High Five For Friday!!

This blog post is being written during my three hour break at my new part time job (which has seemed to morph into a full time job). 

I worked four hours this morning, went home, took the puppy on a run, showered, ate lunch, gasped at the number of emails that I currently have in my inbox, wrote this blog post, then I will be scooting off to work for another four hours.

Yeesh. 

Here are my top five things that I am loving this Friday....

/one\

At work this morning (I work for Edible Arrangements now fyi), I got to spend four hours dipping fruit into melted chocolate. Standing over a giant thing of chocolate all morning is the most lovely way to start the day. Also, I am pretty sure that I have the best smelling job ever. 

 via

/two\

The weather here has been so cool and rainy the past few days. I love being able to go on a mid-day run and not fear of dying of dehydration.

/three\

My husband starts his law school exams this Sunday. Even though they are going to be a $%&#@, at least they are finally here, he can do his best and we can be done with the first year of law school. Hooray!

/four\

The Voice!

I love this show so much. The judges are awesome and funny, the talent is awesome and the song choices are always so good. 

Maybe its because this is the only show my husband and I watch together, but really...I do love it so much. 

Fyi....the winner is going to be one of these three...

/five\

I don't have to work out of the house on Sunday. And I am so freaking excited about that. 

Yoga pants and no showering....here I come!

Enjoy your weekend everyone!!

#Pinning

Oh yeah, I went there. I am actually a little embarrassed at my joke, but it's close to midnight and I am tired and that is the only title I could think of for this post. 

Oh my goodness. This has been one heck of a busy week. I started a new part-time job this week and have been training/working all week. I have to say, with working one full-time job (my jewelry business) and now a having a part-time job, I haven't figured out how to balance my schedule yet. 

I know it might sound silly, but after working from home for the past three years, I forgot how long it takes to exercise/shower/get made up/commute each day. I am seriously needing a few hours each day this week to get caught up on life. 

With that being said, I apologize for not blogging the past few days. 

To make up for it, here are some awesome pins that I found this past week on pinterest. I am linking up with 'The Vintage Apple' for this post!

/one\

source

I love the colors on this vintage clutch! So vibrant.

/two\

source

I don't think I am anywhere near as talented enough to do this, but I would love to try. 

/three\

 source

This is one of my favorite paintings. I once knew a guy that had this tattooed on his entire calf. It wrapped around the whole leg and was amazingly well done. 

/four\

 

source

Love the scalloped lace detail on this handbag.

/five\

source

I make a quinoa salad very similar to this recipe, but I love the addition of the cumin-lime vinaigrette. Definitely going to have to try it with that added in.

/six\

source

Even though this skirt has a crazy side mullet thing going on, I love the print. The hem is unfinished, so it could easily be cut to have one length all around. 

I hope you like some of my new discoveries from this past week. Follow me on pinterest to see what else I found!

www.pinterest.com/mysweetnomsa

Also, if you haven't entered my $25.00 gift certificate giveaway yet, what are you waiting for??

 You can find out all the details about my first giveaway here....

http://mysweetnomsa.blogspot.com/2012/04/first-ever-giveaway.html

I hope you all are having a great week and let me know if any of you are on pinterest so I can check out what you are finding on there. 

Ta ta for now.

I Don't Like Pants With Zippers & Buttons

So...something interesting has happened all of a sudden. I seemed to have gained some weight. 

I guess it wasn't really all of a sudden, but you know....kinda, sorta, not really paying attention, so some doughnuts attached themselves to my outer thighs, all of a sudden.

Right around Thanksgiving I was around 145 lbs, the lowest that I had been in about five years. Since Thanksgiving, I have gained about 15 pounds. 

Gasp. Gag. Shudder. 

Unfortunately, at 145 pounds, I wasn't one of those people who walked past you and you thought to yourself, 'She needs to eat a ham sandwich.' You thought....she looks good, but might need to lose a couple of pounds. 

So at 160 pounds, you can see the kind of predicament that I am in. I went from needing to drop a couple of pounds to needing to lose 25 pounds.

Total bummer right? I will admit, these last few months were kind of awesome. I stopped being a vegan and went full-on meat eater. I went from one extreme to the other. Instead of beans, I have been eating McDonalds. Instead of fruit, I am eating fried eggs. 

Well...today I realized that I need to lose some weight. Since I work from home, I have the pleasure of wearing yoga pants all day/everyday. No tight waistband, no constricting materials. It's awesome.

I just started a new part-time job today though (more on that later) and need to wear jeans to work. 

O.M.G. 

My Old Navy jeans and I had one hell of a battle this morning and I was actually almost late for work as I had to do about three dozen deep squats to activate the 'stretch' in my jeans. When I got home from work, I ripped my pants off immediately and actually had the jean side seams imprinted on my outer thighs. 

Am I painting you a sexy enough picture yet? 

So yeah...I need to get back in shape. I know what I need to do, how to work out correctly, how to eat right, I just don't do it. I get a bit lazy. So I am hoping that by posting updates on my weight loss each week, maybe you all will keep me accountable and help me lose my saddlebags (I'm keeping the booty though). 

So....as if my jeans experience wasn't bad enough, I took a few photos of me in a bathing suit today, thinking that I would post a 'before' picture on the blog with this post and then show you photos in a few weeks of how I look after getting my fitness on. 

Um....well after reviewing the photos, I have decided that no way am I posting photos right now. I have realized that 1) I have an ill fitting bathing suit, 2) I am deathly pale and 3) I don't want any creepers looking at my photos online. Who knows though....maybe when I get all fit, you guys can see some photos then. 

Maybe. 

So since you guys aren't getting any photos, here are some of my starting stats. I didn't measure myself because I feel like it is too inaccurate for me. I always seem to measure myself in different places, so I get all amazed at a 3 inch loss per thigh after a week.

So no measuring tape, just my scale and calorieking.com (to track my food intake/calories burned). All of this information is as of this morning.

Weight:  160.6 lbs

Body Fat: 45.5 lbs

Body Fat %: 28.4 %

BMI: 25.1

Ugh. So there you have it. All my info is out in the interwebs. Be kind.

First Ever Giveaway!!

Alright y'all....I'm a little bit nervous here. I am about to do my first ever giveaway on this blog and I don't want to come out of it looking silly, so I need all of you to participate. So if you could all do me that favor, I would appreciate it. 

So.....Mother's Day is coming up. And if you are like me and love your mom, you want to get her something special, to show her how awesome she is. Well...what do mom's love? Jewelry. Specifically my jewelry. Case in point....

**My mom wearing one of the necklaces I made her**

What's that?? My mom is a super model and looks just like Sandra Bullock? 

I know, right?!?!

Anywho... to celebrate the mom's out there, I am giving you a chance to win a $25.00 gift certificate to my etsy store, My Cellar Door!!! Isn't that exciting?

Now, with this $25.00 credit, you can pick out a piece of jewelry for your mom for Mother's Day, you can give her the gift certificate as the present and let her choose her own gift, or you can keep it all for yourself (don't worry...we won't tell. You deserve it)!

So I bet now you're thinking....'Geez, Ash. You've got me all hyped up for some awesome jewelry, how the heck can I win this amazing giveaway??'

Thanks for asking dear reader. It's going to be super easy, and I am providing you with five, yes FIVE, ways to win. 

*Mandatory*

1) Follow my blog via Google Friend Connect. Click that little blue 'Join this site' button on the right hand side of my blog.

*Extra Entries*

2) Follow my business's facebook page - www.facebook.com/mysweetnomsa

3) Facebook about this giveaway to all your friends (use the handy facebook button right below the green ribbon signature, to make it super quick and easy). 

4) Follow my twitter account - www.twitter.com/mysweetnomsa

5) Tweet about this giveaway to your twitter followers (use the handy twitter button right below the green ribbon signature, to make it super quick and easy).

For each entry in the giveaway that you do, leave a comment below letting me know what you did. So, if you do all five possible ways to enter, leave five comments below. If you do three entries, leave me three comments, one for each entry. 

The giveaway will end April 23rd at noon and the winner will be announced in that evening's blog post. 

So what are you waiting for....go make your mom happy and win some jewelry!!

Ch-Ch-Ch-Ch-Changes!

~Turn and face the stranger. Ch-Ch-Changes!~

David Bowie Anyone? Anyone?

Let me just say that I have watched Labyrinth more times than quite possibly anyone alive. For whatever reason, I watched that movie at least 100 times as a child. I introduced it to my husband a few months ago, and enjoyed watching him, watching the movie ... jaw-dropped. 

I blame my childhood obsession on Jim Henson. I am sucker for anything with puppets.

Anywho, I hope everyone is enjoying their weekend so far. I just wanted to stop in and write a short post so you all could see my fancy new blog design. I have been working on it the past few days now and I sort of love it. 

A lot. A lot.

A few changes of note. At the top menu bar, you might see a new tab called, 'Sponsor.' I would love to swap blog/etsy shop buttons with anyone, so drop me a line and let me know if you would like to do that. You can see some examples/awesome blogs already on the right hand side of my blog.

Want to swap? Email me at - mysweetnomsa@gmail.com

Also, you can now find me E-V-E-R-Y-W-H-E-R-E on the web. So with those round purple buttons on the right hand side, they will take you to every possible form of social media, so you can stalk me with ease.

You're welcome. 

I hope everyone enjoys the sun and awesome weather this weekend. I am probably not going to be because I am sort of obsessed with making changes to this blog. So enjoy the weather for me!

TTYL!

Oh, How Pinteresting...

This week seems to have gotten away from me. I feel a few days behind on all my work stuff, housecleaning and personal things, including this lovely little blog. 

(You don't even want to know about the massive pile of laundry that I have had sitting on my floor for the past three days. I'm going to give it one more day to figure out how to fold itself, then I suppose I will give in and do it myself).

For the past two Wednesday's, I have shared some of my favorite items discovered on/pinned to Pinterest from that week. Since I didn't do it yesterday, and I still want to show you guys some cool things I found, I am going to go ahead and double-back and do it today. So, let's all just pretend that I did this yesterday and kept with my usual schedule.

 

/one\

 

via

Royal Blue Velvet Loafers. Loving the tassel. 

/two\

via

 Haunting quote from my favorite author. 

/three\

 

via

Digging the neon yellow and gray.

/four\

 via

This are H-A-N-D-M-A-D-E by a couple on etsy. Seriously....how talented. 

/five\

  

via

From the always wise and fabulous Oscar Wilde. The above quote is actually on a piece of metal that is part of a cuff bracelet. 

 /six\

via

Hello................

 /seven\

via

I really want to try this out. I need to remember to buy make-up sponges the next time I'm at Target.

/eight\

via

A little 'Mumford & Sons' jewelry for ya. 

So there you have it! My favorite pins of the week. 

Want to follow me on pinterest? 

You can find me here - www.pinterest.com/mysweetnomsa

Leave your pinterest username in the comments below, so I can follow you and your discoveries!

Rest in Peace...

I have to say that I am not sure how to start off this post, nor how to write it. I am still trying to gather my thoughts and channel my emotions after learning about the passing of a childhood friend yesterday.

I had known Sarah since elementary school and well....we didn't get along too well when we were young. Both of us were bossy, loud and knew the best way to do things. When we got placed together in school projects or partnered in our Girl Scout troop, we both felt the need to control and manage the other, often leading to tension and spirited words. I still remember in sixth grade when our teacher seated us next to each other and that was the first time I ever got a 'C' on my report card. It was for 'talking during class.' Sarah and I were constantly informing the other person that they were doing the assigned task wrong and insisted on showing the other how to do it properly. 

As we entered middle school and high school, our paths separated as our social groups went in different directions. While being friendly acquaintances, we were never very much 'friends,' not due to dislike but rather never seeing one another anymore.

Thanks to the wonders of facebook, we were able to reconnect a little over a year ago and shared sweet words with each other. She was incredibly encouraging about my business and I gushed over how adorable her sweet daughter was.

I am so incredibly thankful for this exchange because it has helped me deal with the guilt that I feel for how I treated her when we were children. As kids, we often say and do things we regret later in life, since we don't quite yet understand the power of our words. I can't remember anything specific that I said to Sarah in anger, but I know that my tone couldn't have been very nice, nor my words. 

With all that being said, I do harbor a lot of guilt in general and find myself constantly apologizing for things that I have done. I often end relationships with friends due to mistakes on my end (I'm talking to you Andrea, McKenzie & Naomi) and not being able to handle the guilt and shame that comes with continued contact. For whatever reason, I decide to cut people out, rather than try to work through whatever has come up. It is a nasty habit that I am fully aware of, and try very hard to shake, to no avail yet.

So if you were a friend of mine, and I have done this....I am so sorry. You didn't deserve it. And honestly....it wasn't you, it was me. 

To Sarah.....thank you for burying the past and being so kind to me. You really were a wonderful person and I hope as your sweet daughter enters elementary school this fall, she gets seated next to a 5-year-old version of me. They might get off to a rocky start...but they can make it work. 

RIP Sarah.

High Five For Friday

Happy Friday Everyone!! I am linking up with Lauren at the 'From My Grey Desk' blog to feature five things that I am excited about on this wonderful Friday!

one.

I discovered the most beautiful neighborhood about two miles from where I currently live. In the last 24 hours, I have walked my puppy through it three times and each time I feel all creepy because I am just stopping to stare at all the architure/amazing landscapes. 

It has seriously become my dream neighborhood. I am planning on taking my camera there sometime in the next few days to show you guys how amazing these houses are. 

I saw a 'for sale' sign in the front yard of one and went online once I got home to check it out and gasped at the price tag .... $750,000. 

I told my husband he better be studying really hard for the next month for his law school exams. 

two.

These shoes....

one / two / three

I bought these three shoes online from Target yesterday. Thanks to a gift card from Christmas, a 50% off shoe sale, and free shipping.... all three of these babies only cost me $4.00. 

$4.00 for three pairs of shoes!!!

three. 

My husband found out that he is going to be on the mock trial team for his law school next year. He had the try-outs last weekend and did awesome. They only accepted 16 first year students and him and his bff are two of them. I am pretty darn proud of him. 

four. 

Since my husband is busy studying for his law school finals, I have complete control over the netflix queue. These came in the mail yesterday...

via

via

Oh yeah....I've got big plans this weekend.

five.

The puppy and I have gone into some quite intense training sessions this week and I think we might be making progress. I think I have taught him 'turn-around' (walking around in a circle) and now he can lay down and roll over and speak pretty well. 

Besides being cute, he might actually be somewhat smart too. 

Happy Friday Everyone!!

The color of the season.....

Every spring I remember my love affair that I have for coral clothing. It is so flattering on my pale skin after a winter of hibernating and somehow doesn't make me look as deathly white as I actually am. 

I found this dress a few months ago at Target and was pretty darn excited to wear it this past week. After seeing this photos though....I am not so sure about it anymore. I love the sleeves, the color, the print....but I think it looks a bit too frumpy on me and kinda 'poufs' me out. 

Um.....needless to say that after viewing/editing this photos....I have a renewed vengeance to get started on my half-marathon training plan and to lose some weight. I will probably have a post about that sometime next week....once I recover from the shock of these photos.....(ps....I am definitely buying a full length mirror at Target).

 

 

 

Action shot of me holding cookies and trying to swat at a bug on my leg. 

Dress: Thirfted - Target Brand

Shoes - Payless

Earrings - Handmade by Me!

Gold Watch - Walllllymart

Oh, How Pinteresting....

 

Oh Pinterest...how I love thee. 

This week you introduced me to so many things I will never be able to afford, dishes that are too complicated for me to cook and crafts that I will never do half as well as the photos lead me to believe. 

Yet I still pin. I pin with a passion. 

Here are my favorite pins from this week...

source unknown

 

I love the glitz of this collar. 

It definitely seems like something I would love to do myself on a collar with some sequins 

(I'm watching too much Toddlers & Tiaras).

source

Apparently this hair brush is a wonder brush. 

It has little micro-fiber nubs in it that sucks out the excess moisture while you brow-dry your hair. 

It's only $12.00 and at Target. I might have to give it a shot. 

source

So microwavable cakes, cookies, muffins are all the rage now and I am on board with this bandwagon. Anything that helps to limit me from eating a dozen cookies at one time is alright with me. 

And I LOVE carrot cake, but my husband doesn't. I never bake or buy it because I know that I will eat ALL of it.

Pretty excited about this cake for one!

source

I am so in love with this tile and designer. 

The kelly green shade, the white lines, the hexagon shape, I love it all!

Click on the source button under the photo to see some other great tiles by this designer.

source

The scallop trim on these shoes is killing me with cuteness. 

Not going to be spending $105 on these though.

source

I have been on the hunt for about a year for the perfect rug for our living room. I had never considered making my own until I saw this tutorial. I would probably try making a smaller rug first, before I went all crazy making a big rug.

So there you have it! My favorite pins of the week. 

Want to follow me on pinterest? 

You can find me here - www.pinterest.com/mysweetnomsa