Miss Alyssa

hey hey HEY!

2011-01-11T21:27:00.001-08:00

Have you ventured on over to my new blog yet? Please please please do if you haven't yet, I miss you - I promise! :)

New Blog!

2011-01-01T11:27:00.000-08:00

A few of you already know, but I've been working on a new blog and am officially switching over today, yay!

So please head over to my new space, Woodland Dreams, and update your bookmarks, readers, and all that exciting stuff :)

I won't be posting here anymore; maybe just a reminder or two to head on over to my new blog.

See you there!

xoxoxo.

Reflection

2010-12-31T12:11:00.000-08:00

Wow, this year has really flown by, it must have been all the wedding stuff going on. I hope the next year slows down a little. I wanted to go through all my photos from the past year and choose some of my favorites/favorite memories from each month. Enjoy!

January: We got engaged last year on Christmas Eve, but had some amazing engagment pictures taken on January by my super awesome buddy Colleen.

February: We got to play in the snow a bit, I love this one of Sadie!

March: We continued with our many home renovations by painting our old kitchen cabinets black and additing hardware. It made such a huge change! Which reminds me, I still need to share our new wood flooring.

April: I got to hang out with some of my bestest friends. Oh, how I wish we lived on the same street, even the same town would be nice!

May: My adorable niece turned ONE! And 7 months later, she looks SO much different from this photo, it's amazing. I love being an aunt!

June: 2010 was the year of weddings, the first wedding of the year was one my closest/oldest friends. It was small and sweet and great to see other people in your lives so happy and in love.

July: My birthday month! Chris took me to Disneyland for my birthday (first time he had ever been there!) and we spent the weekend in SoCal. I had just purchased my camera so I got to mess with it a lot, which was way fun.

August: Chris and I had also never been camping together, and I hadn't been since I was a kid. We purchased EVERYTHING we needed for camping, found a random campsite a few hours away, way way way up in the mountains, packed up our dogs and had a great time. The closest store ended up being an hour way. It was an adventure to say the least ;)

September: Wedding #2 of the year, was my cousin's, who is the same age as me - and they had been dating the exact same time as Chris and I (almost to the day) they got engaged a couple weeks before us and got married a month before us.

October: So much stuff in October! But obviously our wedding was the best part. There's so many photos I love; but this is one of our ceremony and I ADORE this moment.

November: My family took a little hike, and it's actually where Chris and I got engaged - we hadn't been there since so that was kind of neat :) The scenery was amazing; I picked a bunch of these little red flowers and took them home and put them in a vase.

December: Christmastime is my favorite time of year! Everything about it. This is just a sweet memory from Christmas eve, my aunt had some sparklers left over from my other cousin's wedding (wedding #3, which was in November) so we took them out and dance around the streets with them. SO much fun.

I hope you had a lovely year, and that 2011 is even better! I have something exciting to share tomorrow, I've been working on a new blog and I hope you all will join me there :)

RIP iPod

2010-12-27T10:39:00.000-08:00

So Chris got me a new little toy for Christmas this year, a hd Zune! I am beyond excited to retire my old iPod for this little guy. It has a lot of things my old iPod did not (internet, touch screen, apps, etc), and the Zune software is much better iTunes (which I had a hate-hate relationship with, hah!). I haven't really use it much yet because I mostly listen in the car and we just ordered a FM transmitter and holder thingy for my car that should come this week. But so far, it's awesome! I'm a bit of a tech nerd sometimes :)

So do you guys have any new music suggestions? I have kind of an ecclectic taste but generally I listen to the same 5 bands/artists and that gets old after a while :)

Oh yeah, hope everyone had an awesome Christmas! We had such an FUN time with our families and making/eating yummy foods. Good times, kind of sad it's already done and over with.

Merry Christmas

2010-12-24T08:12:00.001-08:00

Our little Christmas card this year :)

Hope you all have a wonderful Christmas! We're looking forward to spending some more time with family tonight and tomorrow. We have an annual Polish feast every Christmas Eve, and I'm pretty sure it's the best tradition ever! (pierogies & other yummy Polish foods, drinks, peppermint ice cream pie, singing Christmas carols...eeee!).

Oh and before it's too late to share these, we went to an ugly Christmas sweater party a few weeks ago and I wanted to share some photos!

Cheeseballs in front of the fake tv fire.

Fun props.

Yummy dessert table. I made those eggnog shortbread puddings in the mason jars...so good!

Chris and I - you love my vest? Sears special! Hah!

Crafty Christmas: Goodies & Cards

2010-12-20T21:06:00.001-08:00

I haven't been able to get enought of Christmas lately! Our house is all decorated, and it makes me happy :) Maybe later this week I'll share some more decor around (and outside!) our house. I've been doing a bit of baking for a few Christmas parties I went to recently. One was a cookie swap, where each girl had to bring 5-dozen cookies. It was also a contest to see who made the prettiest and yummiest cookie. Although I didn't win (I totally should have!!! bitter much?), I wanted to share what I baked because they are sooooooooooo delish!

I made Salted Caramel Chocolate Cookies, recipe found here. I've been obsessed with salted caramel goodies for a while, sipping on salted caramel hot chocolate, and I've even made cupcakes.

This was my little cookie setup at the cookie swap party:

I totally forgot to take a photo of the inside of the cookies, but if you check out the recipe you can see it's filled with a carmely suprise in the middle :) They were awesome, and pretty, if I do say so myself. Which I do.

I also wanted to share how I am hanging our Christmas cards this year:

I just took some green and red yan and twisted them together, and used some push pins to secure them to the wall. Cards are being held to the yarn with the cutest mini clothes pins (from Michaels). Last year I just taped the cards to the wall, and I like this a whole lot better!

toasty

2010-12-16T21:43:00.001-08:00

I havent written a random blog post in quite a while! I'm currently sitting on my couch next to a warm fire that smells absolutely amazing, while making some Christmas gifts and watching Brew Masters. have you seen the show? its pretty interesting how the whole process works and how scientific brewing beer is. anyways...i had a long, tedious day at work and my brain is fried so it feels amazing right now to relax. im looking forward to this weekend and a weather forecast of RAIN for the next 5 days :)

On Portland Being Awesome

2010-12-14T19:30:00.000-08:00

I can't remember if I had mentioned it here or not (I probably did, who am I kidding..because Portland is awesome!), but after we got married we went on a little trip up to the beautiful Northwest. Our first stop was Portland. Chris and I have been dying to go to Oregon and Washington for the past few years because we both see it as somewhere we just NEED to live (asap). So our "mini-moon" was a perfect time to go! We flew from Bakersfield to Portland (which was awesome..not a fan of having to fly out of LA) the Tuesday after our wedding - and spent the first 3 days of our trip in Portland.

We stayed in downtown Portland in a super adorable hotel called Hotel Modera. This was our view from the 5th floor room:

That was our room! It was super cute and stylish!

Best part? There were outdoor firepits on the patio. And since the hotel has a fabulous restaurant as part of it, we were able to eat and drink out by the fire (luckily for us, it wasn't raining!). It was just perfect.

This was our rental car, I felt so gangster driving it!

One day we drove about 30 minutes (or more?) west of Portland, along the river, and stopped at a bunch of different waterfalls, a fish hatchery, some parks, and a dam.

Multnomah falls.

Chris was kind enough to pose next to a gigantic fish :)

Spawning salmon.

Bonneville dam.

We spent the rest of the time trying to find the best restaurants, breweries, bakeries, coffee shops, stores, etc. to go to! Luckily we have friends in Portland who were able to hang out with us for a bit and take us to some neat place. Here are a few of my favorite places we went:

Deschutes was rad, from the decor to the beer. Their food was AMAZING - I wanted to try so many things, but alas, we could not. We had some beer samples and I got a large glass of the Black Butte XXI. Oh and their sweet potato fries are a must!

We also did some shopping, hit up Powell's bookstore, Pearl Bakery (where we saw this lady), VooDoo Doughnut, and this adorable Anthro store!

Another place we had breakfast that I just cannot forget, Slappy Cakes. All you need to know is from the picture below. Mmmmmmmmmmmmm.

Awww, this post made me really miss our trip! Portland/Oregon was pretty amazing and I was SO sad when we had to leave! I cannot wait to go back and explore more (and have more Stumptown coffee)

Next up, Seattle!

Christmas Cheer

2010-12-09T21:00:00.000-08:00

I can't get enough of this time of year...

My niece during some family photos, she's so CUTE! I love being an aunt.

Some cute deer; at a local zoo that put Christmas lights all over the park for the holidays.

I love this little penguin! I think we got it last year.

Oh, and Tundra wishes you a Merry Christmas. She's very amused, as you can tell!

Wedding Wednesday: S'more Bar

2010-12-08T08:00:00.000-08:00

It didn't show up in most of our wedding pictures because it was dark & late once we all got to it, but we actually had a s'mores bar at our wedding! Our venue had a GIGANTIC fire pit, and so we took advantage of it.

Our bar included baskets of:
-Marshmallows (regular, strawberry & chocolate/white swirl)
-Graham crackers (regular, cinnamon & chocolate)
-Chocolate (milk chocolate, dark chocolate & cookies 'n cream bars)

We also purchased some actual smore's sticks so our guests didn't have to forage in the woods for sticks, hah ;)

Here's some photos I found around the web for a little wedding s'mores inspiration. It can actually be really fun and even look super cute!

Love the various homemade mallows!

Don't have a fire pit? Look at those little burners! So cute!

I also found a great tutorial for making s'mores kit as a wedding favor here, super adorable!

Gettin' Pretty

2010-12-07T15:00:00.000-08:00

I'm not too huge of a makeup person, generally I've used the same products for a while and don't really change it up too much. Ever since I was around 17 or 18 I used Bare Escentuals foundation, because liquid foundations always made me break out and it just didn't work for my oily skin. I've tried a few different foundations in those years, not because the BE doesn't work well..it's pretty good, but it is soooo messy! So when it came time to find some wedding makeup, I knew I needed to amp up my makeup bag a bit. A friend of mine suggested Make Up For Ever, so I went down to Sephora and asked about it. I bought their foundation as well as their primer. Generally I'm not a big fan of spending a ton of money on makeup either (I love you Sephora, but my bank account does not!). But, I I have also purchased a few other things that I am currently in love with.

So here is my current makeup regimen, and I am loving it!

Make Up For Ever HD Primer. Bought this for wedding makeup and am still using it every day! It works fantastically.

Make Up Forever HD Foundation. Again, bought to use as wedding makeup and I think I have officially made the swap from Bare Escentuals to this liquid makeup. I don't have to use that much, it feels light, doesn't make my face all greasy, and lasts all day. Since it's pricey, I'll probably try to find some better deals on Ebay maybe?

BE Mineral Veil. Used after foundation application, I've always used this and I love it.

I've purchased Benefit's Bad Gal mascara a few times in the past, but I don' usually spend the money on it (I usually buy the regular old pink & green Maybelline mascara at Target). I'm currently using the waterproof version this mascara, which I like because it actually lasts ALL day.

Plixi Endless Silky Eye Pen in Black Cocoa. I am SO glad I picked up this eyeliner, it's AMAZING. As the name suggests, it's silky and goes on easily & is also easy to fix if you mess up - AND it lasts all day. My normal cheap eyeliner tends to melt off towards the end of the day. Plixi is sold at Target, and I was just looking for something different (I've always used black pencil eyeliner for my everyday look), so I am glad I tried this beauty.

Benefit Coralista blush. Although I did purchase this as part of my wedding makeup, I'm using it every day and I think the color is perfect for a lot of skin tones.

Crafty Christmas: Book Covers

2010-12-06T20:58:00.000-08:00

So! It's December and I'm sure everyone has been busy decorating for Christmas, right? I'm sure there are even those crazy people that started in November. Yes, you. ;) I've been doing a lot of little, easy, DIY projects around the house and this is one of them.

I have a bunch of old books around the house that I use for decor, because they are so cute and I just love the look. But, they don't really go with holiday decorations. So I came up with this little idea. Remember in school when you had to cover your text books so they wouldn't get so torn up during the year? It's basically that, but cuter. Have fun!

What you need:

Some books. Scissors. Tape (if needed). Holiday wrapping paper, or any wrapping paper that goes with your theme. I even used some holiday paper grocery bags.

For each book, lay out some paper, put your book on top and measure how much paper you will need to cover it. Leave 1-2 inches excess paper off all edges. Then cut out your book cover piece.

Now that you have your cover piece, you'll need to fold over the top and botton edges of the cover just to match up the top-to-bottom length of your book, as shown below.

Then position your book so it's fairly centered on your paper. Fold the overlap of the front cover side of the book and make a crease. Then insert the book edge into the "pouch" created by the overlap paper. See image below. Repeat for the back cover. Use tape to secure any pieces of paper that just won't stay tucked.

Repeat for as many books as you see fitting! I covered all my books that weren't really Christmas colors :)

The brown paper is from a Trader Joes bag, btw.

Hope you enjoyed this little DIY!

Cell Phone Love

2010-12-01T21:55:00.001-08:00

I always love when bloggers post random photos they take on their cell phones. so I though I'd share some from the past month or so; a little winter love going on around here :)

Oh my sweet Sadie, that face is to die for!

I baked these little heart shaped pocket pies...they are SO adorable! And they were yummy too!

A Christmas wreath I made the other day...which I need to fix because some of the balls fell off and broke :(

New Starbucks cups! Even better? A discounted cup!

Oh I also baked the most awesome applie pie ever. I used this recipe: Vanilla Bean Roasted Apple Pie. I've never made a pie so pretty! Actually I have only made a couple pies..soooo uh, not hard to top that :) (PS, I love my new pie dish from Williams Sonoma..its adorable & will hopefully last forever!)

I reused these letters from our wedding decor for some home decor. The red deer is from a very sweet friend, and just happens to match just perfect with all the Christmas decor!

Uh yeah..so I bake a lot...and I eat a lot, and like to take pictures of food :) These were my attempt at making The Best Lemon Cupcakes of All Time. And, they were.

Chris and I have been really into beer the past few months, a lot of craft beer and seasonal beer. Yummy.

We got a record player for a wedding gift (yay!) and I purchased a new Christmas album from my fav, Dustin Kensrue :) So good!

His & hers mugs we purchased on our honeymoon (from Anthro!). Love.

Wedding Wednesday: Some Details

2010-12-01T15:20:00.001-08:00

I'm going to start blocking out Wednesdays for wedding posts, some DIYs from our wedding and such. I think it'll be a weekly feature for me, as I have had some friends ask me to help them with designing their weddings! Yippeeeee!

Our wedding was featured yesterday on Love & Lavendar, which is a super adorable wedding blog I wish I had been reading months ago! There's some great photos of some of the things I made for our wedding.

I wanted to share how easy it is to make your own chalkboard signs! For the table top signs, I bought some various sized pictures frames at places like Goodwill. I bought chalkboard spraypaint and simply sprayed a few coats on the glass part of the frame, and also bought a bronze colored spray paint and painted the actual frames (if needed). Super easy, and there's no real tricks to it..it's so simple. For the the large sign (which we used for our seating chart), I bought a cheap posterboard frame (with a coupon!) from Michaels. I ordered some chalkboard markers (like they use at Starbucks) in our wedding colors. I enlisted the help of my sister and her boyfriend to do the writing for the signs :)

Our other wedding signage were directional signs that were made from scrap wood that a friend gave to us. I gave the boys the job of putting them together. I think they actually stained them a darker color! Another friend of ours painted the wording on the signs.

Nature

2010-11-24T18:30:00.000-08:00

I have a draft of another wedding post sitting around, buuuut instead I wanted to share a few pictures of a little hike we did last weekend. We hiked up to the place where we got engaged, it was so pretty. I picked a bunch of those flowery things to add some pretty color inside my house :)

Hope you have a wonderful Thanksgiving, I truly am thankful for so much!

Ceremony Favorites

2010-11-18T10:00:00.000-08:00

We also had a short and sweet ceremony. Since it was so short we didn't really do much decorating at all. Not that anyone would need to, look out beautiful the scenery is!

I guess the flower girl (she's actually my cousin!) got a little scared and started running down the aisle. Those are white feathers in her basket - she didn't really throw them I don't think, hah!

This picture of my parents is sooo sweet.

I'd suggest you watch the video I made of the wedding to see more ceremony pics + music.

The bridal party walked down to Love and Some Verses by Iron and Wine, I walked down to Ingrid Michaelson's verson of Can't Helpt Falling In Love, and we walked out to New Soul by Yael Naim. I loooove all our wedding music, we put so much work into not only those songs but our entire playlist for the whole thing. I'll share more about that later too :)

Wedding Party Favs

2010-11-17T10:00:00.000-08:00

And here are some of my favorites of our wedding party. We had a super small group for our wedding party, I'm not really a fan of having half of my guests in my wedding party ;) Small and sweet is our style.

It also cracks me up how less photogenic guys are compared to girls!

Us: Favorites

2010-11-16T19:28:00.001-08:00

Here are some of my favorite wedding photos of Chris + Me (but really, honestly..wish I could post them all, there so many good ones. But I'm afraid you all would abandon me)

Video

2010-11-12T16:09:00.000-08:00

I made a little wedding video today with some of our pictures. Warning, it's actually 12 minutes long (hah). Make sure you have your sound on :)

I'll post more of my favorite pictures later!

Breakin' it Down: Wedding Prep

2010-11-10T13:13:00.000-08:00

Gosh I have so much to share! We already received our wedding photos from the most awesome Colleen {Color Me Rad}, and they are just so pretty and amazing! I want to share some of my favorites along with some details/DIY's over the next few weeks.

Enjoy this first batch of photos! :)

We did our makeup and hair at the little hotel we were staying in; it was quaint and kind of old fashioned, but super cute at the same time. My sister did my hair and my good friend Mallory did my makeup!

Mine & the bridesmaids bouquets, which I made.

After we were done getting ready, we headed to our wedding venue, River Ridge Ranch. They have these little "cabins" and we got dressed in the little bridal cabin. It was kind of fun, because we stayed in there while guests were arriving and there was a few little windows to peek out of and spy on people :)

My niece, she's such a cutie & loves the camera!

Dressed & zipped up - yay!

I was pretty relaxed all day. Really, the only time I was stressing out was the day prior, since our wedding was over an hour away we had to make sure we had everything done, and everything packed and there. We definitely had forgot a few things, and thankfully we had people still back in Bakersfield to bring them to us :) After that, it was kind of a piece of cake!

A little wedding diy: favors

2010-11-08T20:39:00.001-08:00

Alrighty! I am back in the blogging mode (I think), as I have tons of fun stuff to share both wedding and not wedding related. While I'm waiting to receive our official photos (this week, yipee!!!!), I wanted to share a DIY or two. I'm not kidding when I say we did everything ourselves for our wedding. And I am so glad we did. Everything turned out perfect, exactly our style.

I had a few different ideas for favors, but my sister and I came up with this great idea to use the many bags of coffee she has been able to accumulate from her job (helloooo Starbucks!). Each guest was able to take home a cute little bag of yummy Starbucks coffee, and oh, it smelled SO GOOD! You can do these easy favors for many other kinds of gatherings, too, and customize to your liking of course.

The VERY few things you'll need:

1. Muslin baggies. I used 4"x6", which held about a cup of coffee beans.

2. Alphabet/number stamps. I borrowed this rolling stamp from the lovely Morgan. An alphabet/number stamp set like this would be just as good.

3. COFFEE!

4. Stamp pad in your color of choice.

So as for the DIY, just use your stamps to decorate your bag! If you are doing a bulk amount, I recommend doing one word/line one each bag, then switching to the next word/line. (for example, I stamped "CHRIS" on all the bags, then switch to "ALYSSA", etc.).

I happend to find the cutest little coffee mug stamp among my Mom's stamp collection, it was PERFECT for this. Fee free to use any decorative stamps, or none at all. Here's some adorable little stamps that would be perfect. I also had to use a brown Sharpie to create the "+" sign and the hearts in between our wedding date.

After all of your stamping is done, fill each bag with coffee using some kind of funnel (I made a ghetto funnel out of paper so coffee beans could fit through easily). We used one cup ber bag.

And last of all, tie your baggies so you don't lose the coffee (because that would just be sad!). So,voila, your favor bags are done! They shouldn't take very long and they are oh so cute :)

Oh and the best part, I only spent about 20 bucks to create 75 favor bags since all I had to buy were the muslin bags and the stamp pad. Score!

Oh hi!

2010-11-02T21:19:00.000-07:00

We're married :) Just got back from our little honeymoon...more pictures and blogging soon!!!!

Photo from the lovely Colleen of Color Me Rad!

Hellooooo there!

2010-10-13T21:34:00.000-07:00

WOW, it's been way too long since my last post. Obviously, I've been a little busy. Between the wedding coming up in, oh. TEN DAYS (!!!!), and having our house all torn up for wood floor installation/bathroom remodel..it has been just a little crazy. We didn't even have our computers hooked up at home for almost a week (until last night), that sucked!

We had a co-ed wedding celebration this passed weekend, which was SO FUN! We did a Lumberjack & Jill theme, and my sister threw the party. Here are a bunch of fun pictures.

The food: mini corndogs, mozzarella sticks, jalapeno poppers, kettle corn..I'm probably forgetting something. All deliciously horrible for you, but like i said, DELICIOUS!

Oh and I made these s'more cupcakes, super last minute, but that's ok!

So, we had set up a few areas to take photos of everyone's attire, and the ohsoclever Talia came up with the idea to make some fun props....

Danielle & Rachel!

One of my most favorite things, I finally got to use my Instax more than just a photo here and there, so I scanned all the photos we took :) Here are some:

Ok that's all for now! It's almost 10pm and I still have like 30 DVR'd show to watch :) I hope to blog a few more times before the wedding. Weeeeeeeeeeeeee. TEN DAYS!!!!!!!

Random Thoughts

2010-09-24T12:31:00.001-07:00

Ack, I have been meaning to post all week but I feel like I don't have enough to say. First I wanted to thank you for all your comments about losing my kitty. I am still very sad, but better than the first few days. I would cry almost every time I went into my bedroom because that's where she hung out :-/

I had my bridal shower last weekend and had such a great time! It was my family and friends. Morgan, Jimaie, Steph & Sarah all drove down from out of town - which was super awesome! I just love my friends :) I was waiting to post about the shower until my aunt sents me photos (which she hasn't yet), but here are a couple that were on my camera.

Other than that, I am in full-force wedding planning mode. I've been ordering things for decor left and right the fast few weeks, so hopefully I will have all those things together soon! Only one month left as of yesterday, holy cow!

We are also having hardwood floors installed next week in our house. I am SUPER excited to get rid of our ugly white tile, I just hate it. It's a bit chaotic doing it right now since we have SO much going on, but I think it will be way worth it.

I am going to my cousin's wedding tomorrow, which I am super excited about! We have been dating our men for the exact same amount of time, got engaged within weeks of each other AND are getting married a month apart. And we are the same age, it's really weird! Unfortunately for them and the rest of us, its going to be in the HIGH 90's (!!!!) tomorrow & their wedding is outside. Hopefully it was be too bad.

Well that's about it, I think I am get strep throat or something...so that's AWESOME..not. :)

Have an awesome weekend!

Loss

2010-09-17T08:34:00.000-07:00

I've had a sad week. My sweet, adorable, loving, kitty is gone. I miss her so much. :( :( :( :( :(

My Uterus Hurts

2010-09-13T20:24:00.000-07:00

My weekend was filled with cute little girls....you can't tell me you don't love photos of random little kids you don't know! Yeah, that's what I thought :D

My niece is the happiest little gal ever, I adore her!

It was this little one's first birthday, she's my cousin's daughter. SO CUTE.

Sadly, it warmed up here a bit this weekend :( Otherwise, we got some much needed stuff done: bought out wedding bands (!) and picked out the guys' wedding tux's. Woot!

Did you have a good weekend?

Fresh Air

2010-09-08T23:08:00.000-07:00

This weekend we had a fun little trip up the mountains. After stopping by our wedding venue to take a looksie around, we headed up to about 7500' elevation to my grandparent's house in the mountains.

We had a great time just breathing the fresh air, relaxing, taking the dogs for walks. One morning we did a big hike up to a fire lookout WAY, way, way up on a mountaintop overlooking miles and miles of the Sequoia forest. So pretty.

This was our destination, although it probably took us 45 mins or so to even see this.

When we finally got up the the lookout, we had to climb these super scary stairs that were built up the side of huge mountainous rocks. Plus there was some wind. I didn't get many pictures of the stairs, needlesstosay.

We finally reached the top! The dogs even went!

The views were AMAZING. Seriously..you can see SO far away!

This little kitten lived up in the tiny lookout with a lady who worked there. Their space was SO small, maybe 12x12 - all they had was a bed and stuff to cook on, it seemed. Crazy.

A helicopter flew over us, they were taking supplies to the lookout.

Anyways, it was a nice little getaway and made for an awesome 3-day weekend. Although we were a bit bummed to leave and come home :) How was your weekend?

Wedding Love: Wood

2010-09-04T13:29:00.000-07:00

I have been adoring anything wedding that has to do with tree carvings. If you got one of our invitations you know what I'm talkin' bout! I came across a few Etsy shops that I'd probably buy everything from if I were rich. Here are some of my favorites:

{click to enlarge}

1. I have loved the stuff from Block Party Press' shop for a while, but the Wood You Love Me Necklace is catching my eye at the moment. You can get it personalized with you and your other half's initials and wedding date on the back side! Too cute. They also have matching cufflinks in the shop to match.

2. Blue Fabric Birds with Love Heart: I'm not sure if there is any cake topper more sweet than these two fabric birds. It's a little pricey at$93, I think I may try to make my own. I just love them too much!

3. I came across Rock Candy Vintage's shop a few days ago and I could literally purchase about 10 different items for our wedding. This Personalized Frame is a little "differen't" and I think it would be super cute at your wedding, and then used for decor at your home!

4. Another cake topper that I just adore, Love Birds with Tree and Nest. They are completely custom, and yet another thing you can use for decor/memorbilia in your home :)

5. How cute would these little Personalized Heart with Easels be if they were placed on all your wedding tables! Such a cute idea.

6. Wood Burned Bride & Groom Signs: I would use them for photo props and hanging in the back of our receptions chairs. I think they are super rad!

7. These teeny Personalized Birch Heart Magnets would make perfect wedding favors! Have them made with your initials and wedding date and voila!

8. I love stamps. And I really love this Tree Heart Stamp! You can use it in your wedding decor, stationary, etc. Plus, it lasts forever! :)

9. I love these Personalized Table Number Mason Jars as centerpieces. No seriously, I think I am going to make my own with some of those tags, so clever & rustic!

10. Wood Tree Slice Wedding Centerpiece: I also adore slices of wood as part of centerpieces. Having your initials carved into them is seriously so cute!

Hope you loved this stuff as much as I do, I wish I could have it all!! :)

The Blahs

2010-09-02T10:43:00.000-07:00

I've been struggling in recent months trying to find a balance. There are days and weeks when I am swamped at work, or so mentally tired from work that all I want to do is go home and do absolutely nothing. It's so draining! Most of the time I feel like I have zero energy, and it shows by my dirty, unorganized house, unkept yard, piles of dirty laundry everywhere, dogs in need of exersize, etc. Oh and also, things that I normally enjoy doing in my free time, like going for walks, taking the dogs out, crafting, my Etsy shop, blogging, reading blogs.

I feel so lame even complaining because I cannot imagine doing all of that plus having kids! Maybe it's the wedding planning that is added to that mess. Or the fact that I loathe summer and the heat makes me a grump.

So I am kind of looking for tips I guess. I feel like I am stuck in a rut. I am super happy and excited with wedding planning things, but everything else is such a mess it's sometimes hard to even BE excited about that. Just more things I have to add to my do-list. Do you guys ever feel like that? How do you have energy after a long day of draining work do get things done?

End rant! Thanks for reading my mess :) Hah!

Hooray!

2010-08-25T08:10:00.000-07:00

Hello to everyone stopping by from Freckled Nest, Leigh-Ann is super awesome and sweet! And you guys, are so lovely - thanks for all the comments thus far!

I'll take this moment to confess, I have a bit of an online shopping problem. I buy little random things online all. the. time. Ok, maybe not THAT much...but if I haven't received a package in the mail in a while, I get kind of sad! Here are a few things I've bought recently that I love:

This super cute ruffly dress from Delias. I bought it to wear to my cousin's bridal shower this weekend :) I think it needs a cute pair of yellow shoes, don't you?

I thought this plate thing was awesome! One, there's deer on it! Also, Chris is from Michigan. And the color of green is actually really pretty! I haven't found a spot for it yet (since our woodsy room is green, it really won't go there), but I kind of think it's awesome!

Yet another dress I just ordered from Modcloth :) I think it's so cute, I haven't received it yet so hopefully it's worth the money and looks good. I want to wear it to my bridal shower or maybe my cousins wedding. Hmmm...decisions, decisions!

This is actually a panel of fabric! I randomly came across it while fabric browsing, and I bought this panel and was thinking I could frame it for some wall art? I'm not sure what else I could do with it to display the whole thing, it's kind of large.

I found a super good deal on these beautiful Craspedia that you have probablly, like me, been seeing a lot of. I have wanted to incorporate them into our wedding since yellow is one of our colors. I ordered a bunch of them as a test to see how they look, and it far exceeded my expectations so I will definitely be ordering more :)

xoxoxo

randoms

2010-08-23T19:56:00.000-07:00

Some random thoughts and what not...

Putting wedding invites in the mail tomorrow!
Been working too much :(
...don't want to work!
My house is a mess...
...but I've been too busy to want to clean!
..I'm gross, apparently.
I miss my friends.
I wish I had time to craft, and work on my Etsy shop.
I'm ready to move.
I've been visiting Modcloth.dom daily.
I need to learn more about my camera.

So yeah, super exciting. That's all I've got now! Pizza time!

Camping!

2010-08-16T19:36:00.000-07:00

We've had a camping trip planned for a few months now, and it was this past weekend. We'd taken an extra day off work, and although there were some last minute changes in plans - we had a super great adventure :) Our weekend included:

Finding a closer place to camp the night before we left (originally planned for Yosemite)

Picking a random place to camp.

Packing way too many things we didn't use, lol.

Driving up to 8,000-foot elevation.

Super desolate dirt mountain roads.

Finding out there was nothing (stores, gas, etc) within an hour of the campground.

A stream running right next to our site.

And all this awesomeness

Only bad part, didn't see any deer, booo! :) Camping was totally satisfying and definitely worth the drooling I've been doing thinking about it for months!

Spray Paint Adventures

2010-08-08T13:50:00.000-07:00

I'm probably a little late to hop on the spray paint bandwagon. I've spray painted a few things, but nothing fancy or exciting. I found this cute key at Marshall's the other day and I love it but didn't love the color so much.

So I decided to grab some spray paint and transform it. I painted it a lovely shade of blue:

Found the perfect spot for it, right next to the door! And I actually JUST made the art above it...the space felt empty and I needed to fill it up. Luckily, I'd bought some embroidery hoops a few months ago and it fit the space perfectly. I made some flowers and added some pearls for a little cuteness.

And of course, I didn't just buy blue spraypaint...I also bought yellow.

I bought this bottle of wine a few years ago (just because it was a cat!), and it was purple, however, not the prettiest purple. Much better now.

Last weekend we were up in the bay area, staying with Those Corwins. We hit up an antique store and we found these AWESOME brass deer. Not a big fan of the brass decor, so I spray painted them grey :)

I like that the paint is super cheap and you get a lot of bang for your buck! This is going to be an addiction, I think.

Are you a spray painting fanatic? What kinds of things have you spray painted?

Fall....

2010-08-07T08:12:00.000-07:00

Something like 2 and a half months (!!!!) until our wedding! This week I received our invitations that I ordered on Etsy :) Here is a little peek:

And rightfully so, I am dreaming for fall....changing colors....

Perhaps some rain....ahhh, rain :)

Pretty, warm scarves.

And of course, hot drinks to warm you up.

Working for the weekend

2010-07-29T21:25:00.000-07:00

We're headed up north this weekend, hooray!!! I get to see some of my most awesome friends, andddd, spend Saturday at the SF Renegade Craft Fair!! I am soooo excited and can't wait to find some super cute handmade stuff! I promise I will share with you my finds :)

Oh and here's a cute deer photo for good measure. Have a great weekend!

A peek inside: Tres

2010-07-28T18:48:00.000-07:00

Alright this is my last post on this topic! And hopefully I'll get to posting more interesting things sometime soon (lol). I mean, this is interesting right? RIGHT? :)

Lauryn wanted to see the inside of my purse:

Woooow, so not exciting! I am weird in the fact that I hardly carry anything in my purse! Every other woman I know has tons of stuff (crap) in theirs. I don't know, I have issues finding my 5 items alone already, hah. So at this moment, all I had was my wallet, some ibuprofin, some pens, tissues, gum, and my Disneyland birthday pin (why??! lol).

Raven wanted to see my spice "cabinet":

So we got this when we first moved into our old apartment. I like the look of it, but for me, I use the same handful of spices all the time so it's kind of impractical. Plus it's covered in dust ;) Oops.

Talia wanted to see my "garden":

HAH. HAH. This is my only "garden" that is currently qualified as a garden: my wine barrel which houses my newish tomato plant and some deadish chives (lol!).

Sara wanted to see the inside of our fridge "cribs style":

I recently cleaned out our fridge, I'm very happy about this because there was so much STUFF in there! So the important stuff: beers. Chris drinks the Mtn. Dew (blech). We've got some blueberries, hummus, piats, milk, juice, leftover mystery food, salsa...etc. :) Why does is seem like we have SO many condiments?

A peek inside: Part II

2010-07-22T20:14:00.000-07:00

Here are some more :) I have only a couple left! Taking more until this weekend for the last post! Ask me here.

Sarah asked to see my favorite makeup item:

I've used bareMinerals foundation since I was like, 17! I can't do the liquid stuff, so this is fantastic for me - love! Tip: buy on Ebay and you'll save around $5-8!

She also asked to see my favorite pair of shoes:

Currently my favorites, sorry they are just a tad dirty :x

And my favorite coffee mug:

For one, it is gigantic (like 3 cups of coffee in one!). It was gifted to me by Steph Corwin for my birthday a few years ago. It came delivered with flowers in it :)

Susan asked to get a sneak peak of a wedding item:

It's no secret that I have been looking for some yellow shoes. I've planned on ordering a few different pairs and seeing what I end up liking the best :)

Morgan asked to see my craft room. She noted that I am organized...

NOT! My craft room hasn't been organized for months. When we redid our guest room, all of the crap lying around in there got shoved into my craft room, so I have hardly any room! I keep the door closed.

A peek inside: Part I

2010-07-19T19:56:00.000-07:00

The other day I asked you guys if there was anything you wanted to see a photo of in my life. Here are a handful of them :) I'll post some more later this week. Also, if you haven't had a chance to ask me to take a photo of something yet, feel free to visit my last post and leave a comment! I'll take some more througout the week for sure! Thanks :)

Natasha asked me to take a photo of my sink RIGHT NOW.

lol! Thankfully, I did the dishes before we left for the weekend. So this is our ugly sink! All that browness is {i guess} worn off finish? Anyone know of a good product to spruce that up? I really hate our sink!

Shannon asked to see my kittehs :)

{Garbage} I love his silky black fur!

{Kitty} I call her Miss Kitty. So hard to get a photo of her because she is always moving around and acting paranoid! She was our first pet!

Talia asked to see my favorite spot to relax:

Definitely our loveseat! Chris takes the bigger couch, hah! I snuggle up with that pillow and a blanket every night we watch our shows :)

Ashley & Jimaie asked to see my closet:

My closet is definitely NOT organized which is why I only opened one side! Hah. Last weekend we actually started to search for some budget closet organizers. The ones we have are wire and they were just there when we bought our house. I HATE them! I throw my shoes on top and they always fall down because there is a gap in the back. Grr!

Jimaie also asked to see my medicine cabinet:

Uh, kinda boring. What's funny is I don't use half of that stuff! LOL. I like how there's no actual MEDICINE in the medicine cabinet. That makes sense!

Ok that was fun!!! Ask me more so I can post some more photos at the end of the week :) I'll get to the few other questions I had so far as well :)

A peek inside

2010-07-15T12:40:00.000-07:00

Over the past year or so I've seen a ton of bloggers doing this thing where they open up their comments to invite people to ask what they would like to see a photo of inside the bloggers life. Well, every time I've written a post to do it, someone else gets one going and then I feel like I'm a big fat COPY CAT, push it to the side...forget about it, rinse and repeat.

Well! I just got my new little friend yesterday, and want to mess around with it, get to know it a little. So there is where you come in, my lovely friends :)

Do you want to know what our mess of a bedroom looks like? Or maybe my favorite place to eat? Or perhaps my cats that hardly get any blog attention? Or a photo of why my neighbors suck?

Ask and ye shall receive! Also, I get major sadness when I know you're reading and don't leave me some comment love, seriously, I have self worth issues :) Lol. So if you've never said hello, pleeeasseee say hi and ask me to take a photo of anything! I will probably start answering them after this weekend!

OK GO!

ps, spending my birthday tomorrow at Disneyland, then the following day going to see Thrice in Pomona, yay for an awesome weekend!!!

I Cook: Gone Bananas

2010-07-08T18:40:00.000-07:00

Looking for a yummy summertime treat? Well, look no further. Ok no really, that was semi-cheesy but I'm serious. For some reason I've been going through a banana phase, not just eating plain 'ol bananas, but satisfying my summertime sads with some yummy treats.

First off, frozen bananas from Trader Joes. Covered in chocloately goodness. They are delious :)

Something else I tried recently: banana "ice cream" that has no other ingredient than bananas. All you do is throw some bananas in the freezer & when they are frozen, remove and let sit for about 5-10 minutes (so you can remove the peel). Remove the peel, then whip the frozen bananas with a hand mixer or blender. It's possible they may be too soft, so I threw my whipped bananas back in the freezer for a bit. The end product was awesome, cool and healthy :)

And now, a yummy recipe!

Blueberry Banana Cake w/Cream Cheese Icing

Adapted from The Kitchn

Cake Ingredients:

3/4 cup unsalted butter, softened
1 cup white sugar
1 cup brown sugar
3 eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
2 tablespoons rum (the recipe said optional, I say NOT)
1 1/2 cups mashed bananas (about 3 bananas)
3 cups flour
1 1/2 teaspoons baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 lemon, juiced and zested
1 1/2 cups milk
2 cups blueberries, washed and picked over

Preheat oven to 325 degrees and lightly grease a 13"x9" pan. Cream the butter and sugars in a large bowl.

Blend in the eggs one at a time, and whip until creamy.

Add the vanilla, bananas and rum. Mix until creamy.

Add the flour, baking soda and salt. Stir the mixture roughly, but do not combine completely.

In a large measuring cup, mix the lemon juice with the milk. (Reserve the lemon zest for the icing.)

Pour the lemon/milk mixture into the bowl with the rest of the ingredients. Mix until smooth. Fold in the blueberries. Spread the batter in the prepared pan.

Bake the cake for 75 minutes, or until a tester comes out clean. (Start checking after 60 minutes.) When the cake is firm and a tester comes out clean, remove the cake from the oven.

While the cake is baking/cooling, make the frosting :)

Icing Ingredients:

1/4 cup butter, softened
1 (8 ounce) package light cream cheese, softened
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 tablespoon rum (again, not optional -lol)
3 cups confectioners' sugar
Pinch salt

In a large bowl, whip the butter and cream cheese together until very smooth, with no lumps remaining. Beat in 1 teaspoon vanilla and 1 tablespoon rum, if using. Add the confectioners sugar, reserved lemon zest, and salt and beat on low speed until combined, then on high until frosting is smooth.

(huh, I only took one picture..must have been the rum, sorry!)

After your cake is all baked and cooled, spread the icing all over it! Top with some blueberries!!! YUM! *The original recipe also garnished with some almonds, which I clearly forgot but didn't miss!

I'm really sad this cake is now gone, I want more after seeing the pictures!! Enjoy!

Creativity itch

2010-07-06T19:35:00.000-07:00

Sorry for the double post today! I had a little time earlier today and I updated my blog header & it's a little less frou-frou and a little more fun :)

Also! I've been wanting to add different types of items to my Etsy shop, and I've finally made the time to make a few new things. I just added 3 different necklaces. More to come..sometime.. :) Hope you like!

Litter box woes

2010-07-06T07:58:00.000-07:00

Just a forewarning, this post has to do with poop. And cats.

Moving right along.

I have always had a cat, ever since I was young. At home, as far as I can remember, our cats were always indoor/outdoor cats, so I don't really recall having a litter box - they'd just do their duty outside. Well, I don't really love the idea of my cats living outdoors in our busy neighboorhood with crazy people driving around all fast and not paying attention, thus smooshing my not-so-street-smart cats at any moment. So we definitely have to deal with "litterbox woes". I call it that because the litter box is the most annoying thing of all times. The smell, the size, the ugliness, the inconvenience, cleaning it, the litter mess..it's all bad.

A few years ago, when we lived in our apartment I bought one of those litter box "hider" things. You know, like this. Well that was all alright, but cleaning the box was even more inconvenient and since all you could do was put a tray in there, litter got EVERYWHERE. I blame the male cat. And honestly, who has time & remembers to clean the box every. day. Not me. Sorry kittehs.

I am pretty sure this is how my cats have felt about their litter box:

But not anymore! I kid you not. I have found the Best Litter Box of All Time. And it's not one of those fancy pants expensive, self cleaning boxes either, though I think it is equally as awesome. After some extensive litter box research (I know, I know, this is all very exciting), I think I have brought some sunshine into the litter box woes.

Here it is in all of it's kitty poop glory:

Omega Paw Self-Cleaning Litter Box

Some things I am a fan of:

It's great for multiple cats/large cats (I have both!).
Get yourself some clumping litter, and all you have to do do clean the box is ROLL IT OVER. Yes. You heard. You roll this littter box on it's side and all of the clumped litter/kitteh poo get's sifted into the tray. And the tray? You can see it in the picture, you just pull it out and dump it in the trash. Heaven. There's a video demo on Amazon.
It's enclosed so keeps any smell inside.
I have noticed less litter getting tracked out of the box.
It's not ugly.
The price! Most self-cleaning boxes are hundreds of dollars!!

I think we definitely have happy cats!

Do yourself and buy this box, it's fantastic and a great deal! Yay!

Happy weekend

2010-07-02T09:23:00.000-07:00

We haven't been in town for the 4th in years, and it kind of makes me sad. I will miss this view:

In other news, my 25h birthday is in TWO WEEKS. I feel old already! I am hoping for a day at Disneyland (somebody make this happen for me!). The next day we are going to a concert to see my fav, Thrice, down south. It will be a great weekend :)

Have a fun, safe, long weekend!!!

Vintage + Camping

2010-06-26T20:54:00.001-07:00

I've got camping on the brain these days. Today I was looking for a few little camping supplies and started to find all kinds of goodies. If these lovely finds don't make you want to go camping, I have no idea what will :)

1. 1960s-70s Floral Carafe - $18.00

2. Vintage Floral Coffee Pot Pump - $30.00

3. Vintage Whale Coffee Pot Pump - $17.50

4. Vintage Woody Thermoses by Thermos - $20.50

5. Vintage Melamine Dishes for Camping - 16.75

6. Set of 4 Melmac Aztec Plates - $10.00

7. Four Fun Steri-Lite Plastic Mugs - $8.50

8. Two Antique Metal Lights - $34.00

9. Turquoise Igloo Cooler - $21.00

10. Vintage Kiltie Picnic Jug - $18.00

11. Vintage Owl Camping Lights - $31.00 (current, Ebay)

12. Pink Enamel Saucepan - $9.00

13. 4 Vintage Camping Chairs - $19.00 (current, Ebay)

14. Vintage Camp Kitchen-Set of 3 - $375.00

15. Vintage Hot Pink Oil Lantern - $8.00

If that wasn't enough cuteness, here's some camping photos to make you drool. (all via weheartit)

Did you hear?

2010-06-25T12:11:00.000-07:00

My good friend Morgan is preggers! So happy for her and her husband Justin. And uber jealous of their cute little family. I love you! :)

You should definitely stop by her blog and congratulate her if you haven't already!!!

xoxo

Ps, YAY FOR FRIDAY!!!!

Weekend

2010-06-21T20:25:00.000-07:00

I had such a great long weekend. I am thinking the fact that it was extra long (yay for 2 days off work!) made it much greater :) Some highlights:

I found a super cute deer in a local antique shop that was an awesome deal (I saw it for $30 more on ebay!).

I got baby fever, again.

One of my very very bestest friends, and one of my oldest, got married! YAY! They got engaged the day after Chris and I :)

I hope yours was as good as mine :)

Feeling Lovey

2010-06-18T10:00:00.000-07:00

This song came on and now I'm listening to it over and over, love the lyrics and they are oh so true. So I'm sharing :)

Thrice - The Weight

There's many who'll tell you they'll give you their love,
But when they say "give" they mean "take."
They"ll hang 'round just like vultures till push comes to shove.
They'll take flight when the earth starts to shake.

Someone may say that they'll always be true,
Then slip out the door 'fore the dawn.
But I won't leave you hanging on.
Another may stay till they find someone new,
Then before you know they'll be gone.
But I won't leave you hanging on;
No, I won't be that someone.

And come what may, I won't abandon you or leave you behind
Because love is a loyalty sworn, not a burning for a moment.
And come what may, I will be standing right here by your side;
I won't run away, though the storm's getting worse and there's no end in sight.

Some talk of destiny, others of fate,
But soon they'll be saying goodbye.
But I won't leave you high and dry.
Because a ring don't mean nothing
If you can't haul the weight,
And some of them won't even try,
But I won't leave you high and dry;
I won't leave you wondering why.

And storms will surely come,
But true love is a choice you must make
And you're the one that I have set my heart to choose.
As long as I live, I swear I'll see this through.

200 + Yellow

2010-06-17T16:00:00.000-07:00

So this is my 200th post! Ah! I wanted to do something exciting, but I haven't come up with any brilliant idea yet, but I will! Soon! I just had about 3 other things I wanted to blog about and didn't want to wait :)

Anyways, I haven't talked about wedding stuff lately, mostly because not a whole lot has been going on in the past few months. But now, we have 4 months to go and we need to start working out the little details like decor and such!

What I really am struggling with is finding the perfect shoes. I want yellow shoes! At first I wanted just flats because I am totally not a heels person, and I wouldn't be comfortable wearing them for hours. But, I think I want a tiny bit of a heel because I am already the shortest person in the wedding party and I know the other two are going to have some sort of heel = awkward :) I have found a lot of cute stuff, but I am not sure I have found the perfect shoe. What really bugs me is when I see photos of an awesome/perfect shoe but have no idea of the brand or anything, this makes me cry.

Anyways, here is some yellow wedding shoe inspiration for ya'll (oh hai, I am apparently from Texas today).

Are you dying of cuteness yet? Omygawd, so cute I may just puke.

Quick Important Update!

2010-06-14T18:00:00.000-07:00

Hey guys! Just a couple things I wanted to update you all on. I've been pretty busy lately doing this and that (and by that I mean buying too many vintage deer figurines and attempting to garden in the 95-degree heat), and hopefully I'll be able to do some more exciting blog posts in the upcoming weeks :)

My good friend Steph is hosting an online raffle to raise money for breast cancer research, as she is participating in the Avon Walk for Breast Cancer this summer. The perks (other than donating to a good cause, of course!) are winning free, a GAP gift card and super cute accessories from a few very talented people, including a few items from my Etsy shop :)

Please please PLEASE go here and read her blog post and details on how you can enter to win one of the lovely prize packages, all of the stuff is super cute!!!

And in related news, I have been adding some new designs to my shop the past few weeks as I've had time, here are some of my new things:

1. Floral & Feather Heart Hair Pin
2. Feathered Hair Pin - Jade, Black & White
3. Rosette Brooch - Pink, Green & White
4. Rosette Brooch - Blue, White & Tan
5. Ruffle Fabric & Felt Flower - Cheerful
6. Ruffle Fabric & Felt Flower - Print

I have about 5 billion others ideas for new things in the workings, so hopefully I can find some time to work on them and share with you guys :)

Hope all is well, have a good week! I am looking forward to a possible extra long weekend and one of my bestest friend's weddings (yay!), as well as Father's Day & a little family reunion, hooray!

*Ohhh, I just realized this is my 199th post...maybe I"ll have to do something exciting for my 200th! What do you think!? :)

Try This: Salted Caramel Cupcakes

2010-06-06T19:13:00.000-07:00

You know how sometimes you see something delicious and you just need to eat said item asap? This is one of those. I saw these amazing Triple Salted Caramel Cupcakes from Sprinkle Bakes and I was just waiting for a time to make them. While I didn't try to make mine quite as extravagant (well really, I didn't want to spend any extra time baking), they tasted AMAZING. I highly recommend you try and make them, the most tasty part is the yummy frosting. Just the right amount of saltiness and really, not a ton of sweetness over all in the cupcake. But the other awesome part? A dollop of homemade caramel in the middle of the cupcake! Ohhh yes! I also opted to not make the pretty salted carmel decor for the top.

I'd do a step by step baking instruction, but I kind of forgot to take pictures of some of the steps, and she does a really good job describing everything on her recipe, go here to check it out! It's definitely as good as it looks :)

I Bake: Monkey Bread

2010-06-02T21:02:00.000-07:00

Have you guys had monkey bread before? The first time I really had it was on one of our many trips to our cabin at Shaver Lake. They have a sign that says something about their monkey bread being famous, but I'm sure most places say their food is famous (like, "world's best pizza!", etc., I think that's so funny - when you go to a big city you see a dozen of them :D ). Anyways! This bread is to die for! So yummy and fun to eat, not so happy for your gut but happy for your mind and tasebuds!

I randomly saw a recipe while browsing The Pioneer Woman's recipe gallery, and it was SO easy that I could not believe it and was thinking about it nonstop for days. I ended up making it this weekend when I was on a random baking spree, and oh my is it good! Here's the recipe

Monkey Bread

Recipe adapted from The Pioneer Woman

The ingredients:

1/2 cup brown sugar

2 sticks of butter

2-3 tsp. cinnamon

3 cans buttermilk biscuits
1 cup sugar

Bundt pan

*Options: chopped pecans or other nuts of your choice

Now that you have those few little things, preheat oven to 350 degrees.

Open your cans of biscuits (does this scare the poop out of anyone else, I have so much anxiety opening those popping cans, hah!). Cut each biscuit into quarters.

Combine 1 cup of sugar with 2-3 teaspoons of cinnamon (depending on how much you like!).

Now, if you're "with it" you will have a large zip-lock bag. Pour the sugar/cinnamon mixture into the bag, along with all of your little biscuit pieces and shake it to coat.

However, if you are like me and forget said bags, this is easily done by mixing in a big bowl :)

*If you're adding any nuts to your bread, you'll want to put them in the bottom of your bunt pan NOW, before you put your bread in the pan.

Place the coated biscuit pieces in your greased bundt pan. My pan was either small, or I had really big biscuits, so they came way close to the top of the pan. I don't recommend this unless you want drippings all over your oven :)

Alright, put that pan to the side for now! In a small saucepan over mediun-high head, melt the 2 sticks of butter with 1/2 cup of brown sugar.

Stir stir stir until it is fully melted and combined. Also, sorry for my bad kitchen lighting, it was kind of sucky at this time of evening.

Now that your super healthy sauce is done, you can pour it all over your biscuit pieces that are awaiting you in the bundt pan. Mmmmmm.

Now, place the bread in your preheated oven for 30-40 minutes (mine took 40). Take it out, and take a whiff, yummm. Let the bread cook for a while so the "juices" thicken up a bit - you want all that yumminess to stick to the bread, trust me. After that, flip your pan over on a big plate and voila!

I added yummy pecans to the bottom of my pan before cooking :) You can also mix them in the whole bread if you wanted to.

NOM!

Easy DIY: Grapvine Ball Lights

2010-05-31T13:04:00.000-07:00

No really, this is so easy that I am almost embarassed to post it! Have you seen these uber cute grapvine ball lights at Target? I am sure there is similar stuff elsewhere, but I think they have been at Target for a few years and I have always wanted them. So we went to Target yesterday and they were on sale for $10 a package, and since we just purchased a new patio set, I HAD TO HAVE THEM. So we bought two.

And so, we get home, put up our new pation umbrella, and I want to hang the string of lights around the edge of the umbrella...aaannnddd, the two strands of lights (10 lights on each) only get about halfway around the umbrella. Then I am thinking, "am I seriously going to spend $40 on these dumb lights?! I could have made these for half the cost!" And so, since I was not that brilliant, let me share with you the easiness of making these for yourself.

Step one: Get a strand of white lights (if you have a house you most likely have some Christmas lights you can use!), we'd probably have to use a strand of 50 lights, but maybe you need 100 lights. Anyways, I found a 50 light strand online as low as $5.

Step two: Buy some grapevine balls. I am pretty sure I have seen them at lots of stores, including Michaels - not sure how much they are - however, I found some online for 49 cents each.

Step three: Do a happy dance because your strand of lights and your pretty grapevine balls probably only cost you $25, and you would have spend $50 at Target if you'd just bought the premade light strands. Plus, PLUS!!! You have one light strand which is WAY less of a headache than putting 4 or 5 light strands together (such. a. pain.).

You can thank me in baked goods or coffee, kthnx.

Dress Me Up

2010-05-26T19:36:00.001-07:00

I am definitely a jeans and t-shirt or cute blouse kind of girl. And whenever I do need to purchase a dress, or any clothes for an event, I usually wait until the very last minute and buy something just OK and never want to wear it again. Oops. I have/had a few events upcoming this month and over the next few months, so I went ahead and started to look around for dresses, and I even purchased 3(!!) already! So I wanted to share with you my cute finds :)

Beach Brunch Dress from Modcloth - I LOVE this dress! I have favorite way too many dresses on this site, and it was hard for me to chose just one, but I am super happy with this one.

Elle Brushtroke Mixed-Media Dress from Kohl's - This dress is SUPER cute and I love the colors. It was a tad short for my taste so I wore some black tights with it.

Brooke Polka Dot Dress from Delia's - Super comfy and the length we perfect for me. I was worried about it being too HAI I LOVE AMERICA, but it wasn't :)

Confession: I totally ordered dress #1 for two back-to-back events that occured this past weekend, but of course it came ONE DAY LATE. So I had to go out and find a dress to wear, which ended up being dress #2 a Kohls. Doh!

What are you favorite places to buy cute dresses from? I think this is going to be a bad habit from now foward :)

Books, they make you smart. Or something.

2010-05-20T22:13:00.000-07:00

I used to read a lot when I was younger. Not so much when the high school and college days rolled around, and now I just find myself skimming through Real Simple and reading blogs. Some twittering about The Babysitter's Club books kind of got me thinking about my favorite childhood books. Here are some of my favorites:

Ohh, that was fun! What were some of your favorties? :)

Quarter Century

2010-05-18T17:00:00.000-07:00

No it's not my 25th birthday, yet (aghhh 2 months, yikes!). Today is my parent's 25th wedding anniversary. It's easy to always remember the amount of years they have been married because I was born the same year :) When my mom was 7 months pregnant with me (at 24 years old, actually!), my parents got married.

I know a lot of people think they have the greatest parents in the world, and there are a lot of people who don't have the best relationships with theirs, but I really think my parents are amazing!

Some tidbits about my parents:

They have always been super encouraging of anything we wanted to try out. My sister and I were involved in so many different sports and activities when we were younger. Between me and my sister (off the top of my head) we did ballet, jazz & tap dance, baton twirling (lol), soccer, softball, swimming, synchronized swimming, sewing, horseback riding, misc. church activities, girl scouts, piano lessons, drum lessons, and probably other random classes I can't think of.

Family was always #1. My dad was telling me & Chris about all his various work-ventures throughout his life the other day, and numerous times mentioned how my mom would always encourage him to go for it. All he wanted to do was provide for a family and give us a good life. Even though there were some hard times, we always had a nice house and everything we needed.
My mom is a talker. She is also a therapist. When you meet her she will expect your life story and ask 80 questions. Be prepared. What I did not inherit from my mom is her energy, she loooovesss hiking and goes multiple times a week. CRAZY WOMAN :)
My Dad loves text messages and writes them in email format, complete with "Dear Alyssa" and "Sincerely, Dad". He also has this great memory that I definitely did not inherit. Whenever he hears a song from "back in the day" he can tell you the band and what year and MONTH (usually) the song came out, what he was doing at that time, and random facts about the band.
They live less than 2 miles away from us and I normally at least text one of them every day. When my Mom hasn't seen me in a few days she texts me that she misses me :) Love it. Probably one of the big reasons I haven't moved away is because I would die if they lived far away. It would be sad times (hence, Operation: Move Entire Family to Washington).

Okay I think that's enough blabbering for now. Happy Anniversary Mom & Dad! <3>

Wishes

2010-05-12T05:00:00.000-07:00

Wishing for...

A family.

A yard full of sweet little friends.

A roadtrip.

Closeness.

What are you wishing for?

Birthdays & Baked Goods

2010-05-11T05:00:00.000-07:00

Whenever we have a family or friend event to go to, I have a bad habit of volunteering myself to make dessert. Ok so it wouldn't be so bad if I didn't always try to do something new and unusual and totally exhaust myself. (Or, the time when I baked a cake super last minute, only to have it overflow in the oven & burn to a crisp, leaving me no choice to pick up something at the store.) But it's fun! And I love when people are impressed with whatever it is I've come up with.

Of course my niece's 1st birthday party was no exception! I volunteered to do dessert right off the bat, and had planned to do rainbow cupcakes. A few days before the event, she told me there'd be 40 people coming. Yikes. So I tried my best not to procrastinate and do something fun. Even though it took forever, it was pretty simple.

The cupcakes. Ok they came out all cute and dandy & tasted delicious. But can I tell you how utterly retarded it was to find cupcake liners that weren't white, Dora the Explorer or metallic. Such a pain. Glad to get that off my chest!

Some stats on the cupcakes: 3 boxes of white cake mix, divided into 3 bowls & colored pink, yellow & orange. Buttercream frosting from this recipe. The flower idea was stolen from Bakerella, thanks Morgan ;)

I also made a mini cake for my niece, Madelyn.

The death of said cake.

And, last minute I decided to make some red velvet cake pops. I picked up a round piece of styrofoam & fake flowers from Michaels. I cut just the flower parts off the stems and stuck them in the styrofoam & wrapped some ribbon I had around the edge. Voila! Also, if you haven't made these yet I highly suggest it. I don't know what is better than a mixture of red velvet cake & cream cheese frosting, for reals.

And, let me throw some more cuteness into the mix:

Hopefully that wasn't too much cuteness for you. She is the most adorable baby girl ever!

Make Yourself At Home

2010-05-09T17:51:00.000-07:00

A couple weeks ago we started to put some elbow grease into our guest room. It was previously an ugly light yellow room, where we kept our turtle, always had the door closed because it was a hideous mess, and we always threw random junk in there when guests would come over or if we had nowhere else to put something.

Exciting, right? So here is our guest room now :) (Oh & sorry about some of the lighting, a storm rolled in just because I took pictures, offfff course!).

We painted 3 walls this pretty green color...

I love this bedding from Target, I am still unsure about the bit of pink in it, but I love it. Need a few more pillows though. We also purchased a night stand on sale at Target, and a lamp at Wal Mart. I already had the curtains, but plan on buying some blinds still. I also need to fill the wall behind the bed with something...

Our cat was admiring the weeds outside, hah.

My most favorite part: the decals! I purchased them from an Etsy shop, designedDesigner. I highly recommend because they were cheap compared to similar decals and they were shipped super quickly! We painted this wall a super light grey.

View from the bed.

I love these prints that I purchased from Etsy, via GreenNest, so cute. & they were buy 2 get 1 free!

This room will also house most of my deer collection :)

I love this room, I wish it was our bedroom, hah! I didn't show the wall with the closet because we didn't put the doors back on yet, oops. Still a few things to do to fill it up but I think it's coming together nicely :)

Captured

2010-05-04T19:25:00.000-07:00

I took this last Friday off for an extra long weekend, because we had a few friends staying with us. Here are some snippets of my weekend - cell phone picture version :)

A drive from Bakersfield to LA.

I was determined to find a good eatery in LA that had been feaured on Diners, Drive-ins & Dives. I made a list of all the places in LA, and we ended up at Oinkster. We also happend to see a famous person! Zach del la Rocha from Rage Against the Machine was eating solo and having a heated conversation on his cell phone, hah. (Ok, so I definitely wouldn't have known who it was if it wasn't for someone else who pointed him out, shh).

I had the Oinkster Pastrami and it was FAB. Note to self, order plaintains instead of fries next time (I tried a friend's an they were AMAZING).

We ended Friday evening walking around Hollywood & Highland Ave.

We stayed the night in LA, then had a gigantic breakfast Saturday morning, followed by a pitstop at Ikea on the way back home.

The rest of the weekend was spent doing random things and thrifting :)

This caught my eye in a local antique store because Jimaie had just purchased something similar. I may or may not have picked it up for her to match :)

I didn't buy this bitty-squirrel-on-a-nut but I thought it was hilar!

We also went to see peacocks at a local park, and I finally got a good picture of an albino peacock! We lured her in with french fries :)

My friend Mallory and I.

I hope you had a lovely weekend!! I promise to post more soon, including our guest room makeover :D yay!

Day Trip

2010-04-29T12:20:00.000-07:00

This is for my LA area friends and/or people that have been to LA and can give me some suggestions. I am headed over to LA for the day (tomorrow) with a few friends fom the SF area. While we have a few must-see things on our list to do, I was wondering if you all have some must-stop eateries for us to go to. Because food is obviously the most important part of any trip. OBVIOUSLY!

So please, give me some ideas! I am most likely looking for cheapish places, and definitely places that are only in LA.

Annnddd, GO! Thank you so much :)

New Look

2010-04-25T00:00:00.001-07:00

Since I have been changing things around on my blog a bit, I created a widget for both my blog and my Etsy shop. If you would like to add one or both to your blogs, please feel free to grab them off of my site!

Also, I have added some of my favorite reads to my sidebar, if you have a badge for your blog and I am missing yours please email me at alyssadawn3(at)gmail(dot)com and I will happily add you to my list :)

Weekend

2010-04-23T09:16:00.000-07:00

I have so much to do this {long} weekend! Luckily, I have today off work so I can start to tackle things. Wish me luck:

What are your weekend plans?

PS, little blog makeover been going on here this week (a little bit at a time), sorry if it's all funky right now!

Guest Room

2010-04-20T20:01:00.000-07:00

One of my very good friends is coming to visit in less than two weeks and I have to get our guest room finished. Currently, the room has a bed, a random dresser and a BUNCH OF CRAP. You know, that room you throw all your random stuff in when you have people come over because you want to hide it all? Yep, that's the room. The room is also an ugly shade of yellow - which is a bummer, because I am a fan of yellow, but this yellow is fugs.

Here are some photos of inspiration that I have for this room...

Usually this busy print wouldn't be my thing for a bed, but I really love this and think it would work well! Plus it's on sale at Potterybarn.com :)

I purchased this print along with another coordinating print from Green Nest on Etsy, while I haven't received them yet, I adore them!

I adore this birch tree wallpaper!!! I want to cover just one wall with it. In fact, I have been thinking about it nonstop for a week. Because of it's steep price, I am looking for other options, possibly wall decals?

Chris suggested we paint the room green, and I really like the green paint in this photo!

This room will also be a place for me to store some of my growing deer collection :)

Wish me luck!!! And, you are very welcome to give me suggestions if you know of some cute decor that will go with what I dub my "woodland" theme. :)

Biiiiicycle

2010-04-19T19:22:00.000-07:00

I have been dying for a bicycle for a long time now. We didn't have room to store bikes in our apartment so that never happend, and now that we have a house we obviously do, but it seems like we always have house stuff to spend our money on.

Well, I want a bike! With spring arriving it is the perfect time for us to get bikes, I think. There are some very cute bikes that I would love to have, but they can be pricey. So I have been browsing for semi-budget friendly bikes for us. Especially since Chris and I both need one.

Schwinn Crest Urban Hybrid Bike = Love. It's $289 on Amazon. A tad bit more than I'd want to spend but I love the color, the fact that it's a hybrid bike (it's good for anything I'd want to use it for) and that it has a men's bike to go with it that isn't girly :) I haven't found anything that is around or less than the price that has as good reviews and is as AWESOME. Whatcha think?

Do you have a bike? What kind do you have? Any bike buying tips? I'd like to get any info from you all on what you have so I can do some better research :) Thanks!!!

oh, love

2010-04-18T07:50:00.001-07:00

a small conversation while driving yesterday....

(beatles song comes on the radio)
me: do you love me 8 days a week?
him: thats not even possible.
me: but would you if there was?
him: *rolls eyes*

Etsy Giveaway

2010-04-15T12:17:00.000-07:00

Want to win one of my hair pins and a headband? Head on over to Blair's website, Wild & Precious, and check it out!

She gives you EIGHT (!!!!) chances to win, and you have until next Friday to enter! So go do it, pretty please!

Enter here!

DIY Save the Date - Viewfinder

2010-04-13T20:42:00.000-07:00

I am so excited to share this DIY with you! I just finished up our Save-the-Date cards and I am pretty excited about how they turned out. Since I am pretty sure all of my guests have received them, I want to share it with you all.

I got the idea for this in a book I purchased a few months ago called The DIY Bride. Their card was ultra simple and a lot smaller than I wanted to so I had to basically design the whole thing. So here goes! Enjoy!

Viewfinder Save-the-Date

{Click photos to enlarge}

Materials:

Cardstock (colors of your choice!)
Colored brads (I purchased mine at a scrapbook store)
Fiskars Circle Cutter

Cutting mat
Paper cutter
Scrapbooking tape
Avery Sticker Project Paper

I'm too lazy to add any extra tips/information right now, so I think I will make a Part II here pretty soon! Hope you like them! :)

**Edit: For some reason my pictures won't enlarge in a new window...will try to fix asap, sorry :(

Cute Finds - Ring Pillows

2010-04-07T20:59:00.001-07:00

It starts with one cute thing...then you find yourself browsing the internet for hours trying to find more....

Via yandebridal

Via GiggleRoom

Via DearLillie

Via palomasnest

Via jencarres

What do you guys think? Have you seen any other cute/unique ring "pillow" ideas?

PS, sorry for the slackage lately - work has been leaving me tired and grumpalicious :-/

Change

2010-04-01T11:34:00.000-07:00

Every once in a while I get these urges for change. What about you guys? Life seems so monotonous sometimes and I like to mix it up at bit, but I usually don't go all out and go for it. I have been feeling the need for change a lot lately, wondering what I want to change and how that's possible. I think about the times that I actually made the necessary decisions and just went for it, not sitting around wondering "what if." I was thinking about it again last night after an 8pm grande toffeenut latte (ps, thanks Starbucks for keeping me awake late on a work night), and it got me thinking about something that has changed my life more than most anything.

Image credit.

I was preparing for an extra long Memorial Day weekend. I had taken a couple extra days off of work to spend the weekend flying across the country and back. At 20 years old, I was still pretty shy and no way had I ever dreamed I'd just get up and do this. I had a 6:30 am flight to catch and I couldn't hardly sleep at all the night, I got maybe a couple hours of rest - then my alarm went off at 4:30 am. I actually still lived with my parents, but was doing this completely on my own. I'd only flown in a plane once, with my parents. Never had gone anywhere alone, not even an hour away from home.

I got ready, made sure I had all the necessary items, and headed out into the dark, crisp early morning. I made the short drive to the airport, parked in the long-term parking area, and hauled my things inside. After I checked in, I remember sitting in the waiting area and staring out the window as the sun came up. I wondered where all these people were going, if someone could possibly be making the same kind of trip I was.

I had a long, sort of lonely trip. The only thing keeping me entertained was my iPod - I vividly remember listening to Death Cab for Cutie's album "Transatlanticism" on repeat (5 years later, listening to those songs still brings me those memories). Finally, after what seemed to be the longest journey ever, I arrived in Michigan. When I got off the plane I called my mom to let them know I had made it safely and I stayed on the phone until I started walking down those steps to baggage claim. I hung up and scanned the crowd as I continued down the ever-long flight of stairs.

And then, finally, after what seemed like eternity, our eyes met for the first time. You know when you had to do your first speech in school and you were absolutely dying with a million different emotions? Or the first day of high school maybe? That's what it was, times a million, as I finally reach him and there were no words needed. We hugged and stayed that way for a while and I knew that this was the best leap for change I could ever make.

I am glad I went for it that time.

Too short...

2010-03-28T21:09:00.000-07:00

We managed to get away for the weekend and headed up to the mountains for some relaxation. Also, to get away from the 80-degree weather (YUCK!). It was around 50 up at Shaver :)

We also had some visitors...

And got some play time in...

It was beautiful, and I wish we didn't have to come home so soon. Here's to another work week...le sigh! Are you ready for Monday?

Antiquing fun

2010-03-23T18:50:00.000-07:00

I have never been a big fan of shopping in general. I mean, Target is fine and all, but I can't shop at those places that have a million things to look at and sift through (Ross, for example). This means that every time I have seen an antique store I never thought twice about wanting to go inside and see what kind of treasures I could find. Also, most times I have tried my hand a garage saling, or taking a trip to Goodwill to find something awesome, I always fail. Never find a thing! And I always see people posting blogs about all the cool things they find an thrift and antique stores, and I'm not gonna lie, I am totaly jealous!

So this weekend we were downtown eating and just looking for something to do to waste a few hours of our time and we decided to stop in a couple big antique shops. Wow. I never knew they could have THAT much stuff in there! I was pleasantly suprised that not all of it was just..junk. I had my eye open for a few things (hint: did you read my last post?), but otherwise I was just looking for cute stuff. Well, the first thing I ran into was miss Talia :) And I am pretty sure she took all the cute things, I saw her grabbing a few adorable items - which I never found anything close to what she had, dangit!

Anyways, it was so fun to wander around. Here are a few things I picked up:

A cute little deer! (Shh..I may have bought more than a few cute little deers!)

Some pretty books, for $1! (Oh look..another deer).

A pair of these sweet little bird cages. Do you think I should put something inside of them?

So all in all, it was a success! Except for the fact that Chris now wants to decorate our house in antique swords...oye.

So who is with me next weekend?! :)

Loving: Vintage + Deer

2010-03-18T21:53:00.001-07:00

Fawn & Flower Wall Wear via neawear

Ceramic Deer Figurine via fruitflypie

Michael Miller "Pet Deer" Fabric via SewMaterialistic

Forest Friends Fabric Buttons via aimoobaroo

Deer & Butterfly Print via GreenNest

Forest Fawn Necklace via PrettyParis

Little Hooves Print via WildLifePrints

A Few New Things

2010-03-16T19:32:00.000-07:00

I've got some more shameless self-pimping going on here. I've been slowly trying to spruce up my Etsy shop, and I've made a couple new headbands listed to show you. I am working one some new hair pin designs as well :) Yay! I love me some crafty time!

Double Bow Headband

Pink & Grey Headband

Yellow & Grey Headband

Along the same lines, I'm trying to do a few new things with my shop and will hopefully get those things in order soon. Aaaannndd, that made absolutely NO sense to you. Sorry ;)

Thank you all for looking! :D Hope you are getting through your week, I am trying!

Winner!

2010-03-16T14:43:00.001-07:00

Yayyy, congrats to Lauryn!! You win the Spring Giveaway! Wooohoo! I'll contact you soon to get your address :) Yummy cleaning goodies will be coming your way!

Phone Wars

2010-03-10T10:09:00.000-08:00

So I got a new cell phone. I did not get an iPhone. Amazing right? I'm not one to jump on the bandwagon because "lyke omg iphones are so cool and you're totally not cool to not have one". Just kidding, slightly. Sorry to my many, many iPhone loving friends (youknowiloveyou).

ANWYAYS! Chris and I both got new Droids (by Motorolla), we switched from ATT to Verizon. Which, is weird for me. I always cursed Verizon but I have noticed that ATT has had crappy service where I don't want it to suck (like in hour house! And at our cabin!). Does anyone else have one of these things? I am looking for some good app recommendations. It seems like when I search for recommendations it's always based on a guy's perspective. So yeah, halp!! :)

Also, ahem. Did you sign up for my giveaway? I don't think you did! I mean, I know cleaning isn't the funnest thing in the world - but free stuff definitely is! Do it, make a sista' happy! :)

Semi Kitchen Makeover: Paint Job!

2010-03-09T10:19:00.000-08:00

When we bought our house, we knew there was a lot of work to be done. Not really necessary work per say, but things to do to get it up to par with our style. Well, in the year and a half that we've lived here, we have done quite a few updates. The kitchen has always been one of the top things to we wanted to work on - of course, it can also be one of the most expensive things to remodel!

Here is the lovely kitchen when we moved in:

Well, we don't have a ton of money stashed away, so we are always looking for ways to a) save money, and b) do ourselves. Every time we head over to Home Depot or Lowes, we wander around (mostly the kitchen and flooring areas) just to check things out. We toyed with the idea of purchasing new cabinets before because we really don't have that many of them to being with. Also, our cabinets aren't real wood, not even the doors (just the door frames?). But, once you begin adding them up, it starts to eat your money.

So we ultimately decided that painting our cabinets would be the best bet for us for now. I did a bunch of online research to make sure we would get everything we needed, especially the right kind of paint and primer for the job. If you're thinking about doing this yourself, this guide from thisoldhouse.com helped a lot. Also, if you have laminates, this article was REALLY helpful for us. So yeah, DO YOUR RESEARCH!

A couple of tips:

As your a removing your doors/drawers, number them. Especially if you are using the same hardware, if you mix and match, after you are done you may find that things aren't fitting how they should. I just ripped piece of tape and wrote the numbers on them.
Make sure you have a BIG work area. We spread out everything in our garage over paint tarps.
Don't be too anxious. Most everything I read said to wait 1-2 weeks (sometimes more!) for the paint to "cure". If you put everything back together too soon, because the paint can still be semi sticky, your doors/drawers could possibly stick to the cabinet base and ruin your pain job!
Hardware. Don't think that everything you purchase will work for you right out of the package. We had to buy longer screws for our handles than what came with them. We also purchased new door hinges, and tried about 4 different ones before we got one that worked correctly (hint: buy several different types to try, THEN purchase the necessary amount. oops). I think I had to go to the hardware store about 6 different times. Ugh.

So yeah, the most important part:

I love love love it! Although the awesome new paint job and hardware make our icky white floors and counters look even more blah, that's okay :)

Edit: Oops, forgot to mention that this only cost about $125 :)

Spring Cleaning: A Giveaway

2010-03-08T09:54:00.000-08:00

Let me tell you a little something: in general, cleaning is such a big chore for me. There are a few things I don't mind doing, but other things I absolutely dread and hate (like cleaning the cat box, or the bathrooms..apparently I don't like poop).

So when I get down to cleaning, I need something to get me up and keep me going! That includes some fun music to sing along with and dance with my dogs to (you know you do it!), and cleaning products that make me happy. Yes, a cleaning product can make me happy and actually help me along with my cleaning. Vanilla scented dryer sheets? Yep, they make me want to do my laundry so I can smell it afterwards! Cucumber melon cleaning spray? Yes please - help me get the stinky food smell out of mah kitchen!

So, this is a little GIVEAWAY - and I am going to give the winner some of my most favorite cleaning products to aide them in spring cleaning - yippee!!!! I'm not going to tell you all of what this will include, but it WILL defeinitely be delicious smelling and make you happy!

To Enter: Leave a comment, and be sure to tell me what your favorite cleaning product is and why.

Deadline: Friday, March 12th!

Extra Credit?: I know you all love extra credit, so if you would like to Tweet about it or blog it, you are more than welcome to for an extra entry. Just please leave me a link to your tweet or blog. Thanks!

Ohhh, Fancy!

2010-03-05T10:26:00.000-08:00

I came across this on Etsy today:

It's called a "Fancypack" and I am totally unsure of what I think of it. I mean, I know how I feel about fannypacks...totally lame/not cute/unflattering. I am pretty sure my mom still wears one sometimes, and it's old and PURPLE. O.M.G.

So at first glance, I am all "are you kidding me?", but now that I've let it saturate in my little mind a bit, this is actually pretty cute, looks more like a belt, and really is a good idea. The only problem I have with it is that for someone that me who doesn't really want to draw attention to my belleh, probably not the most lovely thing to wear. I think Stacy and Clinton would want to have a word with me on that.

What do you think?

Happy Things

2010-03-02T14:14:00.000-08:00

I have been slacking at weddings things, and thus, been sucking at posting on The Bridal Bloggette. But! Today I managed to post a wee little update there, so I hope you can head over there, read it and help me out a bit! Thanks!

I have really been trying to get my creative juices flowing again. Over the next few days I plan to be working on our save-the-dates - I found this really cute idea in a book I have, and have been dying to get it going for a while now! I also managed to add a couple new things to my Etsy shop today, and will hopefully add another few things in the next couple days :)
I am planning on doing a GIVEWAY(!) later this week, just for fun.

I have a whole chicken in the crockpot right now, along with some sliced lemons, garlic cloves, and rosemary. You should smell it. Better yet, you should definitely make it!
I had a super fun weekend that included good times with some of my most favorite people, and even met a new one! Check out our adventures over at Mrs. Priss' site.

Want to ask me something? I decided to start a Formspring. Ohhh goodie! :)

DIY Covered Light Switch Plate

2010-02-24T14:26:00.001-08:00

This is a really (and I mean really!) easy DIY to pretty up your boring old white light switch plate.

What you'll need:

A very small piece of fabric
Scissors
Light switch plate
Mod Podge
Paint brush (I used a 3/4" brush)

Step 1: Measure and cut out your fabric to cover the switch plate. Leave about 1/2", or a little more, hanging off the sides.

Step 2: Spread a layer of Mod Podge on the front of your plate, then place and center your piece of fabric over the glue.

Step 3: Turn the plate over an spread some glue around the edges of the plate. Fold over the excess fabric. You may need to add some more glue to make sure it sticks. Make sure your corners are nicely tucked! Wait 10-15 minutes for the glue to dry a bit.

Don't try to be all pretty on the back, I obviously wasn't too worried about it :)

Step 4: Flip the plate back over. Cut a slit in the fabric where your light switch is supposed to poke through. I just cut a slit from top to bottom of the rectangle, then made small snips up to each of the corners.

Step 5: Flip the plate over to the back. Place some glue around the hole you just made and fold the little bit of fabric back, just like you did the edges of the plate in Step 3.

Step 6: Flip it back over to the front! (Are you tired of flipping yet?). Paint a layer of Mod Podge over your fabric. Let dry for 15-20 minutes.

Step 7: Guess what? Flip your plate back over and paint a layer of Mod Podge over the bit of fabric that you'd folded over the edges. Let dry.

Step 8: Forget to poke holes in the fabric for your screws. Or not. Please don't forget to poke holes in your fabric for your light switch screws! I just poked a hole in the fabric after it was dry (with some sharp scissors!), and it worked fine.

And now, you're done! It really is super easy and barely takes any time (besides the drying part!).

Re-Post: Favorite little table

2010-02-20T09:35:00.000-08:00

I wanted to go back and find this old post from 2 years ago, because I still love my little table :) And I probably have tons of new readers (um, I hope?). Enjoy!

This weekend we were cleaning and Chris was re-arranging some furniture in the living room. I have this hideous pink $10 table the was from Ikea and it's been sitting in the living room covered with magazines. Yuck. I had it in my old room back at home when my color theme was grey, white and pink. So Chris says, why don't we re-paint it or something? So all day I was trying to think of the best way to cover the table: paint? wallpaper? contact paper? wrapping paper? I finally got annoyed searching online for a few hours and decided the best and quickest way would be to get some mod podge and cute wrapping paper. I grabbed my mom and we hit up Michaels and Target. And $10 bucks later...voila!

Before:

After:

On Crafty-ness: Easy V-day Cards

2010-02-09T21:04:00.000-08:00

Valentine's Day is all fine and dandy I guess, I've never been that into it. These days (hah, I sound old) I think of it more as a time to love your family and friends, not just your significant other!

So my work just moved a few doors down from a scrapbooking store (yikes!), and I wandered in there the other day. Right smack when you walk in was a huge display of Valentine's Day inspired items. Aka, the cutest papers you have ever seen. So right then and there I decided I wanted to make Valentines for not just Chris, but other people in my life that I love. So I went around and picked up various papers here and there.

I was making these tonight, took a few pictures, and decided I'd do a little blog tutorial. So hopefully I inspire a few of you to make some cute, cheap and easy cards :)

Supplies:
-A variety of cardstock. I picked up plain white, rose and chocolate.
-Some cute scrapbooking paper, valentine-ish.
-Scissors! Regular old scissors work fine. Bonus if you happen to have any funky ones.
-A good black pen. Other colors if you want, but black is my go-to. Silver pens are great to have as well (awesome for dark colored paper!).
-Some type of scrapbooking adhesive (see picture below). I like the rollers, but the little sticky square are fine too :) Notice I am very technical with my terms.
-Paper cutter. Not mandatory, but nice (and very handy) to have.
**Other ideas: this could be a very long list, but, any fabric, felt, stickers, vellum, etc. If you have it laying around and it'll work for v-day cards, go for it.

Step 1:
Take a sheet of cardstock (mine were 12"x12") and cut into quarters. These will be the "base" of your cards, if you will. Repeat for as many as you plan on making.

Note: I didn't only use the plain cardstock as the "base" of my cards, I used some patterned ones, too :)

Step 2:
Cut and semi-assemble (don't glue yet) your other "pretty" papers (and/or fabric!) with your squares. I mainly just cut squares and rectangles...kept it easy. If you happen to have more time, this is where you can get creative by cutting different shapes, layering, etc.

Once you kind of have an idea of some various designs, start laying them out like I have below. Again, you don't need to glue anything down yet.

Step 3:
Now that your designs are all laid out, you can use any of the special scissors you have to make any paper edges pretty. This is optional of course.

Step 4:
Finish your assembling and glue, glue, glue!

Step 5:
Now that everything is all adhered together, you can add stickers, stamps, and write your little love notes. And that's all, folks!

I realize that most of this is really simple, but I just wanted to show you guys that is IS actually easy. Especially making a bunch at once, plus it's cheaper than buying your standard $3, $4 cards :) Plus, who doesn't love a cute handmade card?

PS, it took me about an hour to do 10 cards.

Tonight is...

2010-02-08T20:43:00.000-08:00

Tonight is Pillsbury Simply chocolate chip cookies. Image via here.

Tonight is homemade lattes. Image via here.

Tonight is making valentine's day cards. Image via here.

Tonight is watching How I Met Your Mother.

...and Heroes :)

Tonight is a good Monday night, how is/was yours?

Sorry Veggie Friends...

2010-01-31T19:11:00.000-08:00

I'm currently obsessed with stuffed animal head wall hangings...

This one cracks me up with the grandma-esque red glasses! Via themuststashstore.

And how sweet is this little heart nosed deer?! Via miniforest.

I think girlsavage's shop is the first place I ever saw these.

How can you resist this cute little Rhino!! Omygawsh!! Via PlanetFur.

Just kidding on this one. I mean it's cute and all, but, can you imagine a tiny deer head protruding from your chest? Via kitschygalore.

PS, the weird things I had to sift through to find some of these..yourewelcome.

Wedding Talk: Falling In Place

2010-01-27T18:46:00.000-08:00

I have a whole bunch of wedding stuff to update you on all! (Oh my gosh my blog is turning into a wedding blog!!) - Speaking of wedding blog, have you all heard of the brand spankin' new blog Bridal Blogette? Well you can find me contributing even more wedding related stuff there along with a small group of other bloggers. Check it!

So, the latest news is that our wedding is scheduled for October 23rd, 2010!! NINE months to go! It's funny, some people are like "oh wow, that's soon!" and the others are like, "really? that's far away!" So that would be just one little example of ALL THE OPINIONS people have about weddings. Man, it's just hilarious to me how every one has an opinion.

Oh so you want to know where we are getting married, right? We're not getting married in Bakersfield, but just over an hour away in Springville, California. It is a quaint little town in the foothills east of Porterville. We looked at a few places there (after much Internet research by me, searching for a good deal within 1-2 hours away of Bako), and although both were fantastic and beautiful..we chose a place called Rive Ridge Ranch.

There is this amazing gazebo on site, I love it. See more pictures on their Facebook page if you'd like!

This past weekend the awesome Colleen Sherman took our engagment photos. You can check some of them on her website :) (Yes, she edited them and got them all online IN A DAY, how awesome is that??) We love them and we had a ton of fun hanging out with her! Oh and by the way, we also booked Colleen SHOOT OUR WEDDING! I am a big fan :)

Reunited, and it feels so good.

2010-01-20T20:31:00.001-08:00

Let me just preface this post by saying this afternoon was a roller coaster.

12:00 pm - Get a call from a veterinary hospital 4 miles from my house telling me they found my dog Sadie running behind their office; HOWEVER, could not catch the Husky that was running around with her -.-

12:01 - Leave work to rush across town to pick up Sadie and search for Tundra.

12:05 - Call Chris to help me look for her.

12:20 - Pick up Sadie and start driving around looking for Tundra. It starts pouring rain outside.

1:00 - Call Dad to see if he can help. Keep driving around, start crying.

1:30 - See a dog on the side of the road - freak out. Not Tundra, but another lost dog (Aussie) on the side of the road in a field, in the pouring rain, eating grass.

1:32 - Call Chris to come get the poor dog.

1:40 - Take found dog to a nearby doggie daycare place. They agree to keep the dog for a few days. Think to myself that this good deed will bring us some luck. Keep crying.

2:00 - (Still looking for Tundra) Call Mom to see if she can help. She leaves work to come drive around.

2:15 - Drive back home, still looking for Tundra. Drop off Sadie, pee, grab a bite, and call animal shelters. Leave to keep looking.

3:30 - Still looking, decide to drive back home again looking for her. Dad calls and says he's going to go look. Still crying.

3:40 - Decide to drive out to the shelter 25 mins away to see if she's there.

4:05 - Arrive at shelter (which is technically closed), look through kennels and do not find her. Fill out a lost animal slip.

4:20 - Head back home. Cry more.

4:25 - Get a phone call from our neighbor, "umm, you're Husky has been sitting outside your house for 30 minutes, do you want me to put her in your backyard?" Me: "WHAT!!?!?!".......etc....etc.

4:30 - Keep being amazed that they ran at least 4 miles from our house, through neighborhoods and busy streets...and 5+ hours later she finds her way back home???

4:45 - Arrive home and snuggle the crap out of my dogs.

Seriously, wouldn't you cry if you lost that face?

Wedding Talk: The Search

2010-01-12T18:19:00.000-08:00

I'm not gonna lie, I've more or less known what I wanted my wedding to look like waaaaaaay before I was engaged. Fall. Outdoorsy. Evening. Lots of lights. Trees.

Image from here.

So as we started looking for places (umm, the day after we were engaged?) I kind of knew what I had in mind but didn't know where to start. I googled, and googled...and googled some more! (Is googled a verb? Because, I really think it should be). I found tons of relatively close places, but had to immediately decide:

How many people?
How far do I want them to drive?
Soo, how much is this place?
Can people stay there? What other accomodations are included?
Wedding date!?

And so on, and so on. Kind of overwhemling if I think too much about it, but the whole planning thing has been fun, so far. So after a while I have kind of narrowed down the where, the when, and the how many - so that has helped. But the most important right now...WHERE!

I have been looking for places a) out of town, but not too far (like 1-2 hours away tops), b) outdoors, trees, nice weather in the fall, c) secluded. That pretty much puts me up somewhere a little higher in elevation, and most likely...a ranch! There are some cute little ranches in nearby places that I would loooovee to get married at. I love the scenery that I have seen and how seclucded they are. There are a lot of other nice places that don't really have the seclusion...and while they are nice, I really would rather not have onlookers and passers-by. IfyaknowwhatImean.

Anyywaaays, that's about where we are right now. We are planning to go to a few places this weekend, so cross your fingers for us. I would love to just set a date :) And if you know of anything near Bakersfield, plus or minus a few hours, that would meet my standards (HAH, standards...I sounds like a snob) please let me know :) :)

PS, I was messing with my blog layout yesterday...does it look okay? I have never made any sort of banner/header/graphic so that was kind of my first shot. Constructive criticism appreciated :) I kind of think the birds look mean, but who knows. Some people tell me they look snobby ;)

A decade in hair

2010-01-07T19:32:00.001-08:00

Some notes to my past decade of hair-dos.

Year 2000

Long hair. Un-dyed. Parted in the middle. I think that even though you are 14/15 years old (!!) you are still stuck in the Jr. High ugly phase.

Year 2001

Your hair looks a little better in this photo. I think you've had the same hairstyle for about 4 years now, and I'd like it if you did something about that. Not pretty. That being said, nice tan!

Year 2002

WOW...looks like you entered the world of hair styling. I don't know what happened here. I think you went a little too blonde. Why must you STILL have that middle part??

Year 2003

You are graduating high school and I think your hair could look a little better here. You're chopping it shorter, and shorter. If I can remember right, this year you changed your style and color a handful of times (couldn't find the reddish hair pic, darn!).

Year 2004

Thank you Lord almighty for making me part my hair on the side. This looks pretty cute, the color is nice. Gettin' there, I suppose!!!

Year 2005

Me'thinks you just broke up with your longtime boyfriend and are trying to grow your hair out. It looks alright, better than years 2000 thru 2003 I guess!

Year 2006
You kind of look weird here, and young. I am not digging the whole growing out the hair thing, and the color looks a little dark for you. Just ew...moving along...

Year 2007

Ugh, can you please get rid of this, it's getting old. I don't think your hair is dyed here, and it's just blah - no wonder you're putting your bangs back all. the. time. Also, I can't believe this was early in your relationship with Chris, you look so un-cute! BLAH!

Year 2008

YOU CHOPPED IT OFF! Thank God! And got some straight bangs, nice. I am starting to like you again, and you seem much happier (maybe that's wine induced, but still!).

Year 2009

Finally your hair is back to looking cute and stylish! Good job, I am so proud of 24-year-old you! I am wondering if you will look at this picture in 10 years (!!!) and still approve?

Shed. It Happens.

2010-01-05T15:28:00.000-08:00

Just when you thought you have seen it all, no, you have not.

I get a text message earlier from Chris: “When you get home, google 'shed happens'”

What the what? Don't you love random text messages? So when I got home, I googled that shizz to see what was up.

Either he was referring to websites that sell sheds or this:

I am assuming because we have a Husky, that is what he meant. “Do you want me to buy that shirt?” Chris: “It's a lady that makes purses and clothes out of pet hair”

WHAT!!!!!!!?????

Okay so I found this article on it. Read that. Right. Now.

Are you kidding me? And the further you look into this, the more you find. Like, kitting with dog hair. Because, that's what you should be doing with that hair you brush off your dog. HOW UN-GREEN OF YOU TO BE THROWING AWAY DOG HAIR!

I decided to browse Etsy to see if I could find any pet hair goodies. Oh boy, you bet your life I did. Etsy is the best place to find the weirdest things you could never imagine other people buying. So in case you feel like purchasing handmade pet hair items, here are a few of the best:

A...troll.

Yarn. Made from YOUR dog's hair. Yeah, just send it in! I think I found my niche, knitted Husky and Aussie hair products.

Or! If you really love your dog, you can send this lady it's hair, and she'll make you a hat. All of a mere $1,000.....holy moly.

I don't know, hopefully I'm not the only one that finds this as kind of creepy.

Sister

2010-01-04T16:14:00.000-08:00

Today is my sister's 23rd birthday, HAPPY BIRTHDAY KRISTIN!

So in celebration, I'd like to share a few embarrassing photos from early childhood :) Oh, if only I had more scanned pictures....

Me, Grandpa, Sister

Sister, Grandpa, Me

Cousin, Sister, Me
Also, is this not THE BEST picture ever????

Inspiration

2010-01-02T14:03:00.000-08:00

Well I have no concrete wedding plans yet, but I pretty much have the whole thing planned out in my head. Jumping the gun much? I do want to get married sometime in October, though! What I am loving most about being wedding crazy is seeing all these awesome ideas everywhere and being all, "ohhh I can make that!" I have a feeling I will go a little bit insane if I try to make everything though :) We'll see!

But! I did make this inspiration "board" the other day and it makes me drool!

Let's make this happen!

PS, Morgan sent me this awesome wedding blog, Ruffled - it is absolutely AMAZING. Check it out!

This Year

2009-12-31T09:00:00.000-08:00

The time it was 70 degrees in January.

The time I re-did the guest bathroom.

The time we got a new puppy.

The time we ripped out our planter and made it our own.

The time we took a spontaneous drive.

The time my sister was having a baby.

Madelyn Rae...I'm an aunt!

The time I made a bomb cake for Mother's Day.

The time they were best friends.

The time I saved a life.

The time of year when the flowers are amazing.

The time we took a walk by our cabin (the parents).

The time my cat drove me crazy.

The time we hiked down to the lake to watch a fireworks show.

The time I found a birdhouse in the forest.

I just love this.

The time we had a blogger birthday retreat.

The time we were going to meet more bloggers, and be ridiculously silly.

The time we saw the big trees.

The time we hiked to an old logger camp.

The time we went to Michigan.

The time we drove to Mackinac bridge.

The time we become one of those people.

Thanksgiving.

My favorite picture of us.

The time I was really bored and she is obviously very happy.

The time we got new carpet!

The time he surprised me, and i said yes.

The time we got engaged.

Here's to a much better year, if that is even possible. I think it is!

PS. Thanks to all the lovelies that made this year possible :)

Well I guess I have something to blog about now

2009-12-27T19:50:00.001-08:00

Christmas Eve morning we piled up the dogs in the car and drove up the Kern Canyon to go on a little hike.

We stopped at a little place where a creek was supposed to be (it was kind of dried up). We'd been there once before.

And Chris asked me to marry him!!!!

SO HAPPY AND EXCITED!!!

Christmas Fatness Post #1

2009-12-22T18:21:00.000-08:00

I thought I'd share with you an AMAZING cookie recipe. If you haven't done any holiday baking yet, need to do some, or just want some yummy cookie you definitely need to make these!

I was going to just bake some plain 'ol gingerbread cookies, but while I was browsing for the ultimate recipe, I found this and just had to try it out. Enjoy!

Butterscotch Gingerbread Cookies
Via allrecipes.com

Ingredients:
3 cups all-purpose flour
2 teaspoons baking soda
1 1/2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
1 1/2 teaspoons ground ginger
3/4 teaspoon ground cloves
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 cup butter
1 1/2 cups packed brown sugar
1 large egg
1/3 cup light molasses <--(I used dark)
1 (11 ounce) package Butterscotch Flavored Morsels

Directions:

PREHEAT oven to 350 degrees F.
COMBINE flour, baking soda, cinnamon, ginger, cloves and salt in small bowl.
BEAT butter, sugar, egg and molasses in large mixer bowl until creamy. Gradually beat in flour mixture until well blended. Stir in morsels. Drop by rounded tablespoon onto ungreased baking sheets.
BAKE for 9 to 11 minutes or until cookies are lightly browned. Cool on baking sheets for 2 minutes; remove to wire racks to cool completely.

Lovely Things

2009-12-08T19:37:00.000-08:00

Ah, so much going on...yet so little blog about. Let me share with you all a few (or a ton) of recent purchases that I L.O.V.E.

More importantly, NEW CARPET! We used to have those ugly white tiles under there, so gross and COLD! Can you guess what the first thing I did when it was installed? Rolled on it, like a 5 year old. I'm cool.

This whole carpet buying thing was kind of a long process, but OH SO WORTH it. Unfortunately, we still have ugly white tile. Pray for us to save money soon for wood floors :)

They love it, too.

I didn't actually buy this, I WON it from a contest that Michelle Woo had on her blog. The lovely frame was from a company that her sister started, Name That Frame. I got to pick what it said and obviously I gave her some cheesy word ;)

Are those not the cutest little winter birdies you've ever seen? (have you even ever SEEN winter birdies? Probably not!). I got them at a little gift shop at Shaver Lake.

I also got these adorable salt and pepper shakers at the same place as my winter birds :) CUTE.

The best shoes, ever. I had a brown pair of these Sanuk's, but they may or may not have got covered with an explosion of purple nail polish when we went to Michigan.

This big, yellow, warm scarf from Target. I'm kind of obsessed with this color lately, not gonna lie. And I just LOVE this scarf. I'm one of those people that wears something new that I buy basically all. the. time.

I bought this headband from an Etsy shop a bit ago. Seriously so cute. Of course, I do make my own headbands but I just loved this fabric/color combo. Plus, Etsy seller love ftw. I also bought this yellow one. I'm such a sucker for cute hair things.

Oh and just for good measure, a picture of the lovely Sadie McWhinerson.

Hope you all are having a lovely winter! :) Stay tuned for more posts, I promiseeeeeeeee!!!

Fabric & Feathers, Oh My.

2009-11-22T18:38:00.000-08:00

Just a little shameless update on my Etsy shop, PinnedUp.

I have been working on a few new things, and I've recently added some headbands (finally!) and a new feather hair pin design. See pics below, I hope you guys like them!!!

I also have been working on a few non-hair things that I've been adding in yet another Etsy shop for just random things I make. I won't share that with you yet though because I'm not all there yet :)

Pink & Black Flower and Feather Headband

Black & Green Flower and Feather Headband

Powder Blue & Black Hair Pin

Because I have nothing more exciting to talk about

2009-11-18T11:37:00.000-08:00

A series of random little conversation's between Chris and I over this past weekend:

Whilst at Target...

Me: Ohhh I need new mascara!

Chris: That stuff you put around your eyes?

Me: No, that's eye-LINER...get it..it LINES your EYES.

Talking about the dog...

Chris: Tundra has pretty mascara around her eyes.

Me: Um, it would be called EYELINER. Her eyes, they are lined.

i may or may not have uploaded this picture saying "not eyeliner"...apparently I don't even know what eyeliner is!

Getting ready in the AM...

Me: (Putting on mascara)

Chris: (looking at me) Put some of that eyeliner on my lashes!

Me: Dude. It's MASCARA!

/punch

I'm not even kidding. this all took place over the span of two days.