Furry Friday

I decided to add a new feature to my blog called Furry Friday. Each Friday I'm going to post a picture of one or both of our furry family members. The idea came partly from my favorite non-fiction book, "The Daily Coyote" by Shreve Stockton. Shreve moves to middle-of-nowhere Wyoming and ends up adopting a coyote puppy, whom she posted pictures of every day on her website, "The Daily Coyote."


So today I'm introducing you to Conan and Lily. We got Conan at 11 months old when we were living in Florida. He came with the name Conan and, since it's a bit odd, we initially planned to change it. But then we realized that all the pop-culture references for the name Conan fit our dog's personality -- Conan the Barbarian, Conan the Destroyer and Conan O'Brien. (I think he was originally named after the latter Conan because his fur is a pretty close match to Conan O'Brien's hair.) Conan has been our furry child for almost four years now and we love him to pieces and spoil him far more than we will spoil any future human children.

We really wanted another boxer sibling for Conan, but our yard is pretty small and just the thought of air travel with two huge dogs when we move from Hawaii in 2012 gave me a headache. So last July we adopted Lily in the hope that she would become a companion for Conan. Her parents are feral cats and she and her littermates were rescued when they were about 2 months old. She's quite a handful and she is the subject of many glares, shoos, water bottle squirts and yelling fits (complete with hand gestures). But she has grown to be best buds with Conan and we're hoping that she'll settle down as she ages. (She just turned 1 in May.)

Incidentally, Lily's name was also inspired by a book. I really wanted to name her Artemis because her coloring and gray-green eyes reminded me of the moon, and I was reading one of the Percy Jackson and the Olympians novels at the time. Artemis is the Greek goddess of the moon and the hunt and I thought the name was fitting. But nobody else liked it, so we went with my second suggestion of Lily. I had recently finished "The Secret Life of Bees" (a fantastic book) and the protagonist in that book is named Lily. Unfortunately, as she's gotten older it seems like Lily really doesn't fit her. We should have stuck with the name the 10 Lives rescue gave her -- Miss Chiff!

Making Lemonade from Lemons... Literally

To me, pumpkins mean fall, hot chocolate means winter, daffodils mean spring and lemons mean summer. Maybe it's my childhood Countrytime Lemonade stands, or the light, fresh smell and bright, sunshiney color of lemons, but I've always associated this particular citrus with summer.

Since summer is starting to set in, I've been craving lemon. I recently made some Vermontucky lemonade cocktails from my favorite cooking blog, Smitten Kitchen. And for my weekly doggie playdate with my friend Jessica today, I served fresh-squeezed lemonade. I always have some Simply Lemonade in the fridge, but there's something about homemade lemonade that makes it taste a little bit better and feel a little more special (maybe it's the elbow grease expended while juicing all those lemons!). To make my lemonade, I loosely follow this recipe from All Recipes. After juicing my lemons, I tailor the rest of the ingredients to the amount of lemon juice yielded. I usually add about 3/4 as much water and simple syrup as I think I need, then keep adding more splash by splash until I've achieved the perfect tart-sweet taste. Then, of course, I serve it in mason jars. Next on the lemon to-do list: lemon bars.

What I Wore Wednesday #3

Once again, I'm linking up with The Pleated Poppy for What I Wore Wednesday. This has been quite the week for me, between giving my two weeks' notice at work, dealing with the emotional rollercoaster of finding out when my husband will be deployed to the Middle East, having him gone on a TDY (business trip, for you non-military people), more health problems with the dog, and lots of craft projects going at once. But on Sunday, I actually hauled my sorry butt to the mall (the real MALL!) and did some shopping. I had great success both with finding stuff I liked and with those things also being on sale, and I got seven new items for under $100. Since I got my new clothes on Sunday and am no longer dressing nicely for work (I'm now wearing t-shirts like everybody else), the only new purchase you get to see this week is Tuesday's shirt. Incidentally, Tuesday's outfit is my favorite for the week. I really like my new shirt, and I wore my favorite earrings and bangle as accessories. So without further ado:

Wednesday (quit work day!)
Ruffled tank top: JC Penney
Sweater (my favorite): Target
Jeans: Seven For All Mankind, Nordstrom
Watch: Fossil
Earrings (which, sadly, you can't really see): Kohl's

Thursday (dinner at Bubba Gump with Jarrod to celebrate our anniversary -- which is today -- since he's gone for work)
Shirt: Target
Jeans: Paige, Nordstrom
Earrings: handmade by my friend and (soon-to-be former) co-worker, Ming
Sunday (shopping!)
Shirt (which has a row of really cute heart-shaped buttons that aren't visible here): Macy's
Jeans: Paige, Nordstrom
Turquoise earrings: Bealls Florida
Tuesday (lunch with a friend)
Shirt: American Eagle (I love this new top! I typically try to avoid horizontal stripes since they don't do anything for my wide -- or child-bearing, as Jarrod jokes -- hips, but I couldn't resist this one. Turquoise is tied with raspberry pink for my favorite color, and that turquoise stripe just won me over!)
Jeans: Seven For All Mankind, Nordstrom
Earrings: Bealls Florida
Bracelet: Bealls Florida

What I Wore Wednesday #2

This week I didn't have any special occasions that necessitated dressing cute like I had last week, so this is a more accurate idea of how I usually dress. Again, I reeeeally want to start shopping around more and putting together more interesting outfits. I have a lot of clothes that I don't ever wear and I want to try to incorporate those into my daily wardrobe. Wish me luck! (On a quick side note, I have such trouble getting the spacing right on my blog posts! I finally gave up, many accidentally deleted pictures later. I really need to learn to edit the HTML code!)
Thursday (errands)
Shirt: Old Navy
Skirt: Old Navy
Earrings: Target
Yarn-wrapped bangle: Hickam AFB spring craft fair

Friday (went to work and had a friend over for dinner)
Sweater: Old Navy
Camisole: Kohl's
Jeans: American Rag from Macy's
Earrings: Aloha Stadium swap meet


Saturday (Aloha Stadium swap meet and errands)
Shirt: JC Penney
Skirt: Old Navy, thrift shop
Sandals: Target
Earrings (which are actually really pretty with a white stone and pearl): thrift shop

Monday (work)
Shirt: Macy's
Jeans: American Eagle
Earrings: International Marketplace in Waikiki
Headband: ME! (See Tuesday's post for the project details.)

Tuesday (lunch with hubby and friend, errands)
Shirt: Target
Jeans: Silver from The Buckle (From college! It makes me happy that I can still fit into jeans that I bought 7 years ago!)
Yarn-wrapped bracelet: Hickam AFB spring craft fair

Getting Crafty!

I have shamelessly stolen another idea from my friend Veronica's blog, Life by the Skein. Last week she wrote about rosettes and I was so inspired by the gorgeous necklace she made that I decided to try my hand at one of these little fabric flowers. I used the same tutorial Veronica did from Portabello Pixie. To make this rosette, you need a strip of fabric, a needle and thread, a button or bead, an iron, and some patience.

I had planned all along to attach the rosette to an old headband I never wear anymore. It initially had long ties coming from the ends, but I clipped those off. My first attempt at the rosette was too three-dimensional and I thought it would look like a lone horn sprouting off the top of my head. On my second try, I went for a flatter, wider look and I was thrilled with the result. Then I hot-glued it on to the headband and wore my new creation to work today. For the whole outfit, check out this week's What I Wore Wednesday post.

"I'm a Stranger Here Myself"

"I'm a Stranger Here Myself" by Bill Bryson
Published in 1999
My rating: 4 out of 5

I just finished reading Bill Bryson's compilation of weekly newspaper columns written for a British magazine about coming home to America after living in England for 20 years. The title, "I'm a Stranger Here Myself," is a very apt description of the book because it's obvious that although Bryson is American-born, he's British in culture and spirit.

The columns are mostly humorous, and alternate between self-deprecation, pointing out American eccentricities, and occasionally teasing the British audience for whom the columns were written. Bryson tags himself as kind of a bumbling idiot, and his column on getting a new computer up and running was one of my favorites. The column is written in the form of an instruction pamphlet, but says things like, "Congratulations. You are ready to set up. If you have not yet acquired a degree in electrical engineering, now is the time to do so," and "If you have not yet committed suicide, then insert Installation Diskette 1 in drive slot 2 (or vice versa) and follow the instructions on your screen. (Note: Owing to a software modification, some instructions will appear in Turkish.)" In other columns, Bryson details his incompetence in dealing with repairmen of all varieties, two different occasions in which he encountered trouble with airline travel, disastrous haircuts, difficulties with Christmas decorations and his adventures on a snowmobile, which he describes as "a rocket ship designed by Satan to run on snow."

Many of the columns deal with what Bryson (and likely his British audience) views as the eccentricites of American life. He describes the vast amount of cupholders in American vehicles, fast food drive-thrus (which I was surprised to learn don't really exist in England), the fact that Americans (even very fit and healthy ones who work out daily) seem to have an aversion to walking anywhere and would rather get in the car and drive across the street to a different store than walk. He asserts that Americans are accustomed to instant gratification ("To an American shopper, there are just three spans of time: now, tomorrow at the very latest, and we'll look elsewhere."), an abundance of choice ("I remember going to the supermarket for the first time [since arriving back in America] and being genuinely impressed to find it stocked with no fewer than eighteen varieties of incontinence diaper."), and a never-ending supply of junk food. This is all presented humorously (and often with statistics) and as an American reader, it was easy to admit that all of Bryson's observations on the quirks and uniqueness of American life were true. I laughed out loud when Bryson made a mockery of his income tax form, and nodded in agreement when he described renting a car and the rudeness of airline employees.

However, there were times when Bryson's teasing of American ways felt more like a harsh critique. These observations were mostly true as well, but these columns were on things such as excessive red tape, immigration, the ineffective war on drugs, government inefficiency and so on. When I read these columns I felt a bit resentful and angry and was thinking that Bryson spent pretty much all of his adult life in England; who is he to come back to America after 20 years and pick on the way we do things? Again, these arguments were pretty much all things I could understand and even agree with. But it's kind of like this: I have a little brother who's eight years younger than me. When I was a a kid and had friends over, he could sometimes be a bother. It was all well and good for me to tell him to go away, that he was being annoying. But if one of my friends dared jump in, I would immediately get defensive of him. It was much the same with these columns.

Overall, this book was a really enjoyable read and had many laugh-out-loud moments. I'm planning to read Bryson's other books about walking the Appalachian Trail and visiting Australia. And maybe I'll finally crack open his "A Short History of Nearly Everything," which has been sitting on my bookshelf unread since my sophomore year of college.

What I Wore Wednesday #1

My friend Veronica has a great blog called Life by the Skein in which she writes about knitting, crafts, and other fun stuff. The main thing I look forward to, though, is her What I Wore Wednesday posts, in which she links up with the originator of WIWW at The Pleated Poppy blog and posts photos of some of her outfits from the week. I think the whole thought process behind WIWW is that it will make you put more time and consideration into your outfits, since you know you'll be posting pictures of them for all the world to see. My motivation is a bit different -- I've somehow gotten stuck in a shopping rut since we moved to Hawaii. I used to love shopping, but now almost all of my clothes (especially shirts) come from either Target or the Air Force base thrift store where I work. My goal is to re-expand my shopping horizons. So without further ado:

Dress (which I purchased especially for this occasion -- my husband's promotion -- and actually has a really pretty light black print that's hard to see with this lighting): Target
Pearl earrings: thrift store
Shoes: several years old and horrendously uncomfortable, Target

I wore this outfit to a poker party last Friday (which turned into an all-night affair!)
Sequined tank top: Target
Jeans: Paige Denim, Nordstrom (these are my favorite jeans and I wear them incessantly
Earrings: Target

This is what I wore to work today. It's a pretty typical work outfit for me; I usually wear jeans and a decent top.
Jeans: (same as above) Paige Denim, Nordstrom
Tank top: Target
Sweater: H&M (I sure wish we had one of these here in Hawaii!)
Necklace: The Vintage Pearl
Earrings: Kohl's