Saturday, December 11, 2010

New Obsession

I was always curious how bloggers did style boards. It seemed like a lot of work in microsft paint, but shows how much I know about the internet world of design! Well, I came across a contest to win a $500 gift certificate to my favorite store, Anthropologie, and I had to at least try. The contest directed me to a site called Polyvore, which is a little gift from heaven!

This is what I made for the contest, which was to pick items from Anthropologie and create a holiday outfit. There have been 5,000 entries in four days this contest has been going on, so I'm sure I am low on my chances, but it was really fun to create and I will surely share more of my projects from that site.
Lastly, if you didn't catch the reference of the phrase in my board, please listen to this song, it makes me teary eyed!

Tuesday, November 16, 2010

What is wrong with this picture?

I was browsing the daily discount emails I get on RueLaLa and came across a "sale" for a Birkin bag. For those of you without a mountain of money or those who don't watch Sex and the City, the Birkin bag is one of the most coveted purses in the fashion world. The bags have years of wait-lists to buy one and they sell for ridiculous prices.
I always knew they were expensive, but I didn't know how expensive. This is what I saw when I went to the "sale" website:



$19,000! And that is at a discounted rate! I had never actually checked the full price of these bags, so I went online to see what I could find. That is when I came across this:






They want $52,000 for a bag. Something I put my tampons and granola bar wrappers in. My favorite part of this though, is the advertising the seller used as an incentive. "Free Shipping!" Like someone out there is saying, "hmmm, I would buy this, but I really don't want to pay $12.50 for the handling fee."

Monday, November 8, 2010

Will Run for Chocolate and Fur Coats

This past weekend Jonathan and I ran our 15k by the lake in downtown Chicago. It was a Hot Chocolate themed event, so they gave us chocolate and fondue after the race. It sounded appealing at the time we signed up, but I could barely stomach the chocolate after the race!
A fellow Oak Parker that we know, Matt, ran in his wife's place, so we ran together until about mile 7. At this time my body said, "F-You! I didn't sign up to run in 40 degree weather!" So, the last two miles were a bit of a haul for me, but I still ran it in my personal best time at a pace of 9:59/ a mile. We were running at a 9:30 pace up until mile 7, but let's not talk about those dark 2 miles!
Excuse the grainieness of the picture, I jacked it off of the race photo site.

Jonathan was my momma kangaroo and supporter through the race, which was probably why I did so well. He had a hoodie with a front pouch on it, so I could strip down my clothing layers and he would store them until I needed them later. Mind you, he could run circles around me on this run, but he stayed with my pace and we finished together.

I also got an early Christmas present in the mail, due to a great find on Etsy.

Again, don't mind the orginal posting picture, I will have to update with one of my own.
It is a vintage fur capelet and I am in love! I don't count it as buying fur if it I'm buying it second-hand, but that's just my own logic.
 I have wanted something like this for a while now and it was a great price.

Busy week ahead of me. Found out I will be traveling to New York and Los Angeles/possibly San Francisco for work in the next month, so that should be fun and will give me more to blog about!

Wednesday, November 3, 2010

Halloween Weekend and other stuff that has been keeping me from the Internets

Oh, hi there. Work has vastly picked up for me, as there have been many events in the past few months. Also, it isn't slowing down!
At the encouragement and help of Mairead, I wanted to post a recipe of these AMAZING cupcakes that I had the chance to make this last weekend. They take some time, but are soooo worth it.

Salted Caramel Cupcakes:


Here is the recipe I worked off of:

For a first time made-from-scratch cupcake baker, the directions were simple enough. It gives you directions for the cake, the frosting, and the filling (yes, salted caramel filled)!
The best advice I can give if you decide to make these is make the filling and icing first, as they will need time to cool in about the time it will take to make the cakes.

Another great thing happened this weeked: The question was finally answered if Sham would look like Jonathan if he grew a beard and had curly hair:


The answer is Yes! Very much so!






At one point, Sham had his back turned to me and I kept saying "Jonathan, Jonathan," to get his attention.
Please also notice the half-way ninja turtles costume. I had pants, but they were cut from a child's sized costume and might have been inaapropriate for climbing in!

To complete my overachieving halloween celebration, I spent a ridiculous amount of time carving a pumpkin for our building's contest:



It had a mohawk and press-on tattoos! I was pretty proud, but got won out by this:


Stupid Chilean miners, who even thinks of that?!
Kind of funny though that they used chilies. Also, it is hard to see from this angle, but I believe they used a lit-up bong as the tube to get from the top of the box to the pumpkin-mine.
Oh well, I will have to use my political wit and Fedex boxes to try and win next year.


Friday, September 17, 2010

Can't stop listening to this

Fierce. That is all I can say.

Tuesday, September 14, 2010

Moral Dilemma of the Day



I just so happen to be in charge of registering the CEO of my absolute favorite store, Anthropologie, for an event at work and I now have his personal email address.


Do I :

A) Send him a very long love letter, sharing with him all of the beautiful thoughts that his stores inspire me to have.

B) Cut to the chase and ask him for free clothes in my size

C) Spam him with eHarmony and OkCupid emails

D) respect his privacy and do nothing (lame)

I am tempted to post his picture on here that we have, but afraid of getting sued by my own office. Probably not the best idea.
However, I googled the store and couldn't help but post a few great pictures that I found of some of the interiors. Heaven.



Let's all say a word of thanks for the glorious Poms, as they were a beautiful addition to the wedding.




Oh Anthropologie, you have my heart, but you can never fully have my wallet. Please stop being sooo expensive.

Tuesday, August 31, 2010

Officially Obsessed

I haven't mentioned it yet, but I have been fasting with Jonathan for Ramadan. For those who don't know, Ramadan is a 30 day fast, where you do not eat from sun-up (around 4:30am) to sun-down(around 7:30pm). Surprisingly, after the first 10 days you get pretty used to it.
However, this does not stop me from having really obsessive thoughts about delicious food. I was thinking of all of the amazing treats we had in Spain on our honeymoon and have spent the last 45 minutes trying to find a particular recipe of a dish, as I am now pretty sure the restaurant made up on their own.
This obsession is also relevant to the fact that we will be going back to Texas tomorrow for a long weekend. I should be thinking of ways to spend time with all of my loved ones, but mostly, I have been carefully planning out where I want to go for every meal!
So, as I have no better things to do on my "lunch" break, let's take a gastronomical journey through our honeymoon. 

Breakfast


This is pretty much what I ate every morning we were in Mallorca for a week. Goat cheeses of various textures with fresh bread.

In the city, we went for the old standby of cafe con leche and croissants. Not pictured is the even more amazing chocolate croissant that is always an upgraded choice!


Morning Snack



Raspberry Chocolate Tart. duh.

Lunch


No, not my hamberguesa, that was Jonathan's and it was the size of his head and it had a fried egg on it! Scary.
I opted for the "bocadillo" sandwich with jamon serrano and a semi-firm cheese. Also, seen here is a staple of my Spanish diet, Coca Cola Lite. Not to be mistaken for Diet Coke, Coca Cola Lite is a-mazing and I even managed to smuggle back a six-pack, which I rationed out carefully to myself.
Those patatas bravas in the middle of us were also much better than the ones I've had before, as the sauce really makes it a hit-or-miss item.

OR

This, my friends, is THE meal.  Jonathan was the smarter of us and order the elusive dish that I cannot find on the internets ANYWHERE!
It was a baked fish with delicious seasoning on a bed of french fries. And, I'm pretty sure I'm not imagining things, but I believe there was a fried egg in between the fish and the fries.
My fresh pasta with crazy amounts of cheese was a pretty good contender, but could not surpass the dish of awesomeness.
To accompany, Mallorcan aioli, olives, and bread.
Oh yeah, and wine. Let's not forget the wine.

Afternoon Snack



Churros and Hot Chocolate. Double Duh.

Dinner

We didn't get a lot of dinner pictures, but we did end up making quite a few of our dinners at our cottage, which was really fun.






Everything was so good and the main reason I want to go back is to eat. My fat kid heart is on my sleeve today, if you couldn't tell.

Tuesday, August 24, 2010

Ceremony Pictures

I had promised a while back that I would eventually post a little bit of the wedding photos. I already posted the preperation shots, so we are moving on to the ceremony. And can I just say again how much I loved our photographer. A-mazing.



Short,sweet, and overdue post, but I still love to look at these photos!