from my camera / girls' weekend

last weekend my parents celebrated their anniversary in palm springs, so jarman and i got to stay and 'babysit' my three (not-so-little) sisters. jarman ended up working almost the whole time, so we got to have a fun girl's weekend. on saturday we started out at the farmer's market in temecula. we got some pretty flowers, fresh lemonade, and a couple of the best gyros in the world.

then we did a few photo shoots of the girls, of course...

then we had a lazy afternoon watching friends and taking naps. once we felt disgusting enough from laying around, we headed to starbucks for an energy boost and came up with the genius idea to throw a party. the girls invited all their high school friends and we all pitched in to get drinks, candy and snacks. we played ping pong and the boys had a fifa tourney (jarman made it to the finals, which he was super proud of). but mostly, we danced our aces off. it was seriously so much fun, even though it was only me and my sisters and cousins who were dancing, while everyone else did other things. we loved it. oh, and jarman danced with us for a while and somehow got everyone to do high kicks? i was super sore. sometimes when you're 23 and live in temecula you have to hang out with high school kids on the weekends. it's cool.

we are obviously very good dancers. look how in sync and serious we are. we don't mess around.

recipe / chocolate covered profiteroles (cream puffs)

i have had these sweet morsels of goodness accompany most big events throughout my life. for starters, we have them every christmas eve, and most other holidays. they are seriously delicious and can really replace any meal, breakfast lunch or dinner. you are probably going to want to double the recipe, they will go fast!

Chocolate Covered Profiteroles (Cream Puffs)

Puffs:

1 c. water

1 c. flour

1/2 c. butter

4 eggs

Heat oven to 400 degrees. Heat water and butter to rolling boil. Stir in flour. Stir vigorously over low hear until mixture forms a ball, about 1 min. Remove from heat. Beat in eggs, all at once, until smooth. Drop dough by scant 1/4 cupfuls about 3 in. apart on ungreased cookie sheet. Bake until puffed and golden, 35-40 mins. Cool away from draft. Cut off tops; pull out any filaments of soft dough. Fill puffs with cream filling. Top with chocate ganache.

Cream filling:

prepare small instant vanilla pudding. whip 1 pint of cream and fold it in to the vanilla pudding.

chocolate ganache:

heat 1 square (1 oz.) unsweetened chocolate and 1 t. butter over low heat until melted. remove from heat. stir in 1 c. powdered sugar and about 2 tbsp. hot water. beat until smooth and of spreading consistency. if you like lots of chocolate, double the recipe (we alw

fashion / white winter princess

while things are freezing over on the east coast we have been enjoying a california winter. actually, i have been a bit confused as to which season i should be dressing/shopping for. i really want to wear a winter palette, but it's so hard when it is 80 degrees every day. i usually end up wearing brights and dresses and summery things, though i wish i wore outfits like this more often.

syd and i originally wanted to pair the glammed out sparkle sweater with a short purple leather skirt, but somehow i felt like the colored leather trend already annoyed me. or maybe it's because syd's legs are much longer than my stubs, so it was wayyyy too short on her. the tulle skirt is perfect. it adds to the light palette, gives more texture, and is a much more appropriate length. how much do you love those snakeskin booties? i have been made fun of for years (by my loving family) for them, but i still am totally obsessed. i got that fur jacket for christmas (it was $20 at h and m). we put my plum bobbi brown lipstick on her giving her an awesome contrasting color. and what did i tell you about that hat last week? i want to pair it with every outfit every day. this is probably my favorite shoot we have done so far!

bedroom makeover part 2 / shopping list

this week we are painting our room (martha stewart's nimbus grey), and shopping. things are happening people and it's really exciting! i'm hoping to have final pictures by the end of next week, but who knows. i tried to add the colors that will be in the room in my little collage, but i realized those are only the colors on my bed, there are a few more that will be in the room too. it may sound busy but i think it will pull together nicely!

1. navy diamond duvet cover- i already bought this and am loving it on my bed! it isn't online any more but i have seen tons of them in stores, sometimes you need to target hop to get what you want. and it's on sale for $60. score. 

2. pink tufted ottoman- this is freaking adorable. i haven't found it in any of the stores we have gone to, but i'm still searching. there is a chance i may end up using an ottoman i already have. this will be going at the end of my bed by the tall mirror, so that i can have a place to lay clothes while i try things on, or if i need a break, you know. i also need something that i can use to climb up in my closet in, because roll-y chairs and me are a lethal combination.

3. desk drawers / more storage- right now we just have the linnmon desk from ikea, with no drawers. it isn't a very big workspace, so we don't like to have much on top, and we need a place to keep all of our important things (cameras, laptops, work stuff etc.). in a perfect world i would also be getting a whole closet kit, but the clothes are hidden behind curtains and what we currently have is working fine. i don't want to invest the money into it right now.

4. desk chair- jarman and i have looked for a desk chair that we both like since we have been married, and this is the only one we can agree on. the $200 price tag makes us hesitate a bit though. we may keep looking for a while, this isn't urgent. we will definitely need one while jarman is in law school. he talks about how amazing his workspace will be a lot. it's the only space in the house he really cares about having just perfect.

5. mirror- we have not one mirror in our room, and no full length mirror in our bathroom. it is killing me. this is a must.

6. art prints / frames- i have been purchasing prints and postcards from museums, so i'm planning to frame them and make an awesome art wall of things that i have actually seen and like. i also might include some of my photographs. i am very excited and planning on adding a lot of color (as if i need any more)  with this project.

from my camera / san francisco (day 2)

on our second day in san francisco we finished off all of the touristy spots. jarman hadn't been to san francisco since he was really little, and didn't remember anything. i feel like we had to cross all of those off the list, and next time we will do irregular things (or just shop, all i wanted to do was shop but that doesn't always go over well with boys). we visited the golden gate park, which was enveloped in fog and completely breath-taking. i had never been before, and i'm so glad we went. we went to the de young museum and saw an exhibit on david hockney (don't worry, i'm going to do a whole post on it because it was amazing). there was tons more to see at the museum, but we wanted to get to other things. we visited the japanese tea garden that was authentic according to jarman. after that we went underneath the golden gate bridge where there was an old military fort. then we got treats in ghiradelli square and walked over to lombard street (and up the street, rough one). we watched the pretty sunset near ghiradelli square and then headed to uc hastings for a law school orientation. (by the way we would love to live in sf for law school. it is one of our top four schools.) that evening we went to tacolicious for dinner and had braised pork tacos and butternut squash tacos. so good. oh, and i included a couple of pictures from our drive home. we stopped by half moon bay and walked out to where the huge mavericks waves break. there were these awesome colorful plants i couldn't get enough of.