A little bit of everything

I'm not even sure how to sum up my life lately. It's been busy, crazy, fun, all that stuff. It's been kind of an insane whirlwind that I can barely remember, but I feel like I've been enjoying it. Ha.
By the way, with all the Rachel Zoe marathons on TV lately, my fashion radar is that much more in effect, so it's been fun living this whirlwind, meeting my inner stylist somewhere in the middle, and seeing what comes out.

Here's my latest collection of evidence.

Studying my script for my latest film, "The Hit."

 A quick, healthy dinner mid-week: Open-faced egg salad sandwich. Hard boiled egg chopped up with a little mayo, topped with avocado slices, a slice of cheddar cheese, and turkey bacon on once slice of whole wheat bread. Cucumber "chips" and grape tomatoes on the side.

Heaven = almost burried under a pile of clothing to try on, in the dressing room of Buffalo Exchange.

A retro-inspired dress and modern smokey make-up to attend the premiere of my film, "Everything's Ok."

On the way to Dallas for some time with Steve's family.

This is where you can usually find me.

 Coffee and auditions and shoots, oh my!

Obsessed with this new vest from Buffalo Exchange, which I got for $15 and makes me feel like a fluffy little owl.

My sister moves to town this week, so things are probably about to get that much more cool around here. But this past weekend was one of the best I've had in a long time.

Dallas and stuff

This last week or so has been packed pretty full, but it's been fun. Steve and I celebrated our two year anniversary of meeting/Cinco de Mayo/his sister's birthday in Dallas this past weekend. I also kept busy with a 12 hour film shoot immediately prior to our drive up there on Friday. There are way too many pics of food but I'd been eating super good for a couple weeks to prepare for my shoot (in which I wore very little, heh), so splurging a little was nice. But I'm still mostly trying to stay on the healthy-eating wagon. We also spent some quality time with Steve's niece and nephew and played tourist in Dallas with my friend Kady before heading back to Austin. Here is the random collection of photos I managed to get recently:

2 years ago, I met this cute guy.

Yummy Tex-Mex/Salvadorian cuisine at Gloria's. I'd always wanted to try plantains.

I love having my hair and make up done on set (with independent films, it's not always provided). I was definitely digging the look they gave me.

Dallas sight seeing...somberly. Outside the building where Oswald shot JFK.

 Iced cappuccinos and baked goods at a cute museum cafe. We needed something cheery after seeing the JFK assassination site and some fuel before hitting the road back to Austin. We were pretty beat after the busy weekend.

Paparazzi shot, courtesy of Steve. With my future niece (ok, that still freaks me out a bit!) at her twin brother's baseball game.

I seemed to be a bit popular with the little girls there.

My homemade smoothie obsession is continuing. Yesterday morning I had a strawberry + ice + almond milk + greek yogurt (honey-sweetened) smoothie and some peanut butter toast. So healthy, yet delicious!

 We had an amazing breakfast prepared for us by Steve's brother-in-law our first morning in town.

Did I mention this was my anniversary gift from Steve? Lovely! But I'm not sure I need any for a while after Cinco de Mayo festivities at Gloria's. I definitely paid for it the next day. Luckily, Steve also bought me a pair of earrings and a cute little onesie, which I may have to post photos of soon to do it justice.

Cozy nights + Christmas lights

How was your weekend?
Mine was quite nice. On Friday night, Steve and I had a couple close friends over for a little Christmas get-together/sleepover (not just for teenagers anymore, oh, no!). We made a pot roast dinner in the slow cooker, made some ready-to-bake chocolate chip cookies (just as delicious as the ones you have to mix up yourself, I say!) and experimented with some different cocktails, and  "Sassy Little Elf" martinis. I quite enjoyed playing bartender. I must say, this was a very easy way to throw a nice, cozy little soiree without spending a ton of money (even to feed everyone a hearty meal - crock pot meals are genius and so simple!) or putting in a ton of effort. Light some candles around the apartment and put on a pop Christmas pandora or iTunes station, and you're set! It was a fun night, which we ended by watching "Love Actually".

We stayed up until 5am, crazily enough! When we were all finally awake the next day, we cooked up a pancake breakfast. Always a good way to start a Saturday. The rest of the day was pretty chill. 

 "Sassy Little Elf":

2 oz. X-Rated Fusion Liquor

1 1/2 oz. vodka

1 1/2 oz. guava juice

1 oz. half and half

1/2 oz. lemon juice

Pour everything into a cocktail shaker (along with some ice cubes), shake, and strain (so no ice cubes go into the glass) into a martini glass. We garnished the drink with blueberry candy canes (you can hook them on the side, or put them in the bottom of the glass), which explains the blue specks in the photo above.

Major winged eyeliner.

I wore my new fur vest (I wanted it long and baggy, so I bought it in extra large) from Vera Wang's line for Khol's. The $69 item was on sale for $27! Score! Khol's is amazing. I don't know why I don't remember to go there more often.

On Sunday I had a nice walk/jog around the neighborhood, and I gotta say, I love finishing a work out and stopping by the mailbox to find two new magazines waiting for me. It's like a little reward.
Sunday evening, Steve and I ventured out to an annual Christmas light display at a park downtown and then over to a nearby mall that we don't get to very often. We browsed around and grabbed some food court Thai and Japanese food for dinner. Why is mall Asian food so delicious? It's a total guilty pleasure, which unfortunately should probably only be enjoyed on rare occasions.

 Steve and I under the large light-tree at Zilker Park.

Steve and I leave for Arkansas on Tuesday to spend Christmas and New Years Eve. I am super excited about going, even though we were just there for Thanksgiving. I know I'll be running around finishing up my shopping and doing a lot of visiting with family and friends, so I'll go ahead and say right now that I am just going to try to blog whenever I feel the urge and not necessarily stick to my usual schedule.

I hope you have an amazing Christmas, and I'd love to hear your holiday stories!
I'm off to start packing!

Some Thanksgiving snaps

Some photos from Thanksgiving weekend:

 An unexpected braid in a pile of hair.

My sister Emily making her newly famous "Trifle" (a layered British dessert with cake, pudding, and pumpkin). I'll have to get her to share the recipe here.

 Elastic-wasted pants and a baggy top = necessary Thanksgiving attire.

Double checking those pumpkin pie directions. I'm no baker.

 Football snacks! My mom and her husband made quite a spread. Steve and I were on our way out the door to meet up with my sister for some shopping...but...oohhh, ok, we'll stay and watch some of the Arkansas game. You convinced us.

Fab cocktails at Fox and Hound Pub, our usual karaoke spot! I was a server there, back in the day....I much prefer this side of things.

How much is too much makeup to pack?


Ok, so obviously, I was pretty awful at taking blog-worthy photos while I was gone. I'll need to get the hang of documenting the holidays through blogging, as I didn't even have my blog this time last year!
Tell me how your week is going and feel free to share any holiday stories!

Most wonderful time of the year...

 How was your Thanksgiving?
Overall, my entire trip to Arkansas was great. I love being with my family over the holidays. It seems though, that my bad luck hasn't quite gone away, because my car decided to break down ON Thanksgiving (you might remember I wrote about spending far too much money to get repairs done on it just last week!). We were on the way to my sister's that morning to bake pumpkin pies. Being stranded on an exit ramp (in traffic) and emergency towing on a holiday was really not in the plan. Thankfully, the transmission shop where we had it towed was able to fix it by the end of the next day, even after telling me they didn't think they could even look at it until Monday! Whew! I was so thrilled. It actually turned out to be a relatively minor fix, but I am hoping the charges are going to be taken care of by the shop I used in Austin last week. I'll be putting my game face on when I go in there this week.

The rest of the weekend was filled with friend time, family time, a delicious Thanksgiving dinner at my grandma's house, the traditional cousin-gathering at Golden Corral (I don't know why we think a buffet is appropriate on Thanksgiving weekend, but we always go!), watching lots of football (and one Millionaire Matchmaker marathon at my sister's. Haha), tree decorating at my mom's, whipped cream vodka with hot cocoa (highly recommended for this holiday season!), Starbucks and political philosophizing with my dad, a little bit of shopping/browsing stores (but we avoided the Black Friday madness. Really not my thing), dinner at a Japanese steakhouse with a funny waiter on the hibachi, and overall bonding time with my sweet boyfriend.

Now begins one of my favorite times of the year. I am eager to begin my Christmas shopping and start thinking of fun ideas for everyone. I'm glad I'll be heading back up to Arkansas again so soon. Now, I just have to get through these three weeks of real life! I only wish I had some leftover pumpkin pie for breakfast...I love it cold.

Best friend

RIP Dawson. 1998 - 2011.

Best little mutt anyone could ask for. 

Sorry I didn't post yesterday. You can imagine why. 

I leave town to spend Thanksgiving with family tomorrow. It's going to a busy week, so I will plan on seeing you after the weekend. I hope you have a lovely holiday!

Birthday Weekend

I wish I'd been more diligent about taking pictures over my birthday, but cest la vie. Here are a few highlights from the weekend:

Steve took me to PF Changs for a pre-birthday dinner Friday night. I WISH I could remember the name of this delicious coconut/lemon cocktail. I highly recommend it, if you're ever there. It's easy to recognize on their cocktail menu. We had a drink at the bar while we waited for our table, and then enjoyed a marinated lamb dish and shrimp with lobster sauce, paired with brown rice. I tried a pear Mojito with dinner, which was also quite good.

 

On Saturday (my actual birthday), we headed to Dallas for a day trip. My dad happened to be in town for business anyway, so we met up with him and his wife for a bit, and had a nice lunch together at Five Guys' hamburgers (my first time there! Very yummy). Steve and I spent the rest of the day exploring some of his old stomping grounds in the city, and browsing the beautiful (and large!) Galleria mall. Even though I think they should wait until after Thanksgiving, the mall was nicely decorated for Christmas, complete with a tree that stretched through all four stories of the building and was surrounded by an ice rink!  I got a kick out of browsing some of the very high end shops there, but my favorite part was going to The American Girl store. I have a huge collection of their stuff from when I was a child. For now, it's all safely packed away in my mom's attic for when I can pass it on to my little girl.

Dallas actually works alright as a day trip, but it was definitely a bit exhausting. Especially because we left so early in the morning. It felt great to just veg out on Sunday. Steve and I had breakfast in bed (strawberries, croissants, and Ruby-Red grapefruit mimosas) and watched "A Goofy Movie", something else nostalgic from when I was younger! The rest of the day was more of the same...movies and lounging around. Quite nice.

This Saturday, Steve and my friend Kady are throwing me a little belated party at Chuck E. Cheese. I can't think of a better place to be a kid again for a day, and forget how old I'm getting. ;)

Austin - Little Rock - Fayetteville - Kansas City...and back.

I have to say, I am thrilled to be starting a new week. It couldn't possibly be as hectic or stressful as this past one (right?). Even though my trip to Arkansas/Kansas City was a whirlwind and involved way too much driving in 3 short days (30 hours total in the car), I had a nice time seeing family and friends, which is always worth a little craziness. For now though, I am very happy to be home and back with my boyfriend.

Luckily, I don't have to settle into a too-normal routine just yet, because this week I am doing a play reading with some local playwrights. It's been a little while since I've done a live event, so I'm really excited. I was asked to participate by one of my favorite college professors (back when I was earning my acting degree in Birmingham, Alabama), who is also now living in Austin. We have a rehearsal this evening and the performance in on Wednesday night.

Meanwhile, here are some photos from my trip (in no particular order):

 I loved the walls in the building where my cousin's wedding reception was.

 

 Remnants of a wedding...

 Awake at 6am. This had to be documented.

 

 Sunset while driving through Fayetteville, Arkansas. If my camera had worked just a few seconds faster it would have been a much more amazing shot. Trees got int the way.

 A great little dive burger shop...somewhere in Arkansas.

 Looking up at the wedding reception.

 Personalized bottles for the couple. Cabernet Sauvignon - my wine of choice.

 Center pieces. And my mom's husband.

 

 Last night in Little Rock meant dinner and drinks with friends. The awesome manager at Old Chicago gave us a sampler platter on the house.

Best wishes and congratulations to my cousin, Erin and her new husband Greg on their marriage! 

Road trip: attempt #2

Ok, I'm a bit more "regrouped", I'd say, than I was yesterday. I'm finally off to Arkansas, and immediately onto Kansas City with my family. I will see you on Monday, hopefully with some recoverance of sanity. Have a great weekend!

p.s. Don't forget, you can stay connected with me in other ways, too:
- Follow along on Twitter
- Ask me anything on Formspring
- Stay updated by "liking" me on Facebook

I wasn't even supposed to be here today...

I'm just gonna say it: this week has been absolute murder. I felt too sick to drive to Arkansas today when I woke up (this would be day 5 of being sick), and on top of that, my dog is suddenly really ill and we spent the whole morning at the vet with him. In fact, he's still there, while they run some tests.

Someone needs to bring me a latte and some sanity.

I was a Halloween zombie, but not in a good way

I'm still mourning the fact that I missed Halloween. I rarely get sick, so the fact that it had to happen on one of my favorite days of the year is making it difficult to take.

Luckily, I can still look back on Friday night, when my boyfriend and I attended our friends' annual pumpkin carving party. I didn't carve a pumpkin this year, but it's always good fun to go and hang out with everyone, and enjoy a nice spread of Halloween food and drink. There was no shortage of talent among the pumpkin carvers, as well, and it was fun to see what everyone came up with.

Drink of choice for the night: Snakebites (Guinness and Hard Apple Cider)

 

My cold-weather, casual party wear

I'm still feeling quite under the weather, and aside from that being a real annoyance, I am driving to Arkansas on Thursday morning, and then up to Kansas City with with my family on Friday, for my cousin's wedding! I am really looking forward to it, but being sick during the entire trip is definitely not the goal. My body needs to get in gear!

D.C. Vacation

It was so nice to spend the weekend up in Washington D.C. and Northern Virginia. As much as I still think about my old stomping grounds, I had forgotten how much I truly missed it there and just how beautiful it is this time of year. We couldn't have gone at a better time to see the vibrant Fall leaves, and we were lucky enough to have sunny weather at 70 degrees the entire time.

I still have family in the area, some of who we met up with our first night in town. I loved going back to my hometown of Woodbridge to my Aunt and Uncle's house for dinner, and I couldn't help but swing by two of my old houses nearby. I was happy to see that almost everything looked exactly the same, except I think  even prettier than I remembered! I feel lucky to have grown up in such a lovely place.

We stayed with Steve's cousin Melissa, who he had never actually met in person! Thanks to the internet, they were able to get to know each other over the past year or so. We all hit it off great.
We packed a lot into the weekend, including a road trip to Charlottesville, Virginia where we enjoyed a picnic lunch and wine tasting at Blenheim Vineyards, and I loved taking Steve to one of my favorite historical sites, Thomas Jefferson's Monticello. The drive down was absolutely gorgeous, too.

We spent our final day in D.C. exploring the Smithsonian at the Natural History and American History Museums. Steve was excited to see real dinosaur bones for the first time, and I always get a kick out of seeing historical pop culture items, such as Judy Garland's ruby slippers from The Wizard of Oz. I think we were all fully exhausted by the end of the day!

I tried to remember to take plenty of photos, but thankfully, Melissa is a photographer and helped supplement when my little camera phone failed (usually due to bad light). You can check out more of her work, as well as her brand new blog at: heartsparkphotography.com
It's a super cute site!

Meanwhile, I think the rest of my weekend story can be told best through photos:

Landing at Dulles Airport. We sat next to a cute little German lady on the flight.
I regret that I didn't remember to take anymore photos this first night, when we spent time with my family and saw my old neighborhoods!

Croissants and french vanilla coffee, fuel before heading to Charlottesville for the day.

On the road to Charlotteville! First stop, the vineyard...

Wine tasting and strolling around Blenheim Vineyards (Hm...I thought I seemed a bit more tipsy than anyone else... Just kidding).

 Grape tomatoes growing on the property.

 The wine glasses were ours to keep.

 The wine theme continued at Monticello. Loved this quote. ;)

Thomas Jefferson's grave, surrounded by many other family members. It is still used as a Jefferson family cemetery to this day.

35 cent candy sticks from the gift shop are a must. Tuti-fruiti and Cherry Coke flavors!

 A little afternoon snack after touring TJ's house, which I also regret not getting any photos of! (By the way, I love that I discovered these Honest Tea organic teas and juices. I've seen them since coming back to Texas, too. They have just a hint of sweetness, are all natural, and quite low calorie.)

In the car on the way to the Smithsonian the next morning.

Impressive ancient birds, giant sea turtles, and a gigantic sloth that looked like something out of Star Wars!

 

 Lunch break at the nearby sports tavern; Capitals and Redskins flags flying high. Delicious guacamole burgers here!

 Pretty building for a Starbucks.

At the entrance to the Revolutionary War exhibit at the American History Museum.

Steve made me extra glad I was wearing leggings this day....

 Energy boost at Red Mango, after a long day at the museums. As you can see, Steve made sure he got plenty in his cup. I made sure I tried as many toppings as possible. The winning combos? Blueberry frozen yogurt with dried cranberries, or the melon/coconut swirl with fresh mango slices. Yum!

 

The cats patiently awaited dinner outside the kitchen. We spent our final night sitting around the fire pit on the back deck, grilling hamburgers and corn on the cob, and enjoying some local wine and beer, which we purchased at Monticello.

Steve following me around with the camera. Comfy and warm on our last night! We left very early the next morning and caught our 8:30am flight back to Texas.

Driving home from the Austin airport. Steve wasn't very happy that the vacation was over so soon. I think that about sums everything up.

We had an excellent vacation, and I can't wait to get back up to that area as soon as we can!