NYT: A Place for the Imperfect

This morning, an article in The New York times titled "A New Cottage in New Orleans With 'Katrina Patina'" caught my eye. 

The article highlight the story of a couple who lost their home in Katrina in 2005. After many struggles (as you can probably imagine) they rebuilt a beautiful home on their property.  

Source

What's more, Ms. Gentinetta (pictured above) decorated the entire house for $12,477 (excluding appliances and electronics).  That's pretty amazing if you ask me. Even more amazing once you visit the NYT picture gallery and see how beautiful their home is!  It looks like it came out of the pages of a magazine.  She has some great ideas for beautiful furniture and accents on a budget.  Just thought I would share this inspirational story today! 

Things I'm Loving Right Now

I finally figured out how to get to the Jefferson Memorial on foot. Go me! I even took pictures to prove it. But I'm not going to post them right now. But maybe I will someday...

P.S. Why isn't there a metro or bus stop closer to the memorial? D.C. definitely fails in making it easy on you to get to many of the monuments. I guess most tourists use those tour bus things, but dang. Can't a regular person get to the monuments without shelling out $30?

Speaking of the Jefferson Memorial, I am really enjoying all the Cherry Blossoms in D.C.  I did not, however, enjoy fighting all the tourists when I tried to go to the tidal basin the other day. I guess people are just trying to enjoy the scenery but my gosh, I felt like there was a competition to see who could walk the slowest while maintaing forward motion. Sheesh.

Okay... off my soapbox now.

I'm absolutely loving everything in this etsy shop, especially these earrings. Which reminds me, I have some stuff to do for work...

Love, love, love.

Have you ever heard of eShakti? My friend Emily introduced me to it about a week ago. It is a site that has dresses from size 0 to 26. The dresses are also customizable, if you want to change them. You can change the sleeve style and the length of the dress.  Pretty cool, huh? 

Flutter Sleeve Dress, $59.95

I'm also loving this skirt from Talbots, but given budget constraints, I definitely won't be buying it anytime soon (or much else for that matter...), but somehow that doesn't keep me from online browsing.

Check out this picture of my aunt's dog. Is he not the greatest?  He is seriously the friendliest dog I've ever met.

Lastly, I made some banana bread this weekend that turned out to be epic. I'll be posting the recipe soon. Get excited, folks!

Weekly Gratitude Post #4

I'm thankful to Southern Living for providing me with some entertainment and good ides this week. I'm really glad I signed up for that super cheap subscription.

I'm thankful for the University library. Being able to check out books needed for my courses is a huge plus for me. (Books are expensive, yall.)

I'm thankful that asparagus is now in-season. It is so yummy roasted and thrown in a salad. 

I'm thankful to etsy sellers for being inspiring. A special thanks to those who sell the items I can actually afford.

I'm thankful for online banking. It is hard to imagine a time when people didn't have this handy-dandy tool.

I'm thankful for people who are willing to share their advice with me, especially on the topic of job-hunting and careers. I've been making some big decisions lately about school and work and I'm happy about that. If you know of any great jobs in DC, please send them my way!

Lastly, I'm thankful for ALL the recent comments I've gotten. Good grief, yall. So many! I love it!  (As a side note: I'm thinking of installing Disqus on my blog so that I can reply directly to someone's comments rather than just post an additional comment. This is my request for thoughts from fellow bloggers on Disqus? What do yall think?) 

What are you thankful for this week? 

A Tisket, A Tasket

Baskets. There are so many great uses for them. Since I like to keep things organized and orderly, I use baskets a lot to group things together and keep them from going crazy.  The best part about these baskets is that I only bought one of them for the specific purpose it is serving. The rest I just happened to have and was able to find a useful place for. 

So, what can you use them for?

Dog supplies.  Eliza is high maintenance. This is no shock to those of you who know her.

 Lotions and potions.

Socks and other unmentionables.

Dog toys.

Snacks. (This really helped me maximize space while still being able to reach everything.)

Light bulbs. Secure they are much tougher to break.
Fact: I absolutely HATE the sound of a lightbulb breaking. And hey- those energy efficient ones don't come cheap. I can't afford to have them break. 

Toilet paper. This way, my guests don't have to go rooting through my closet to find more toilet paper if the roll runs out.

I did actually buy these with the specific purpose of desk organization a couple of years ago for another desk. I was so happy when they fit in this desk! Each basket is labeled too. I know it is obsessive but it makes me happy.  It's the little things, right? 

Sometimes you have to get creative with your resources, and it works out quite well.

On Blogging

In September, I made the jump and finally started blogging. This, after originally getting hooked on Kelly's Korner  (I blame that on my BFF Courtney) and subsequently getting sucked into the world of décor and lifestyle blogs.  Many of my favorite blogs are highlighted on my right-hand sidebar. I do hope you will visit them and give them some love. 

Back to why I started blogging. I guess I decided it was time to contribute and I wanted to test the waters of joining a different type of community. I also wanted a place to post pictures so that my girlfriends could see my new apartment. (And let's face it- facebook is not the best place for such a thing anymore. That's another topic for another day.)  

When I first started this blog, I knew I would have at least two faithful readers: Courtney and Emily. I knew (or trusted) that they would read my blog because they love blogs as much as I do, even though neither one of them have taken the plunge and started contributing to the community... yet.  And when I first started blogging, I was so excited with every single comment I got. And I still get excited whenever I see a new comment. Like really excited.  And when people regularly started reading my blog it made me really excited (and surprised).

Well now, after six months of blogging, I have over 30 followers. Let me just say that I am astonished by this and so thankful to each one of you for visiting this little blog and sharing your thoughts with me. I feel a bit like Sally Field: They like me! They really like me! 

Source

I didn't start blogging looking to build a blog "brand" and that still isn't my goal. My goal was to document things about my new life as a semi-adult and as a young woman starting out and making her way in life. That is still my goal. The idea that blogging can lead to more is just icing on the cake.

That icing materialized last weekend when I had the chance to attend a local Blogger's Brunch with several other bloggers in the DC area. I've highlighted all the attendees under my new sidebar section: DC Bloggers.  I really hope you will go and visit some of these wonderful ladies and read about all their ideas for life and living!  The fact that I have made new friendships through blogging is amazing to me and I am very thankful for it. I hope blogging will continue to be a connector in my life and for other people.

I've noticed that I have a few new followers following this brunch extravaganza! I thought I would point to a few of my favorite posts for anyone who might be new around these parts. 

Click here for:

My Home Tour

The Top Ten Moments of 2010

An Awesome Guacamole Recipe

My Tips on Starting An Art Collection

My First D.C. Christmas

I say all of this to say, thank you. Thank you to people who read this blog regularly and hopefully get something out of it! You keep me going and motivated.  If I wasn't a poor little old graduate student I would have some giveaway to show you all my love. 

But instead I'm just going to give you all a big virtual hug.

Source

I really do love ya'll more than my luggage.

(Major props to anyone who names the source of that quote.)

Sweet Tooth

Looking for a couple of recipes to satisfy your sweet tooth? You've come to the right place. 

The first recipe I have for you is for Bakerella's "Brookies."

Brownie + Cookie = Good

Ingredients:

 2 3/4 cup all purpose flour

2 1/2 teaspoons baking powder

1/2 teaspoon salt

2/3 cup butter, softened

1 lb. light brown sugar (Oh my and thank you!)

3 eggs

1 teaspoon vanilla

11.5 ounce package milk chocolate chips

1 cup chopped pecans (optional)

(I used half a package of chocolate chips and a couple of handfuls of m&m's.)

Sift flour, baking powder and salt into a large bowl. Set aside.

 Stir brown sugar into softened (not melted) butter in another large bowl until butter disappears. You can use the back of your spoon to help incorporate the two together.

Add eggs one at a time to butter mixture and stir well after each egg.

Add vanilla, chocolate chips and nuts. Mix well.

 Add dry flour mixture and stir until well combined.

 Coat a 13 X 9 pan with non-stick spray and spread batter evenly into dish.

Bake at 350 degrees for 30 minutes or until top is golden brown. Make sure you don’t over bake.

(Mine actually took 40 minutes.)

Yum!

The second recipe is for "Cake Cookies."

 Ingredients:

 1 pkg Duncan Hines® Moist Deluxe® Devil's Food Cake Mix

2 large eggs

1/2 cup vegetable oil

1/2 cup semi-sweet chocolate chips

1/2 cup chopped walnuts

Preheat oven to 350 °F. Grease baking sheets.

Combine cake mix, eggs and oil in large bowl. Stir until thoroughly blended. Stir in chocolate chips and walnuts. (Mixture will be stiff.) Shape dough into 36 (1 1/4-inch) balls. Place 2-inches apart on prepared baking sheets.

Bake at 350 °F for 10 to 11 minutes. (Cookies will look moist.) Do not overbake. Cool 2 minutes on baking sheets. Remove to cooling racks. Cool completely. Store in airtight container.

Enjoy! And make sure you give some of both of these away! (I recommend bringing them to group project meetings.)

Put A Little Spring In Your Step

I don't know about you, but every springtime, I find myself shopping for some new shoes. My spring/summer shoes just don't seem to hold up as well as my other shoes, and the ones from the previous spring and summer usually need to be thrown out.


In D.C., we do a lot of walking. And I mean a lot.  Come visit me and you'll see. It is necessary to have comfortable shoes, and for me, comfort takes precedence over style. But when I can find both, I go for it!


I recently found these sandals.

These are by B.O.C. and have pretty great support for flat sandals.  I wore them one day last week (when the weather was actually warm) and it worked out pretty well. They still need more breaking in, I think.


I also found these at the same time.

These are by Naturalizer and have great air support and cushioning as well. They are a little tight in the front for me, but I think that just may be my foot. I'm going to take them to a shoe repair place to see if they can be stretched a little.


Keds are also a classic stand-by for me.

The classic Keds are great, but this "sport" type has great supports inside. They might be a little dowdy, but let me tell you. On a day full of sightseeing, your feet will hurt even if you wear the most comfortable shoes known to man, so you might as well do yourself a favor and wear the most comfortable thing you own.


I thought it would be fun to play with some outfit ideas for all the shoes I think I'll be wearing out this spring and summer.  Here's what I came up with.

What items are you adding to your closet for the new season?