My favoirte things

Some of my favorite things

• Google Reader! I have about a million blogs I check daily. So having this handy little site where I can review my blogs instead of logging into each of them one by one is such a total time saver!
• My Happy Lite! Sunlite at my desk :)
  
• Mary Kate and Ashely Olsen's Style: Not so much the trashy hair, dark circles under the eyes and anorexia (crack head) look but here are some great examples of fun scarfs, shoes and kimonos!! And did I mention the SHOES?? <3
  
• Swap-Bot: If you like writing letters, making crafts, or putting together fun packages. Try it out. Swap-bot is a online service that organizes group swaps and a community of creative individuals. Swap-bot takes the hassle out of participating in group swaps by organizing all of the participant information and doing all of the partner assignments. On Swap-bot, you can host swaps, join swaps and chat with other swappers from all over the world. Give it a try!
• Amazon: Seriously, I would have been a mess this Holiday season without it. And if you like to read, used books and the library are the way to go.
  
• Cable Knit Bangles: Etsy has a slew of adorable styles and colors
  
• Having a family/friend network that will always be supportive, loving and compassionate especially if you fall down... hard. They will tell you to get back up, keep being your loud, horn-tootin', kiss-blowin' silly self. Or the hard times when you do something really stupid and they can tell you in a loving way that you need to fix it or work on it or whatever it may be.
  This article I keep in my bookmarks as a reminder from iCiNG about coping with a "quarter-life crisis", taking a hard look at the friendships you have aquired/kept close because of convience or whatever other reasons. Part One and Part Two. Its a bit long, but a great article.
• Making New Years Resolutions. Usually mine are financial: save 10% of income; Relationship: get more involved with people who are inspirational or great to chat with versus the "drinking buddy", the negative, or the ones that seem to always let you down; Health: Work out 3 days a week, eat healthier. This year I feel like those are pretty routine by now, so I am going to make some "try something new" resolutions. Things I have always wanted to try, and since here in Minnesota it is winter all but three months I will have some neato winter activities to try out. So stay tuned!

Happy Weekend all!! :)

Wedding Update

Wedding update

Location: Bakers Near Wilderness Settlement Link About 30 minutes from the house.


Dress: I am having my fantasy gown designed by LoriAnn, here is her link

Bridesmaid dress will most likely be one of these (In Aqua of course):

My veil is all set, from yours truely. I will be posting a how to as soon as I download the pictures

Hair style is figured out: Long, curly, romantic, super fun


I <3 Avril

Photography: I am SUPER excited to work with Colleen & Micah from Paisely Road Photography, they have the photojournalistic style I have been looking for and also specialize in graphic design, videography, and editing, so that just makes my day ;)

Bridesmaid Dress Ideas

Ok, so my very non-traditional, but very pea and potato wedding is coming along! HOORAY.
A little background info: We want a low key, but very fun celebration with our peps. I am only having one bridesmaid for too many reasons to list, but mostly because we're only inviting 50 people and my baby sister (well, she is 17) is going to be my Maid of Honor. Since it is a fairly casual wedding and my sister is not the girly girl type, I want to find her a fun summery/sun dress. Our colors will be types of light aqua, brown and ivory/light champagne. The idea of trying to match the exact hue and saturation of a color is silly and a head-ache waiting to happen.

So, in my off-time here I have a few ideas for Bridesmaid dresses:
1st up dress from Blue Fly by Alxia Admor for $62


Another from Blue Fly by Nicole Miller for $140

This one by Vera Wang for $140, I'd change the ivory ribbon to a blue ribbon
























Urban Outfitters for $40!!! Now, trouble with Urban Outfitters is the colors are always different when you get them home. This one is called 'Emerald' but it looks very aqua to me :-/

From Nordstroms for $108 and on sale ;)

T.I.L.T.

THINGS I LOVE THURSDAY

• Jewelry made from the cables of the Brooklyn Bridge. From here

• Run through the World of Warcraft: two words Treadmill and wow - exercising while playing wow...... and yes I totally think its about the greatest idea ever. CLICK
  

• October = Beer and Zombies... of course!
  

Aren't these two ADORABLE???

The crusade of the dress

This is a no Tato viewing day.

Ok, so there is this thing, its a simple maybe not-so-white dress that you wear one day that seems to be so darn important. I have this idea in mind that my friend has so eloquently put it "You're looking for a costume not a dress" So I've been thinking so what? It's my day, and I know I wont get too too carried away. Here are my fine inspirations for your visual appetites.

This is my favorite la la la dream dress from Fire Fly



























Here are some styles for the skirt that I just love love love

Tomorrow is dress shopping day EEEEEEEEE!!!!!!!

We're Getting Married!!!

Well, me and my guy are getting hitched in June :D It's totally official, date is set, and we couldn't be happier. Excited to put our DIY techniques to colossal work, we decided to go low key and do an at home reception and have the ceremony in a park by the house.

So, here is a list of things we plan on attempting ourselves:

1. Stationary: Save-the-Date, Invitations, Announcements and Thank-yous.
2. Decorations: beeswax candles hanging from mason jars in the back yard, LED Throwies, twinkle lights galore, paper lanterns etc.
3. Flowers: Bride and bridesmaid bouquets, Groom and groomsmen boutonnieres and some cocktail table centerpieces (4-5)
4. Corsages and misc boutonnieres: felt/fake flower and feathered thingys
5. DJ PeaPod: My Ipod! To make a playlist and find one of those units that has a remote I can keep in my pocket for the ceremony and reception.
6. My dress: Now I cannot make this but I have a design in the works that I would like to have custom made for me in silk jersey. Or to buy something really simple that I can embellish on my own.
   
7. Birdcage veil
8. Nix things we do not want/need to save the dolla dolla bills

Stay tuned for the fun, I have mock invites ready for assembly that I will be working on in the next week or two.

New listings

My first listings!

Feels like its been a year now, my promising to put some pretties up to sell. Well, today is that day :) I have these listed on my etsy account here and can make any custom sets as well, just shoot me an email.

Henna Hair Dye.... Experience

Tales of a hair dying experience using henna

This was a while back and I have been trying to post it for awhile now.

OK, am in search of a new dye technique that wont chem-out my black locks and am going through a big "Go Green" phase. I always love the blue-black color, gives such a pretty luster :)
So, after online threads and making a trek to my fav little store LUSH :D I got my first henna coloring

Doesn't look too hard based on the directions (she has the red version in the pictures, I picked the blue black kind)! So you should kind of shred the block up to make it easier to mix with the warm water. CHECK!



Not so sure about the smell and look of this here mixture, but it mixed up fine!



I slather this stuff all over my head and OMG I literally smelled like some kind of bong watery mud creature.



The bleaching of my poor counters... this is after 3 scrubs already :-/

You're supposed to keep it in for about 4-8 hours, so I slept in it... Thick loooong hair rock solid on the top of my head 5 am almost in tears trying to get this stuff out before work. I remember being a kid and putting clay in my hair because of who-knows-why, mostly because I was a feral child who wished she was living like her Indian ancestors anyways, this event brought mega flash backs. NOT FUN and my hair just pretty much stayed a dark green after finally getting the henna out.

SO, I am back to the chem coloring... going green didn't really go as planned. I didn't plan on BEING GREEN hehe.