#1: dressing like a lady

The challenge officially starts February 1, but I decided to go ahead and get started today for a couple reasons. First, this way I will finish on the last day of February, and I just like that tidy ending. More importantly, since I had a bad cold, I basically didn't get dressed for real all week, and it felt like about time to get a nice outfit together.

skirt: Anthropologie (a splurge for me, rationalized as "an investment piece");
cardigan: Loft; tee, boots: Target; tights: F21; necklace: gift from parents

Part way through the week I managed to get over to the park with Ginger so she could run around in a fenced-in area for a while, and while we were there a bunch of middle school hoodlums (i.e., boys) came through and tipped over a port-a-potty. As they were running from the scene of the crime (laughing), one of them saw Ginger and me and said "hey guys, there's a lady over there!"

Which I thought kind of funny because in my unkempt/sick/very layered and bundled up state, the only kind of lady I could be mistaken for was a bag lady. Today I felt more like the kind of "lady" I'd aspire to be...

getting the juices flowing

I've been feeling kind of blah and not creative lately. Winter and bad colds have a way of doing that to a girl...

So when I saw that Kendi is doing a winter 30 for 30 challenge, starting February 1, I kind of thought I would pass on it - until I realized that much as I don't feel like trying to come up with outfit ideas (or wear these darn sweaters one more time), this is of course the kick in the pants I need to get my creativity back. And start actually getting dressed again.

And so here are my items:

p.s. I realize that's 29... I couldn't for the life of me think of a 30th, so I'll reserve that in case I need a t-shirt (!) while I'm in Miami for a board meeting...

p.p.s. In real life my shirts and sweaters are not way smaller than the rest of my clothes. I'm just a little photoshop-stupid and cannot figure out how they all started out the same size in photoshop and uploaded like this. And I give up.

dinner & a movie

I would like to thank Groupon for our recent dinner & a movie date... If you haven't heard of it, Groupon is a site where you can get major discounts to local retailers, restaurants, services, etc. I check daily to see what the most recent deal is, and I'm always looking out for good restaurant ones as I've got a list of places I want to try out around here. I bought two of these for Peter for Christmas, and last night we made use of one - I paid $25 for a $50 gift certificate to The Quarter Bistro in Mariemont (a very cute area of town we strongly considered buying a house in).

As for the movie portion: I came across the trailer for The King's Speech yesterday and knew I must see it ... and remembered that the restaurant is right next to a little neighborhood movie theater (attached to it, turns out!). Since we were getting a discount on dinner, it felt okay to buy some movie tickets.

The Quarter Bistro was great - it has an old movie theater feel with 20s style decorating and lots of red accents. Peter had their acclaimed short ribs (very good) and I had an excellent trout. We'd go back - several other menu items looked great.


And The King's Speech was even greater. For starters, it stars Colin Firth, but it's also an excellent story, very well scripted and acted, entertaining, and uplifting. We most definitely recommend.

vacation reading

Often I can do a book a day when all I'm doing is sitting on the beach, but I had a couple rather long ones in the queue, so I have only 3 to report back on: East of Eden (640 pages!), The History of Love (252 pages), and The Lacuna (544 pages). All three were great. On the way home I began Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close, which is off to a promising start.It's interesting reading books in close succession because even though I just sort of randomly picked these off of my "to read" pile and they have vastly different settings - early 20th century northern California, present day Brooklyn/WWII Poland, and mid 20th century US/Mexico - there were some interesting parallels and themes. The History of Love and The Lacuna both feature authors as main characters, so it was interesting to compare their struggles/approaches to writing. Extremely Loud and The History of Love both have modern day young people dealing with the loss of their father along with immigrant characters from their grandparents' generation dealing with their WWII memories.

we even read at the bar :)

East of Eden was for one of my bookclubs - somehow none of us had ever read it, even the very well-read former English teacher in the group - and I actually really liked it. I'm curious about the James Dean movie version since there's rather a lot of depravity in the story ... but also lots about good and evil and its role in our lives, as a choice or something we're born with. And it was even funny at times - not the Steinbeck I remember from Grapes of Wrath.

When not busy reading about thyroids and stuff like that, Peter read The Fiddler in the Subway and My Own Country (memoir from author of Cutting for Stone) and enjoyed both.

Mexico vacation

We're back from our 5th anniversary/seriously needing a break vacation to Mexico... and slowly adjusting back to the cold. Such a treat to be in the warm sunshine for a few days - unfortunately it was only a few days since the last two were entirely cloudy and rainy, but at least we were still in short sleeves. And we did actually go to the pool in the rain for a while:

It was so nice to see color in the world again - in these northern parts, pretty much all we've got outside is brown (dead grass/leaves, barren trees), usually gray (sky) and maybe some white (snow).

Our usual schedule for the day was to be up pretty early, done with breakfast and sitting at the beach/pool by about 8. Break for lunch at some point, and then more poolside until about 3:30 or so, after which we'd play tennis/exercise, clean up, and then head over to the lobby bar for some pre-dinner drinks. Early to bed after dinner so we could be back up with the sunshine!

Buffet restaurant area - I liked how they had my same big ornament Christmas decoration idea

View from my chair...

All-inclusive vacations are fun because every night's date night
when everything's included - you can have drinks and dessert!

holiday remix #5 and #6

After the 30 for 30 challenge, something I wanted to try incorporating into my wardrobe after seeing so many other bloggers wear them so fabulously was colored tights.

For church on Christmas, I remixed a summer skirt into festive and holiday-appropriate wear by adding these snazzy red tights that I got for a great deal at TJ Maxx.I might have shocked my husband and my mother a bit when I first appeared with red legs, but I really liked this outfit. Now the trick will be to see if I can wear red tights and not feel like I'm going to holiday party. That's part of my red issues, I guess - I wear it so infrequently that whenever I do I feel like it looks really holiday-ish. But looking at this outfit again, I think it could be worn anytime in winter... yes?

And here's the other way I've worn my new red tights - with this gingham dress I got from Old Navy for a mere $15.
I have no qualms about re-wearing an outfit I really like, and it just so happened I had 3 holiday events this one was perfect for - and no overlap of people at any of them! So it was like a new outfit every time, really...

get organized - kitchen

Last week I participated in Domestically Speaking's get organized series with my craft center... and this week's assignment is kitchen areas.


A while ago I won a $100 gift certificate to CSN stores through Joi at Nuestra Vida Dulce, and I finally decided on ordering some food storage canisters that I'd had my eye on for a while. They arrived while I was in Michigan over Christmas, so the day I arrived home, I just couldn't help myself... Into the pantry they went (after being washed, of course), which spiraled into an entire pantry/cupboard reorganization and cleanout. Naturally.

With my $100 at CSN I got the 10-piece set (great deal!) of OXO Pop Containers plus an additional 4 quart (good for flour/sugar storage) and .9 quart, all for a total of $107.93. Once I figured out what was going in which, I decided I needed a few more, so I went over to Bed, Bath & Beyond with a 20% of entire purchase coupon that I'd been saving for a worthy occasion and picked up 7 more of various shapes and sizes.

I was so excited to start that I forgot all about before pictures, but here's the after:
The baking stuff used to live at the top of the pantry, but I couldn't reach the stuff at the back so it just turned into a mes - so I moved around some things to other cupboards, and now I've got a whole baking center with all the staples and measuring cups, mixing bowls, etc.

Here's hoping that a well-organized and stocked pantry with visible items will encourage me in dinner making and get me to actually use the items we've got on hand instead of letting them get buried at the back of the cupboard and buying new ones...

holiday remix #3 and #4

Next item that needed some remixing work in my wardrobe: these wine-colored cords. I wore them two ways over the holidays but forgot about photos, so I've recreated!

When I got them last year, I stuck entirely to pairing neutrals with these pants, and wore them exclusively around the holidays (kind of like the outfit below, which I wore on Christmas).

I like the version above, so I see nothing wrong with wearing it.... And I didn't want to make anything to crazy looking since the pants are quite a bit of color on their own, but it was time to figure out how to wear a non-neutral on top, now that I'm a brave 30for30 remixing veteran. So here's what I did the day after Christmas:

Pretty happy with it... and now the challenge will be to keep finding ways to wear these pants the rest of the winter.

p.s. please forgive the appearance of my head - the electricity was out when I got up this day, and when it came back on a few hours later, I had moved on from things like hair and makeup...

holiday remix #2

I know we're way beyond the holidays now, but I thought I came up with some pretty good remixes over the holidays with items I hadn't yet figured out how to wear all that well, so I thought I'd line them up to post while I'm off in Mexico...

In remix #1 I figured out one good way to wear an under-used red sweater that was holiday appropriate but not over-the-top overt about it. I tried it out a second way for our Costa Rica-inspired chalupa & cacique family dinner, but I forgot to have anyone take a real photo of me, so here are a couple Anne's-eye ones...
Polka dots make everything fun, so I'm calling this one a success.

Ginger's Christmas vacation

Another way having a dog is like having a kid: they go a little nutty and start acting up a bit after too much Christmas vacation and being out of their routines/getting spoiled/being super stimulated with so many people around. Ginger kept very busy during our Michigan Christmas visit - she loved all the people and dogs around to play with, but all good things must come to an end, and it's time for her to get back to her regular routine (and obedience level!)...

Playing with her new favorite toy, a gift from Owen & Dirk

Hanging out with old Aunt Louise

Being a little passive aggressive toward the dogs my mom was taking care of...

... maybe a little jealous of what was going on in my chair?

Going geocaching with the whole fam

Finding a new sleeping spot under the kitchen island

2011: resolutions

Now that we've done recapped 2010, we can move on with a couple of resolutions for 2011....

This year I'm going with a couple specific things that I can check off a list (except #4, that's a more regular thing). I've been wanting to do all of these these for a while, so this is going to be the year to make it happen!

1. Run in my first 5k race.

2. Take a Photoshop class so I can get rid of my frustrations and actually learn how to use the thing!

3. Read 5 classics that I should have read.

4. Be a regular participator in Meatless Monday, for our health and especially for the planet.

Christmas in photos

Lots of catching up to do after being in Michigan for a week and a half.... Ginger and I had a great time hanging out with the family, and I was very happy to be able to make it to all the family Christmas events. PLUS, we got our own little Christmas miracle with Peter getting enough sleep/getting done early enough from his Christmas Eve call to be able to hop in the car and surprise us by arriving on Christmas day. All around a great holiday.

A few snippets (lots more happened of course; these are just when I managed to get some photos):

A bounty of gifts

Lots of present opening...

...and then of course wrapping paper cleanupA Costa Rica reunion of sorts with cacique sours made by our fearless bartender...
...and build-your-own chalupas for a fun family dinner
It's a little fuzzy b/c of the lighting, but I just had to post this self-portrait of my mom... Dirk gave her an as-seen-on-tv bump it for Christmas; definitely the most amusing gift of the year
Doing a little tromping through the woods for some geocaching, which Joe introduced us to

2010 in review

2010 was quite a big year for us, with some major firsts:

• 1st job after 8 years of post-secondary education for Peter
• 1st move outside of Michigan
  
• 1st house
• 1st addition to our family
• 1st trips to Asian continent and South America for Anne

We are very blessed and thankful for how all these big changes in our lives turned out (even if a bit stressful at times!).


Best trip:

--This is a tough one - so I have to pick one work trip and one pleasure, I think. For work, I would say Rio. I spent most of the time working, but the touring/dining we got to do was totally worth it!
--For pleasure, there were several great ones, but I would have to say Chicago with Peter for our anniversary. Most of my trips ended up being without Peter this year, so having one with just him was nice.

Best book(s):

--I read and loved a lot more non-fiction this year than I usually do. Three of my favorite books were Coop, Eating Animals, and The Year of Living Biblically. They were all really interesting and entertaining (first and third will make you laugh for sure) - and they all made me think long beyond putting them down.

--I can't leave out my top novels... Cutting for Stone and The Hunger Games.

Best movie:

--The #1 Ladies' Detective Agency series from HBO. I was kind of depressed when we finished watching it, it was so good.

Big achievements:

--Peter: graduation from medical school!

--Most blog posts in a year, thanks in big part to my foray into style blogging with the 30 for 30 challenge (successfully completed, I might add!).

Big events (aside from the above...):

--Transitioning to working from home... I love it!

--Match Day. Crikey. That was a big one.

--Trips with both of our extended families - California with the Hoekmans in March, and Fripp Island with the Tanis/Van Huesen clans in April.

2010 resolution recap

I'm proud to say that in 2010 I did better than ever with my New Year's resolutions. I wasn't always completely consistent with them (mostly in the May-July region; I blame the move), but I've ended the year with all three being a regular part of my life, which really was the purpose of setting these resolutions.

1. lift weights
2. categorize/track spending
3. try 3 new recipes per month

My favorite things about having incorporated these resolutions into daily life:

1. lifting weights
Having something to show when I flex my biceps. It's pretty awesome.

2. categorizing/tracking spending
Feeling much less stressed out/guilty about pleasure-related spending since I know I have money budgeted toward this - especially great is having a vacation saving fund, which we get to make use of next week. We'll be here - and I'm beyond excited for this, especially because ever since our February 2006 honeymoon to Jamaica, I've been asking Peter when we get to go on a warm anniversary celebration trip. I was always hoping for #5, but with medical school tuition, it never seemed like that would be a possibility - and now we're making it happen, a month shy of 5 years of marriage... Wahoo.
3. trying 3 new recipes per month
Learning to make risotto. It's not really that hard, but it always seemed intimidating, and now I can do it, and it's one of the most delicious meals in my new repertoire - about my first recipe here; I've also done this one a couple of times. Tackling risotto makes me feel like I can take on a few other new things, like cooking fish (another thing that might sound easy but is scary to me), so it's really mission accomplished with this one.