I originally was not going to post a recipe for this as I'm not much of a chef. However, my fellow blogger, Bivi, gave me the friendly suggestion and I thought why not. So, here it is! I apologize ahead of time if the instructions are a somewhat lackluster. I had seen something similar on a website and

While I didn't experience a white Christmas (no white frosted winters here in SoCal!), the weather here has finally been cold enough that I could throw on a thick coat without sweating profusely. Autumn seems to have arrived late in our sunny state, but that's nothing to be surprised about. I'm  thoroughly enjoying it, however. Surrounded by all

 ...to be jolly! Christmas is just days away and I feel like I'm walking in a daze of dazzling ornaments, twinkling lights and glittering tinsels. Everywhere I go, I am bombarded by displays of decked out Christmas trees and holiday streamers, brilliant and colorful under bright white lights. Every corner is a scene in itself. Scents of cinnamon

Even as a child, I was always interested in astronomy. How my eyes would light up should they witness a shooting star streak across the dark night sky. Ephemeral and radiant. The thing that always gets me is that our galaxy is just one of billions in the vast universe. How many other habitable planets must there be?

While this particular outfit isn't as festive, I wanted to do a remix of this dress I wore around the same time last year. Unfortunately, the scrunched part of the dress sits higher than my natural waist so it protruded above the skirt in a rather unsightly way if I wasn't careful. Rather than worry about that, I

 I had a rather eventful weekend full of music and dancing and cheerful holiday merrymaking. One of those nights we attended the Queen Mary CHILL event featuring a brightly lit Alice in Wonderland themed maze. I'd say this was the highlight of night. I had been convinced that ice skating was included with the general admission ticket but

  I apologize in advance for the brevity of this past as I've got to catch up on all the fox scarves I promised friends and family I'd knit and give away as presents this Christmas. As it is, I'm super behind and have finished only a few. Anyway, a little bit about this vintage cardigan: I discovered

 They say there are two types of people: those who live to eat and those who eat to live. Clearly, I am the former. With the holiday season putting me in a very festive mood, I find it all too easy to overindulge this time of the year. I'll reach for that extra helping of mac n cheese

"For my own part, if a book is well written, I always find it too short."  -Jane Austen, Northanger Abbey (1817) 

  I cannot express how happy I am that autumn has finally graced our sunny Southern Californian region. A blanket of dark, grey clouds stretched over our blue skies this past Thanksgiving weekend and unleashed a torrent of gusty rain. The temperature dropped significantly, requiring all to dig out their thick, warm coats and blast the heater inside

I'm happy to say that I'm finally a proud owner of mustard colored tights. As someone with so-called thunder thighs, I've always been told to stay away from bright colors because they draw more attention to unwanted areas. "You must wear dark bottoms and light tops," they said. For many years, I'd only wear black tights because black

  I attended a wedding this past weekend and was not really up for fancy attire as I'd been sick nearly the entire week. Regretfully, I couldn't make it to the ceremony. Since the reception wouldn't take place until evening, I dropped by the park to kill some time. It was a beautiful day with clouds slowly blanketing

Indeed, a silly fool I was. I was excited to do this shoot because it was finally cool enough to wear this mustard beret I knitted last week. I had left my home and scampered off into the park without bothering to check one very important thing: my camera battery. I happily set up the tripod, managed some

 Many things didn't work out this weekend. I was to wear this outfit to a nice dinner in honor of our 8 years together, but I didn't expect to get so violently ill. I had woken up early and ran off into the park to snap these photos all by myself. John was still asleep. I wanted to

 It's been a rather stressful week to put it lightly. Things didn't work out the way I had hoped. I moped around for some time but eventually roused myself from the lethargic lull following a certain momentous event. I needed to get mind off things and this post was not going write itself. As famously quoted in Moulin

 With the lack of fall foliage in my life - aside from artificial decorations exploding from all the stores I visit - I find myself impulsively drawn to autumnal golds and russet reds. Even pumpkin oranges like this knit top I purchased from Uniqlo. You cannot imagine the happiness that alighted me as soon as I found out

 Remember what I said about shrinking your clothes in the washer/dryer and how you run the risk of too much shrinkage? Well, this burnt orange dress was a victim of such an atrocity. I purposely meant to shrink it down a size but I wasn't expecting it to shrink that much. It's shorter than I'd prefer but I

 And so we come to this at last. The Velvet Panoply. I felt this name perfectly reflected the reason why I dress the way I do. I grew up with friends who weren't as interested in clothes/appearance as I was and often felt overdressed when we went anywhere. I was very self conscious of this but did not

 Thought it was appropriate to make a post about our little adventure to The Rise exhibit. On display were thousands of uniquely carved pumpkins. There were simply too many to capture them all on camera so I've chosen a few I thought were especially interesting. As pictures are worth a thousands words, I'll let the pumpkins tell their

 As stated by the title, that is exactly what we did last weekend. I needed to drop off my phone at the Apple store to get it fixed and knew was going to take several hours. I'd planned to do some shoots while we waited. What I hadn't planned on was for it to rain! When I left

 I'm not too keen on DIY projects but thought this costume was the cutest thing ever. I had a talk with a friend and we encouraged each other to make something and show each other. And so I thought why not make a Halloween costume. It's fairly easy and does take a couple of hours. I split it

 We visited Tanaka Farm last year and decided to stop by there again this year (mostly because our favorite Thai food place is here). And once again, the weather was in the high 80s. I often forget that my legs too need protection from the sun. So while the rest of me was safe, my legs burned that

 I've been itching to wear this mock neck top ever since autumn officially began but weather in SoCal has been consistently in the high 80-90s. I despaired of ever experiencing fall in October because I honestly feel in my heart that it is the perfect autumnal month. How can one resist all those plump orange pumpkins decorating all

 When I first received this dress, which I bought on sale from ASOS, I was fairly disappointed in how loose it fit. I had already chosen one of the smallest sizes so imagine my dismay when I tried it on. The waist was down to my hips and the dress itself sagged in the most unflattering way. I've