17 Days!

The countdown continues, I will be sitting on this beach watching the sun come up and watching the sun go down for 14 glorious days.  Words cannot express how excited I am for this yearly vacation with family, friends, beach, smores, campfires, tents, thunder storms, gambling, wake boarding, Red Sand Beach, PDQ deli sandwiches, and Sand Harbor.  (Just to name a few)

Coral

Coral is the new color of pink!  I have been on the hunt to try and find some fun pink/coral summer color nail polish to wear this season.  Here are some of my findings so far.  I cannot wait to try out these shades of coral.

Essie - Haunte as Hello

Chanel - Orange Fizz

OPI - Conga-Line Coral

My favorite website to play with is the OPI site, you can change the colors of the nails and they have such a huge variety of colors.  Enjoy!

Musical Chairs

My girlfriend shared a quote with me today which I loved and thought I would share some key points in the quote she sent me. 

In the game of musical chairs, everyone walks around a circle of chairs.  When the music stops, they scramble for the nearest open chair.  If we were playing this game and found the nearest chairs taken, wouldn't we quickly look around for the next open one?  To remain immobilized, angry that the chair we wanted was taken, would undoubtedly lose our place in the game.  Sometimes in life, we set our sights on a particular chair.  When we don't get what we want, it is easy to keep looking at what we didn't get instead of seeing all that we have.  It is important to be grateful for what we have - for the open doors and empty chairs waiting and inviting our attention.  Loss and disappointment are part of life - but the music will play again and our lives can move on.

To my girlfriend Jess, thanks for always bringing a smile to my face and reminding me that "God is a better manager of the people we have in our lives than we are for ourselves" - Jess you could not have said it any better than that!

Starbucks Proposal

While every girl loves a good proposal story, today I came across one of the most amazing, detailed, and truly original ideas I have ever seen for a proposal.  I came across this story on GreenWeddingShoes.com.   This man proposed to his girlfriend by re-creating their first date at Starbucks.  Here are a couple of my favorite photos that were shared on this website, please click on the link above to read their story, that is just as beautiful and detailed as the pictures are below.

Musics Emotion

I came across a website called STEROMOOD; this website is basically where music can meet your emotion.  In my last semester in college, studying psychology, we did our final paper on the Effects of Music on an individual's moods.  People do not understand the profound effect that music can have on someone's mood.  So here is a fun website to help you either stimulate your current mood or help you curve your mood into something that you desire.  Hope you enjoy this as much I do.

Summer Sweets

My girlfriend and I have wanted to start baking something new every week when we have our girl's night.  I am obsessed with cupcakes and felt that this would be a fun project for both of us to do together.  I have been on the search for new recipes and exciting things to try.  Here are some of the cupcakes that I thought would be fun to bake during the summer.

Strawberry Cream Cupcakes from Call Me Cupcake

Rainbow Cupcakes from trublmaker Tumblr

Pink on Pink Cake from Call Me Cupcake

Lemon Cupcakes from 52Cupcakes

Thin Mint Cupcakes from Ingredients of a 20 Something

Margarita Cupcakes from Ingredients of a 20 Something

Pink Lemonade Cupcakes from Indegrdients of a 20 Something

Key Lime Cupcakes Ingredients of a 20 Something

Actions

A lot has happened this week that has made me question people's intentions and how genuine they are towards what they say and what they do. I always circle back to this quote time and time again and I cannot seem to find a better way to put it into my own words.  "Actions will ALWAYS speak louder than words." What people need to understand is words are the promise, and actions are the proof.  My hope is that some day people can show how they feel with more action and less words.

Since everything is better with a photograph here is one that I found today that I immediately fell in love with.

Tradition

Someone must have heard me talking about crepes the other day or life has just been so busy I completely forgot that a Father's Day tradition is to make homemade crepes.  My aunt made a batch of about 60 crepes yesterday and everyone brings over something sweet and yummy to put in them.  We had everything from cottage cheese, sour cream, grape jelly, blackberry jelly, berry jelly,  lemon jelly, and fresh cut strawberries.  We also enjoyed fresh coffee, orange juice, and fresh squeezed grapefruit juice.  Here is a visual of our Father's Day breakfast tradition.

My favorite of the morning was cottage cheese, fresh strawberries, and lemon jelly.

30 Days!

Exactly 30 days from today I will be in the place that I like to call home. I cannot wait to be in Lake Tahoe for two weeks.

Red Velvet

For anyone that knows me, they know how much I love Red Velvet Cupcakes and anything to do with Red Velvet.  It could just be the rich red color and creamy frosting or the way that it just melts in your mouth and stains your teeth from all of the red food coloring.  Here are some fun recipes I came across but have not had the chance to try yet:

Red Velvet Crepes

Red Velvet Pancakes

Red Velvet Ice Cream

Last night my girlfriend and I enjoyed catching up over some Red Velvet Wine, which I had never tried but she swears by how good it is.  How can I not look forward to a glass of wine named after one of my favorite foods?  My first initial reaction was that it did not taste like a cupcake, which I don't even really know why I was expecting it to.  The wine was light, flavorful, and delicious.  Cupcake Vineyards is the brand that makes this wine and their winery is located in Monterey County, California.  You can find this wine at your local stores and Bev-Mo, the bottle runs around $13 but you can usually catch it on sale for around $7-$8.  I would definitely recommend this wine to all the cupcake loving wine drinkers out there.

Go ahead, live deliciously!

One for One

TOMS are known for their One for One campaign of donating a pair of their shoes to children when you purchase a pair of their shoes.  http://www.toms.com/

 

Recently they announced the next chapter of their campaign One for One:  TOMS Eyewear.  They have three classic styles of Italian-made sunglasses.  Every pair purchased will help TOMS give sight to one person in need - through medical treatment, prescription eyeglasses, or sight-saving surgery.  Please visit their website, I already love their shoes and cannot wait to purchase a pair of their sunglasses, and continue to give back the community one pair of shoes or sunglasses at a time.

http://www.toms.com/eyewear/ 

 




"Out Takes"

All of my life I have always loved photography, I had no choice, it surrounded me every day since my mom was a photographer.  The other day I came across old pictures that my mom had taken of my sisters and me.  She used to dress all of us girls up in Victorian style dresses, set up her back-drops, and would have a staged tea party.  Looking back now, as annoyed as we were at those times when we were younger, those pictures are something that all three of us treasure.  My favorite pictures are the ones my mother would call "out-takes" which consisted of us girls laughing, one of us picking their nose, not looking at the camera, or one us having our eyes open when we were instructed to keep them closed. 

"Out Takes" are often the pictures that we do not like because we are not looking at the camera, it's our bad side, our eyes are closed from laughing too hard, or our smile is too wide.  The emotions and joy behind those photos are often not displayed or admired, and are usually pushed to the side or deleted for no one to ever see.  I wish more people took the time to appreciate those pictures and those emotions because those are true moments.  When I am really happy... the right side of my mouth goes up a little higher than the other and while I hated this smile showing up in pictures, I have come to appreciate that flaw.  Because when I see a picture where my smile is a little higher on one side, I know that in that moment I am at my happiest and I cannot help but show it.

Here is one of our famous tea party pictures that my mother still has in a frame in our house.

Everyone smiles in the same language.  ~Author Unknown

Uncomfortable

Lately I have felt all too comfortable about where I am at, when really there is more that I could be doing with my life.  Today I am setting new goals and felt it was the right time to embrace being uncomfortable, by doing something I have never done before.  I have been thinking about writing a blog for some time now. I wanted a place where I could share and capture all of my moments as I travel through my journey of life. 

Since I tend to be a perfectionist, I am extremely stubborn and I have a hard time showing others my current "work in progress."  From paintings, to pictures, to books, and I rarely ask for help when trying to learning all of the ends and outs of a camera.  So since "MYSELF" is my hardest work in progress, today I figured there is no better time to start showing and sharing myself.

This blog is going to have a little bit of everything that I find interesting or fun things that I find along the way from art, photography, music, quotes, fashion, travel, baking, interior decorating, and hopefully lots of adventures. 

Moments are one-of-a-kind.  Once they are gone, they’re gone, unless someone just happened to capture it with just one click.  I want to remember my life in a way where art and reality coincide.  - Me

My good friend Othello Silla took the picture above, as well as the background pictures on my bog. He takes amazing pictures and I cannot wait to see him become a famous photographer.  Please check out his blog and pictures at http://www.othellosilla.com/