Costume Recap: Gretchen the Biergarten Girl

Ok, so I guess we'll do these in "outfit post" type installments. I am OBSESSED with Halloween, particularly the costume part. My mom said I "always loved the costume box!" when I was younger, and I still have one to this day. I ordered this one from Lingerie.com when I saw a post on Curves and Chaos about their Halloween sale... THIS COSTUME WAS ONLY $15.99! I have always wanted a Beer Maid costume, and when this $60 costume was on sale for such a low price I had to buy it. Anyone looking to jump the gun for next year should head on over and check Lingerie.com out, they still have a lot of costumes on sale!

Picture Post: Pumpkin Carving!

I'm really behind on getting up some of the posts I have wanted to do... but here are the pictures from pumpkin carving! I loved how my little owl turned out, but I kind of messed up and didn't make the part where he was attached to the rest of the pumpkin big enough, so he became Franken-owl when I had to toothpick attach him back to the pumpkin. And of course he started shriveling up already the day after carving just because some of the sections are so thin, but oh well, he was cute at first! Now it's just turned around so the star side faces forward.

Lauryn's dog Dolce just wanted in on some of the action.

Kelly's Happy Little Jack!

How adorable is Lauryn's Hello Kitty Witch carving?

Wouldn't be pumpkin carving without toasting some salted seeds!

HAPPY HALLOWEEN EVERYONE!

Outfit Post: Drinks at Nick's

I met my friend Betsy on Wednesday night at Nick's English Hut (Bloomington favorite) for a few drinks, and since I've been a bit under the weather lately and not making much of an effort to wear "real outfits", I felt like actually putting a decent outfit together. These booties have become one of my favorites!!

Outfit
Booties: Payless
Dress, Leggings, Vest: Old Navy
Belt: Forever 21
Bracelets: Charlotte Russe

Is everyone having a good Halloween weekend? I can't wait to see any costume posts you all do :-) Last night I wore my "Gretchen the Biergarten Girl" costume, and tonight Jane of the Jungle is coming back out to play! That's one of my all time favorites because of the fun make up that goes with it. What are some of your favorite costumes you have ever done?

Better Late Than Never: Fall Festival!

I was waiting to post this for one reason only: getting the fried green beans picture from Nickie at Wild as a Mink. Because YES, I finally got to meet her! She had been having some internet issues but finally got her Fall Fest post up (You can read here), so I stole a few of the pictures from her ;-) I guess you could call it a mini-blogger meet up of sorts, featuring the lovely Sew Me Some Love (My roommate, Kelly), Lalalaurynnn, and Nickie, and then we threw in our good friend Mandy who was visiting from St. Louis as well. Not to mention the million other people we met up with AT the Festival... because you sure can't go there without seeing everyone you have ever known in the city.

(All of the girls with our bug-lollipops)

(Keeping it classy with our "Southern Apples" and "Apple Jacks"... aka alcoholic apple cider)

For those of you who don't know, Fall Festival is what Evansvillians (Evansville, IN) claim to be the "second largest street festival next to Mardi Gras". Whether that is actually true or not is beyond me, but everyone down there sure likes to think so. It has the whole carnival-rides-games thing going on, but the REAL deal is the food. There are over a hundred booths selling ANY kind of food you can probably think of. Especially the really disgusting kinds: brain sandwiches, alligator, turkey testicles, chocolate covered bugs, and any weird combination of things you could think of.

(The guys playing some silly game wearing their hats they won in some other silly game)

(The infamous scorpion lollipop)

This year I got way too full way too early, but we had a good system of kind of just sharing everything everyone bought, so I tried a little bit of: fried green beans, sweet potato fries, deep fried bacon (sorry arteries), Texas tenderloin, apple cider, annnnd a scorpion lollipop. Much to my dismay I didn't actually get to the scorpion because I REALLY accidentally dropped it before I could get there. I wasn't too mad though, because the lollipop itself tasted horrible. One thing I did miss this year was the deep fried cookie dough, but I was way too full to even think about that.





And of course, outfit pictures! I had to put SOME effort into that given that I was finally meeting my "blogger big sister" Nickie. I think our group was probably the classiest to be seen at the Fest... a place most notorious for it's people watching. (Mullet count, anyone?)

Outfit
Dress: Target
Leggings, Sweater: Old Navy
Bracelets, Hair Flower, Boots: Charlotte Russe

Nickie said she gained (and then quickly lost) something like 10 pounds just from that week. Thank god I was only there for one night, and also that I do not even own a scale, because I wouldn't even WANT to know. But in the name of terribly unhealthy but wonderfully delicious food, we all justify it. After all, it's only once a year!!!

And one last thing- new recipe up at Wonderland Kitchen for PUMPKIN CREAM PASTA! Yum!

Procrastination at it's Finest.

The adorable Megan at Time After Tea passed these questions along to me, and they could not have come at a better time as I am desperately needing (or wanting) a little break from writing a book critique. It is actually a really good book, and I think I will probably post a mini-review of it here soon, but I have never written a book CRITIQUE before so it has been a bit of a process trying to figure out what exactly to analyze for this assignment. Anyways, on to the questions.

1. Why do you blog?

I think when it comes down to it, it's essentially "the talking cure"... everyone likes being able to vent, ramble, or share with someone else. And what better place to do it than to a bunch of complete strangers who are oh so supportive? It has really just become fun to get inspiration from other people for different outfit, craft, and recipe ideas, and then passing those along hoping to provide that for someone else.

2. Name three of your best memories...
-Going to the breeder with the family and picking out Penske as a puppy, and getting to hold her on my lap the whole way home :-)
-Running around barefoot in just a swimsuit all summer long in our neighborhood in St. Louis, playing with all the neighborhood kids late into the night (flashlight tag!) until our parents made us come in to shower and go to bed
-Florida Spring Break senior year with the extended family and my best friend Katelyn. I don't know if we even did anything all that exciting, but it was still really fun

3. Name 4 of the best fiction books you've read.

I LOVE reading, but here are a few:
-A Thousand Splendid Suns (Khaled Hosseini)
-Kite Runner (Khaled Hosseini)
-Lullaby (My first Chuck Palahniuk book)
-The Holly Barker "Orchid" series by Stuart Woods (some of his earlier ones, his others are good but the more recent ones have not been as great)

4. What are the 5 best movies ever made?

SO HARD! Uh, here are probably just five of the first few that came to mind.
-Forrest Gump (I don't know how you could not like that)
-Monty Python and the Holy Grail
-Interview with the Vampire
-Public Enemies
-Wizard of Oz (I don't know why I'm so obsessed with this but I have always loved it)

5. Name 5 things you can't live without.
-Music, specifically Rock'n'Roll.
-My wonderfully crazy, fun, beautiful friends.
-My ridiculous, yet entertaining, family.
-Water water water water. More so than the normal human. LOVE it.
-Creativity. Can you even imagine how dull this world would be without it?

6. If you could change your name what would it be?

I hated my name when I was little and always tried to at least go by some other variation of Alex (Lexi, Alexa, etc) because I did not like that it was also a boy's name. I think I've come to terms with it though, I do love my full name (Alexandra) and I was actually just thinking earlier today how cool it is that I have one of the few names with an x in it. Haha.

7. Tell us a unique and interesting fact about yourself....

When I was little, in the school play/musical/whatever about careers, I played the role of a florist, and I think everyone (including myself) thought it was kind of ridiculous to want to be a florist when I grew up (you know, that or a marine biologist. I don't know where I came up with these things), but now I think I would LOVE to own a flower shop that catered to big events.

8. What do you love most about yourself?

Oops... forgot to change this answer the first time: I think mostly just that I generally try to consider how the things I do/say are going to affect other people, and then act accordingly, although it does stress me out at times.

9. If you had a 'Freaky Friday' experience, who would you change places with?

Chelsea Handler. If her life on a daily basis is even REMOTELY close to being as funny as it is in the stories she tells in her books, it would be totally worth it.

10. What is the best thing about being a woman?

HAVING FEELINGS. Haha. Ok, kind of joking. But... I have been reading the book Why She Buys, and I just think it is so insane how women just tend to be more in tuned with and caring of other people and how they feel as well as how what we do affects others. I guess kind of just the "motherly" thing. Well, that and the high heels, make up, and all that good stuff. While it can sometimes be a real pain, when it comes down to it, I love it.

Picture Post:The First Costume Party of the Season

All I really have to say is that I was delighted to discover that Kelly's Nightwing is the character that Robin becomes when he grows up. (According to Kelly's boyfriend, I'm completely illiterate in most things of that nature) Clearly the best roommate unintentionally match their costumes last minute... I was digging through my 'costume box' trying to figure out what to be and stumbled across this Batman mask and knew it was a great idea. Really I'll just take any excuse to work my black stiletto "hooker boots" into an outfit.

HAPPY HALLOWEEN WEEK!

Halloween Cards

I love sending holiday cards. Sometimes I make them, sometimes I just try to find silly/funny ones at the store. Kelly and I were are the Dollar Tree last night, and we stumbled across their card section. ALL OF THEIR CARDS ARE 2 for $1! So obviously I had to at least look at them, and believe it or not a lot of them were actually even better than the cards you pay $4 or $5 for. This one literally made me laugh in the store, just because it was so unexpected and probably even a little inappropriate. I can't wait to hear the response from the lucky friend who gets it :-)

Pumpkin Pumpkin Pumpkin!

It's fall, and I have officially gone into pumpkin craze. Tonight I made Whole Wheat Pumpkin Pancakes, and when I talked to my dad about it, he told me about an amazing Pumpkin Cream Pasta he had tonight... so you better believe I'm going to try to make my own variation of THAT tomorrow night. We're also carving pumpkins on friday, so hopefully I'll be able to try my hand at Pumpkin Bread within the next week!

For those of you who don't follow, but are interested in the recipe, here is a link to my other blog, Wonderland Kitchen, where I try to catalog the recipes I actually get around to recording!



In other news, my first 8-weeks class is finally over, which means I start class two hours later on Tuesdays and Thursdays. Hopefully this means more outfit shots (and outfits, for that matter) since I will actually be up, at em, and NOT all sleepy and squinty before I leave for class! I'm SO excited about that.

Halloween Crafting: Glittery Pumpkins!

I saw something similar to this on How Sweet It Is, and couldn't resist something combining both glitter and pumpkins. In fact, I was so into the glitter idea that I decided to just make the WHOLE pumpkin glittery, and then went out to get another just to make that one glittery too. I mean, as the woman in front of me at Hobby Lobby said, "Glitter just makes EVERYBODY happy!"

And obviously, you can take just about all the artistic freedom in the world with this one, so here are some guide lines, but have at it any way you please!

Supplies:

Glitter of your choice
Pumpkin(s)
Glue
Paint brush
Clear/Gloss Acrylic Paint if you want to cover the whole pumpkin

Newspaper/Plastic plate to combine glue/glitter

To entirely cover the pumpkin with glitter before adding details, I mixed a squeeze of acrylic gloss with a heaping amount of glitter. It works best to sort of "DAB" it onto the pumpkin, because otherwise the brush just drags the glitter around and doesn't really cover anything. After that I sprinkled the entire pumpkin with a little more glitter, just for good measure of course.

Wait for the base glitter layer to completely dry so the black does not get stuck anywhere other than where you want it to be! When it's ready, you can use a pen/sharpie to outline whatever design you choose.

Then go over the lines, a small section at a time, with the glue. Sprinkle the black glitter on to completely cover the glue, and then tilt the pumpkin so you can gently tap excess glitter off. It's good to have another plate handy to use to catch the extra and reuse them. Repeat these steps until all sections of your "design" are covered.

***Be careful to not use TOO MUCH glue, because if you do it will drip down the pumpkin. When I did the spider I propped it up sort of sideways so it was facing more upright and wouldn't drip down the side.


To cover the stem you can use either the method of coating the pumpkin by dabbing, or the glue/sprinkle method!

(Definitely check the link above for the How Sweet It Is blog when you get a chance, her blog is mostly made up of AMAZING and delicious looking recipes, but also has some other bits thrown in, and she is absolutely hilarious!)


Also- I want to thank you guys because SOMEHOW I have 100 (well, +1) followers!!!! I really can't even believe that many people care enough to even occasionally read this, but it has been great getting to know a lot of you and visit your blogs as well. I will hopefully have the "100 Followers Giveaway" ready to go soon! :-)

Pumpkin Patch!

Today was a gorgeous day, perfect for a little pumpkin patch outing! I wish there was some kind of big place around here like one we used to go to in St. Louis, with all sorts of fun little fall things in addition to an amazing pumpkin patch, but we found one good for picture opps and another with an actual pumpkin patch. Our favorite part was the little orange cat that we named Pumpkin!

Outfit
Dress: Target
Leggings/Scarf/Belt: Old Navy
Sunglasses: Delias
Headband: Forever 21
Boots: RCC Western

Also noteworthy is the fact that I narrowly escaped a donkey gnawing my arm off. He was posing so perfectly for pictures with all the kids, and the second I go up there and sit by him he'd rather eat my arm and/or clothes rather than the hay. I feel like this happens every time I'm around farm animals... Thank goodness Nathan had the camera snapping away during this.

(Pumpkin the Pumpkin Patch cat!)