Meeting Maxwell

So as anyone who has read my blog for any amount of time knows that I love Apartment Therapy. So imagine how excited I was to find out that Maxwell (creator of Apartment Therapy) was going to do a presentation and booksigning last night in DC! I was one of those people that pre-ordered the Big Book of Small Cool Spaces, so yeah, it's awesome to have it signed.

Costume Madness!

I love halloween - it's one of my favorite holidays. I love candy and I love dressing up, so what could be better? I've missed out on dressing up the past couple of years for various reasons (I spent last halloween camping in a treehouse), so I'm super excited about making up for lost time. This means two, maybe three costumes. First off is Saturday during the day, for the Rally to Restore Sanity. Several coworkers and I are dressing up as Waldo, so if you happen to catch it on TV, keep an eye out for me.

I was supposed to be running the Marine Corps 10k on Sunday morning, but due to my big toe getting into a fight with a table and ending up with the raw end of the deal, that may be out of the picture now, we'll see. But I had lots of ideas for running costumes - Tinker Bell, Peter Pan, tooth fairy, flash dance....some really good ones.

So that leaves me with the main event - Saturday night. This costume has taken up many hours of planning, visiting three fabric stores so far, with more to come, and a few disagreements with the boyfriend. The inspiration was sexy monster, aka this dress, which I cannot afford:


I totally can make something similar though, so I thought it all out. The yarn might be a bit tedious, so I thought I would change it to feathers, and use boas. Unfortunately, there just isn't a lot out there for sexy feather monster costumes. Or sexy monsters in general. I wouldn't recommend googling it, just so you know. So after coming up wiht many design options ourselves, one of which boyfriend even dreamed about, I've decided to go the more simple route due to time constraints and start with a sequined mini dress and add a feather skirt. I've also purchased a feather wig, because no costume is complete without a wig. Stay tuned for the reveal!

A Snapshot of My Life

So I'm taking an online time management workshop, because I'm ridiculous these days and not getting anything done. It started last week and I'm a week behind. Sad...

Goodness is the Only Word for It

So it's not really an exaggeration to say that at a minimum, my diet is made up of 25% cheese. And potatoes are right up there on the histogram of most commonly eaten foods by Laura. So when I came across a recipe for gnocci mac and cheese, you better believe that I may be getting a little more rotund in the future.

Definitely Not Taking a Dip Now

So back in Austin, while canoeing on Town Lake (aka the Colorado River), I convinced Bushwoman that there were alligators in the water. Of course there were none, but it was all good fun.

The Potomac, in my mind, is equally unlikely to contain vicious man-eating beasts, but unfortunately I'm wrong - according to NBC Washington, a man caught an 8-foot bull shark in the Potomac southeast of DC. Eeek!

How Do You Really Feel About It?

So one of the things I like about Apartment Therapy is the comments. There are some true gems, and once you've been reading awhile, you think, I wonder what so-and-so will say to this post? I've actually seen comments saying they wonder what so-and-so will think, which is awesome. Today there was a great one, on a post about floor cushions:

I once mentioned to a friend that I hate sitting on the floor more than anything.

"Really?" he replied, "More than EVIL?"

My answer was yes.

I Love a Good Before and After...

...but in this case I love the before more. I was perusing realsimple.com this morning and came across some bedroom before and afters (I promise my bedroom is really almost done!), and the after just doesn't do it for me. I think I just like the colors of the before better, although obviously it does need some work. What do you think?

Before

After

(Photos courtesy of http://www.realsimple.com/home-organizing/decorating/bedroom/bedroom-makeovers-00000000041356/index.html?xid=weeklynews-09-01-2010)

Up, Down, and All Around

So yeah, here goes the last how every many months it's been since I've posted - I got laid off in June, freaked out for two days, and then decided to enjoy my summer and hang out by the pool (while looking for a job, no worries). I actually ended up getting a job faster than I thought, 3.5 weeks from the day I got laid off to the day I got my offer, so I was a little bummed my pool time was getting cut short. So I parlayed three more weeks out of the deal, dividing it equally between more lazy time, a trip home to Michigan to see the fam, and a trip down to Honduras to see boyfriend's dad and stepmom. Cue dramatic travel sagas involving much internal cursing of Delta (I'll spare you all the dramatic details, but it wasn't pretty). And now life is pseudo back to normal. Well, as normal as life can be when you start a job three weeks before four DC-area offices of your company decide to play musical chairs. Anyways, boring details aside, I enjoyed my time hanging out and I enjoy being a productive member of society again.

Random Fact: The thing that I miss most about the old job (aside from my wonderful friends) is the tv in the elevator that filled me in on the news of the day. Every day for the past week and a half I've gotten in the elevator and looked up, only to be filled with disappointment, not to mention it was always fun to toss random statements in conversations about what my elevator told me that day. Excuse the rustiness, I'm just getting back in the saddle, but no worries, I'm back for good now. :)

A Little Overbuilt, Perhaps?

So it has been a really long time, I know, but there has been a bit of stuff going on lately. I'm really close to finally finishing up my apartment, with the loft bed built, and one set out of two of copper pipe shelves soldered together and my bathroom all painted, so stay tuned for the final results!

But in other news, I received a local breaking news email from the Washington Post this morning, which explained an unusual shaking I felt in the night. Apparently, the DC area had an earthquake of 3.6 magnitude, and the loft bed shook, but was completely fine. :) I was a little sleepy, so I was confused by my bed shaking, but not awake enough to actually think about it.

The Morning After

So yesterday, after 1 year and 2 months, I caved and lost my re-found hair virginity. That's right, I am now a redhead! I even did highlights and all, but they were a little off with my skin tone, so I am parting my hair on the other side until I get a little more tan.

I Just Fell A Little Bit in Love...

...with these fabulously beautiful shoes, found via Apartment #34.

Cooking with Carrie

So despite all the bad reviews, I will be going to see Sex and the City 2 at some point, as someone who owns all six seasons and the first movie on DVD. But I'm not expecting much. I did get a peak at the interior design in the movie on Elle Decor and had a pleasant surprise. I had run across a tile I loved in a wine shop in Rosslyn a few years ago, and here it is popping up in Carrie's kitchen! It's not the greatest picture of the tile itself, but I just love the textured look of them.

I have a bone to pick with geography

So I was reading a blog post about traveling around the world, and the writer talked about Equatorial Guinea, and how expensive it was. And I thought, oh, bushwoman was supposed to have gone there for Peace Corps, but then there were riots or something, and so she went to Botswana and lived in the bush instead. But then I thought, oh wait, there are multiple Guineas, let me check on that. Yeah, turns out she was supposed to have gone to just plain Guinea, not Equatorial Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, or French Guinea (another continent altogether). Well, French Guinea is technically Guyane, but it's also called French Guinea, so it's close enough.

So my gripe is this - with all the millions of words in the hundreds of languages in the world, four countries have to be named essentially the same thing? I would think the makers of geography could be a little more creative than that.

Sad Day

Very sad news. Friday night I came home and discovered that Lewis had died. He had been really dark colored and lethargic for a few days, but I'm not sure what it was that he died from. He had a rough froglethood, as we had no idea what we were doing when we got the tadpoles, but he was a trooper.

R.I.P my beloved baby frog.

Fashion Inspiration

I love it when a photo speaks to me on different levels. The photo below is of an editor of Martha Stuart Living (if I remember correctly), and is quite obvious the specific person and her dog are the subject. No offense, but I can't even really remember who she is, so that obviously wasn't important to me. What I found inspiring in the photo was her beautiful scarf. As many people who know me know that a scarf is my most frequent accessory, it's not surprising. But it's not just the scarf itself that I love. The slate grey and punch of red work fantastically together and the proportions that they are used are beautiful, and can be translated in so many different ways - different items of clothing, interior design, how a photo is framed to capture something similar, and the list goes on. How are you inspired by the little things in a photo?

(photo courtesy of Martha Stuart Living)