Wishing everyone a safe and Happy Holiday from our little family!
Happy Holidays!
Kitchen Renovations: Before & After
We bought our home a little over a year ago and I would say that we spent the most money and time into renovating the kitchen. It was really small and dark in its original form, but we’ve always wanted some open, bright, and is the center of our home. My husband and I love to cook and entertain, so we wanted a large island to offer a large space to work on and people can gather around.
The process included completely removing the entire original kitchen, designing a completely new layout, reconfiguring the gas lines so that we can put our stove on the island, and putting in a free standing range hood. We had a lot of fun choosing out cabinets, hardware, countertops, appliances, etc. But it did take a ton of thought and decision-making (which I often have a tough time with). Luckily, I knew I always wanted clean white quartz countertops, natural tones wood cabinets, and a minimal style. My husband was in charge of choosing the appliances, since he’s much better with that stuff.
We are fortunate enough to have my father in law and George’s uncle help us. They are both contractors and we couldn’t have done this without them. There were some disagreements on what layout worked best, cost, etc (but what did we expect when working with family), but I just had to go with my gut and stand my ground on what I envisioned.
After all of the work and stress, it turned out much more than I could have ever hoped for. It still gets compliments and our friends and family were so shocked at the transformation. We’ve spent countless evenings making dinner together, hosting parties, and various projects just around the kitchen in the last year. And I’m looking forward to many more.
Here are some items I have in my kitchen!
How I’m Spending My Time at Home
It’s week 6 of ‘stay at home’ orders and I’m lucky that both my husband and I are still able to work. He gets to work from home and I go into the office a couple times a week, the other days, I’ll work from home too. But we do find that we have a lot of extra time on our hands since we aren’t able to go anywhere. Normally, we spend time going to home improvement stores, home decor shops, eat at restaurants, hang out with friends, etc. But all of that is at a pause right now and it can get a little overwhelming how much time you have to spend at home.
To help with that, I’ve really given myself projects, tasks, and activities to do. Sometimes, I don’t feel like doing anything and I just sit around watching TV, which is totally fine too. You just need to decompress sometimes and maybe being productive isn’t in the cards for that day.
COOKING AND BAKING
Some things I’ve been doing other than work are cooking new recipes and baking. We already cook a lot on a regular basis so it wasn’t too hard for us to continue doing that. But we’ve definitely gotten more creative with our meals. Making things from scratch or just coming up with unique recipes due to only being able to use what we have in our fridge/pantry.
STAYING ACTIVE
We both try to work out a few times a week. I’ve been doing my own work outs with resistance cords, sliders, elastic bands, and a yoga mat. Sometimes, I’ll go onto Instagram Live and do a work out from there, go on Youtube and find a yoga video, we’ll take a walk. Just whatever keeps you moving and active.
HOME PROJECTS
There’s also a lot of yard work and gardening so maintenance does take up a lot of our time. I also spend a lot of time cleaning inside the house and just reorganizing, redecorating, etc. We’re also growing our own herbs from scraps of vegetables we’ve used for cooking. Before you know it, we won’t have to buy that much from the markets! π
READING
I’ve also been trying to read more and right now, I’m working on Michelle Obama’s “Becoming Michelle”. I used to be in a book club and really enjoyed it, but once the wedding and purchasing a home came into the picture, my schedule got too busy for it. But if you’re not a reader, I know a lot of people are doing puzzles, taking up a skill like knitting, etc.
CONNECTING WITH LOVED ONES
However, we really do miss seeing our friends and family, so FaceTime or Zoom has really helped. We play online boardgames with friends almost everyday, just video chat with them, and it helps a lot.
I hope that the few suggestions and things I’ve been doing really help give you ideas and that you continue to stay safe and healthy!
Sephora VIB Sale
I feel like I haven’t had a chance to update my blog in a while. I’ll keep you guys posted on what types of posts I’ll be planning to regularly put up and different topics but for now, I wanted to share with you my picks for the Sephora VIB Sale, which starts today!
I really only shop for beauty and skincare products during this sale or if I desperately need to restock on something. I generally purchase either from Sephora or Follain because I want to make sure I choose clean products and I feel like they have the best assortments. So Sephora will run this sale maybe twice a year, which is sufficient for me to purchase what I need to last me for about 6 months. It is also a great time to try out new products, so I put the Ilia serum foundation, Kosas concealer, and the Ilia multi-use pigment on my list to try.
My recommendation is to either stock up like I do so that you save money on your products, splurge on something that doesn’t often go on sale, or just simply treat yourself! π
The promo code is SPRINGSAVE and ends on 4/29!
Here are my picks and I’ll talk to you all soon!
Off Shoulder and my go-to Accessories
I hope off shoulder clothing items are going to stay on trend for a while because I honestly can’t get enough. I love how they show off your dΓ©colletΓ© and shoulders, creating such a feminine and soft feel to your whole outfit. It gives me the opportunity to stack delicate necklaces and accessorize so that it completes the whole look!
I love gold necklaces that are minimal and delicate so that it makes it easier to wear multiple at the same time. I’m not one for bold or statement jewelry pieces anymore because I find it difficult to wear them on a daily basis. I mean, there are some people that can pull it off so seamlessly, but that’s just not me. I love thin chains with small pendants or discs.
On top of my necklaces, I’ll wear rings as well. Of course, I’ll usually wear my wedding and engagement rings. Both of which are white gold. When I feel like adding on some more, I’ll stack some simple gold rings. The ones I have are thin bands that are either hammered for an unfinished look, beaded for some more texture, or just plain thin bands.
I don’t really have any bracelets that I like to wear right now, but I’m on the look out for some. Let me know if you have any suggestions! Other than that, I keep it pretty simple as you can see and it’s pretty manageable for me.
OUTFIT
BLOUSE (Similar HERE, HERE, and HERE)| NECKLACE (Similar HERE and HERE)| RINGS| JEANS
SIMILAR ITEMS BELOW
Nordstrom Anniversary Sale 2019
Hi everyone! I just wanted to make a quick post on the Nordstrom Anniversary Sale for this year with some of my picks, since at this time every year, there’s a frenzy that is the Anniversary Sale. Nordstrom has this month long sale to offer discounts on products that they are bringing in for the Fall, which is really cool! For the last few years, I found tons of amazing deals and products that I absolutely love, but to be honest, I didn’t find a great selection this year.
Having just bought a home, I was really excited to find home items in their sale, but the selection was really minimal and nothing really stood out to me, except maybe some candles. Some of the clothing items sparked a bit of interest to me, but I’ve seen almost the same things as last year? Nothing really new or exciting.
I remember scrolling through pages and pages of products and wanting nearly everything but overall, I felt like there were much less products, the variety and selection also wasn’t really there. But anyways, here are the few things I think would be worth purchasing and will be purchasing for myself.
Dress Like Me Feature
It was so cool to be featured on Dress Like Me, which is a site and fashion community that allows you to shop products from your favorites brands and companies, while also featuring a variety of influencers and bloggers of all kinds! I was very honored to have been chosen and would love for you to take a look at the article! π
Wedding Wednesday: Bridesmaid Dresses
I really don’t have a favorite color, other than maybe white or grey, and with our wedding being pretty minimalist and neutral, I thought about what color I wanted my bridesmaids to wear for a bit. I figured the classic black dress would be flattering on everyone and tie in all of the features of our wedding.
I knew I wanted long dresses for the girls and maybe something with a slit because a little leg never hurts :P. We looked at a couple of websites and finally discovered Azazie, which specializes in custom formal dresses. I found the Fiona dress and immediately fell in love. It is a beautiful, clean, sophisticated strapless black dress with a silky sash, a slit, and POCKETS! I’ve been a bridesmaid a couple of times and definitely would have loved to have pockets! Just to hold my phone or tissue (or snacks!). Just kidding about the snacks. Or am I?
Anyways! Azazie allows you to either buy generic sizes or you can send in your measurements and they’ll make your dress according to those numbers. This allows them to get it as correct as possible and you can save on further alterations. Some of the girls gave exact sizes and didn’t have to pay for further tailoring, whereas a few others planned to lose weight so they purchased generic sizes.
Although my heart was set on that dress for them, I wanted to get their opinions and make sure they were comfortable and also loved the dress. Azazie offers sample loans for the cost of $10 each. I purchased about 3-4 samples of different dresses that I liked and had the girls try them on to see which one was best. Almost all chose the one I originally liked, so we went with the Fiona! π After that, we just returned the samples! If you don’t return them, you’d have to pay a fee.
On the day of the wedding, they looked absolutely gorgeous. It was so sophisticated and a lot of people told me it reminded them of a Vera Wang bridesmaid dress, which is great since we paid much less for it!
If you’re looking for bridesmaids dresses or maybe even a formal dress to attend an event, I really do recommend Azazie. They have a huge selection, tons of color options, styles, at such affordable prices.
Wedding Wednesday: Videos
We knew we wanted our wedding video to be shot on Super 8 camera, which is from the late 60s, early 70s, so the video has a unique, vintage feel to it. We found Steven of Wild Light Films after a bit of research and found that he incorporates Super 8 footage into his videos; he has such an amazing vision and creates the most beautiful wedding videos!
I booked Steven thinking he was in Florida but he was willing to travel, but found out that he was moving to LA, so it was great! About a few months out from our wedding, he suggested to meet up in person at a couple locations that we like to get in some extra footage of us that he could mix into our wedding video. I had never heard of shooting extra footage for a wedding, but we were totally up to meeting him in person to get to know him before our big day! AND boy did we have a blast! We spent a few hours wandering around Downtown Los Angeles, having some drinks at a few bars, and just getting really cool footage in.
The day of the wedding, we felt like he was one of our guests and a close friend. So I totally felt comfortable having him film us! His fiance was assisting him the day of with the Super 8 camera, while he had his digital camera. That way, he could get footage on both.
I couldn’t be happier with our videos. They are jaw-droppingly gorgeous and completely captured our special day in the most beautiful, romantic, and best way! I don’t even have words for it. Just take a look at them here!
Wedding Wednesday: Dessert
Now that the wedding is over and we’re getting all of our pictures back, I’ll be continuing with my Wedding Wednesday posts! That way I can feature my vendors and give you all details about my wedding planning process!
This post is about our DESSERT! I had a pretty tough time deciding on desserts and I needed something I both loved AND was within our budget. So I did a ton of research and found Dazzling Donuts, which is a donut vendor that makes hot, fresh mini donuts right in front of your guests! How could I not choose them right?!!
They allowed us to choose a few flavors to have for our wedding and some topping options from nutella, to birthday cake, samoa, tutti frutti, and many more. It’s such a fun feature to have because it’s a like a conveyer belt that pops out delicious donuts! Our guests were raving about the donuts because of how unique it is! They normally see a donut bar or wall, where it’s just arranged in a pretty way, but never have they seen donuts being made in front of them! I loved how easy it was to work with Kim from Dazzling Donuts; she was so accommodating and everything went so smoothly.
I hope I attend a wedding that has them as a vendor so that I can enjoy them again!