I'm back! But I've moved...

Oh hey there! I know it's been a while so freakin' long! But I'm back! Did you miss me? I've definitely missed you! I'm going to keep it short and sweet here because this space no longer feels like home, and I'd love for you to check out my new digs and get you caught up on what I've been doing all this time.

I'm blogging over at Positively Mo now!

Quick! Get your butt over there and check it out- there's so much new content!

I have no intentions of getting rid of this little space of the interweb for the time being, but be forewarned that the domain name (www.picturesandparagraphs.com) will expire in July... so if think you might want to check back after then for an old post or recipe, make sure to bookmark picturesandparagraphs.blogspot.com.

Thank you so much for sticking with me all this time!

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Blog Maintenance

Just quickly popping in to let you guys know that some images on the blog may not be working for a bit... for the past 8+ years I've been using Photobucket to host any of my non-photo images (pretty much all the blog design stuff, and anything for the Fun Finds Friday posts, Netflix posts, etc), but Photobucket suddenly decided to stop hosting 3rd party photos unless you pay them an absurd fee. So I'm in the process of migrating everything over to my Flickr account, and then I have to go through each individual post and change each link. I have 700+ posts. Yeah, it's a process. I'm not happy about it. So bear with me while I switch everything over! Thank you!

Also, I've been thinking about switching the blog over to Wordpress for a while now, and I think this may be the push I need. So before I get too involved in moving photos, do any other bloggers have tips or good references for how to make the Blogger >>> Wordpress switch? I'd really appreciate it!

I love you all! Thank you for sticking with me!

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This just in!

If you're reading from a blog reader, you should really hop on over and check out the blog. I've been working on a new layout for a while, and it just went live! I'm pretty freakin' proud of this one. I kept trying to keep this space minimalist, because that's what I'm attracted to when I look at other blogs... but I finally came to the realization that that's just not me. I'm quirky and colorful, and I finally made a layout that reflects that. (Well, replace colorful with textured, and we're golden.) Also, my love of stationary and assorted paper goods prevails with this one, and I think that's pretty rad. I love all the layers, and I really hope you do too! And I finally figured out this whole google fonts business too so, woohoo!

Not tooooo much has changed aside from the overall aesthetic. Social media links are both up at the top menu and in the sidebar. Popular (or what I deem to be popular) categories are the clickable polaroids in the sidebar. Side note: check out the travel and recipe pages - I went polaroid crazy! I plan on posting some old photos from trips I took before this blog was even born, to fill up the travel page a bit more. And there should also be more recipes coming your way! (Keep your eyes open for one of my favorites tomorrow!)

Oh, and I decided to do away with Disqus for the comments. So, none of the comments from the past 2+ years show up any more :/ Disqus stopped syncing with Blogger a few years ago, and it has been frustrating trying to make it work with my past two layouts. I got tired of no longer getting notifications when someone would comment - I try to respond to all your comments, but I kept missing some because I would have to physically check each post to see if there were any!


The most daunting part of this overhaul was the recipe page, honestly. I've been unhappy with the look of it for a very long time now, and the whole polaroid idea gave me a chance to spiff up the page a little. But I have 28 recipes! That's way more than I realized, considering I rarely post any. So that was 28 "polaroids" I had to make and upload... and then 28 polaroids I had to edit and re-upload once I noticed something I didn't like about them. And now I have to spend an hour or two reformatting all the older recipe posts so that everything looks uniform... I would have done that before going live with the new layout, but fuck it, I couldn't wait any longer!

The sidebar photo of me is courtesy of my friend Rebecca. I had her snap a few photos of me the other day because I needed one to go alongside a mini biography for my yoga teacher page on my studio's website. (I don't graduate until February, but we have to teach our first class before then- I'm teaching mine mid-December!) She snapped some really great ones, so I thought it would be neat to use them in this space too. I really don't have many (decent or recent) photos of myself... I'm always behind the camera, and being in front of it was so awkward.

Anywho, I hope you guys are as stoked about the new layout as I am! I seriously can't stop looking at it! I'm all about embracing me lately, and this is one more step in that direction.

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2015 Highlights

Let's see, in 2015....

• Shawn and I took a short staycation and explored Philadelphia in January.
• That included a visit to The Academy of Natural Sciences.
• I baked a ton of amazing things, including fossil cookies.
• I posted way too many selfies in this post about growing out my pixie cut.
• I shared the recipe for my favorite muffins.
• I saw Incubus in concert, and one week later, Earth Wind and Fire!
• My phone took a lot of photos on its own.
• I flew down to Ft Lauderdale to spend a girl's weekend with my very-much-missed girlfriend Sam.
• I quit my baking job and started working at a brew pub.
• My best friend got married and I co-hosted her bridal shower, and threw her a bachelorette weekend in Cape May.
• I started taking charge of my closet.
• You guys got a peek at our apartment. (Which has changed since then....)
• I shared my make up routine, and then promptly stopped wearing any for the most part.
• I took a trip to D.C. to renew my passport, visit an old friend, and visited the National Arboretum.
• I died my hair pink! Then purple.
• I simultaneously over and under packed for my trip to Spain.
• I went to Spain!!! I spent 10 days with my parents and got to see Barcelona, Madrid, and Segovia!
• I cleared out 60% of my closet by listing a bunch of my clothes for sale on Poshmark.
• Shawn and I celebrated two years of marriage!

When I was going through the 2015 archives I actually thought to myself, "Man, there weren't many quality posts last year... just a bunch of Project 365 and Cat Life posts...", but apparently this list begs to differ. All in all, 2015 was a pretty good year. It had its ups and downs, but despite all the unpleasant things that no one wants to hear about here, 2015 was generally positive. I certainly experienced a lot of personal growth this past year; maybe I'll broach that in another post, we'll see!

This blog definitely took a back seat once I got back from my trip to Spain in October... I don't regret that though. I'm going into 2016 with fresh ideas and excitement about what's to come (both online and off). Thank you all for following along this past year, even though the cat photos have been sparser for a few months now ;) I hope you'll keep reading and learning with me as we go through 2016!

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Autumn Afternoon in Lititz

Two weeks ago I had lunch with Katherine of Of Corgis & Cocktails in the quaint little town of Lititz, PA. We actually met while I was working at Anthropologie! We went to Tomato Pie Cafe for lunch and then wandered around for a bit. Found some ducks and bought some chocolate at the chocolate factory in town - the whole block smelled like chocolate! It was a beautiful autumn day, perfect for an afternoon stroll. I'm happy we ran into each other, considering I still don't know very many people in Philadelphia and I certainly don't know any other bloggers in the area! All of these photos were taken by Katherine, whose camera seems to be on the fritz but still takes better photos than my little point-and-shoot nonetheless.










coat: Modcloth / dress: vintage (When Decades Collide) / cardigan: Knitted & Knotted (Anthropologie) / boots: Dolce Vita (Anthropologie)

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Jammin' on Between Three Kitchens

I posted my super simple recipe for strawberry rhubarb refrigerator jam over at Between Three Kitchens; you should definitely check it out if you're into that kinda thing.



Have I ever mentioned Between Three Kitchens on here before? It's a food blog that some friends and I share. I wanted a place where I could post recipes without people needing to see all the intimate details of my life too. But I knew I wouldn't have content frequently enough to post on my own, so I invited some friends to join in on the action, and Between Three Kitchens was born. We've been terrible about updating since our 'launch' over a year ago, but I'm hoping to flip that around this year and be more diligent in posting over there. My ultimate goal is to move all my recipes from here over to there, but first I'd like to make them all again to get some new photos and to see if anything needs tweaking. Well, that sounds like quite the project!

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Time for a New Look!

I'm not the only one changing my appearance around here. As you may or may not have noticed, over the weekend iveseensomethings.com got a whole new design! Gone are the days of grey and yellow with double sidebar action - it was time for a change... we had the old theme up for far too many months in a row. (Especially compared to how often we used to go through new themes!) So here's another simple design with some more exciting colors and a couple of new features.

First things first, we have a new tag line! Recollections of daily life: things we've seen, made, & done. When Shawn originally purchased iveseensomethings.com a few years ago it was a little spot for him to post his photography. When we decided to use it as the domain for our blog in 2009 I struggled to find a tag line that properly encompassed what the blog was about while still tying in the name. It took me over a year but I think I finally accomplished that.

But back to the new look!

Up at the very top you'll find our menu for all the useful things: our about us page, the recipes page, the walk log, and a link back to the home page. There's more fun stuff in our sidebar - just click the tabs at the top of that first box for tags, archives, and the walk log.

Below all of that are links to various other places you can find us on the web, and links to our respective individual pursuits (comics and dog treats!). I also implemented a search feature if you're looking for something more specific than what you can find in the tags.

Also, since my birthday is coming up... I conveniently put a wishlist in the sidebar too :) But you know, no pressure or anything. I'll probably leave it up there even after my birthday passes since, you know, Christmas is right on our heels...

The only thing this layout is missing is a more recent photo of the two of us; we haven't taken any since the last one was taken months ago. It's about time for a new photo! Funny enough, for a blog that's all about us, there aren't a whole lot of photos of the two of us on here. Hey Shawn, lets get on that!

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July Happenings

Hey-o! It's been quiet on my end round these parts... so far July has been a fairly boring month for us, for sure. We both had to work on the 4th (opposite schedules, of course) but where I was lucky enough to only have to work until 1pm, Shawn was stuck at the deli until 9pm... lame!
My co-workers and I got together for a small after-hours pot-luck at the cafe - there was homemade pulled pork, colorful cabbage salad with roasted peanuts and lime, creamy potato salad, blackberry shortcake with lime-zested whipped cream, strawberry brioche bread pudding, and shoofly pie. Unfortunately, Shawn missed the feast, but at least I brought him home a heaping plate of leftovers! Then we watched the fireworks from our living room television set; they were quite un-impressive this year, might I add.

So instead of a hearty post full of pictures and recanting of daily activities, I thought I'd introduce you all to a couple of new features I recently added to the blog!

We started a Walk Log so that you can keep up with our daily mileage, if you care to. The permanent link to it is at the bottom of the left sidebar. I've been logging our daily walks around the neighborhood for a few months now, and we finally decided it was time to do something with all that -otherwise useless- information, so do with it what you wish!

The other change can be found in the menu tabs, also in the left sidebar. We used to have a tab for Videos and a tab for Lists. I decided to move all of our lists over to Listography, and the Videos tab was futile because it was just a link that sent you over to our you-tube page. So I simplified everything and made a page with links to all of the other spaces we occupy on the internet.

In particular, keep your eye(s) on our flickr over the next few days/weeks... Shawn is going through all of his photographs taken over the last couple of years and posting them to flickr for a permanent spot on the interweb.... there are a bunch even I've never seen!

And I lied earlier... I can't have a post with no photos in it!
Here are a couple of dinners we've made lately:

pasta with baked tomatoes


potato and green bean salad


homemade wholewheat crust with zucchini, spring onion & mozzarella pizza

Happy July!

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It's already 5 days into 2011?!

First of all, Happy New Year, faithful readers! Albeit already being a few days into it, but a happy start none the less.

Since we like to change the blog's look fairly often, I figured it was time for a new layout - the winter theme was nice, but the santa hats and mistletoe were no longer in season, so our first layout of the new year pays tribute to the 70's. Shawn wanted a 60s/70s couch type of look, and I think that has been achieved.



We brought in the new year with some tasty spicy tilapia and season 3 of 30 Rock (which we've really been into as of late). A nice relaxing New Years eve at home on the couch was an enjoyable contrast to my last two new years eves spent working in a pastry kitchen. Shawn and I actually got to kiss at midnight! Cliche, but enjoyable regardless. Once midnight hit and our neighbors finished setting off sparklers in the courtyard, we called it a night. (Geez, we're like an old couple already!) I had work at 8am though so a late night was not in the cards.



Neither one of us is really into making resolutions, but I definitely have a few goals I'd like to focus on this year... new habits I'd like to form, if anything.

In terms of the blog, I'd really like to start posting at least one recipe a week. We make so many tasty things that I hardly have time to keep up with it all! Recipes I keep intending to post get lost in a shuffle of other pages of recipes... and thus our blog is left fairly devoid of recipes, despite our 9 month trek into the blog-o-sphere. If I can kick it into gear, we could have 52+ recipes on here by the end of the year!

Another thing I'd like to do is start bringing lunch with me to work. I work in a coffee shop and although we do sell bagels and panini sandwiches, those aren't the types of foods that are going to keep me alert and energized throughout my 8-hour work day. Shawn and I eat a lot of bread and cheese throughout the week already, and I'd really like to bring more fruits and veggies and 'whole' foods to snack on when I'm not at home. Just because Shawn doesn't enjoy munching on leafy greens and root vegetables, doesn't mean I can't prepare a salad of them for myself to bring to work!

I'd also like to play around with more bread-making! I'm not quite sure what 2011 has in store for us, but I'm excited to see what I can do with it.

(30 Rock image courtesy of Yahoo TV)

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