Interior designer Emily Johnson Larkin started blogging in 2007 as a creative outlet. Then House Beautiful and Elle Decor magazines listed it as one of their favorite blogs.

The 105,000-square-foot JCPenney store at Timber Creek Crossing includes a Sephora boutique, and it opens Sept. 30.

Sephora will hand out gift bags to the first 450 shoppers that day.

Plano-based JCPenney linked up with LMVH-owned Sephora to offer the store-within-a-store concept in 2006 in an effort to draw young female shoppers.

That’s the interesting tidbit I learned in the DMN’s profile of the new Sam’s store that opens today at Northwest Highway and Skillman. (The story is behind the paper’s paywall.) Sam’s has 600 U.S. locations, and the store at Park Lane (now closed in favor of this Timbercreek store) was the top wine seller.

Apparently, so much wine flies off the shelves at Sam’s that the company constructed a separately owned liquor store (separate to meet TABC rules). Hard to know if the large amount of wine sales there was due to the formerly oddball wet/dry regulations in these parts, but that issue has been addressed and every grocery and convenience store worth its plastic bags is or will be selling booze shortly. We’ll see if Sam’s still retains its mammoth wine ranking next year.

Also new from the Park Lane move — more high-priced luxury items like shirts and watches. You can check it out for yourself starting today.

Meanwhile, I noticed that the overall site plan (in addition to Sam’s, Walmart and JCPenney) calls for a Chick-fil-A and a Del Taco. We’re starting to see plenty of Chick-fil-As around here, but a Del Taco? Turns out the Observer says a franchisee plans to open about 80 stores in the Dallas area, where now there is one in Arlington, one in Denton, and that’s about it.

I don’t know anything about Del Taco, but who doesn’t need access to another fast-food Mexican joint?

This mom takes her kids and friends to a local dumpster to search for discarded coupon inserts.

So, you step out to grab the Sunday paper from its usual spot on your lawn, but, it’s not there. You figure it’s just some delivery glitch, so later that morning you pick one up at the grocery store, but it’s a little light. Something’s missing. Could be you have a coupon junkie in your neighborhood.

My mom loves coupons. She keeps them in a little box and often brags to me about how she saved $4 on shampoo or some such. Sure she had to buy four  20 oz. bottles of the stuff (mind you, between her and my dad, there is only one full head of hair in the house) but she saved FOUR friggin’ dollars! But my mom’s frugality focused mind would be totally blown by today’s coupon clippers — the practice has become an art, a sport, and, of course, the subject of a reality TV show — TLC  just announced a second season, beginning Sept. 28, of Extreme Couponing.

I’ve watched the show, and shopping with a book of painstakingly organized coupons, and executing a plan to get $300 worth of groceries without spending a dollar does seems like a fun game, though I cannot imagine putting a cashier through the rigmarole in which the self -proclaimed coupon queens apparently revel.

These truly extreme couponers are obsessive, addicted and kind of like hoarders, only way more organized. They can get downright rude and annoying — see for yourself: check out this clip from the show — and might even resort to stealing newspapers from yards or sections of newspapers from stores, or digging through trash cans, according to a recent USA Today story. You’ve been warned — get your morning paper first-thing, because these extreme couponers get up early, and as Extreme(ly witchy) Couponer Michelle, in the above-linked preview told some poor guy after she cleared the shelf of Power Bars, “early bird gets the worm.”

(To be fair, there are serious and ambitious coupon clippers, penny pinchers and savers out there who follow a code of ethics and who do not steal and pillage to save a few bucks).

Houston-based liquor store Spec’s is building its first store in the Dallas market, and it’s just outside our neighborhood.

We mused about locations for Spec’s earlier this week. But Escape Hatch Dallas got the scoop: Spec’s is taking the former Toys R Us space at Walnut Hill and Central.

Spec’s is more than just liquor, beer and wine. It’s like Sigel’s crossed with the cheese and olive section at Whole Foods. The stores feature delis, and they sell cigars, gift items and glassware.

We know Trader Joe’s is coming to Dallas, but where?

A story in the September Lake Highlands Advocate explores the state of retail development in that neighborhood.

Some Lake Highlands residents in the last couple of months put vast amounts of energy (and probably some money for signage and such) into landing a Trader Joe’s at Lake Highlands Town Center — campaigning, setting up Facebook pages and organizing petition-signing events — but a spokesperson basically told our reporter Meghan Riney that all the wooing, rallying and Facebook ‘liking’ in the world won’t affect Trader Joe’s decisions.

Some reliable real estate experts speculated a while ago to reporter Keri Mitchell that Trader Joe’s would most certainly begin its Dallas occupation in Preston Hollow.

Deep-throat Trader Joe’s informants reportedly told Teresa Gubbins of Pegasus News that a Preston Hollow location is a “done deal”. They also told her that a rumored Greenville Avenue location ain’t going to happen (which our Jeff Siegel has actually reported time and again), and they confirmed (as did the official Trader Joe’s spokesperson on record to us) that no Lake Highlands locations are planned.

However, if said sources are accurate, Lake Highlands is in luck, because the location they are naming is just across the expressway from Lake Highlands at Walnut Hill west of Central.

Mind you, not everyone thinks Trader Joe’s is all that great, and East Dallas already has some great grocers — Central Market, Whole Foods, Newflower and Natural Grocers, to name a few.

While food trucks, those incubators of independent restaurants, are all the rage in some cities, here in our neighborhood is another kind of truck.

This month, news and updates from La Calle Doce, Cowboy Chicken, Alligator Café and more …

Used computer donations are finding new life at a neighborhood resale shop.

ZZ Top's Billy Gibbons will be here in September to welcome the neighborhood's new liquor store.

The Sam’s Club store on Park Lane, which is moving to the new double-decker Walmart/Sam’s store in Timbercreek Crossing, already sells beer and wine. But the new Sam’s, at Skillman and East Northwest Highway, will also sell liquor.

We didn’t know until today, when we received a press release regarding an appearance from ZZ Top’s Billy Gibbons to promote a brand of tequila, that the Walmart company was even in the liquor business. Since it’s Sam’s Club, which is known for selling 50-oz. jars of mustard and the like, we wondered if they would be selling kiddie pools of gin or something. But no, it seems Sam’s Club liquor store sells regular-size bottles.

If you’re interested in seeing guitar legend and Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductee Billy Gibbons, his appearance is from 1-4 p.m. Saturday, Sept. 10, which is the day of the store’s grand opening. He will be signing bottles of Pura Vida Tequila.