Some of my most treasured possessions are of the tchotchke, knick-nack, whos-its whats-its galore, thingamabobs, ugly, and old category. I've always loved collecting and I would always like to get all of whatever was in the "set" or "collection" including all of the color variations. This method of collecting little treasures has adapted into my "grown-up" life, and I think Ariel had a lot to do with this... her and her darn grotto. I'm just glad I don't have a fork collection. (Side note, I love the innernet: lolz).

As a person who no longer needs a bushel of electronic pets large enough to knock someone out, I have moved on to vintage housewares. Any and all of it. I've always had an affinity for items of the past, but it really came into full swing once I realized that one day I would have my own home to fill and decorate. I wanted ALL the old things. I was (and still am) just stopping in the thrift store real quick to see if there is a mug, or a dish set, an embroidered wall hanging, or a serving platter, an afghan, a macrame owl, or a piece of furniture I might need. A good bit of the time I find clothing and accessories, but most times its housewares.

I still have him, he hangs out as a decoration.

One of my best memories of scoring an amazing vintage item was when I was about 10 years old. My dad was selling our old pedal boat at our favorite campground. There was an amazing antique mall just a few miles away and he promised me that if the boat sold that weekend, we could go back and I could get the purse I saw there the other day. In my head, "get" meant "save". Because I HAD TO SAVE THE POOR LITTLE ALLIGATOR THAT WAS TURNED INTO A PURSE!

Next time, I think I'll share my collection of old coffee mugs! What was your first beloved old or vintage find?

:)

If you know me, then you know I love nail polish. I have tons of different brands, but I must say that e.l.f. polish is top on my list of favorites for the quality, color selection, and of course it's practically free price tag. It recently went up from one dollar to two dollars but... THAT IS STILL SO CHEAP! Plus they say it went up in price because of new improved formula. I'm okay with that because I thought it was awesome already.

I placed an order online last week when they had free shipping for facebook pals, where I picked a holiday color 5 pack, a matte finisher, dark navy, and smokey brown. I also picked up a couple other things that I can't live without (eyeliner marker, studio blush...), but I will save that for another day.

First time using glitter polish since I was a preteen!

So what did I do with my new fancy colors? I did a little ombre sparkle technique. I used two coats of smokey brown on all of my nails except my ring finger nails where I used two coats of mod mauve. I let that dry for a while before adding some golden goddess glitter on about half of my ring finger nail.

Here is a peek at my e.l.f. nail polish collection. You should totally check them out, I use so many of their products and can't say enough good things about them.

Eleven bottles and counting!

If you were wondering, e.l.f. stands for eyes lips face! Happy browsing!

P.s.  They are constantly doing awesome promos that save you lots of money on the already cheap and amazing things.

:)
  

I have ended up doing way more cupcake and baking posts than I ever thought that I would. I blame my new red hand mixer and cute cupcake papers, but who knows. Maybe I just like having baked goods with my coffee for breakfast. I'm not sure where the idea came from but I urgently needed to make peanut butter cupcakes. Like, I had to make them. Had to. I am so glad I did. I searched around the innernet but only found some generic recipes that used oil or shortening which I don't like to use. That is when I concocted this masterpiece:

To die for!

Peanut Butter & Nutella Cupcakes:

6 tablespoons unsalted butter at room temperature
1/2 cup peanut butter 
1/4 cup Nutella
1 cup packed brown sugar
1 cup flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 egg
1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla
1/2 cup "super skim" milk 

I mixed up the flour, baking powder, and salt in my cute green bowl (you must use a cute bowl or it will ruin everything) and set that aside. Then I mixed up the butter, brown sugar, and Nutella with my beloved lil red hand mixer. After that was all nice and smooth (and smelling wonderful already) I added the egg and the vanilla. Then accidentally spilled in a few extra drips of vanilla. I then added about a third of the dry mix and kept mixing. Then half the milk. Then another third of the dry mix. Then the other half of the milk. Then the rest of the dry mix. Kept on mixing. 
At this point my brown sugar turned into little clumps so I smooshed them out with a spatula. Finally I took my cookie scoop and put two balls of batter into the 12 purple houndstooth cupcake liners (again, your cupcake liners must be cute or else you're going to botch this whole recipe). Baked 'em at 350 for about 25 minutes and kept sneaking big whiffs of the delightful peanut butter scent that was filling the kitchen.
I let them cool for about 20 minutes on a wire rack before I topped them with a dainty amount of Nutella as frosting. 

Cooling!

I had thought about making these a PB&J kinda cupcake with some blackberry buttercream (like I did here) but I think I will save that for next time. Nutella was easier.. and obviously delish. At this point I could no longer stand just looking at them and I promptly enjoyed one. These guys are amazing. If you have milk to drink when you are eating them, do it. Especially if they are the teensiest bit still warm inside. They are so soft and moist and peanut buttery and the Nutella adds just enough pizazz to make you one happy person. It felt like an illegal treat and I might have gotten in trouble at any second. Let me know if you try these out!

:)

p.s. The Beard just got home from his hockey game and plopped a box of Dunkin' Donuts K-cups on my lap. eeeeee!

Sometimes my online window shopping turns into accidental purchases. Here is what I accidentally bought today, on sale. Oops.

First I fortuitously bought *this* sale cardigan from FreePeople. I can't wait to style it in basically an almost identical way. I am SUCH a sucker for drapey and oversized layers. I can't help it. I love them and they love me. Its a love story, really.


Then I had an argument with myself on whether or not to get a sale wrap-scarf-fringed-blanket also from FreePeople. Then I realized it was 75 inches long and I am a mere 60 inches tall. That wasn't going to work. (Even though I was trying to tell myself I could belt it and wrap it up so it wasn't trailing 5 inches behind me in the snowy Pittsburgh slush.)

not happening. way too long. :/

I eventually talked myself out of it, and found myself on UrbanOutfitters. There I made up for the sale wrap-scarf-fringed-blanket dilemma with a much more appropriate length *poncho* with fringe. AND it was 5 dollars cheaper. Win.

Brulee Vamp Teddy on byLangley.com

Reverse Shell Bolero on BHLDN.com

Emme Crochet Dress on nastygal.com

"Hey, don't go chasing those."

HOW could I forget?! I LEARNED HOW TO DRIVE AND GOT MY LICENSE ON THE FIRST TRY!

Busy, busy, busy!

Dunkin Donuts makes up for the lack of Tim Horton's in Pittsburgh.

I love April because of the flowers!

Epic!

June was awesome!

Photos with Kyna always result in tears of laughter. :)

That gelato was amazing!

Such a busy month!

Tea parties are amazing!

Best way to cook a turkey.

A very fun month.