Rent the Runway

We have a wedding to attend after the new year and it's for one of my husband's college friends I've met her and she is honestly wonderful and super nice and I feel relaxed around her - but they went to a fancy private college (read: expensive) and I want to make sure that I feel comfortable by looking super-deduper fab. I feel out of place really quickly if I think that I look like the kid from the wrong side of the tracks.

So, after reading about it on Glamour magazine's webpage, I'm wondering if anyone has tried this out: http://www.renttherunway.com/?

I signed up and am cruising the website. It's not super cheap by any means, but it seems like a great idea if you have an EVENT and need a special dress.

You basically rent a fancy-pants dress that you'd probably never buy. It's a little wierd to think about renting a dress, but at the same time they have swanky brands that I can't imagine actually purchasing for one time wear. I'm thinking about trying it out, but am gun-shy.

I went through the website and two dresses got my eyes:

This is a Diane Fursteberg (sp?) that rents for $75

And this one, from Pencey also for $75

What is neat is that they let you pick out two sizes and then, if you want, you can get a "back-up" dress for $25 extra. So, I tested it out and picked the two above. To ship to Houston and rent both dresses with two sizes each for 8 days, it would cost me $150.

Okay, again, not cheap. But not totally ridiculous either.

It's an idea right now. I'm going to scour the resale shops before ordering, b/c I could also find the perfect dress for $15...

Keep your fingers crossed!

-b-

Purse and a minor rant

Figured I’d show you my new purse. Its Nine West, via Marshalls. I’ve actually had it a couple months, but never got around to switching purses (I usually stick to one main purse at a time). I made the transfer before heading to LA, and really like this purse. It hold a fair amount of stuff and looks sharp.

And now time for a rant about feeling disconnected:

Not sure if this is happening to anyone else, but despite all the phone/email/text/facebook connections, I feel completly disconnected and quite frankly a little hurt sometimes.

Today I found out that an old friend of mine is pregnant. On facebook. Understandably, we’ve grown apart some in the last couple of years: she lives in Miami – I live in Houston. But we were great friends throughout high school and college. She is the person that moved me out to Texas. And I find out that she is pregnant on facebook?

It wouldn't hurt if it was just her, but this is the third person that this has happened with. Either I’m a much worse friend than I thought with keeping in touch, or people just don’t feel like sharing this information in a personal way. I don’t know, but it actually kind of hurts my feelings. I mean, that is BIG BIG news, right?

I felt unimportant finding out through ominous comments by family members on facebook pages.

Maybe I’m placing too much importance on them telling me? I mean, I’m not the person that is pregnant, so obviously they have a lot on thier minds and telling me isn't top priority. I get that. But, I don’t know, it feels not-good.

Thought I’d throw that out there..I’m having a moment.

Lucky for me – I’ll be on vacation in a couple hours and this moment should be swept away very soon. Hope to rejoin with a renewed sense of "ahhhhhhhh"

Have a great thanksgiving...

-b-

Ribbon Necklace: Round Two

Another ribbon necklace:

My favorite part is the hidden clasp. I'm wearing the necklace today and with the bow tied in the back, you can't see the clasp. yea!

I LOVE it and while purchasing the supplies got to hear some awesome employee bickering at Joanne’s. It was pretty funny, I guess one employees kids were pranking the store phone every 3 minutes and the other employee was flipping out…I’m not sure how long it’d been going on, but he was getting pretty amped up about the whole thing. They were arguing at the registers and in the small store, you could hear everything. I bet those kids got in a heap of trouble that night!

-b-

ribbon + bead = new necklace!

I’m starting to really like all the different ribbon-y necklaces and bracelets that I’m seeing in stores and magazines. After going through a Harpers Bazaar at the YMCA this week, I decided to try making my own.

This is my first stab:

This black ricrac ribbon was purchased with the intent of decorating Halloween pumpkins, but never got used. I think it worked pretty well with the white plastic beads. I bought those a while ago, but couldn’t think of what to do with them without them looking cheap.

I basically sewed the beads to the ribbon and added a chain – not too hard at all! The only difficult part was sewing the bead in at a good point, if it was too tight or too loose, then the ribbon didn’t lay right across the bead and that is what I was going for with the ricrac.

I didn't follow any instructions to this, but if you're a visual person - I stumbled accross a blog with instructions - Samster Mommy. She has some instructions here for a similar necklace.

Check out this beaded necklace (also with instructions).

Now you know what to do with that ribbon! Get to it!

-b-

Kiddo

For Hillary

Here is me as a kiddo (5th grade). Can you pick me out?

I remember being really excited to be on a SPORTS team. The 5th graders were still in the Elementary School, so the only organized sports team they had for the girls was basketball. I also got to start playing on a soccer team that year, but it was with the city.

Once I was officially in middle school (6-8th grades), they had the more sports and I played everyone they offered as a team - volleyball, basketball, soccer, and track. I did it all three years of middle school and LOVED it.

I remember getting an All-Sports Trophy in 8th grade and feeling really proud of myself.

-b-

getting around

It seems like I've traveled a lot in the last year and I know that next year I'll get to travel more. We've been really fortunate lately and are taking advantage of the opportunities to see new places. I've gotten pretty good at packing, but still am not great. Here are some items on my travel wish list:

Sweater, not too heavy, not too light

Navajo sweater from Gap $59.50, but there are 25% codes floating around the internets.

Or this convertible shawl/scarf/cardigan/etc. :

From Boopie Creations Shop on Etsy for $60

Comfy pants: Hmmm, nothing has piqued my interest in this category. Something with a little stretch, but not full on stretchy pants.

Comfy walking shoes that aren't sneakers:$19.99 at Lands End

Cross body purse:

These are pretty awesome, custom made bags on Borsabella's shop in Etsy for $38.00.
I haven't bought from this shop, but I like the idea of picking out my fabric for a bag.

Anyone want to share thier wish list or essential travel items?

-b-

We've got spirit, yes we do!

The weekend started as an extreme version of Team Spirit.

We flew to LA for the Dynamo vs. Galaxy game (it was semifinals people) on Friday night. Here If you stayed up late to watch, you would've seen me on TV! There was a section of just Dynamo people and there weren't too many of us, so I guess we ended up on TV at one point.

I was oranged-out to the maximum, check it out!

Here is an obligatory shot of Beckham. He is a handsome man, but sheesh, that hair! It's awful.

We ended up losing the game, so that was a real let-down after traveling all the way to LA, but we still had a fantastic weekend. It was our anniversary weeked (today is two years!!).

The weather in LA was fantastic and we took the opportunity to walk EVERYWHERE. We walked Redondo Beach:

We walked around the Tar Pits:

We walked around Santa Monica:

And then on Sunday morning, we walked a little more. This is me after jogging up an incline, if you look closely you might see my heart pounding.

For all that walking, not one celebrity was spotted. TMZ has officially led me to believe that there is an actor or actress on every corner, at each restaurant, and all shopping centers. But, nope. Not so.

I learned two interesting things about dress in LA: they really really really like Uggs & tights/spandex pants. Seriously. There was an obscene amount of Uggs wearing. And the tights? I'm not talking about tights under a dress, I mean like a normal stops-at-the-waist shirt and then tights/spandex pants.

??

I don't think I'll be following the LA trends as they were presented. I like warm feet and I stretchy pants are comfy, but um, nope. not for me.

later

-b-

Outfit post

I really liked my outfit yesterday and wanted to share:

It's a light blue dress that matched with a yellow cardigan. The photos* don't really do the outfit justice, it was super comfortable and also pretty darn cute!

My favorite part:
Red Shoes & Red nails

I didn't plan on the matching but it worked out perfectly. BTW, I love this polish, the color is golden wine. It's sparkly withough being gaudy.

Later

-b-

* I haven't replaced my camera yet, but its on the way out. I'm pretty lucky if i can get the timer to work, so I'm stuck with whatever photograph it happens to take for right now*

As seen in Houston

This post is for my Dallas bloggy pals. We saw this shirt last weekend at the Dynamo soccer game.

Those of you outside Texas may not know about the (absolutely ridiculous) rivalry between Houston and pretty much every other city. Since I'm not Houston-born I don't really get it, but am amused.

In regards to Austin: They have a city slogon that you see all over when visiting "keep austin wierd"

Houston's response (as seen on at least one bumper sticker ): "keep austin 170 miles from Houston" Ouch!

Why the aggression Houston? Are we going to threaten to secede from the state that threatened to secede from the Union?

-b-

More shells

Check it out - more non-nautical shell necklaces:

There will be earrings, oh yes, there will!

-b-

Pink lemonade at the office

I've started taking a real shine to yellows and light greens lately. Today I wore a yellowy-green long sleeves with light pink pants with pink ballet-like flats and feel like a real life glass of pink lemonade*. Drink me up!

My attempt at showing you my ballet shoes in action. The chair was too squishy though!

Here are the shoes:

*Random word question: Can I say that I anthropomorphasized pink lemonade there? When I use the word, I'm usually giving an human-like characteristics to an animal. Mostly I like that word and want to know that is indeed okay to say that I made a beverage human-like*

-b-

Video

I did a video a while back (last week?) It's not totally me, I look really nervous and fidgety (and am blinking like a kook) - but I was hoping to give you a clue.

The real problem: Lighting.

I was able to watch on my camera with no problems, on blogger it looks like I like in a cave. So, I don't know what to say. You want to hear my voice, then click below. Otherwise, it's pretty pass-up-able.

Glad to present you with such quality work today! So yea. That was me. Sorta. I guess.

WORST.POST.EVER!

-b-

While not running

As I've said before, I'm offiically in my training period for the 1/2 marathon in January. October was 'eh', I did pretty well with keeping up - except that my foot hurt for a while and I didn't want to aggrevate it and work out. Turns out that I just needed a new pair of shoes. hmm. go figure. To make myself accountable, here is what October looked like:

The check marks are days that I accomplished my set goal, the red lines are days I missed. This weekend I skipped out on my long run (supposed to be 6 miles) and had fun with other things:

I had beer with pals on Friday night. It's been so nice out lately that celebratory beers to the weather have been plenty the last couple weeks. yea for fall!

On Saturday, Mr. Moto and I woke up earlyish and did yard work. No photo of me doing yard work, but here's a photograph of a fat ole monarch caterpiller munching on the aptly named Butterfly weed:

Since we finished the yard work quickly, we went and had some fun in the afternoon. We played like tourists and went to the San Jacinto Monument. I had been before, but the elevator to the top was in repair at the time and my husband has never been.

Its frickin hugely tall and proudly touts itself as larger than the Washington Monument. So very Texan of it!

Here is my view from the top: HELLO HOUSTON!!!!

We were extra touristy and had dinner in Kemah after riding the Boardwalk Bullet:

Its a wooden coaster and was AWESOME to ride. I think we both forgot how much fun a roller coaster is, and this one was even better with the slightly wobbly wood. Super fun.

Sunday was soccer, soccer, soccer! It started with a personal game at nine (we stunk, lost, and I was bummed). But then we went to watch the Dynamo during thier semifinals game...and we won 1-0 in overtime. It was exhausting to watch with all the anticipation.

After watching that game, we followed it up by eating seafood and watching LA Chivas take on LA Galaxy. Mr. Beckham's team won 1-0...again, a lot of anticipation in this game.

Then it was all over and we were pooped.

Hope you all had great weekends!

-b-

Holy Moley - Free Jeans!

Oh Snap!

Awesome day. Work stinks today, but I'm getting a free pair of jeans. I won a pair of the Antique Rivet jeans from DaddyLikey's giveaway!

Yippee! Thanks Winona!

Check out the jeans here:

I'm not going to lie, I'm super excited. I don't have any jeans embellished like this, and they look like a TON of fun to wear.

-b-

Put a Ring on It

My halloween costume came out super this year! I was Beyonce in the Put a Ring on It Video.

It was cheap and looked cute & timely. Using the restroom was a PAIN, I stuffed my butt and hips, so between a belt, leotard, stuffing, crazy sucker-inner tights, and a glove - it was a 20 min affair!

I ended up making the metal glove out of aluminum foil in the end, the other ways I tried looked too much like Michael Jackson gloves. Here is a look.
I was also really proud of my hair and makeup! I straightened it and then used a bumpit to get that pouf she had in the video. For the makeup I used a TON of mascara and loads of black & silver eyeshadow. It was hard to get off at the end of the night, but worth it!

Hope you all had a great halloween too!
-b-