Project 365, 173-179

173/365: With all this extra morning time on my hands, I have the time and energy to try out new recipes. I made drunken zucchini noodles, and bought a new rug for the kitchen. And I wore a zebra print dress - what a day!

174/365: We sat and watched one of the best thunderstorms that has rolled through here in a long time. The sky after a storm is my absolute favorite type of sky - look at those clouds! I also spent the day cleaning and organizing things around the apartment... my jewelry hadn't been organized in years, so I finally got rid of some useless pieces and now have only the most lovely pieces to choose from.



175/365: Healthy breakfasts! What's your favorite thing to eat for breakfast? I love Trader Joe's greek yogurt with granola and fresh fruit. Or multigrain english muffins with jam and almond butter.


176/365: Oh hai, soap, you look so strange.


177/365: The sweetest little face. We have the boys eating 'diet' food because Lloyd is such a chubster. You should see how much belly hangs through that hole when he stretches out on the scratching post. (This is nothing.)


178/365: I came home from work to witness this scene. Impossible not to take a photo before waking them up.


179/365: Home improvement! My parents bought us some brand new knives that are too nice to just toss in a drawer, so I bought a knife strip and had Shawn put it up. I also bought a small shelf to go above our "coffee station"... we have limited counter space as it is!

Two weeks into the new job and I'm still trying to get used to the schedule (and probably will be for a few more weeks). I love it (the job, and the schedule!), but I've always had trouble prioritizing things and now that I have more productive time on my hands, I really need to work on actually being productive with that time. I am a procrastinator by nature, and it has always been tough getting out of that mindset. But I'm taking pride in small accomplishments (a clean apartment, new recipes, more time with the cats) because I should be proud of those things too, right? The blog has taken a bit of a back seat these past three weeks, but I'm not going to apologize for that. I'll be back to a somewhat regular posting schedule soon, hopefully. Let me get my head wrapped around these life-schedule changes first.

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Fun Finds Friday #95

What a lovely necklace!



I was looking at aprons for work and I love this one... it's a little too bright for where I work though.



Anthro always has great, comfy basics. (And they're having a huge sale right now!)



This gradient color puzzle looks pretty difficult.



I caught a ghost on Google Maps!

+ Inspiring quotes turned into comics.
+ I try not too get opinionated about politics on here... but this is absolutely ridiculous.
+ While we're at it, let's talk about overparenting...
+ Life advice from cats.
+ Pizza boy becomes pizza man.
+ Loved this post about how to host a game night for adults.

Happy Friday!!

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Project 365, 166-172

166/365: Making Nutella brownie muffins. Yep, those are dinosaur muffin liners.

167/365: Got my first StitchFix box! Nothing wow-ed me though... hopefully the next one will be better!


168/365: Shawn and I had a day off together, so we went disc-golfing early, before the temperature rose and the crowds showed up.





169/365: The desk invasion of June 2015.


170/365: Let's play How Many Toys Can You Place on Sylvester.


171/365: A critter visitor!


172/365: Weirdos.

I went a little heavy on the cat photos last week because it was my first week at my new job and my head just wasn't in the photo game. I love the job though! Things have been easy to learn, and all of my new colleagues are super nice. And I've been enjoying having mornings to putz around the house, run errands, go to yoga classes, and do general somewhat-productive things that I didn't have a chance to do when I was working 9-5. The schedule change has been nice, but it would be nicer if someone would tell my brain that I don't need to wake up at 7am anymore - K, thanks!

Excuse me while I re-find my footing with the blog schedule too!

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Amy's Bridal Shower

My friend Amy is getting married in August, and she asked her three best friends to be in her bridal party. Her friend Billy lives out of the country, so the other maid of honor, Alyson, and I took it upon ourselves to throw Amy a bridal shower, with lots of help from her family. We decided to have it at her house, and asked her mom to take her out and distract her while a few of us decorated the backyard for the shower. What ensued was something "very Pinterest-worthy"... as we were told by a few people at the shower!




Alyson is the queen of DIY and made all of the decorations herself! With her crafting skills and my kitchen skills, we threw a heck of a party! We went with a wine & cheese theme, and a teal/pink/gold color scheme. She spray painted wine and beer bottles white and dipped the bottoms in gold glitter, then we tossed some pink peonies in them. She also made a bride-to-be banner out of burlap and paint, and made a wooden A & E sign in the color scheme, with the date of their wedding on it. (That's now sitting on Amy and Eric's mantel!)








As far as food goes, we opted for light fare since it was outside mid-afternoon on a warm spring day. Alyson made a southwest-inspired quinoa salad and a watermelon mojito salad. I picked up a few different cheeses, some prosciutto, soppressata and crackers, and made caprese skewers, triple lemon cupcakes for dessert, along with nutella brownie muffins, and I purchased some macarons from a local French bakery. We also had some fruit and vegetables out with hummus. Her parents brought the wine - an assortment of reds and whites, though I think most of the guests stuck with white, myself included. Alyson also made a delicious ginger mint punch that didn't last long!






For favors, Alyson made oatmeal lavender bars of soap with a little wrapper that read "From Amy's shower to yours!" (Like I said, she is the queen of DIY!) For the game prizes we gave out small bottles of wine that she decorated with burlap and ribbon to fit the color scheme. When I was out shopping for shower supplies, I came across fun cutouts of glasses, lips, and crowns that Alyson and I glued to long skewers to use as photo booth props! We used my polaroid camera to snap silly photos of each of the guests, and then they used washi tape to stick them onto a colorful page and write a piece of advice for the bride. We put all of those pages, along with some other fun photos snapped throughout the party, into a small scrapbook for Amy. Alyson glued the shower invitation onto the front of the scrapbook, and now Amy has a tangible reminder of the special party we threw just for her!






This is the second bridal shower I've thrown (also the second wedding I've been in!) and it was so much fun to plan! I was a novice for the first shower I co-hosted, but for this one I had some experience under my belt, and lots of help. Alyson and I started planning months ago and it was difficult not mentioning any part of the process here, because I know Amy reads the blog... but now that the shower has happened, I'm excited to share the details here. Alyson and I had a private pinterest board where we exchanged ideas about what to do/make. It was fun putting our own little twist on everything. And I'm not ashamed to say that I definitely used the shower as an excuse to buy that polaroid camera ;) The shower was supposed to be a surprise, but Amy figured it all out the week beforehand. Oh well! It was still a blast for everyone that came, and we couldn't have asked for more cooperative weather. Just an awesome day all around!

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Fun Finds Friday #94

This galaxy wrapping paper is so cool!



Animal selfies for science!



Sometimes you need little reminders.

+ One of my favorite things about languages is things that can't be translated literally.
+ An interesting look at the hourly wage you need to make to afford a 2-bedroom apartment and live comfortably.
+ Yay for cheap grocery stores! Where was all that food going before?!
+ I enjoyed reading this.
+ (Rough) photoshopping across countries.
+ Sooooo there's something called CatCon? I don't know that I would go to one though.
+ Would you spend the night in a museum on a robotic bed?

Happy Friday!!!

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The Cat Life - Cat Tower

This cat tower used to belong to my parents' cats, Bamboo and Mushu. When they passed, we took it home with us and Lloyd and Sylvester have been using it every single day since. It's starting to look a little shabby though... the top-most tier fell off during our last move and we were never able to reattach it, and the bottom legs have been scratched down to the cardboard layer underneath. Of course, the cats don't care that it's an eyesore and continue to use it anyway... but I've been looking for a new tower for the past few months. We haven't found anything we like in a price range we are willing to pay. So, this shabby tower stays put, for now. That chair next to it is also something we've been meaning to get rid of... I don't think a human has sat in that for over a year! (Good thing too, because the bottom of it is partially broken and might give out under the weight of a non-feline body...) But something keeps stopping us from throwing it away. They have plenty of other furniture to lay on, but for some reason they like that one, so it is sticking around... for now.

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Project 365, 159-165

159/365: My friend/colleague Jami gave me a cute bag filled with fruit on our last day working together.

160/365: Sylvester is always judging me.


161/365: Shawn said he got me something as a surprise..... I was not expecting a key lime pie!!


162/365: Margaritas with the girls from work as a bittersweet celebration of change.


163/365: Tried something new for dinner.... open-faced caprese chicken sandwiches. Yum!


164/365: Co-hosted my friend Amy's bridal shower! Months of planning, and all of a sudden, it was time!


165/365: When in doubt, cats.

I don't have much to say about last week except that I really hope to never leave a job and host a bridal shower in the same week ever again. Talk about not sleeping! Of course my last week at work was filled with projects... which meant I spent my Friday night scouring the grocery store, baking cupcakes, making caprese skewers, frosting cupcakes, wrapping gifts, and locating my head to put it back atop my shoulders. But now I have a few free days before starting my new job, and I intend to fill that time with lots of yoga, crafting, and blogging!

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