all the pretty:)
Okay time to wrap it up….my daughter just dumped a whole bottle of water on the carpet….
If you are up for it, write your own “Things I’m Afraid to Tell You” post & link it with Jess and Ez!
I could play with pattern and color all day long:)
These were a few looks that stood out to me this week!
Hope you have a fantastic Cinco de Mayo weekend ahead! Don’t forget to tune in tomorrow for the REAL CHAT post! I will be participating in Ez’s challenge“Things I’m afraid to Tell You.”
I admit I was a little excited to have an excuse to play around with some new photoshop elements and fonts:) I designed these prints for you to use this Mother’s Day if you are in need of a note card, post card, or gift to give! They are 5 x 7 in. and you can download and print for free! Print on nice paper, cut out, and add to some textured paper for a thoughtful card or just frame as a print! These are designed so that you can give to a friend, MIL, or someone who just deserves a thoughtful note.
Coral red dress on a Spanish patio, while drinking a class of Sangria? Yes please! Who wants to join me?? Sometimes, its fun to dream, but rest assured, everything I post here is for inspiration and creativity only. My life is most certainly not always a dream. I have been talking about this subject a good deal with bloggers. That is why I started the Real Chat series. Ez of Creature Comforts is starting a series tomorrow on the topic of sharing the real and the not so pretty with readers. I suggest you tune in! You won’t want to miss!
* P.S. I want to hear your suggestions for topics on the new Real Chat series! What do you want to discuss? I have some wonderful guests lined up to share with you as well! Shoot me your ideas:)
