So Sweet Birthday Surprise:)

Lau's friend Megan had the best birthday surprise shipped to her yesterday, cupcakes! All the way from home, Georgetown Cupcakes! I don't think I captured just how surprised Lauren was! So much birthday fun:)

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Out and About Outfit

Tshirt Express, Leggings Forever 21, Clutch Express, Shoes Pumas, Sweater Forever 21

Lau in LA

My BFF from Maryland, Lauren, arrived in LA last night:)

First stop: Coffee Bean on Sunset & Fairfax

Second stop: shoe shopping (studded shoes, Luichiny; gray heels, Michael Shannon)

Last stop: Late night dinner at Canter's

Do You Like The Beatles?

From the moment I met my husband it was love at first sight. Completely. We were inseparable. After dating only a few days he called me to ask, "Do you like the Beatles?" It was at that moment I knew he was going to be my husband. He wanted to know if he should get us Paul McCartney tickets. He did. We went to the show and it was one of the best nights of my life.

Jeff and I are probably in the category of extreme Beatles fans. We have all of the songs on CDs and itunes. It is mine and his favorite group ever. Our First Dance song was "In My Life." Seeing Paul is the closest thing you will ever get to seeing the Beatles. It is indescribable, amazing, tears :' ). We just got tickets for the show next month at the Hollywood Bowl!!! I cannot wait...

My sister compares that moment I had when Jeff called me to a scene from Office Space where Peter asks Joanna if she like Kung Fu: (minute 2:40)

Do I Need These?

After months of foot injuries and being completely confined to wearing sneakers I have rekindled my love for pumas. Thank goodness the "I just left the gym" look has been trendy for a while. I already have these in a white/silver/pink colorway. I think I might need these too.

Puma Speeders in Limestone Gray/Black/White $60

Two Outfits With My New Shoes

Sweater Forever 21, top Pop, shorts J Crew, belt J Crew, shoes Steve Madden, clutch Kira Plastinina, bracelet vintage

Sweater Forever 21, top Monteau, shorts J Crew, belt J Crew, shoes Steve Madden, bracelet vintage

Okay I guess it's pretty much the same outfit, just two different tops.

A Little Gardening

I don't have much of a green thumb. It's sad. My mom and dad both do and I can remember being very small and helping them in the garden. I loved it. Maybe I just need a little practice. Since we moved into this house I had big plans for my gardening. I wanted to plant fruits and vegetables. I was so excited. Only to have my big plans thwarted when I bought my first herb plants. Dexter ate them all within days. His favorite was the cilantro. It was our favorite too! He ate those plants first. Our neighbors Katie and Andrew just moved and left me some potted plants. So I brought them into the backyard and forgot about Dexter's taste for plants. Dexter went outside for exactly two minutes before I remembered. That rosemary didn't have a chance! He ate it. Anyhow, in order to avoid Dexter eating everything I've decided I'm going to try to put a few plants on the front porch. Dexter doesn't hang out in front. We'll see how it goes.

Kira's New Boyfriend

Move over Shark. Kira has a new boyfriend. The neighbor's dog across the street couldn't keep his eyes off of Kira on our walk yesterday! This is the second time he has done this. Yesterday Kira wanted to cross the street to go meet him. I didn't let her, but we'll see how this romance progresses...

Good Neighbors

Things That Make a Good Neighbor

1) Quiet
2) Friendly
3) Not strange/weirdos
4) Keeps an eye on your place while you are gone
5) Picks up mail while you are away

Things that make an amazing neighbor:

Brings you homemade yummy num nums like cupcakes, rice krispy treats, pumpkin muffins, homemade butter, flan! My neighbor brought Jeff and I a slice of homemade flan. It was definitely enough for at least two servings. I must be missing mom's homemade flan so much I ate the whole thing! Jeff didn't even have a chance to try it! Thanks so much C!

Anyhow, C is a good neighbor for more reasons than that. She and I gossip about the goings on around the neighborhood. Jeff calls us the neighborhood watch. So recently we learned about a few break ins around here and I was asked by a woman down the street to start keeping an eye out. C said she would too. We've started taking down plate numbers of strange vehicles. Jeff laughs because he says we actually are the neighborhood watch now!

What do you think makes a good neighbor???

New Shoes

Pizza Party Friday

Play Her Off Keyboard Cat!

Watch this video and see the Frenchie falling after about 3 seconds in the downhill event! Too bad Frenchie! You get the keyboard cat Frenchie:)

*It seems that the video has been deleted at times due to infringement. To see it you can search "Marion keyboard" on youtube.com.

Valley Girl

I went to the valley yesterday. I have what I call a "valley day" every month or so where I go take care of my errands there like Costco, Ikea, sometimes Target, and usually a yarn shop Unwind. I'm lucky to have amazing yarn shops where I live but it's always fun to go different places.

First stop was Ikea. We need a new comforter but I really had no idea what to get. Ikea breaks them down into warmth ratings from 1-6, 1 being the coolest and 6 being the warmest. I'm a 3, my husband is a 2. Besides that, i really didnt want to spend a ton of money on this since my dog (Dexter) gets on our bed all day. If he isn't sunbathing on the deck, he is on our bed. He ruins the comforters pretty quickly so I wasn't about to get a 100% down comforter. And also, I was pretty annoyed that I was doing this alone. As a housewife, I'm pretty happy to take care of all of the errands I can successfully on my own. That doesn't work when I have things on my To Do List that I need Jeff's help with. Somehow those things don't get done. So I just try to do them myself. But choosing a comforter is something I prefer to have Jeff with me for since he is by far pickier than I am with his bedding. So anyhow, I chose a 2 to make him happy and we used it last night and he gave it a thumbs up today. So it did work!

Second (and last stop) was Costco. I could spend so much time at Costco. I love it. The highlights of my Costco trip were that I found a new dog bed that I liked. I just bought one. We'll see which dog takes to it, or if both do, before we buy another.

The other highlight was running into a girl who had a Rainbow Sprite! The Sprites were Rainbow Brite's little friends. She had a doll that was identical to the one I had as a child. How cute!

The Bachelor On the Wings of Love...

So this is my little commentary on The Bachelor Monday night's episode. If for some reason you havent seen it yet, then please dont read this if you dont want to hear what happened. I know that some people let the episodes pile up on their dvrs and then go through them when they have the time. Anyhow, I hate spoilers so I just wanted to give you a heads up. Which reminds me, I'm going to have to stop discussing the Bachelor with my friend who shall remain nameless. She always reads the spoilers and then accidentally lets out little hints about what is going to happen. She doesnt mean to do it. It's just hard to gossip with someone about a show when they know the ending weeks in advance. So anyhow, let me get to the show here. Im going to preface it by saying that I am brutally honest when it comes to gossiping about reality tv. It's one of my guilty pleasures!

Jake

Jake seems like a nice guy, very cute, morals, good job, blah blah blah. I just don't care for him. First of all, I think that guys who seem a little too nice are probably really not that nice at all. And he's an adrenaline junkie, which I think is a bad sign in a a man, like some kind of compensating. I didnt like how he came back to warn Jillian about that weirdo last year. Guys do have a guy code, and he broke it. It wasnt really his business to do that. I think his judgement in women is pretty poor.

Gia

Gia is super pretty and certainly the nicest girl on the show. However, she had very obvious insecurity issues. I mean everyone has insecurities but hers were very apparent. I don't fault her for that. What I think is strange is that her insecurities were what was attracting Jake. She went home on Monday, so I'm sure many men will fall in love with Gia when she gets home. She's beautiful and sweet. She will be just fine.

Tenley

Now onto Tenley. Tenley is also one of the prettiest girls on this season. I think she is a nice girl too and has more values than most girls on this kind of show. She has good wife/mother qualities about her. But i think that she and Jake just arent that into each other. I mean, Tenley just got divorced. Clearly she isn't ready for another engagement. She kept saying things along the lines about how no matter what happens Jake opened her heart up to love since her divorce. I get a serious friend vibe from their relationship. I think Jake and Tenley both look at each other and see how good on paper it seems, but they probably both know it's just not there.

Vienna

Which leaves us with Vienna. I mean really? Vienna? Ick. I don't even know where to start. Vienna was "that girl" this season that was the crazy pants in the house and just drove the other girls crazy with her antics. One thing you have to watch out for is a girl who doesn't get along well with other girls. The girls that say things like, "All my friends are guys.", "Girls are such b------." Trust me, those girls are psychos. And that is the girl he is falling over all over? After how he tried to warn Jillian last year? What a hypocrite. Vienna's appearance on the first episode was in a bikini and bragging about her five car crashes that her daddy paid for and just kept buying her new cars because she's a princess. And she went on about how she is unemployed but that her daddy buys her everything she wants again because she is his princess. Weirdo. It seems pretty obvious from recent interviews with Jake and Gia that he chooses Vienna in the final episode. Jake keeps stating he surprises everyone in the end and that he hopes everyone understands. By "everyone" I'm guessing he really means his family (not to mention America). I would be embarrassed to bring home Vienna, especially after introducing my family to a nice girl like Tenley. His family must be devastated. I'm pretty sure Jake's family will be gracious on camera either way but I feel for them. And maybe I'm overestimating his family, maybe they arent normal either and will be fine with Vienna. Who knows. But I cant wait to see next week. And I'm glad Jake didn't let Allie back. She was a very mean girl and I hope she sees how mean she was by watching the episodes. It was not okay to treat Vienna the way she did, despite how annoying Vienna is. Anyhow, I hope that I am wrong and that Jake chooses Tenley but I dont think that is going to happen. I predict a crash and burn here. Especially with all of the recent articles about Vienna and her topless photos, table dancing, stripper mom, it's not looking good folks. Anyhow, cant wait to watch the women tell all next week....

Shen and Zhao Win Gold

Yay for this love story that ends in Olympic Gold! Congrats to Shen and Zhao:)

Chicken Spaghetti Dinner

Valentine's Day Yumminess and Romance

Valentines Day Yumminess!

Holidays are the best! Jeff wasn't feeling that well on Valentine's Day so I had to revise my breakfast and lunch plans, but I was still able to make a great dinner. For Valentine's Day Dinner I decided to make one of our favorites, fondue! I made cheese and chocolate with lots of dippers. A meat entree is just too much food for us so I usually just stick with the cheese and chocolate since they are our favorites. I made a cheddar, gruyere and beer cheese recipes and the chocolate is a half dark and half milk chocolate mix. It was great.

And for the romance, I was able to repair The Shark just in time so he and Kira could cuddle for Vday!