Scarf Swap

The really cool Jess at JustExpressive, hosts a scarf swap each year in honor of her birthday. I didn’t meet her until last year at the Blathering and then since she lives near-ish to my parents, we got together brunch around Thanksgiving, and ended up chatting for 4 hours. She’s pretty great!

The gist of the scarf swap is that you are assigned a swap partner, and you buy each other something you think the other person would like. My swap partner was Kristabella. I’ve never met her in real life, but we’ve gotten to know each other online over the past few years. If 2012 isn’t the year we meet up, I guess it’s not meant to be.

She and I discussed our scarf preferences and went our separate directions to buy. Here’s what I chose for her. Something she could wear in cold-ish winters, but also fashionably.

And a few days after I sent that scarf off to her, I found a package at my door. I thought to myself, “Wouldn’t it be so crazy if we bought each other the same scarf!” Then I thought realistically, “Overstock.com has lots of scarves, so just because the package looks similar, doesn’t mean it’s the same.”

But y’all! Look what I got!

We picked the SAME SCARF! I got her the one that’s more purple, and she got me the one that’s more red! And we both love them!

I’m really excited about this because I really liked the scarf I picked for her, and strongly considered buying one for myself. Now I don’t have to!

How crazy is that!!!

(If you like the scarf enough to get one for yourself, it’s called the Cotton Bina Scarf in the Worldstock section of Overstock.com. Kristin and I even helped support education in Nepal with our scarf swap purchases.)

Italian Cooking Lesson

Before the next stop on our Italian adventure, we made a little pit stop just a few towns over from Scalea. Cherrye had arranged a cooking lesson for us. We toured the kitchen and got down to the real work. Making fresh pasta. Fusilli is a regional type of pasta, and we were able to learn from the best teacher in all of Italy.

We’ll skip all the details of mixing the dough and get down to the kneading,  which you have to do a precise way. And a precise number of times. See how confused we look?

After you let the dough sit for a few minutes, you cut it into strips, and then pinch off enough to roll into a long worm. Then you wrap the dough worm around a thin little stick (as thin as spaghetti almost) in a spiral, and then you roll that on the counter to flatten it into the shape (which is like a flat spiral I guess). Our teacher made it look SO easy.

Here’s the finished product, pre-cooking. We made at least 5 pans of these, which is no easy feat.

Here’s a video of the process. I’m really happy one of the guys at the place picked up the camera and filmed us doing this. You can also hear Cherrye translating for us in the background. And by the end, despite our limited Italian skills, we knew if we were in trouble by the teacher.

Another of our lovely cooking lesson teachers helped us make eggplant parmesan and stuffed zucchini.

Baby Max even got in on the fun.

After a little appetizer of cedro soda and chicory on toasted bread, it was time to eat.

And we ate lunch for about 3 hours. The pasta was delicious (even though I wasn’t adventurous enough to eat more than a few bites of the sauce cooked with goat meat.)

Fresh made fusilli.

Peppers.

Stuffed zucchini.

Eggplant Parmesan.

There was plenty of wine and after dinner, homemade limoncello. And after everything, we even tried homemade bay leaf liquor. And yes, bay leaf liquor tastes as strange as it sounds.

After we were thoroughly stuffed, we got back on the train for a few hours headed toward Cherrye and Peppe’s house!

My mom’s jewelry box

On Christmas Eve, I asked my mom if we could look through her jewelry boxes at some of her jewelry, and she kindly obliged.

So for probably two hours, my mom, sister and I got a kick out of looking at all my mom’s stuff. From the fancy to the ridiculous. It was so fun! Want to see how much fun it was?

My mom had spectacular taste in HUGE costume jewelry back in the early 90s. This is just a small sampling.

Swirly AND clip on! Also comes in a darker purple version.

My sister is much better at posing than I am. Hand painted baby!

Hello rainbow!

Her modeling style is more ambivalent. “What, I didn’t even know you were there taking a picture of me and these awesome earrings.”

Mine on the other hand is more aware/awkward.”Oh hi, let me tilt my head just so. I want you to be able to see the earrings, not my double chin.”

Look, these are so huge they actually have their own shadow.

Mom was such a good sport about it all and even got in on some of the modeling.

After all the fun, and being the good daughter I am, I brought home some of her old silver stuff and polished it up for her. Here’s just a sample. (The pictures are kinda crappy, but you can definitely see a big difference!)

We also went through some of my memaw’s old costume jewelry. When she was alive, people would always ask her if her rings were real. She’s always tell them yes. And of course, they are real rings!

After she died, I brought some things to a jeweler to be sized for my mom, and when I went to pick the things up, the jeweler very quietly brought me aside. “You know this big stone in the middle isn’t real, right?” I laughed a little bit, and said, “Yes, I know. Thank you though.”

Anyway, I’d really recommend getting together with your mom (or grandma or aunts or any other family members) and having her go through her jewelry box. She’ll have plenty of stories to tell about everything, and you’ll probably recognize some of the pieces from when you were growing up. Even Taylor saw how much fun we were having and asked his mom to go through her jewelry box with me sometime.

And in case you are dying to own any of those earrings, let me know. I currently have them (and many more) in my possession. We could strike a deal.

I opened a few crappy day presents

Participating in a Crappy Day Present swap was one of the best things ever. Here’s the post where I showed you what I received and also a sneak peek at what I sent out. I enjoyed participating so much that I signed up again. (PS If you would like to have some little presents to open when your day is crappy, go to  HERE for instructions on how to sign up to send AND receive your very own crappy day present package.)

I have been lucky that there haven’t been many crappy days since I got my very own crappy day package. But then again, I was off work for almost two weeks for Christmas and the New Year.

Right before I had to go back to work, I opened this one with chocolate! And hot chocolate! And an awesome handmade coaster/pot holder.

Today was just a rough day. Not the worst by any means, but I woke up with the same headache I went to bed with, and I didn’t sleep particularly well overall. I had a few issues to deal with at work, nothing so major, but just a little annoying.

So, after Taylor offered to stop at the store to get wine and ice cream, (wine for me, ice cream for him…he had a busy day too) I came home and opened another present. This one was really awesome. MORE hot chocolate!! And two really neat, tiny, framed silk paintings. I can’t decide where I want to put them just yet, but I really love them.

That Carmen really knows how to put together an awesome gift package.

Not that I want crappy days to happen, but I could definitely get used to this present thing when I’m feeling down.

2011 in review

I didn’t think I was going to write one of these, but then I finally looked back to see what I wrote last year, and thought I’d do it again. I kind of like having a little summary all in one place. Here’s 2010 if you’re interested.

This year Taylor and I :

Moved into a new apartment, and survived.
Celebrated our 2nd wedding anniversary.

Visited

• New Orleans (March)
• New York (May)

And I:

Completed a 2nd Warrior Dash, without barfing

Celebrated

• New Year’s Day in New York City
• My 30th birthday

Cooked – Not as much as I would have liked. Learned how to cook risotto.

Visited

• Italy (July)
• Austin (October)

Read

• Room

Harry Potter Series

• Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix
• Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince
• Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallow

Started but couldn’t finish

• The Pioneer Woman, Black Heels to Tractor Wheels
• Chelsea Handler, Chelsea, Chelsea Bang Bang

Watched

• True Blood (Seasons 3)
• Lots of How I Met Your Mother &  Big Bang Theory
• Tosh.0
• The New Girl
• Lots of Intervention, Addicted and Obsessed

Listened to/Discovered Music – Again, not all new stuff, but I love all the same.

• Matt & Kim – Cameras
• Eric Hutchinson – Sounds Like This
• Freelance Whales – Weathervanes
• Discovery – Discovery LP
• Ke$ha – Animal
• Grouplove – Never Trust a Happy Song
• Edward Sharpe & the Magnetic Zeros – Edward Sharpe & the Magnetic Zeros
• O.A.R. – King

And talking about 2011 wouldn’t be complete with a special new category.

Developed Friendships

• I became closer to friends I already had while planning our trip and traveling to Italy together.
• I also met new friends at the Blathering. Some of them I think will be friends for a very long time.

Can’t wait to see what 2012 has in store!

Best Friends Forever and Ever

A few weeks ago -R- and I were chatting when the conversation turned to best friend jewelry. She said she didn’t remember ever having any. I knew I had, so I dug through my jewelry box, and lo and behold.

Having both halves could mean I didn’t have anyone to give the other half to, but judging on the state of the “Friends” half, maybe I had two best friends!

I also have half a “FRIENDS FOREVER” necklace. When I was in high school, my German pen pal and her family had a layover in Houston when they were on vacation, so we met up at the airport. This was back before the mega security, so we could go to one of the restaurants in their terminal. We exchanged a few gifts with each other, and so maybe wherever she is now, she’s still got the other half.

I also exchanged my fair share of friendship bracelets, but I couldn’t find any in  my jewelry box.

Anyone else still have some of these childhood artifacts? Were you more a bracelet or necklace best friend?