california craving : tommy's

Today I woke up craving The Original Tommy's.  Damn it.  Flavorful, thick, rich chili that sticks to your insides smothered on and eaten with everything.  :(((  I almost had them cater the wedding....too expensive.  My brother and I would eat Tommy's together in the middle of the night.  You can't live in Fountain Valley, CA and not love Tommy's.   

I'd like to order a #2 with extra chili and tomatos with chili fries but with the chili on the side and a Coke.  That's my usual.  Now I will go cry as I eat cereal for lunch.  

unsolicited wedding advice wednesdays : christmas traditions

Mark and I were talking about it recently but this will be one of the few Christmases that we've ever spent together even during our dating career.  Of course it's extra special that it our first as hubby and wifey.  We'll be spending the Christmas season apart from our parents (although we'll be spending some time with his aunt and uncle and their family) and it got me thinking about starting our own Christmas traditions.  I think we kind of talked about this before we got married.  Like, who's parents would we have to go to on Christmas Day or on Christmas Eve (That's a tip right there.  Figure that stuff out BEFORE the Christmas season.  Unknown expectations from the family are a bitch!) but I don't remember that we talked about starting our own traditions.

I guess our first tradition was getting a tree.  Neither of our parents put a tree anymore so I suppose it'll be a tradition for us now.  I stumbled upon the idea on this blog, here, who got it from this blog, here, who got it from this blog, here.  The idea is "12 Dates of Christmas" when you intentionally spend time together during the Christmas season.  One of the bloggers and her husband each secretly wrote dates and put them in envelopes to be opened and done on different days and it seems like the other bloggers just intentionally did things together during the month.

I think this is a great idea for people who are married, who are dating, and who are single.  For instance, if I were single I'd go on 12 "dates" with different friends to catch up with during December.  That would be a lot of fun.  I like how some of the dates that the bloggers go on are simple like: decorate the tree and listen to Christmas music, or see Christmas lights, or do some Christmas shopping together.  I think the key here is being intentional during this season to connect with people and show them you love them because that's what the first Christmas was all about.

christmas gift ideas : baggu bags

Baggu reuseable bags are prefect for your eco-friendly friend or a frequent day traveler.  A cool stocking stuffer because of their size.  Check out all the nice colors and patterns.  The bags vary in shape and cost from under $10 - $100+.  I'm partial to the stripes if you couldn't tell.  :P

christmas gift ideas : funko pop! dolls

Funko makes these cute POP! dolls that you can find at Target and Barnes and Noble stores and I'm sure other places too.  These would be ok for kids but they're really made for big kids (aka adults).  They have most superheros, Star Wars characters, and some popular Disney characters.  Some of them are bobble heads whereas others are not.  While they are incredibly cute I must say that the quality of these dolls are very poor.  The consistency of paint and color can be off and messy so choose your doll carefully before buying.  

pantone color of the year : 2012

2012 has been dubbed the year of Tangerine Tango by Pantone.  I think the color is more orange and less red than what the swatch looks like in the press release (above).

Here are a few things that I pulled on Polyvore to get a feel for Tangerine Tango.  Remember that lighter shades can be drawn from the color to get a more creamy orange (reminds me of Orange Bang!) or keep it as a saturated almost tropical orange color.  Is it bad that I'm ready for spring now?

turkey noodle bake

We had leftover soup and I decided to make a casserole type noodle bake.  Keeping this recipe from Pioneer Woman in mind I made my own noodle bake.  I thickened up the soup (about 2-3 cups) with some extra butter, flour, and milk.  Threw in some noodles that were cooked a little under al dente and some pulled turkey meat.  Gave it a stir, poured it in a casserole dish and topped with it with mozzarella cheese.  350 degrees for 30 min and browned the top with the broiler.

unsolicited wedding advice wednesdays : rings

I think more engagement rings will have color to them in the future with the influence of rings like the sapphire royal engagement ring.  Diamonds beautiful and traditional but for many people they're just not economical especially when you consider that the wedding will not be cheap either.  For me personally I preferred having color to my engagement ring because it seemed more interesting and unique than a diamond that everyone has.  Plus, I knew that Mark was definitely limited to a budget.  Mark chose the ring himself (with the help of some secret agents) but I definitely dropped hints that I didn't want a diamond.

Check out beautiful examples from Bario-Neal that use colored stones and that I think would be really pretty engagement rings.  I like the raw stones and the reticulated bands (kind of bumpy) bands that they have on the site.  I'm not suggesting that you buy rings from Bario-Neal (unless you really want to) but get ideas from the site and find a jeweler who can make an affordable version.  Definitely not for everyone's taste but it's nice to know that different options are available out there.  One thing that I'd like to mention is to keep the wedding band in mind when you think about engagement rings (or mention to your guy if he's choosing the ring).  For example, my ring's tapered band is so that a typical wedding won't lay flush to it.  It'll require a custom wedding band to match but we didn't discover this problem until we went wedding band shopping.  Probably something that should have been pointed out by the jeweler that Mark went to but oh well it doesn't keep me up at night.

[1, top] Custom Turquoise Ring
[2] Cala Sapphire Ring
[3] Avens Ruby Ring
[4] Custom Airy Sapphire Ring
[5] Custom Bezel Ring with Rough Sapphire
[6] Custom Rough Emerald Ring