Autumn Prelude

Last weekend Loudoun County was having a farms tour.  Which is essentially just a chance for all the historic properties to be open to the public and for us to ooooh and aaahhh over how extraordinarily wealthy these families are (did I mention that the Kennedy's had a summer vacation home near Loudoun?  Yeah those kind of people).  The house we went to see has been donated as a museum with the National Historic Trust etc or something like that.  Anyway, Loudoun is only about an hour away and I was VERY persistent about seeing the Autumn leaves so I cooerced the family into going.  We spent a good three hours walking the grounds, taking pictures, taking a tour of the house, having an alfresco lunch, and touring the gardens before we were kicked out by an impending Scottish wedding that was going to happen on the property.  We weren't told to leave in so many words but the intent was clear once the caterer and the DJ and the wedding party and the guests and the party planners all descended on the main house with nary a thought to the insignificant tourists just wandering around.  We didn't mind too much though, honestly there are only so many pictures of trees that you can take.

Speaking of massive amounts of pictures, Dad had one camera and since I think I can do everything to perfection I had another camera.  Between the two of us we took a lot of pictures of foliage.  Which means I have at least a few hours to spend on Lightroom getting the best pictures ready to show, but in the mean time I wanted to share a few of the finished ones. 

Hope it makes you feel like Fall in New England (which is what I was going for ;) )

<3 B

Random Ramblings 2

Morning!  Or Happy Wednesday Lunch Break!  Here's another installment of whatever craziness is on my mind.

1.   I've started ordering Christmas presents as of Last night!  I've been making a list of what to get everyone and what I want everyone to get for me ;) ;) for a while now, but I only actually started buying presents last night.  I had to take advantage of a free shipping deal at Williams Sonoma and that's all I'm gonna say just in case my mother ever reads this blog.  Merry Christmas Mom!  You and Dad have at least one present!
2.  Speaking of Christmas, the other day at the gym I was on the treadmills and there was a big bank of tvs in front of me.  On one tv there was a preview for some Christmas animated movie coming out in November.  On the tv next to it there was footage of people holding signs that said "Virginia Believes!"  My brain jumped to the obvious conclusion:  every tv channel was promoting Christmas already!  One channel had a Christmas movie and the other channel was referencing "Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus."!!!  Of course!  This is exactly what these two channels are trying to convey!  I later watched the sign channel and realized the signs were meant for the presidential race, but I still thought the juxtaposition was amusing :)
3.  I used up the second to last bunch of beets (from the CSA) last night and made beet cake.  It was chocolate cake with beets in it.  I'm still trying to figure out how to make beet cake without it tasting like beets . . . it's a tad bit difficult considering the beet flavor is so strong but I'm working on it.  To take everyone's mind off of the beetiness, I made the MOST. DELICIOUS. FROSTING. EVER!!!!  No seriously, it was divine.  Cream cheese, powdered sugar, vanilla, aaaaaand browned butter!  Oh my I"m salivating just thinking about it.  Don't worry, once this cake is gone I"ll whip up another batch for another cake to blog about the frosting.  I must share this luciousness.  And if the fam doesn't want to eat it, I'll just bring it to work and stick it in the kitchen with a sign that reads something like "Wanted to bake, but still want to fit in my jeans.  Enjoy for me!"  Or something.
4.  Woah!  just had a random flashback to high school.  And not the one I graduated from, the one I went to in Colorado before we moved, Pine Creek.  Oh how I loved it there.  The memory was of me waiting for my mom to pick me up after sports (I was a freshman and sophomore and couldn't drive) and I would wait in the library and there was this little magazine reading room that had two overstuffed chairs.  I would curl up in those chairs (doing all sorts of funny contortions)  and the nice librarian would come wake me up right when my mom would get there (which was the same time the library closed subsequently).  Life was simpler back in Colorado.  I miss it a lot.  I've vowed to go back some day.  Hopefully when I'm young enough to still hike and rock climb!
5.  Speaking of Pine Creek, funny story.  It was sophomore year in college and I was chatting with some friends before class started.  A guy next to me, Justin, was talking about how he lived in Colorado Springs.  Here's how our conversation went down:
Me:  Oh you live in C-Springs?  I LOVE it there!
J:  Really?
Me:  Yeah I lived there twice, Air Force family.
J:  Cool, where at?
Me:  Well the second time we were there we lived in Pine Creek, lol and I went to Pine Creek high school.
J:  Wait, I went to Pine Creek high school.
Me:  What was your graduation year?
J:  2006
Me:  Me too  . . .
(pause)
Me:  So you were a freshman, at Pine Creek, in 2002?!
J:  Yes!
(pause)
(look at each other and try to remember ever seeing one another at all, ever, both of us not having any glimmer of recognition)
Me:  That is so weird!

Of course we were enthralled by our semi-connection for the rest of the week.  We both had known the same people, both had eaten lunch in the same lunch room (there was only one) I guess that we just both managed to somehow take completely different classes for two whole years.  It just blew my mind that I had NO recollection of him at all.  As an Air Force kid who moved every three years one of my survival skills was to recognize people.  I can't remember names to save my life but I can remember faces.  And Pine Creek wasn't that big.  When I went there it was only recently built and had around 1300 students.  350 some students in one class is not a lot of people to remember considering you've had class and played sports with almost all of them.  It still boggles my mind.  Anyway we were friends in college after that I guess to make up for lost time in high school :)

Ok enough ramblings for now or else I'll never have anything more to say and I'll have to stop blogging which would be sad!

<3 B

Cookie Practice

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas!  Actually, it's not.  It's supposed to be 80 degrees the rest of this week!  It's October people!  Halloween is in a week!  I have vivid memories of all my childhood having a beautiful costume and having to wear a big, puffy heavy coat over it and no one got to see my gorgeous Belle costume which was the only one that I ever got from the Disney Store because the costumes there were expensive and I was the oldest so I never got anything new and pretty and the one time I did I have to cover it up with a pink Lands End jacket!!! 

Ok, I'm back from bitter childhood memory land.  In all actuality it didn't scar me really at all that I had to wear a jacket.  It was cold enough that I forgot everything except getting as much candy as possible and going home!

What am I posting about again?  Oh yeah, cookies.  Well I'm practicing decorating cookies.  Like actually decorating them not just frosting them.  I got the idea from the Pioneer Woman (big surprise there) but she featured a book from the woman who writes the blog Bake at 350.  She makes super cute cookies and as I was checking out her blog I got inspired to make my own cookies.  I tried that night actually.  I didn't have all the "good" materials so my icing colors weren't very bright but they were still semi-decent looking.

After that I broke down and ordered gel food coloring (used by students at the Culinary Institute of America),

All da  pwetty colors!

and meringue powder,

and disposable pastry bags (I only had one washable bag and I wanted to use multiple colors), and finally squeeze bottles.  (If you read the Bake at 350 blog, these are her essential tools).

So I baked up some cookies and tried her techniques.  Most essential concept is that there are two thicknesses of frosting, one is thick to use for outlining the cookies and adding eyes and such, and one is liquid so it fills in the cookie and dries smooth.

So I had to outline all three dozen cookies.  My hands HURT!  And I say "hands," plural, because I switched hands and it still didn't help.  But once they were all outlined I started to get creative with the liquid or "flood" icing!

I had three things of color I was working with.  I made one recipe of royal icing.  I split it in half and colored one half orange and one half black.  I then took the still stiff black icing, put it in a pastry bag, and outlined all the cookies.  I then took all the stiff black icing left and the stiff orange icing and slowly added water to the two bowls stirring until it reached a liquid consistency so that it falls off the spoon in a ribbon and smooths out in three seconds.  I took the two different colors of flood icing and put them in squeeze bottles and was ready to decorate!

Here I filled the whole cookie with orange icing.  Then I drew lines of black horizontally.  Finally I took a toothpick and went up, then down, then up, then down, then up, then down, then . . . yes I'll stop.

Here I followed the same thought process  but instead of horizontal lines, I drew half circles starting from the corner and only drew the toothpick up, then up, then up, then . . . ok you get it.

Now this one was cool.  Fill the cookie with orange, then make a spiral of dots.  Now take a toothpick and start from the center and just draw it through all the dots in one continuous sweep.  It turns the dots into hearts!  So cute!

This kitty was filled in with black and horizontal orange stripes (up and down and up and lol)

This one was easy, fill with black icing and then just add orange dots!  

This one was my reference to a spider web.  Fill with black flood icing, draw concentric circles in orange starting from the center, then take a toothpick and draw lines from the center out all around.  I used leftover stiff black icing to add even more lines on top.  I didn't need to, I just did, and I overdid it.  I should have used the Chanel moto: whenever you're going out of the house, take stock of your accessories and take one thing off (or something like that).  Essentially Coco just meant that less is more, and I didn't follow that with this cookie and I should have.

 
Here I just used some stiff black icing to make fur.  Kinda funky.

Ah, nothing like yummy sugar cookies in the late afternoon sunlight :)

And since meringue frosting doesn't have that much flavor and we've decorated Christmas cookies with powdered sugar and water frosting forever and ever, I made a few with powdered sugar icing.  I did find that outlining the cookie with the stiff icing helped all the sugary goodness to stay on the cookie and not overflow the sides.

Sigh, that just means more hard work for me.  But it was worth it, I had fun decorating the cookies and I'm looking forward to Christmas where I can take all my new supplies and do some intense gingerbread cookies!  (Don't worry pictures will follow :) )

<3 B

Apples, Apples, Apples

Reppin' K-State!  This was the weekend we beat KU!

We went apple picking the other week!

I'm a bit determined when it comes to apple picking, and by determined I mean that nothing will stop me.  Let's see, last year I even dragged my ex around an apple orchard for over an hour.  I picked a whole bag of apples, I think he picked 10 . . .

Anyway, we picked an entire bushel of apples and ever since them I've been trying to think of ways to use them up!  I've made apple pie, apple bread, and used them in salads.  My favorite way to use them is to juice them for fresh apple juice or apple and spinach juice or apple and beet greens juice, although I'm the only one who drinks that last one ;)

I'm also a bit picky when it comes to my apples.  They are ALWAYS on the "Dirty Dozen" list because of the pesticides that get on the skins.  I get it, trust me, it's hard to grow fruit and veggies!  Bugs eat them all the time and apples are some of the hardest so I understand the use of pesticides but that doesn't mean I want to eat the pesticides.  So I peel all the apples I use.

And when you're using a massive bowl of apples like this, peeling all of them takes a long, loooooong time.  So long in fact that by the time you're finished peeling the apples all you want to do is curl up on the couch and eat chocolate to celebrate the fact that you finished peeling the never ending bowl of apples.  Forget about the apple pie you were going to make, that can wait until you've recovered!

See the massive bowl of peeled apples and the massive pile of peels?  Took.  Me.  Forever!

This one took just as long.  Sheesh the things I do for people.

I was even using Sarah's super nifty peeler.

So I ordered this awesome contraption.  We used to have one and the design hasn't changed one bit.  They sell lots of these on Amazon from different sellers and every single one of them looks exactly the same.  Hey, if it ain't broke, don't fix it!

Here's how you work it:

Use the lever on the bottom to suction cup it to the counter.

See how strong the seal is?  It's literally lifting the cutting board off the counter right now!  (Just make sure the bottom and the counter are completely dry or it won't suction cup itself)

Then press the lever back and pull the rod back.

Now you have room to stick an apple on the three tines.

Hey look, you can see into the living room in this picture!

This thing-a-mo-bobber is used to slice and core the apples as you peel them.  I didn't want sliced apples at this point.

So you turn the winged-nut thingy (I don't know what it's called but you turn it and it loosens things and I'm too lazy to look it up on the internet right now).

And just swing the thing-a-mo-bob down so it's out of the way.

This is the part of the contraption that peels the apples (or potatoes).  You can move it back and forward depending on how thick the skin is.

Alright, step one: impale the apple forcibly on the three tines.  Be VERY careful not to impale your hand on the tines instead!  This will only be a problem for you if you're like me and close your eyes during impact.  This is also why I never played softball . . .

Anywhoo

Turn the crank on the back until your apple reaches the front and just keep cranking!

The peel will start to come off in a long ribbon.

Pretty peeled apple in an inordinately short amount of time!  Boy and I a happy girl  right about now!  (lol I hope you liked that play on words, I did that just for you ;)  )

Big pile of apple peels and peeled apples in HALF THE TIME!

Did I mention that the apple peels come off in really long strips?  Because they do.  It makes no difference to anything in the world, I just thought I'd mention that the apples peel strip is super long.  It is the longest on large apples.  Bet you couldn't have figured that one out on your own!  Did you ever have contests with yourself and try to get the entire orange peel off in one piece?  I did and I never succeeded until I peeled a clementine.  Which isn't an orange.  So I guess I still lost.  To myself. 

MOVING ON!

Sorry.

Btw, freshly picked peeled apples oxidize (turn brown) A LOT faster than store bought apples.  So don't freak out if your apples turn brown sooner rather than later, it's normal.

Once the apples are all peeled, slice them in half.  We now have to core them.  "We" meaning "I".

I used to core apples the Rachel Ray way.  She'd just take a knife and slice diagonally down through the apple 1/4 and get rid of the core.  It was fast, it was easy, and no core was left.  The problem with this method is that it also sliced off a bunch of good apple too.

 So I recently started using a melon baller (or grape fruit spoon) to scoop out only the core. 

See the difference?  The melon baller only took out the yucky core and the knife cut away perfectly usable parts of the apple!

A nice, big bowl of apples all peeled and cored, just waiting for me to use them in lots of yummy ways :)

Go out and pick some apples and keep that doctor away! (or keep yourself away from that doctor because I doubt any of us know a doctor that makes house calls anymore . . .)

<3 B

Bit of a Break

Hi everyone!  I wanted to apologize about my lack of posting for the past few weeks and tell you a little story about why.  Don't worry, I have a lot of posts saved up ;)

Ok, this picture explains my lack of posts recently.
Can you see the difference between these two computer programs?  The one on the left is the one I was using.  Thing is, it's a student edition.  Which is fine because Sarah is a college student.  When you purchase this product you have 30 days to register it.  Well of course I waited the whole 30 days to register the thing.  Why do something before I have to?  I follow this same thought process when it comes to my laundry.  If I can still walk to my bed around my pile of laundry, there is no need to put it away yet!  Let's just say my future husband is gonna looooove me ;)

Anyway, all was going swimmingly until I realized that I registered the product with the wrong email address!  It was written down wrong by the computer and I registered it with an email address that doesn't even exist.  So I call the little "help" (Ha. Ha. Yeah right) people somewhere in India and asked them what I could do.  Unfortunately explaining a complicated problem to people who barely speak english is a long, convoluted process but essentially they told me that there is only one serial number per product and even though the email address it was sent to doesn't exist, the serial number was still sent out.  So I would have to send an email to customer support explaining the problem and asking for a new serial number.  Too.  Much.  Work.
So I ordered a new one, one that wasn't a student edition and it just came in the mail!

Now this wouldn't have been a problem, except for the fact that I've gotten a wee bit addicted to "enhancing" my photos.  Now I know you're probably thinking that I go crazy and change everything and all my pictures are Botoxed, but honestly I'm not even close to that talented!

What I have is Lightroom, not Photoshop.  Photoshop is like $300 and I don't have a need for it.  Lightroom is a lot less expensive.  What Lightroom does is it enhances photos.  I can go in and make a picture I took without the flash less yellow, I can make the red on an apple more saturated, I can (semi) reduce those big glaring spots you get sometimes from reflections on glass, I can increase the contrast to make an object stand out more, etc.  I'm sure I could do more, but I don't really know how yet.  All I try to do is make every picture I take look like it was taken at noon, on a sunny day, with no glare.  I want the pictures I take and show to you look like what I see in real life.  I don't want anything to look fake, I mean come on you can tell when something is fake.  You know all those personal photography blogs (not every blog, but a decent amount) where the baby has luminescent skin and bright, electric blue eyes?  Yeah, you know that's not natural . . .

So, I got attached to Lightroom and when I didn't have it for two weeks, I had very little urge to write a post because I knew that the quality of the pictures would not be up to my new standards.  I'm a perfectionist like that :)

But I'm back now!  And I've saved up a LOT of material for posts, so you'll be bombarded pretty soon, just wait and see!

<3 B

P.S. If you are taking photos for yourself and want to enhance them to make them look their best but don't want to go all out, I'd suggest Lightroom.  It's pretty easy to figure out and can make a decent amount of difference while still looking natural!

Random Ramblings

Just because it's a tuesday at lunch time,
and everyone around me is gone for lunch,
and I'm not,
and I'm not because traffic was bad this morning and I got to work 15 minutes late,
and taking a 15 minute chunk out of my 30 minute lunch break would be just enough time to walk to my car and back,
and that's not worth the effort,
I decided to list my thoughts as of right now until I have no more thoughts left to share.
Here goes.
1.  Have you ever noticed that really religious guys like to grow Jesus beards?  No, I'm serious.  We all know them, those very devout Christian guys who go to church all the time, and Bible study, and are pretty much the epitome of everything holy and you look at them and think that they've never done anything wrong like cussing out a driver when they don't look and almost crash into you?  Yeah those guys. (I personally don't find anything wrong with these guys btw, I just prefer a little more moderation in my personal faith life).  Ok, now that you're thinking of the guys that you know that fit this description, is it safe to generalize that you have some memory of them growing a bushy beard that harkens back to Biblical times and reminds you of Jesus?  I can tell you three examples right off the bat (although I won't to protect these guys privacy).  Maybe it's a phase or a coming of age or just some weird compulsion on their part.  I just find it amusing.
2.  That being said, I hate facial hair.  Any speck or dot or freckle of hair on a guys face I detest.  Don't get me started on mustaches, or goatess, or heaven forbid the dread soul patch!  All of them just breeding grounds for bacteria and ways to hide a weak chin.  Give it up men!
3.  That also being said, the priest at our church looks like he's 30 and it always weirds me out because he's actually in his 50s and he's older than my parents.  The juxtaposition of the knowledge of his actual age and the age he looks always throws me for a loop.  Maybe it's because he's the priest at a college campus church and hangs around with young 20-somethings all day.  Anyway, he used to have a beard and he shaved it randomly on Easter and he definitely looked better with one let's just say.  It also made him look 35 not 30 so he is the one instance where I want someone to grow a beard.  But if he grows a mustache and curls the ends, I'm petitioning the bishop.
4.  I like to read the transcripts of the presidential debates instead of the articles that review them.  This way I can get the completely unbiased record of what actually happened instead of a slanted view.  I also like to read the transcripts and not watch the actual debates because I need to go to bed at a decent hour, I don't watch tv during dinner, and live debating makes me nervous.  Live anything makes me nervous.  What if they mess up and embarrass themselves?!  I would cringe in empathetic horror with them!  It's just too much stress. I think it comes from watching Iron Chef or any tv program with a time limit.   
5.  If I was in AP Government is high school again, I'd be forced to watch the presidential debates.  And take notes.  And write a 10 page essay about them.
6.  I had a Democrat for an AP Government teacher.  She didn't tell us till the end of the year, but it didn't come as much of a shock if you know what I mean.
7.  Speaking of my lovely high school years reminds me that my baby sister is tasking the PSAT today.  ALl that means is that she got to school, took the test, and got to leave at 11am to go back home.  The butt-head.
8.  Why would anyone want to be president of the United States anyway?  That's a ton of responsibility and lots of disgruntlement directed at you.  Seriously who looks at the job qualifications and says "sign me up!" 
9.  My hair doesn't dry at night anymore.  I think it's because it's cold enough now that we don't have to run the air conditioning.  I don't know what causes it, all I know is I go to bed with wet hair and I wake up 7 hours later with wet hair.  It also dries funky when I'm at work so I have to put it in a bun or piny tail to keep it looking decent.  Sigh I will now have to subtract another 30 minutes from the precious little time I have at night to do what I want to add 30 minutes to my nightly going to bed ritual. 
10.  Ugh this day will never end!  I'm running out of things to do and momentum.  Only . . . 20 . . . more . . . minutes . . . I think I can, I think I can.

Over and out, till next time.

<3 B

Velvet Pumpkins

 I was at work one day, just checking one of my favorite blogs, The Pioneer Woman, just to see if there were any new posts, and I saw . . . THESE.

Oh my goodness there were almost no words.  I fell immediately in love!

Btw I'm hoping that is the feeling I get when I find my future husband,  it would make my life a lot easier.  I get this feeling when I'm looking at shoes and clothes and home decorations and jewelry . . . Ok fine, I get this feeling when I'm doing any shopping and I just know, instantly, that I need that product.  You can just randomly shop and see a good deal and be excited or think a shirt is pretty and be excited, but this feeling is a true compulsion.  It's like you're finding missing pieces of the person you will grow up to be and buying those shoes will somehow make you you.
Deep, I know.  I apologize for getting that philosophical this early on a Saturday afternoon.

What I'm trying to say, is that I fell desperately in love with these pumpkins as soon as I saw them featured on the blog, and I went online that night and purchased them.  I can't explain it, I just had to!  And I'll tell you why.

1.  The colors are glorious.  So rich, so deep.  They spoke to me. 

2.  They are gathered at the top to create the look of the actual ridges on a pumpkin.  This is what convinced me to buy them and not try to make them myself (yes I'm guilty of doing that to everything.  Oh the plumber is charging that much?  How about I take a class at Home Depot and I'll be able to replace all of the faucets in the house myself!  cough cough.  Yes I'm working on stopping this).  I have NO idea how they gather the velvet and make the ridges and anchor the stems in!  And let me tell you that stem is in there tight and it is not going to pop out any time soon.

3.  The STEMS.  They're REAL.  As in actual pumpkin/gourd stems.  My Dad got me hooked on picking out pumpkins with good stems, so now when Fall rolls around and I buy my Halloween pumpkin I look for the biggest pumpkin with the best stem.  The stems on these pumpkins are completely dry so there is no worry about mold or rotting, and they're not brittle and they add that touch of elegance that says this just isn't a pillow or kids toy, this is a showpiece!

 4.  The colors!  Oh wait, already mentioned that.  The velvet!  It's so soft and rich looking.

5.  The rice.  They are stuffed with rice so they hold their shape and don't tip over.

6.  Um they're awesome?

7.  They're pretty?

Anyway, you can buy them and see the other decorations they have to offer (acorns and mushrooms and such) at shop.lovefeasttable.com.  A small side note, they're a bit expensive and they're not huge.  The set I got had two 6" pumpkins, two 4", one 5" and one baby 2."  All the pumpkins in these pictures were piled on a white cake platter so that can give you the approximate size.  You can buy them in sets like I did for this one, or you can buy them individually.  They come in all colors.  I have my eye set on the white ones for Christmas ;)
I love them, and I want more!  They would also make wonderful presents.

Greatest Time of Year (sorta)

It's the greatest time of year, and it's here, help us celebrate it.  Joy to the world and everyone lift up your hands and feel the sun?  I definitely don't know all the words to that song.  It's a good thing that my Dad doesn't either or he would correct me.  There is nothing I dislike more than when I'm singing Christmas songs and I don't know the exact words for a verse and I make a word up and immediately I hear this disembodied voice from somewhere in the house going "Those aren't the words!"  Well I'm sorry, sheesh, just let me enjoy the holiday spirit! 
Anyway, it's not this time of year yet, the song was just stuck in my head because it was on my ipod as the songs shuffled on my run the other day.  Weird.  But it IS a good time of year, it's a good time of year for SHOPPING! :)
This is the time when it's still semi-warm outside and you don't need a coat, but all the stores are getting shipments of their deep-winter clothing (parkas, sweaters, down jackets, etc) so all the clothes that you want to wear right now are on sale!  Have I mentioned that I only buy clothes on sale?  And I very rarely if ever buy clothes not on sale? (except for Christmas and Easter dresses).  Anyway I'm a sucker for a bargain.
It had been a month or two since I'd been shopping (Target doesn't count) so I was feeling the urge.  And since Becca needed to go to the mall anyway to pick out her homecoming dress I went to LOFT before I met her and mom at the mall, we picked out her dress and while she was getting dinner at Chick-Fil-A I swung into Gap and Banana Republic.  The next day we went to DSW (also known as heaven) to get the shoes to match her dress.  And here are the things I picked up!

I saw this shirt when it wasn't on sale and I didn't want to pay the full price but now it was on sale and there was an extra 40% off the sale (LOFT does that a lot, I suggest going there for their sales, they have a lot to offer).  The jeweled collar just spoke to me.  I wore it today with a navy and gray stripped cardigan, gray pants to tie in with the gray cardigan stripes, neude shoes to tie into the color of the shirt, and big earrings to match the jewels on the collar.  I was pretty proud of my outfit!  Now if only I had woken up early enough to do my hair . . . lol 
 

This was a light weight sweater from Gap that was on sale.  I try to buy light weight sweaters because the colder it gets outside the warmer it gets in my office so if I buy big chunky sweaters to keep me warm outside I'll sweat like a sinner in church all day.  And the sweater was so soft.  Sometimes you get inexpensive sweaters and they itch.  This one didn't thank goodness.

This was just a pretty, good quality cream shirt from Banana Republic.  It would go very well under a suit jacket.  I need to keep building my work/meeting wardrobe and the best time to do that is when things are on sale.

This was a beautiful cream sweater from BR that had little beads along the neckline.  It's a HUGE pet peeve of mine when a shirt has a design on the the front and the design doesn't continue onto the back!  It just screams cheap to me which is frustrating because there are some pretty expensive clothes that only have designs on the front.  Thankfully this shirt didn't have that problem.  Another good investment piece.  If only I could afford cashmere . . .

See?  Beads all the way around.  Check.

This is just fun!  Its a size to big so the arm-holes gape but I can alter that in about five minutes with a few quick stitches.  Btw I will wear this in the middle of winter.  Bright colors make me feel happy on dreary cold days, and it's unexpected and I enjoy doing the unexpected when it comes to clothing ;)

Again a light sweater.  I adore the contrasting colors!  These colors aren't the same tone so conceptually they shouldn't work but they do!  You can wear this in cold weather with a jacket or by itself in warmer weather.  I've already worn it twice lol

This shirt was pretty and on sale and it's material could transition into Fall so I bought it.  It's a bit blousy and on me since I have boobs it resembles a maternity shirt . . . but I made it work by topping it with a cardigan the cinched in at my waist. 

The detailing on the front was pretty.

And now for this lovely beauty!  I originally bought the skirt in blue because I love the updated pleats and the wide band at the waist.  I considered buying the orange one too because orange is my favorite color but I talked myself out of it since I could wear blue so many more places than orange and I don't wear skirts that often.  But the skirt still called to me . . . So when I saw it on sale (the last on in the store mind you) I snatched that puppy up immediately!  Now, here's the thing . . . the skirt is a size 2!! HA!  I've never, ever worn a size 2, like ever.  Thankfully LOFT sizes tend to run large (fyi buy jeans here, you will feel soooooo much better about yourself) and the skirt was meant to sit on your hips.  This meant that I could zip the thing at my natural waist and the skirt still fit and I was able to buy the gorgeous creation with no guilt whatsoever!

Now onto the shoes:

LOOK at these!  No, seriously LOOK at these shoes!  Has there ever been a more perfect shoe made, ever?!?!  Hot pink with a slightly pointed toe.  The pointed toe makes it more sophisticated, if it had been a rounded toe it would have worked for summer and high school but somehow the pointed toe brings it into Fall and gives it a more mature feel.  And it's hot pink.  Come on that's just awesome.

And last but not least, booties!  I have given up on all shoes that cut off at the ankles.  T-straps, booties, flip-flops with a band around the ankle.  I avoid them like the plague because I have large calves and anything that visually cuts the line of my legs make them look even rounder and shorter.  So I didn't think I could wear cute booties for Fall, but these booties I can!  See how the dip down in the front?  This will continue the line of the leg, making my calves look not so huge and helping me rock these awesome suede booties with a trendy heel in my alma mater purple!