December At A Glance

Okay, so I know I'm a little late, but better late than never. The pic above was our 2009 Christmas e-dard. I can't believe how fast this past month flew by. So here I am trying to get one last post in before the year is up. Here is my month in a glance...

Let It Snow!

In early December, it actually snowed in Houston. Here are pics of my aunt's gorgeous backyard being covered in snow. Well, for us this is a lot of snow. The whole city practically shut down at the sight of the white stuff falling from the sky.

Bargain deal!

I have been eyeing this necklace at Banana Republic for a while, when I saw this cheaper version at a discount accessory store. Score!

Design On A Dime!

Will made a beautiful TV stand for us. I am so lucky to have such a handy husband. I have now requested a new dining table and a bed frame :-) We also got a great new armless double chair. Our place finally looks all put together.

My New Fav!

I love this purplish matte nailpolish. Dries in a few seconds.

Team Edward or Team Jacob???

I created the Twilight cupcake for my co-worker's daughter. Asia loved her Twilight cupcakes!

Baby It's Cold Outside!

Christmas on a budget can be tough! This year, I created scarves for my family. Here are a couple of scarves. The basic grey/black scarf that goes with everything, and a pretty ruffle jersey scarf. My family loved them. Not sure how I'm going to top this next year.

Suspended At Work

You ever look at the window washers of tall buildings and wonder if they are worried about falling? Well this drama unfloded right in front of our windows at work. The scaffolding platform got knocked by unexpected strong winds. It cause the platform to lose some of it's harness. The platform started swinging into the building. Windows were breaking and the poor window washers were holding on for dear life. Thank goodness, one of the guys had a suction cup and stuck it to the window when they swung close to it. It kept them in place and the firefighters got them down safely. Makes me thankful to have a boring desk job.

Cookie Monster!

My girlfriends and I finally had a cookie exchange. I broke the "official cookie exchange" rules and allowed bars and no-bakes. It was a huge success and a new tradition for us.

Well, I need to dash! I've got to get a quick outfit together for our big NYE celebration with friends. I hope you all had a wonderful 2009. So looking forward to 2010!

HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!!

Happy Thanksgiving!

Happy Thanksgiving!!! Thanksgiving wouldn't be the same without The Peanuts! We had a Thanksgiving decorating contest at work. Our team chose to do A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving. It took 5 days for Melissa and I to paper mâché and decorate the character's heads. We hung up clouds, put up trees and turned our dreary office into a happy cartoon! Here are a few more pics...



I was Lucy! I turned my desk into her psychiatric booth.




Snoopy serves up their feast of popcorn, pretzels, toast, and jellybeans.



My co-worker was the best Marci! Oh and we won our little contest :)

To my American readers, I hope you and your loved ones have a wonderful Thanksgiving!

To everyone else, have a wonderful day!!!

~Hillary

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Jewel Tone Colors Are Popular For Weddings

I had a friend's wedding to attend and I was tired of all of my old dresses. While running errands this week, I popped into Target (of course) and picked up a cute jewel tone dress at 50% off. The color was gorgeous and it was a cute style on me. When I got to the wedding, I realized how popular the purple/pink jewel tones were. Here is a pic of me and my girlfriends all nice and color coordinated. I paired my dress with the navy and pink polka dotted peep-toes and a beaded bracelet. All together this whole outfit was aprox $40! As you can see, the weather is still in the upper 70's to low 80's here. I think we will finally get a little colder weather in the next few days.

So how was your weekend? Anyone do anything fun? I am excited about the upcoming holidays. Is it too early to put up my Christmas tree? I really want to start putting it up soon.

Have a fab day!

Recipe: Peachy Applesauce!

Originally I got this recipe from E, but it was for cranberry applesauce. I tweaked this a bit and used peaches instead of cranberries. Because the peaches are much sweeter than cranberries, I can leave out the added sugar the recipe originally called for. My co-workers especially love this when I bring it in to work. It taste great hot or cold. It makes your house smell warm and cozy. It also is super easy to make. So here is the recipe...

Ingredients

• 10 golden delicious apples (gala and honey crisp apples also work well)
• 2-3 fresh peaches or if not in season 1 16oz pkg of frozen peaches
• 2 cinnamon sticks

Directions:

Peel apples and peaches and cut them into cubes. If you are using frozen peaches, you can just cut the slices in half. The peaches don't need to be completely thawed before adding to the pot. Add all of the ingredients in a large pot, cover, and cook at medium to low heat. The apples will break down very quickly and may start to bubble a little bit. It's good to give it a stir from time to time so the apples don't burn at the bottom of your pot.

After 20 minutes, your pot should look a little like this...

After about 45 minutes, your pot should look like this...Cook the applesauce for about 45-55 minutes. If the peaches aren't completely broken down, you can use a masher or leave them as is. I personally like the bits of peaches so I won't mash it too much. Remove from heat and let it cool a bit. You can serve this hot or cold. See? It's super easy. Give it a try and enjoy!

Hallelujah, The Shopping Ban Has Been Lifted!

...and this hat was a must have this winter season! Actually I didn't buy it. My mom got it for me. I was helping my mom out at the house and running errands with her when I stumbled across this cute hat. Whenever I'm out shopping with my mom and I see something I like, she always wants to buy it for me. Most of the time I tell her no, but sometimes it's nice to have your mommy buy you things. Thanks mom!!!

Now on to the shopping deal of the year for me. A couple of weeks ago Oprah had Christian Siriano on her show. He was promoting his new affordable shoe line at Payless. At the end of the show, they announced there was a coupon for 50% off everything in the store for the next 2 days. Of course I had to take advantage of this opportunity. My friend, Melissa, and I hit a Payless at our lunch hour and even though the Payless we went to didn't carry Christian's line, I managed to find other shoes that were just as fab. Here is a (horrid) pic of myself under the a shopping dizzy spell. In the end I bought 7 pairs or shoes, 2 pairs of tights, and a hat all for $90!

So... here's my loot up close and personal...

The Low Boots

Black Heels

Fierce Prints!

Actually the leopard print heels were bought at Sears (yes, Sears! For $19.99). I was buying power tools for Will's birthday and just happened to look at their shoes...

The Flats

Summer Shoes

and last but not least...

The Other Hat

Okay, the shopping fun for myself is over. I need to concentrate on the holidays now. I hope you all had a great weekend!

Mobile Post

I guess it's taken me this long to figure out how to post from my iPhone. We have major firewalls at work so I can't post or comment on most days until late at night. So far this nifty little BlogPress app does the trick. So welcome to my 1st mobile post!

Outfit details:
Bright yellow top - Old Navy
Black pants - Express
Black grey white scarf - Old Navy
Silver drop earrings - Red Stitch
Patent loafer heels - Target
Mt hair is doing this messy side frech twist.

Today we are still enjoying wonderful 70 degree weather. I have been trying to take advantage of it by walking/jogging outside. Hopefully more beautiful days are ahead.

So how are my blogger friends doing? I feel so out of the loop. I plan to catch up on my fav blog reads. Comments are coming your way!

Have healthy and happy day!
Hillary

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Halloween 2009

First of all, major apologies from a long absence. I hope to be back to posting on a regular basis again.

So I thought I'd share some pictures from our big Halloween Party a couple of weeks ago. As most of you know, I got braces this past summer. I thought it would be a good idea to incorporate the braces and make them work for me. The costume I came up with was...Ugly Betty. At first I was planning to just wear mismatched clothes, but when I went to the local Goodwill, I came across a red tablecloth. I immediately remember the famous Ugly Betty episode where she come in wearing a red and blue poncho with "Guadalajara" in big yellow letters. Using my sewing and craft skills, I made my own poncho using the red tablecloth, leftover blue felt found at the local fabric shop, and yellow fabric paint. I found red reading glasses at the dollar spot at Target, and for her Ann Boleyn B necklace, I made a B out of gold scrap paper and taped it on a faux strand of pearls. I just wore crazy tights, a skirt, and a button top underneath my poncho. The total cost of the costume was a whopping $12! The best part, is that I actually won the costume contest. My inner Betty was out in full force! Will was my cute nerd boyfriend. We pieced his costume together using his own clothes (yes, he actually owned grey Velcro shoes already). He really hammed it up and played the perfect nerd! How was your Halloween? What did you dress as?

Here are our pics!

Happy Shower!

After a fun weekend with friends in Austin and New Braunfels, Will and I ran home, got dressed and headed to the fabulous wedding shower of Stephanie and Jonathan at The Wine Bucket.

My outfit:
White top - NY & Co
Green belt - borrowed from my green dress
Black beaded A line skirt - French Connection (thrifted)
Lacey slingbacks - Hype (DSW)
3 strand pearl necklace - Target
Button hair clip - spare button from my green dress

Cheers To The Happy Couple!

Stephanie's fab magenta dress! Love it!

With the lovely ladies....

Scanning Through My Past

Instead of my usual daily outfit pics, I thought I'd share some photos from my childhood... After borrowing a scanner from my friend, Melissa, I spent most of my Sunday scanning pictures from my childhood.

This first post is loooong over due. Back in May, Rachel at Fruit In A Box, tagged me for Prom Flashback. I didn't have a scanner and couldn't really participate, but I loved the idea. So now that I got my pics all on the computer, here is my prom pic. Considering that this was 1991, the dress is not that bad. I'd wear it today if I could fit in to it. It was a simple black lace over satin, halter top, with an A line skirt. Do you have a prom pic to share? I'd love to see it.

This next pic is from a school dance. It was an "Odies" themes dance. I decided to go all out. My uncle is a hairdresser and he got all of my hair up in a bee hive. I remember it took a whole bottle of conditioner to get my hair back to norm. The super fab green dress was my mothers from her early 20's. I love this dress. Most times I favor my father, but in this picture, I see my mom in me. Oh and the guy in the pic was my high school sweetheart.

Now going way, way, way back.... It's almost like a daily outfit pic except I'm 3 or 4 years old instead of 36.

The next pic is so funny because I don't know who dressed me (I have the red hat), but I hope didn't go out like this... Winter hat, sweater, super, super short dress, knee high socks, and some kind of animal booties. Nice! My grandmother is with my sister and me.

This pic is not so much and me and my sis on the plastic see saw (I'm on the left), but about the boat clock in the back ground. Did anyone else have a boat clock? When I saw Napoleon Dynamite for the first time and Uncle Rico brings out the boat clock as incentive to buy his Tupperware, I just about died! Maybe that's how we got our boat clock.

Okay last pic... Here I am with short hair. I am with my sister and brother. For the most part my sis always had long hair. As for me, well my uncle (the hairdresser) always had a say in my hair. Here I am with a fresh cut. I love my little dress too.

Thanks for going down memory lane with me. Back to daily outfit pics this week. Hope y'all have a great day!

Save or Not?

I really didn't expect to be absent from my blog for so long, but I've had a crazy week after getting back from Corpus Christi. Life threw some curve balls and things got hectic, but all is good. I didn't take many outfit pics during the past couple of weeks, but I had one from today and one from last week to share... Funny how both outfits ended up being pink and black. Y'all have seen this first outfit before. I was running a tad late and threw this outfit on. It's easy enough and I know it works well. When you in a pinch, it's always best to go with what you know works...cute Anthro skirts!

Last week I was cleaning out my closet and getting rid of some old clothes when I came across this skirt. This skirt is about 9 years old and I hadn't worn it in a long, long time. I went back and forth about keeping it. I love the way the skirt looks. It's held up well and it's very comfortable. The only major reason of letting it go is because of the material. It's 100% polyester. The skirts has 2 layers. The first polyester layer has strips going diagonal one way and it has that weird polyester sheen. The sheen is slightly masked by the 2nd sheer layer where the stripes are diagonal in the opposite direction which creates the plaid effect. So what are your thoughts? Should I keep it?

Will struck a pose on his scooter for me this weekend. I love Will's t-shirt. For a very long time, Will refused to wear anything related to argyle. I'd pick out nice little preppy shirts and he's turn up his nose at it. Finally he agreed on the t-shirt and I think it looks good on him. As for the checkerboard Vans...that's all Will :-) The weather is starting to cool off a tiny, tiny bit so more scooter days are ahead of us.

With my hectic week, I have been really bad about cooking (something my trainer isn't too happy to hear). The one dish I did manage to cook was this recipe for cabbage rolls. I have to admit although it was tasty, it probably had a little too much tomato sauce/paste. I may change it up and try it again.

I hope everyone is doing well. I am so behind on reading my favorite blogs. I should be back to my regular routine and will be catching up this week. Thanks for your patience! Have a great day!