8.19.2011

My Week in Instagram

I love my iphone Instagram app and have utilized it more than anything in my phone. Here are a few pictures i took when I got crazy taking shots of random things as they happen to come my way.

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Last Saturday was my niece's vintage-inspired bachelorette party. This was the pearl-clad chandelier in the kitchen!

Vintage-inspired bridal shower

Ever since I've committed to hair blow-outs twice a month at Blow Dry Bar, I significantly reduced my trip to the nail salon and try to do it myself. I've stocked up on pretty fall colors from Essie (Case Study and LadyLike) and Chanel (peridot - second picture below). They are lovely colors!

Essie's case study and ladylike


Chanel peridot

I love flipping through the pages of this book and dreaming of Paris and dress like a true Parisian :-)

Bedside reads

Still in back-to-school preparation mode, I stopped by Hobby Lobby and snatched these plain colorful tshirts and a few iron-on letters (they are on sale this week!) and completed Aston's first week of school wardrobe!

Back to school shirts

With a little fiasco on the iron and the letter T, resulted to this monogram added on the side of his green shirt! Cool!

Monogrammed

How was your week like? Enjoy the weekend, folks!

8.12.2011

Planning My Life

After much anticipation, my package from Erin Condren arrived earlier this week. The life planner is what I've expected and more. 

I've recently just used my iphone for appointment scheduling and keeping track of Aston's school schedule. Using the phone was ok but the life planner not only let's you jot down appointments ~ it let's you document notes, scribble thoughts, mark special dates, keep receipts/calling cards etc on really pretty colorful pages with coordinating stickers and hard-to-miss color coded monthly tabs! 

Life Planner

Thank you for the extra goodies too!
Now here's mine and I can't resist taking a shot with a matching colorful pen found at the dollar bins from Michael's! 

Life planner

Love this video from their site. You can order your's here.







Enjoy the weekend friends!


8.01.2011

Quick Easy Dulce de Leche

 So last week my sweet tooth desire got the better of me and I was googling "dulce de leche icing recipe" to try my hand in making them. My new cobalt blue standup mixer arrived and I was dying to try it out. 

I had a few baking ingredients in my pantry but most of the essentials were lacking. I tried making icing without powdered sugar and instead used cornstarch with granulated sugar and I just have to say it was a disaster! Never again! 

Cobalt blue

I had a leftover boxed cake mix of chocolate fudge cake and I wanted to try a dulce de leche icing to give it a twist. I found this recipe and gave it my spin. 

Here's my ingredients for the dulce de leche frosting : 

1 can condensed milk
1/3 cup nutella
3 cups powdered sugar 
2 sticks unsalted butter
1 tbsp vanilla



Here's a not-so-great shot of how it turned out. Its delicious nevertheless! 

Choc cake w dulce de leche frosting


7.19.2011

More Legoland Adventures

I'm sharing a few Legoland shots from our friends Vinnie and Grace!

We are currently checking our schedule to possibly squeeze another trip back before school starts! Can't wait to go back! 


all photos by Vinnie



7.12.2011

Legoland Water Park

First thing we did when we arrived in Legoland on our third day in San Diego was to get soaked and wet at the fairly new Water Park. 

Our friends Vinnie and Grace drove down from Pasadena with their family that Friday night. We have not seen them in so long and it was great for Aston to finally meet the boys and they had so much fun!


Aston and Roman bonding over a lego figure!

Cheetos! Power snack of the day!




More pics of the Legoland adventure coming up soon! 



7.11.2011

Sea World San Diego Part 2

Sea World was our destination for our second day in San Diego. It was a fantastic visit to say the least. Here are some of the highlights. 

Hanging out with daddy and meeting a few wet pals along the way, shamu and the dolphins. 

We were amazed and entertained by the troop consisting of the Cirque de la Mer show. 

The bayside sky ride was slightly scary with cable cars wobbling a bit in the strong winds but it was still a gorgeous ride viewing the Mission Bay from the sky! 



Some farewell shots but with an uncooperative tired little boy! 



7.05.2011

4th of July Weekend Part 1

We took a quick trip to San Diego last weekend for a much needed break and thoroughly enjoyed the stay as we soaked on the beautiful weather. That was something I was really looking forward to ~ escaping the Texas humid heat even for just a short time. 

We stayed at this beautiful resort hotel right next to Legoland and we loved the convenience of how near this place was to the park and the nearby outlet mall. They even have their own private entrance to the resort which was a brief walking distance away. 

Aston right away jumped in the pool for an afternoon dip the day we arrived. It was difficult to get him out of there. We had to bribe him for a day at the waterpark if he gets out in time for dinner. 

Dinner was at the hotel's restaurant grill as it was Tapas Thursday night. Yum!

Next stop will be Sea World. 


I hope you all had a great July 4th weekend celebration as well!



6.15.2011

Big Boy Bike

Aston finally got a big boy bike for his birthday (he actually got 2 bike gifts!) from very generous family and friends and daddy got busy right away coaching him on his biking skills. In minutes, he got the hang of it (with balancing wheels of course)! 











All photo reprocessing by CameraBag



6.07.2011

Sweets and More

The long weekend of Memorial Day brought us to our favorite hang-out outdoor shopping and entertainment destination, City Centre, by the Memorial-Town & Country area. We stumbled upon this charming tiny bakery called Sweet, boasting with yummy cupcakes and delicious french macarons.

Sweet cupcakes and macarons

The little guy had a hard time picking out a treat!

Pick

He settled with a red velvet cupcake (highly influenced by mom) and a truffle!

Red velvet

We can't wait to go back!


6.01.2011

The 4TH Aston Cup Soccer Party

We celebrated Aston's 4th birthday party dubbed, The 4th Aston Cup soccer party, a few weeks ago. Luckily for us, we have friends who are great to share the photos they took of that special day. The following pictures were taken by dear friend Rae (thanks Raez!), who took tons of amazing shots and I'd like to share them with you today. 

As any party should be, it was indeed a memorable one and it was rewarding to see the birthday boy having so much fun with his friends and cousins! 

dessert table

photo by rae

4 yr old!

centerpieces

food for the gods

4th bday

polkadotted balloons

soccer cookies

birthday boy

soccer tots

with cashel

soccer party

Hop on to my other blog, for more party photos and details!