USA | loveliness. | Page 16

Category: USA
- renegade
  
  Posted at 5:05 pm by jasminedesirees, on December 28, 2012
  
  Last weekend I attended the Renegade Craft Fair in San Francisco. It is basically small local businesses that make or design things like clothes, art, cards, jewellery, etc and they all come together to sell it. Many of them have Etsy shops.
  
  It was really neat to see all of the different things that people make, and it made me feel a bit bad about myself that I haven’t quite learned how to macrame myself a pair of jean shorts, but mostly it was just very impressive, it was a bit of a contact high being around all of those talented, creative people.
  
  Even though there was tons of beautiful jewellery, I didn’t end up buying any, there was almost too many pieces I liked and I couldn’t narrow it down to just one.
  
  I did buy this super adorable card, that I might frame and keep by my bed because it makes me happy whenever I look at it.
  
  I bought some gorgeous eyeshadow from Calico, which I didn’t need but the colours were so beautiful I wanted to paint my whole body with them.
  
  They give you a “positive thought of the day” if you buy something from them, this was mine.
  
  I bought this charcoal and tea-tree oil soap for the boy, it smells amazing, and I’m sure he won’t be surprised to find a lump of “coal” in his stocking.
  
  I haven’t decided if he’s been naughty or nice
  
  And I also bought this shirt. I literally saw it from across the room and we loved each other immediately. They didn’t have it in the style I wanted but I went home and ordered it immediately afterwards, and I am impatiently checking my mailbox every day waiting for the moment we are together again.
  
  Posted in exploring, San Francisco | 0 Comments
- tiny dancer
  
  Posted at 5:35 pm by jasminedesirees, on December 24, 2012
  
  Last Saturday we went to see The Nutcracker at the San Francisco Opera House. It was pretty much my dream date, I got to dress up, eat chocolate truffles, drink champagne and watch ballet dancers in glittery costumes twirling around.
  
  The opera house was gorgeous, it was all marble and gold leaf everywhere. I almost took a picture of the bathroom vanity because I couldn’t remember the last time I had been in a public place with actual faucets, instead of the automatic kind, but I decided whipping out my camera in a public bathroom was at least awkward, or possibly ground for arrest.
  
  We had planned on eating supper before the show, but we weren’t very hungry and decided to just get drinks and dessert.
  
  The ballet was beautiful, somewhere around the Dance of the Sugarplum Fairy I finally decided that what I want to be when I grow up is a ballet dancer. I know they have adult classes in the area, I am sure I could be dancing the part of Clara by next Christmas. Probably.
  
  Posted in holidays, life, San Francisco | 0 Comments
- favourites
  
  Posted at 5:08 pm by jasminedesirees, on December 20, 2012
  
  A few of the things make me happy right now:
  
  Cadbury Dairy Milk: I’ve eaten a lot of chocolate. I eat chocolate almost every day. And out of all of it, the cheap and very expensive kinds I’ve tried, this is by far the best. You could easily devour the entire thing in a matter of minutes. Which I never do. And certainly not yesterday since I will be spending the better part of the next 2 weeks in a bikini. Obviously.
  
  Sunset over the bay:
  
  Christmas lights: I got home from work last Friday to find a twinkly surprise over my garage door.
  
  It’s nothing too crazy, but we are the only ones in our whole neighbourhood that put up any lights at all so we won the Christmas decoration battle, if only be default.
  
  But we have a bit of work to do if we want to beat these guys:
  
  Also, this.
  
  Posted in chocolate, San Francisco | 0 Comments
- winter wonderland
  
  Posted at 4:44 pm by jasminedesirees, on December 13, 2012
  Last night we went out for supper in SF, then got Starbucks and went for a long walk before we went skating at the Embarcadero center.
  
  SF at Christmas
  
  Skating was really fun, although they had “hockey skates” and I use the term loosely. They had absolutely no edge, and I kept waiting to crash head long into the boards and take 4 or 5 unlucky souls with me. I managed to stay upright but I really missed my picks, and regretted my decision not to bring my skates to California with me.
  
  “A good skater can skate in anything”- Just Friends
  
  Trying not to die
  
  Here are few of my favourite things about this time of year:
  - skiing, skating, tobogganing, etc.
  - coming in out of the cold and warming your hands on a steaming mug of hot chocolate (see above)
  - it seems like people are nicer to each other, and go out of their way to help even complete strangers
  - finding the perfect gift for someone that you absolutely know they will love (extra points if it’s on sale)
  - all of the cookies (especially these), and other delicious treats
  - there is always an excuse for a party, cute new dress, or cocktail
  - holiday movies, especially Home Alone, and Love Actually
  - when you’re wrapping presents and you manage to cut all the way across the wrapping paper in one smooth line, without stopping and without ripping it. Success.
  Posted in California, holidays, life, San Francisco | 0 Comments | Tagged Christmas, holidays, San Francisco, skating
- Wedding Bell Blues
  
  Posted at 6:44 pm by jasminedesirees, on December 6, 2012
  
  I planned my wedding by myself (with help from my fabulous mother and some inspiration from Pinterest), from across the country. It was a bit stressful, but it really wasn’t bad, especially with the wonders of online shopping.
  
  We didn’t have a huge budget, luckily we were able to have the ceremony and reception at my parents’ lake house, which really cut down on costs, but I’ve also never been someone who would want to spend $25,000 on a wedding. Yes, it is a very special day, but wouldn’t you rather put that money towards, say an insane honeymoon trip around the world, or the down payment on a house?
  
  With a little bit of time and effort, I was able to get everything I wanted, and not break the bank.
  
  I ordered our flowers (white roses) from Costco. You can order them in bulk, they showed up two days before and we all made our own bouquets and my mom and aunts made flower arrangements for the tables.
  
  I am so tan
  
  We had a ton of flowers, 200 white roses for around $160.00. I had also been collecting new and vintage brooches for a few months before the wedding, and added them into my bouquet for a bit of sparkle and uniqueness.
  
  I was a bit stuck on what to get for favours, it seemed like a waste of money to give people something just to give them something. I thought about doing edible favours, like baskets of cherries, or homemade chocolate chip cookies (thankfully my sister talked me out of that with a little common sense about what happens to chocolate left sitting out in the 100 degree July heat), but settled on handled mason jar drinking glasses, which could serve a dual purpose as favours, and also let me get away with not buying or renting glasses for the guests.
  
  I searched for quite awhile to find these at a reasonable price, a lot of the time the shipping was twice as much as the glasses themselves ($300 for shipping, seriously?) but finally found some from BarProducts, Inc. It was $200, shipping included, for 150 glasses. I bought cute favour tags on Etsy, and I couldn’t have been happier with the result.
  
  Since the wedding was in Montana, we continued the rustic theme into the centerpieces, using slabs of cut wood as the base (thanks Dad!) and placing different sizes of mason jars with white candles on top. It was simple and beautiful, and fit the atmosphere perfectly.
  
  We made our own cupcakes, with fondant flowers from Pfeil and Holing, and my very talented friend Amanda made and decorated a cake for us to cut.
  
  I toyed with the idea of getting a vintage typewriter for our guest book, I’ve always wanted one, and I figured it would be my wedding present to myself, but then I thought about how much I loved playing with them when I was little, and realized we were going to have a lot of kids at our wedding. I had a horrible vision of going to read our guest book only to discover it was nothing more than pages upon pages of unreadable typewriter text.
  
  I decided to get a vintage suitcase instead, and I found one on Etsy with a gorgeous purple lining. I knew it would be great for our wedding, and also serve as a wonderfully decorative addition to our home afterwards.
  
  I also found some vintage black and white postcards on Etsy, and had the guests write us a postcard and leave it in the suitcase, along with any cards we received.
  
  I plan to put the postcards in a photo album with our wedding pictures, as a fun keepsake from a wonderful day.
  
  A few more special details were this handkerchief for my flower girl, and this cape and ornate glass box for our ring bearer.
  
  Posted in life, Montana, USA | 0 Comments | Tagged Montana, wedding, wedding tips
- favourites…
  
  Posted at 5:29 pm by jasminedesirees, on December 1, 2012
  
  Things that are making me happy right now:
  
  I am obsessively reading Game of Thrones on my Kindle, I’m on the 5th book and I only started them last month. I watched one episode of the show, but the characters didn’t match what I had in my head (I’ve decided Jon Snow is probably really, really, ridiculously good looking) so I’ve decided not to watch anymore until I’m finished with the books.
  
  This is what Jon Snow looks like in my mind.
  
  This glue pen which allows me to transform even the most mundane of writing tasks into sparkly, glittery wonderment. I have been using it to make my own birthday cards because I find Hallmark (and other brands) of greetings cards to be expensive, cheesy and pointless, and it is not uncommon for me to spend an hour in the card aisle in a cold sweat trying to decide which card best surmises how I feel about my husband’s mother’s best friends’ dog walker’s former room mate.
  
  A Starbucks Mocha on a rainy, cold San Francisco morning. I wish it was an Espresso Truffle, but you can’t have everything in life.
  
  My eggnog candle, it smells so good I want to eat it.
  
  Posted in chocolate, favourites, San Francisco | 0 Comments
- bay life
  
  Posted at 4:32 pm by jasminedesirees, on November 21, 2012
  
  Last weekend we headed into the city for Red Bull Flugtag. I’ve been seeing commercials for it forever, and I was so excited to finally be there to see it. Sadly, we didn’t show up the night before and camp out so we couldn’t get anywhere near close enough to see all of the action.
  
  Luckily, it was a gorgeous day, so we found a waterfront cafe and had brunch and mimosas instead.
  
  “The Golden Gate Bridge is red? WTF!”- My lovely sister Courtney
  
  Luckily you can’t see it in the picture but this was about 5 minutes after I dropped a chicken kebob on my skirt
  
  Posted in life, San Francisco | 0 Comments
- oasis
  
  Posted at 8:27 pm by jasminedesirees, on November 16, 2012
  
  One of the great things about being in this city, is there is something different around every corner. We are always looking for new places to eat lunch, it’s nice to get out of the office and spend time outside especially when the weather is nice.
  
  Last week we were walking to get food, and we turned a corner and found this beautiful park beside the Yerba Buena Center. It has waterfalls, flowers and tons of beautiful green grass, and it is very peaceful, even when there are a lot of people around. It’s the kind of place that makes you wish you had a frisbee, or a book to plop down and read under a tree.
  
  It’s a perfect little oasis in the middle of all of the brick and concrete.
  
  Posted in exploring, life, San Francisco | 0 Comments
- free fallin’
  
  Posted at 6:02 pm by jasminedesirees, on November 6, 2012
  
  This weekend was perfect. I thought about buying a lottery ticket on Sunday because I felt so lucky, and I felt sure that anything I might endeavor to try this weekend was destined to succeed.
  
  I got home from work early on Friday and cleaned the whole house, made quesadillas for supper, and watched The Five Year Engagement, which was actually really funny, and has re-awakened my hunger for hunting down every food truck in San Francisco.
  
  I woke up Saturday morning to a spotless house, and instead of opting for my usual by-myself “healthy” Saturday morning breakfast of scrambled eggs on toast, I made myself two decadent slices of french toast with syrup and powdered sugar, and ate them with a big bowl of raspberries and tons of coffee, it was heaven.
  
  Even though it was the first weekend in November, it was a balmy 80 degrees outside.
  
  After breakfast I sorted though some of our wedding photos, then ventured out to the East Bay Free Book Exchange (yes, all of the books are really free!) and spent about an hour browsing the shelves.
  
  I found some classics, (To Kill a Mockingbird, The Sun Also Rises), and some trashy beach novels, and also a book about digital photography, which I’m very interested in, and one about learning Spanish, which has been a goal of mine for years.
  
  I took classes in university, but not enough to be fluent. I bought the book as a refresher course for our trip to Ixtapa next month, even though I have a sneaking suspicion that “tequila” is the same in every language.
  
  On the way home I stopped in at Michael’s to stock up in supplies and creativity, and I’m very excited about some of my upcoming projects (also known as “covering things in glitter”) probably due to my recent success in the Halloween costume department.
  
  I was supposed to meet that one guy in the city for the Ski and Snowboard expo, so I went in a few hours early, and roamed around in the sunshine on Haight street, popping in to check out all of the neat vintage clothing stores.
  
  I bought my sister a birthday present, and myself some cookies from the Haight St Market, I don’t know what they put in them, but as I’ve been compelled on more than one occasion to walk from my office on 2nd all the way to Haight-Ashbury just to get one, so it’s definitely laced with something.
  
  On the way to the expo we stopped by the Full House house, as a true ’90’s kid I had no choice but to document the experience.
  
  The Painted Ladies, you can see these houses in the opening credits of Full House
  
  After the expo we went out for Mexican and margaritas. Perfect Saturday.
  
  Sunday was equally as idyllic, I even got started on my Christmas shopping.
  
  I was driving down the highway on the way to the mall with the windows down, wind blowing in my hair on the most beautiful day of the year, and then “Free Fallin’ by Tom Petty came on the radio. I was basically Tom Cruise, but taller and with less Scientology.
  
  I got a pretty decent start on presents for my nearest and dearest, and as a reward for being so selfless, I bought myself this lovely t-shirt.
  
  Posted in California, life, San Francisco | 0 Comments | Tagged East Bay, lazy sunday, life, San Francisco
- gigantes
  
  Posted at 5:16 pm by jasminedesirees, on November 1, 2012
  
  Yesterday was the parade to celebrate the San Francisco Giants winning the world series over the Detroit Tigers. There were a million people there to watch, and it was all happening only two blocks away from my work. Even though baseball is definitely not my favourite sport (no body contact, the longest games everrrrrrr) it was still really neat to be here when the whole city was going absolutely nuts for their team.
  
  There were people waiting on Market St. since 6am to get a good spot, and there were people hanging out of buildings, and climbing trees and light posts to catch a glimpse of the players.
  
  That is dedication
  
  That’s one of the great things about sports. Even the sports I do like, I generally won’t watch every game. I love watching hockey games live, there is such a great energy, and hockey rinks always smell like home to me, but I wouldn’t sit at home on the couch and watch every single game on TV.
  
  Still, every year come playoff time it gets very exciting. All of a sudden there is a buzz in the air, and instead of just being a string of unrelated events (even though they really aren’t) every game is more exciting than the last and you can actually see the end in sight, and watch the teams fight it out to get there. Random strangers on the street become best friends, united by a common cause, and a common logo on their chests.
  
  It seems like there aren’t a lot of things anymore than can unite a massive group of people in such a fun, positive way. Plus the wings and beer don’t hurt either.
  
  So congratulations to the Giants on the World Series, and on having Brian Wilson, because he is awesome and so is his beard.
  
  Posted in life, San Francisco | 0 Comments
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