Springtime Quilt Is Done!

Here's what I've been working on the last few days... the Springtime quilt! My sister commissioned a quilt for her friend's brand new baby boy, so she chose most of the fabrics and I added my two cents here and there. Please forgive me for the lacklustre pictures but the light was not cooperating all day because of the rain.

The quilt's been washed so it's all crinkly and scrunchy. We sent it off this afternoon and I was kind of sad to let this one go.

I love how the back turned out.

Very glad we found these dots because I love how they look with the other fabrics.

Treadmill Fail

My treadmill is being a poop. I went to turn it on and the lights on the console came on, but it wouldn't start. I'm so very annoyed because I hate running outside -- we live just off a busy road and becoming roadkill isn't on my to-do list. Plus it's so humid and muggy outside, it's like breathing soup.

The hubs says he'll take the thing apart tomorrow and have a look at it. I'm not sure this is a good idea, but it sure beats doing nothing. Fingers crossed it's easily fixable.

I seem to have bad luck with treadmills... I tore the tread (probably from overuse) in Singapore, somehow managed to get the tread to come off the rollers in Australia and now this. It's as if I'm trying to destroy treadmills in every continent!

What's Going On?

My dad. He. Is. On. Wait for it, I need to brace myself... TWITTER.

What?!?! 

I got an email notice saying he's now following me. Erm, WHAT?! Exqueeze me? A baking powder? What the hell's happening?! Firstly, why? Secondly, how?

Next he'll be on Facebook or something...

I Heart Shirley

Special appearance by Shirley Manson (of Garbage) at last night's No Doubt gig where she performed Adam Ant's Stand And Deliver with Gwen Stefani.

I've loved Shirley since I was 18 and I think I would've peed myself a little if I'd have been there. The video quality's not great, but it gets the job done. Shirley needs to release her album already! Pretty please?

Yellow Jackets Are Full Of Suck

So today we found that we had other house guests. Yellow freakin' jackets! I hate hate hate bugs like that because I never know how to deal with them. And then there's the whole stinging thing which just makes me cringe.

They kept appearing in the guest room (my poor sister) and there were about a dozen dead ones in the window. We thought they were outside, somehow getting in. Oh, how wrong we were.

The little buggers were coming in through the ceiling of the closet! Ack!! When I heard this, I immediately started to panic because that's where I keep my wedding gown and quilts! My heart is only beginning to recover from the fright.

My poor darling hubs attempted to get rid of them and was stung for his efforts. A word to the wise: Don't swat at them. It makes them kind of mad and then they tend to sting you. He sits for the first half of his bar exams tomorrow, so it's really the last thing he needed. I feel so awful for him, but thankfully he's not allergic to bee stings because that would've been supremely disastrous.

His dad came over and I didn't see what was going on because I'd gone for a run, but he killed the lot of them within minutes and we're now a yellow jacket-free zone.

To borrow a term from childhood, this entire episode was grody to the max. Bleh.

Surprise Kitchen Awesomeness

I love love love kitchen knick knacks, and I love having pops of colour all over my kitchen. So of course when I spied Jamie Oliver's upcoming kitchen collection, my heart skipped a beat. And I'm just surprised that the entire collection looks so clean and pretty.

It's released in the UK in September, and I don't know if it'll be available here in the States, but ogling these pretties is free. I love those tea towels and the storage jars are super cute. And these pictures make me wish (once again) that my kitchen was light and airy like that! One day, it shall be.

Pictures from Home Shopping Spy.

Foot In Mouth Disease

Do you ever wish you could take what your other half says and cram it back into his / her mouth? The hubs says a lot of things that make me wish to inflict grevious bodily harm.

Although I must admit it makes me love him a whole bunch more because only he could come up with this crap.

• Yesterday I'm about to leave the house and I go hug and kiss him goodbye. The only thing he could muster the strength to say was "You bringin' food home? Or you cookin'?"

• I was baking cookies last week, and I burned my finger a tiny bit while trying to remove a cookie tray. He goes "Oh no! Watch the cookies!"

• But the piece de resistance... When I came home from four days away in NYC, he hugged me, kissed me, and whispered in my ear "You need to go to the store".

He's really lucky he's got a cute bum. Oh, and he's holding our little baby Isobel upside-down in that picture because he insists she really likes it. The look of horror on her little face says otherwise.

Shopping All Day Is Hard Work

We spent the day at the Wrentham Village Premium Outlets and I do think it was a perfect birthday for my sister. The women in my family are born to shop, and we do it with such flourish and grace. It's been a year since I've there, and I forgot just how expansive it was! We didn't even come close to covering half the shops. My sister's wallet probably let out a big sigh of relief.

It's quite sad that the only thing I had to take a picture of all day was a dragonfly I found in the fitting rooms.

We had dinner at Gilette Stadium, at this place called Skipjack's. Their food was passable. Their bread was amazing. I kept thinking our server wasn't wearing pants. That's my mum-in-law and me. I'm fighting the wind, and she was... well, I don't know.

As we headed back to the car, we were treated to this gorgeous sight. I just love sunset skies.

Oh and while we were there, there was a sound check going on for AC/DC! Aussie! Aussie! Aussie! Oi! Oi! Oi! I was thinking how much I missed Australia yesterday, so this must've been a little taste of home, just for me.

Happy Birthday To My Darlings

My sisters turn 26 today. In my mind, I'm still 6, they're still babies, and I'm still arguing with my mum that I am old enough to hold them without damaging them. FYI, I was only allowed to carry the younger twin because she was a wee bit lighter. I'm pretty sure I didn't drop her.

I don't think I could love two people more than I love these girls. We laugh so hard together, usually about nothing, and we hardly have to finish a sentence before the other two know what we're talking about. They're my best friends in the world, and I'm so proud of the women they've become. I learn from them, I am in awe of them, and I miss them every day (one lives in Australia, the other lives in Singapore). Thank goodness for MSN Messenger though.

I get to spend two birthdays together with the older of the duo (we were in Singapore last year for our Wedding Reception Part Deux) and that's beyond exciting to me. We're going to an outlet mall today. I think she's so excited she can't speak. And then I think burgers for dinner. Which is what I asked for when it was my birthday. Didn't I tell you we were on the same wavelength?

Dearest Averil and Aurelia,

I hope you both have an awesome birthday, and a wonderful year ahead. I love you dearly, and I thank you for your love and friendship... and all the laughter :)

Your LBS (Little Big Sis)

xoxo

xoxo

I have to say, I'm developing a love for Alexa Chung. Her show is pretty good, and I thoroughly enjoy her sense of humour.

Plus she's Eurasian (her dad's Chinese and mum's Caucasian) so she makes me think of my future babies.

Home Sweet Home

Our Saturday was a nice, quiet one. I worked on my sister's quilt for a bit, caught up on some chores, and cooked for the first time in a week.

Pretty pretty flowers.

Any day now, we'll have homegrown tomatoes in our salads! I came home to find so many more tomatoes hanging on the vine. 'Tis a thing of beauty, no?

Oh and that bit of sticky tape in the photograph before? Well, I might have tried to straighten a branch and I might have snapped it just a wee little bit. The hubs put the sticky tape on because he's a genius and I suck.

My sister started squealing and shouting "RABBIT! RABBBBIIIIIIIT!" while we were in the kitchen. You'd think she'd never seen a cottontail rabbit before.

I made lasagna for dinner (it's my sister's favourite in my repertoire) and it's chock-full of cheese. Fresh mozzarella, parmesan and ricotta. What's not to like? There was also a salad but you don't really want to see that.

Going away to the city is great, but there's really no place like home. Especially when while I was away, every couple I saw kissing / holding hands / cuddling made me miss the hubs a little more, making me want to punch them. A lot.

Papaya King Is King

While we were in the city, my sister took it upon herself to taste test hot dogs from three places. Papaya King, Gray's Papaya and Papaya Dog. In one day. Well, in a matter of a few hours, really. She's slightly nuts and I respect that about her.

Papaya King still rocks the hardest. I took a bite of them all, and I concur with her findings.

I have to point out that she doesn't like the papaya juice. What the?! It is the yum-ness. My sister is in need of a check-up from the neck up.

Fashion Inspiration

So cute!

Picture from Stylesightings.

I'm Baaaaack!

Whew! We got back from the city this evening and I miss it already. Don't get me wrong, I missed cuddling with the hubs and snuggling with my cats, but there's something about the city I just love. The people, the noise, the crazy... it's all amazing.

Some highlights...

A visit's not complete without going to The Strand. 18 miles of books = heaven.

The Empire State Building aglow after a day of rain on Tuesday. No photoshop here, it just looked like that and I had to take a picture. Oh and on 23 December, 2006, I said "yes" on the 86th floor :)

Pastrami on rye at Katz's Deli. That's a serious pile of meat so we had to go halfsies.

Pretending to look intelligent at the Public Library.

My sister and I macked on some cupcakes at Magnolia Bakery. She had the red velvet, I had the devil's food cake. I think we inhaled our cupcakes because it was a complete blur after we extracted them from the box.

We're Off To NYC

My sister and I are headed to the city for a few days so no posts till I return on Thursday. My sweetheart of a mother-in-law has offered to drive us to New Haven to catch the train so I wouldn't have to drive and park my car for three nights. I do believe won the Mother-In-Law Lottery, and I'm eternally grateful.

I've stocked the fridge with food so the hubs doesn't starve while I'm away. Lunch meats, cheese, yogurt, berries... and a gigantic meatloaf pre-sliced so he doesn't have to think too hard. I feel a little bad about leaving while he's so stressed out over his bar exam prep.

Although today when I burned my hand taking cookies out of the oven, he was more concerned that my oven mitt didn't damage the cookies. So we're even. Hmph.

Picture from The Daily Green.

Baby Quilt In The Making

My sister wants a quilt for her friend's baby back in Singapore, and these are the fabrics we chose for it. The fabrics on the left are from Studio E's Springtime Nature-ology collection. The solid fabrics are Kona cotton and the dots are just a cotton fabric we found at Jo-Ann.

Can't wait to get started on this baby quilt once I'm back from NYC!

Cooooooooooooookie!

I'm headed to NYC tomorrow so I thought I'd bake some cookies to take to my friend Amanda.

They came out really flat, and I'm not happy about that (oh hey, I rhymed). They taste the same though, so I guess that's a consolation. I'm still going to change my baking soda in case it's the cause. Or maybe it's the warm weather? Ugh, I'm going to obsess about this for ages.

The recipe is from Smitten Kitchen. I also made oatmeal raisin cookies. I forgot to take pictures -- you'll just have to take my word for it.

Am I A Romper Kinda Girl?

I've never given thought to wearing a romper. Then yesterday I saw this Mavi romper at the store (on super sale), and tried it on. Of course it was a size too big and you could see all the way down my back. I'm short so the likelihood of someone peering down is extremely high.

What a pity. It's so cute, and I love Mavi. Hopefully while I'm in NYC I'll hunt down one in my size. Fingers crossed!

Peanut Butter + Chocolate = Coffee Cake

I'm not a big fan of the peanut butter and chocolate combination (I know, it's very unAmerican of me, but my mouth doesn't get the sweet and salty thing). But when I read this post, my sister was behind me. She insisted I had to make it. Then I made the mistake of showing it to my husband. Yup. Had to make it. And pronto.

If you love the combination of peanut butter and chocolate, you'll love this, judging from the absolute silence I was met with while the two of them were stuffing their faces. I had a tiny bite just to make sure the texture was right. There's peanut butter in both the cake and the crumble topping, plus it's just an easy cake to make. Definite keeper.

The recipe's here, and as usual, I made a change -- instead of milk, I used sour cream. I love what sour cream does to a cake, making it all nice and soft.

Fashion Inspiration

I love this dress! My sister's convinced I can make this... I'm not sure but I'll try. Going to have to remember to get elastic thread next time I'm at the store!

Picture from Stylesightings.

Me And My Girls

Would you believe that up till when my sister snapped this picture, I'd never had a picture with my girls before? Shocking.

I celebrated by trying to eat Matilda.

Oh and that American Gothic picture is actually a cross-stitch. I wish I had time to get back to doing cross-stitch. Maybe in the winter.

Fashion Inspiration

I'm loving the outfit on the right! That dress is so cute :)

Picture from The Sartorialist.

My Sister, The Weirdo

We're driving around today and when we pass a cemetery, my sister asks if I'll stop so she can take pictures. Thinking she's just joking, I continue driving. Oh, but she is not. I don't understand why she'd want pictures of a cemetery, but I stopped on our way home.

Such a weirdo.

UO Love

Loving these two dresses from Urban Outfitters.

By the way, they're having a 50% discount on their sale items till the 17th. Only at stores though.

Tomatoes! In My Garden!

Imagine my glee when I went outside to check on my tomato plants and was greeted with this beautiful sight! I've never grown veggies before, so please indulge my glee. I think there's more than a dozen little tomatoes on this one plant.

The other two plants... well... here's what happened. I bought a tray used for hanging wallpaper because it fit into my planters on the back deck. I planted the two tomato plants there a couple weeks ago and was completely puzzled as to why they were looking quite poorly while the other plant was thriving.

Today I asked the hubs to please go see if there's something preventing it from draining it properly. He came back in and informed me that I'm a huge dork. I didn't actually make holes at the bottom of the tray before planting.

If you need me I'll be the one in the corner with the dunce hat on.