PEBBLE BEACH

We bounced around a little in California so my posts are going to be slightly out of order.

On day two of vacation we drove to Monterey and spent part of the day in Carmel - a little town where Clint Eastwood used to be mayor. It poured rain until late afternoon so we had a chance to dip our toes in the Pacific Ocean before dinner. This day was a bit of a shemozzle with the weather and also making counter offers on our house (it has been for sale for 8 months and of course our only offer came about 2 hours after we landed in California). Don't get too excited for us - in the end those people were just wasting our precious vacation time and weren't interested in our house at all.

Spur of the moment we decided to have dinner at Pebble Beach and as you can see from my first post, I am very glad we did! Our meal was delicious and it was kind of neat to overlook the 18th hole of the golf course while we ate.

On the beach in Monterey before dinner. Our little manny would have appreciated the beach. Also, brand new hair cut!!

SEVEN

I've posted here before about my cousin, Dee (Dara) Wilkie and some of her projects and she has had a very busy fall season! She has been working very hard with great results so I wanted to showcase her most recent work!

Dara studied surface design at New Brunswick College of Craft and Design and graduated in 2012. Since then she has been working full time while she also starts her own brand and I am a big fan of everything she has ever done! Her biggest fan maybe. :)

Last summer Dara conceptualized a new project inspired by the seven deadly sins (hence SEVEN). She designed and created seven fabrics, each inspired by one of the seven deadly sins, and four local fashion designers turned these fabrics into beautiful garments. A completely Fredericton based project, local models were then styled by Billy Peterson and Michael Drost and photographed by Lance Kenneth Blakney.

The dresses and photographs are currently displayed at the George Fry Gallery at NBCCD. Gallery hours: 9:00 am to 4:30 pm Monday to Friday. 457 Queen Street, Fredericton, NB.

They will be displayed until January 19th if you're in town! Please stop by and support local artists!

Fashion design:
Michelle Duncan
Adrienne Goodine
Alexandra Keely
Bronwen Robbins

Surface design:
Dee Wilkie

DIAMOND IN THE ROUGH

The 90s may have been the worst decade for fashion. Much of it I hope never comes back around. However when re-watching Full House on Netflix in preparation for Fuller House in February (all eight seasons are available on Canadian Netflix) I realized some things are timeless: good style and John Stamos.

I called this post "Diamond in the Rough" to reference both the outfits in Full House that would still be wearable today and to reference Aladdin (you likely know 'Steve' was the voice of Disney's Aladdin). Little double entendre for you.

Aunt Becky was definitely the style winner of the series (although she had some real doozies too). DJ is runner up and she would have impressed me more if she didn't wear those hideous white shoes in the last seasons.

Let's begin, shall we?

Outfit #1: Season 4 Episode 1
Aunt Becky's silk slip dress. Bravo, Full House team. I personally think this is a beautiful dress and it looks pretty fab on Rebecca. It is my series favourite.

Outfit #2: Season 6 Episode23
Aunt Becky's first Disney World outfit. Special shout out to the shoes - they are just plain great. The cut of the shorts and a plain long sleeved tee? Also timeless. Well done. Joey's outfit? Not so much.

Outfit #3: Season 8 Episode 24
DJ's prom dress. This dress deserves some extra credit because DJ's junior prom dress was not a classic. This is similar in colour and fabric to outfit number one, but a completely different cut. Maybe I'm just really into metallics right now. Regardless, this kind of dress is what Spanx were made for, ladies. Embrace the Spanx. Stephanie's outfit would be ok but what is with these terrible shoes?!

If you haven't watched Full House since you were ten years old I highly recommend it. I was not disappointed. Now I'm really looking forward to Fuller House! I'm curious if you agree with me that these outfits aren't hideously ugly by today's standards. Twenty years from now we'll be looking back at Fuller House style. :)

STOCKING STUFFERS FOR HER

Stocking stuffers for her by amy-claire-russell featuring a light blue fragrance

Dolce Gabbana light blue fragrance
sephora.com

MARC BY MARC JACOBS earrings
shopbop.com

American Eagle Outfitters striped crew socks
ae.com

Marc By Marc Jacobs Classic Q Key Pouch - Black
shopbop.com

Blinc Blinc Mascara
sephora.com

PUMPED UP KICKS

Hey guys!

I was just going through some old photos trying to find something to blog about before heading out for the weekend. I found these outfit photos from back in the spring. Sadly the trees are going to look like this again soon!

T-shirt and pants from Aritzia. Jacket from Garage (my sister went back and bought the same one in burgundy). Scarf from my mom. Shoes from Converse (all the rage in Switzerland, coincidentally).

Have an awesome weekend! I hope it's a little less rainy wherever you are.

NOAH THE MOVIE AND A KIMONO

We don't often see a movie on opening night mainly due to the annoyance of long lines, but this weekend we ventured out for the opening night of Noah, as per hubby's request.  He was very excited to see it and read the (small) section in Genesis earlier in the week as preparation.  I re-read it a few days after seeing the movie and here are the things I took note of from the Bible and movie:

1. Nephilim. I'm sure when I originally read Genesis I had probably never heard of the nephilim and didn't bother to look it up so didn't really grasp what the Bible was talking about.  "Nephilim" are the offspring of an angel and a human.  Genesis 6:4 says "The Nephilim were on the earth in those days - and also afterward - when the sons of God went to the daughters of men and had children by them. They were the heroes of old, men of renown."  Huh.  The movie focused a lot on fallen angels and their role in the building of the ark.  That, however, is not in the Bible.

2. Men were bad.  Like - really bad.  After the movie I asked hubby if he thought humans now were any better than before the flood, and with that train of thought it's probably important to note Genesis 6:5. "...every inclination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil all the time."  Every thought was evil - all the time.

3. All the sons had wives (it seems).  As we were watching the movie which focused very heavily on the fact that only one son had a wife (and therefore the other two sons wouldn't have the chance to pro-create and become "men" - Tim Allan grunt) I was pretty sure that was different from the story...and I was right.  Genesis 6:18. "...and you will enter the ark - you and your sons and your wife and your sons' wives with you."  So as you can see that is wives - plural.

4. The animals. They were my favourite part, I think. I had never thought about how the animals got onto the ark and the movie showing them all swarm the ark together was pretty cool!  The Bible says, "Pairs of clean and unclean animals, of birds and of all creatures that move along the ground, male and female, came to Noah and entered the ark..." That's pretty awesome.  And I had forgotten that there weren't just two of each (as movie Ham tells us).  There were seven of every kind of clean animal (a male and its mate), and two of the unclean animals and birds.  Who knows how they kept the animals alive and fed - the Bible doesn't go into that - but I thought the movie version of putting them into a drug induced sleep was a cool idea.

5. Hollywood, a flare for the dramatic.  As far as we're told in the Bible story, none of the daughters-in-law were pregnant and there was no stowaway on the ark.  Nice try, though.

6. Vegetarians before the ark?  It seems to me (with zero Bible college education) that they were vegetarians before and now, post-flood, they can eat meat. Genesis 9:3.  "Everything that lives and moves will be food for you.  Just as I gave you the green plants, I now give you everything." 

7. The naked scene?  Yeah, that basically happened.  It's true that Noah planted a vineyard, got drunk off the wine, and got naked.  Genesis goes into a little more detail than the movie, showing that Ham found his dad like this and told his brothers.  Shem and Japheth covered Noah without looking and then Noah cursed Ham for not covering him and telling his brothers.

Those are the few things I noticed from the story of Noah (Hollywood version vs Bible version).  And to add a couple of photos, I thought I'd share my movie going outfit.

Coat from Zara, old.  Kimono from Top Shop. Similar here. Tank top from Banana Republic outlet.  Jeans from J Brand.

Skull bracelet from Shop Bop, old (I can't remember the brand).  Rubber turnlock bracelet by Marc Jacobs , old.  Still available on the Marc Jacobs website here.

Booties from Aldo.

DUSTY ROSE CHAIR POST TWO

You remember ol' dusty rose from a few posts ago?  Well, I took a little trip to Fabricville this weekend and found a potential fabric for her.  I wanted something white, cream, or off white with some texture and there were a few things available but most didn't have the amount of texture I was looking for.  I did find something that I think might be a winner, though.

The best part is with a club elite membership it's only $6.99 / yard which is almost unheard of in my limited experience.  It will make recovering the chair much more affordable (because I don't know how to do things like that and have to hire an upholsterer).  What do you think?

Nail polish: OPI "If You Moust You Moust" (Minnie Mouse collection) and OPI "Arbre Aqui" (liquid sand).  A little beauty hint - peruse the Winners/Homesense beauty section for discount OPI polish.

WHAT TO WEAR: DINNER AND A GAME

I'm home from work today because the roads are terrible, so I thought I'd take the opportunity to blog about our trip to Boston from a month or so ago.  Hubby and I hadn't been on vacation together since last year on my March Break (since as a third/fourth year medical student you don't get any vacation during the summer) so we decided to go on a little trip to Freeport, Maine, and Boston, Mass!  I have driven past Boston a few times on my way to Cape Cod and NYC, but I had never actually been there so I was excited to go, even in the midst of the snows of February.  It's the home of Matt Damon and Ben Affleck, donchaknow!

My favourite part of the trip was the Boston Celtics game on Friday night.  I have been to a number of professional baseball games (all Expos games), but this was my first NBA game.  We went to dinner first at Boston Beer Works which is right down the street from the TD Garden.  It was pub food but really yummy, actually, and I'm not normally a fan of pub fare.  I had the nachos (ol' faithful) and they were delish!  And I know me a good plate of nachos, people.

I wanted to wear something kind of nice for a few reasons. 1. We were going out to dinner first. 2. I don't own any green Celtics gear and did not plan on buying any. 3. We only spent two nights in the city so I wanted to make the most of it.  I decided on a sweatshirt from Garage, a skirt (old) from TJ Maxx that I have since trashed (sadly) because it was getting pretty worn out, and booties from Aldo.

The game itself was pretty great.  My dad is a HUGE Celtics fan so I grew up watching a lot of Celtics on tv.  My dad's a teacher and when I was little, his classroom was full of Larry Bird gear and newspaper clippings.  H core.  So, needless to say, that added to my excitement at my first NBA game.

Hilariously, just before halftime, a player was subbing in from the sidelines and hubby and I were both (unknowingly) staring him down.  Hubby looked at me and said, "Is that Kris Humphries?"  I said, "I was wondering the same thing!!"  It was.  The Hump.  Mr. Kardashian himself.  That was quite distracting for me, watching Kimmy K's ex.  I got quite the giggle out of that one.

The whole trip we said, "Wouldn't it be nice to live in a big city and be able to go to shows and games whenever you wanted?"  It would be nice, wouldn't it?  ...and expensive.  Next sports-related item on my bucket list?  NFL game.  Because that would be awesome.  I think hubby would say his is a PGA tour event.  Tomatoes.  Tom-AAH-toes.

NEW CHOPPED HAIRCUT

A couple of weeks ago I decided I had enough of trying to grow my hair out and went back to brunette with a cute chop!  I've had literally every hairstyle you can have from a number one buzz cut to a ridiculously long, one length mane so nothing scares me in the hairdresser's chair.  I have residency interviews in the next couple of weeks so it seemed like a good time to get the ol' hair did.

In the meantime, I have extra time off while I wait for these interviews so I'm tackling the spare bedroom (our dirty little secret, you may remember).  I painted the walls last week and today I spent my first day off painting the ceiling and trim.  While I was at it I figured, why not paint the hallway between our bathroom and bedroom?  It's teeny tiny and only took a little extra time.  I just painted the hallway white to make it a bit cleaner and get rid of the last trace of beige from our upstairs.  Beige.  Shudder.

I got quite excited today when I went on the West Elm website and saw free shipping and an extra 30% off at checkout - one day only.  I loaded up my shopping cart with new bedding for the spare room (shhhh!) and then there was nowhere to type in the promo code!  Not available for us in the great white north.  Don't you hate that?!  Probably for the best, anyway.  Quite disappointing, really, so I pinned it all to my Pinterest wishlist hoping some day someone will take pity on me and give it to me as a gift!  How is it possible to want so much stuff?!  Christmas just finished (took down the tree yesterday, Jan 19th) and my birthday's not till September!! ;)  So in other words, the "after" photos might not make it to the blog for awhile.

And back to the haircut...here's a photo from last week wearing my work attire.  Quite proud of the use I've been getting out of my new curling iron just adding a little wave!

 

Shoes - Aldo.  Necklace - Olivia Welles via HauteLook.  T shirt - Top Shop, old. Similar here.  Skirt - J Crew, old. Similar here.

CROSS CANADA TOUR: POST FOUR

We had a different sort of weekend this weekend.  Leroy and hubby came down to visit me in Halifax (I was totally thrilled to see Leroy)!  Three best friends together again!  We spent the weekend in a hotel that allows doggies so our Manny could come visit.  It wouldn't be our first choice for future trips but it worked out just fine.  It's slightly stressful worrying about Leroy barking at every little noise in the hotel (although he got much better as the weekend went on) and we weren't allowed to leave him alone in the hotel room, which meant we lived off take out and weren't able to sit in at a restaurant.  But I couldn't have been any happier and it's the last time I'm going to get to see Leroy before I return home in December.  And I have to say, he was pretty excited to see me, too.  When I met them at the hotel he kept running up to me for pats and then looking at hubby as if to say, "Look, Dad!!  Mom's here!!"

Growing up I never had a dog, so I kind of thought it was hilarious to see Manny in a hotel room.  It just seemed out of place.  He was so adorable, though.  The "dog rooms" all had two queen size beds so Leroy basically had his choice of bed for nighttime sleeping and at the end of the weekend he realized he was able to jump back and forth between the two which was just about the funniest thing.  Or it was to us.

Here are a few photos from our weekend.  We spent some time throwing Leroy his frisbee at the Commons, where we also found football practice gear.  Naturally, I had a go at pushing the tackle thing, whatever it's called.  We realized after taking a few photos of me not budging it that you really have to get low to make it move or else it just rocks like a rocking chair.  Quite funny.  And the rest of the pics are from lounging in the hotel room with our baby!

Bottoms from J Brand, old. Similar here and here.  Sweater from Banana Republic, old. Similar here.  Top from ASTR, exact unavailable. Similar here.  Sneakers from Converse, available here.

Bottoms from Wayf available here. Top from Banana Republic, exact unavailable.  Similar here and here.

TWAS THE DAY BEFORE NEXT

Twas the day before next when all through the house not a creature was stirring, not even a doggie.
Leroy and I were nestled all snug on the couch while visions of treats danced through our heads.
Leroy in his collar and I in my socks had just settled down for a long afternoon of studying.
When what to my wondering eyes should appear but a miniature brown van and a delivery boy!

He brought me checkered Keds!  So exciting for a Monday.

I found them on Haute Look and they were less than $20 if I remember correctly.  Who could say no? Leroy's a sucker for a deal.

WEDDING WEAR

I thought I'd do a little post on what to wear to a wedding this summer.  Last summer we had five (!) weddings to attend and this year we only have two.  And since I don't know my schedule for two days from now, I have no idea if I'll be able to go to them.  And I have no money so I'm not buying a new dress... But maybe you'll be a wedding guest with some money for a new purchase!

Option 1: alice + olivia.  Tracey sleeveless peplum dress in pink. On sale!  Find it here!

Option 2: Tibi. Velocity dress in pastel multi.  More expensive but oh so pretty. Find it here!

Option 3: BCBGMAXAZRIA. Abigail evening dress. Find it here!

Option 4: J Crew. Louisa dress in silk chiffon. Find it here!

Some cute options if you're on the market for a new dress!  I wore the same dress to all of the weddings we attended last summer.  It's pretty and no one besides hubby and I ever knew, right? :)

FREEDOM OF SUMMER

I wrote my Internal Medicine exam this morning and now I'm free!  (Kinda. Until Monday.)  Either way, it's the second day of summer and my stress level decreased significantly today.  Oh happy day.  I put together a cute outfit for the day with green shorts from J Crew, a patterned tank from Banana Republic, and a Calvin Klein sweater.  Hubby took some photos and the ones I liked best?  They're full of puppy.  And you can't see the green shorts or the pattern in the tank.  But my goodness, look at this mommy/baby photo.  I could not possibly love him more.

The agenda for the rest of the day: paint the front steps, clean off my desk (it is frightening...I've been studying at the dining room table for the last few months because the desk is covered in papers), scrub the floor, and make pavlova for tonight's class potluck.

MASTER BEDROOM: POST FIVE

Hubby and I have never shared a closet.  In our apartment my clothes were in the spare bedroom, and in our house his clothes are in the spare bedroom.  We have a teeny tiny closet in our room and it only has one closet door so half the closet is hidden behind the wall.  You have to practically climb inside the closet to see what's hidden in the back.  This is very annoying to me - someone with a lot of clothing!  In an attempt to cut down on closet space, I switched out all my ugly plastic hangers for lovely, thin, suede ones last year.  There is no doubt these hangers take up less room, but the problem was not solved.  The plot thickens.

In a moment of frustration we went to Canadian Tire and found an incredibly inexpensive solution.  They have quite a selection of closet organizers.  A lot of them don't work for our closet because of the one door.  For instance, your typical fold-able/slide-able doors give you more access.  So we bought a simple organizer that consists of two vertical bars and one horizontal. 

This allows me to have an extra row of skirts/shirts in the bottom of my closet.  It kind of doubles up on the space at the front of the closet.  You clip the vertical bars onto the existing rod and the horizontal bar connects between them.  Super easy and made a big difference in my closet!  It cost around twenty-five dollars.

You can see here how the vertical bars "connect" with the floor.  You adjust them to the desired height and they just sort of push against the floor.  They really don't have to be that secure because they are hanging from the metal rod in your closet so it's quite stable regardless.  I highly recommend this as an inexpensive closet re-do!  It's much cheaper (and faster - and easier!) than ripping out part of the wall and installing proper doors.  In a perfect world full of money trees, that's what I'd be doing.  Hubby's things would still be in the spare room, though. :)

MINT CANDY APPLE

I spent last weekend in Quebec City for a conference and although I spent most of my time studying, I did go on a few walks through the old city and managed to sneak in a tiny bit of shopping.  I didn't come away much but I found these great pajama pants at Simons.  Funny thing is I actually remember this store from my last trip to Quebec City...in grade eight.  There is one Simons location outside of Quebec, in Edmonton.  It's a nice little store.  Anyway, back to the pj pants.  I thought it was quite cute because my toenail polish matches them perfectly, (my toes are Essie Mint Candy Apple).  How cute are the pants?

FLIP FLOPS AND CUT-OFF JEANS

I just discovered the problem with ripped jeans, (or in my case, jean shorts).  When they acquire a new hole you're totally oblivious.  We were away to see Luke Bryan and Jason Aldean in concert recently, (hence the new camo hat), and we did a little shopping beforehand.  When I was trying things on I realized my jean shorts had a hole right on the butt/groin region.  Quite embarassing.  I've been wearing those shorts all summer and I have no idea when this happened, so if you saw more of my bum than you wanted recently... I apologize!  In the future I will be counting the holes in my ripped jeans! :)

FLORAL DAYS AHEAD

In the spirit of spring, I wore my new floral tunic to school today.  It's bright and fun, and although it has long sleeves, it is very light material so it's nice and cool.  Today was a beautiful day so it just felt like the right choice.



Tunic from Modcloth, leggings from Lululemon, Toms shoes, sunglasses from Fossil.

And now I'm off for a run in this lovely 14 degree weather!  Hoping for another gorgeous day tomorrow!

AUSTRIAN STYLE

Today I was glancing through my photos from Europe last summer and came across this photo of a beautiful Austrian couple.  This was taken at a vineyard outside of Vienna and I love how chic this couple looks!  They could have stepped out of the pages of a magazine with their beautiful clothing and dashing pose.  Something about this is just incredible to me.

Sorry about the not-so-wonderful quality of the photo.  I think I was trying to be discrete and was less worried about clarity...

MISH MASH

This post is a mish mash of things from this week!  First of all, I got a new haircut two weeks ago - my first ever dye job and bangs (for the first time since elementary school).  It was all very exciting.  As well, I have new RED pants.  They are kind of fab if I do say so myself.

Blazer H&M, t-shirt Smart Set, pants Tommy Hilfiger.

Onto the next item of business.  At school we drew names for secret buddies at the beginning of the year and we buy gifts for that person.  My wonderful secret buddy bought me a gorgeous hydrangea plant that I am in love with!!  Strangely enough, while grocery shopping the last two weeks, I have mentioned to hubby how much I loooooved the hydrangeas on display and how gooorgeous they were and how purple is sooooo wonderful.  Much to my surprise, my buddy bought me the exact plant I had been gushing over for two weeks!  This led me to believe hubby knows who my secret buddy is and gave them a hint.  However, he says this is not the case, it was just a coincidence!  How funny is that?!  Apparently my buddy knows me quite well.  They even (kind of) match my chairs!

And in case you were wondering, Leroy also liked my gift.

Finally, were you wondering where I was going in those fantastic red pants??  Hubby and I had a date night to a restaurant in the city we hadn't tried before.  We have our go-to spots we love (for sushi, Indian, Chinese, and Thai) but have decided to branch out some in the future.  We went to a little tapas bar we had heard about.  We ordered three dishes and enjoyed them all (although I forgot to take pictures of the last two...I was hungry, ok?).  The course I did remember to capture on camera is a lobster dip.  We also got bruschetta and chicken skewers - all delicious!  And there you have it.  That was Thursday.