skinnygirl margarita

good morning, and happy monday!  how was everyone's weekend? 

i've been wanting to try bethenny frankel's skinnygirl margarita for quite some time now, and this weekend i finally got around to picking up a bottle.  i love bethenny, so it pains me to say this, but i have to be honest with you: i didn't really like it.  it wavered back and forth between being too strong and then not having much flavor at all.  i ended up adding a few squeezes of a lime which definitely helped in the flavor department, but overall i'm not sure i would buy it again. 




image via bethenny.com

the other disappointment was that it's really not all that "skinny".  a 4 oz. serving has 100 calories, which sounds great on paper but really no one drinks just 4 oz.  so you can have a 12 oz. light beer for about 100 calories, or 12 oz. of the skinnygirl margarita, but it will cost you 300 calories.  yikes!  the only way it's truly skinny is if you're a person who loves to drink margaritas and has them often.  considering the average margarita has about 550 calories, you would end up drinking "skinny" by switching to bethenny's brand.  and you are saving about 15 calories per ounce compared to other pre-mixed bottled margaritas.  but since i'm not a heavy margarita drinker, i think i'll stick to my vodka sodas ;)

it's strange because this stuff is literally flying off the shelves in stores all over the country.  so clearly i'm in the minority here.  but there are rumors of here bottling other skinnygirl cocktails like mojitos and cosmopolitans, so i'd be willing to try those if/when they are avaialble. 

if you've ever tried the bottled skinnygirl margarita, did you like it?  we'd love to hear what you think! 

adorable notepads

as you might be able to tell from this blog, i love all things nautical.  show me an anchor, some navy stripes, or a little sailboat and i will swoon over it for hours.  when one of my favorite stationary designer, linda and harriet, sent out an email this week announcing a new line of notepads are for sale on her site, i got a little excited. but then when i went to her website to check them out and they were all nautical themed, i got estatic.  they are so cute, i just had to share!

 

which is your favorite?  i think i am going to be picking up the anchor and blue striped ones myself.

happy friday!

happy friday loves!  i am so excited for it to be the weekend and get a chance to relax and spend time with friends.  i am planning on having a relatively low-key weekend which i am looking forward to after a busy few weeks.  my friend is playing in an all day concert tomorrow and the weather looks perfect to be outside all day (and i am really hoping i can finally get a real tan that doesn't fade after 2 days).  then on sunday i am going to see the phillies beat the cubs with my dad! we haven't had some father/daughter bonding in a while, so i can't wait to go to the park with him.

don't you wish you were there right now? photo taken by my super talented friend heather over at tyro foto

something i am really looking forward to this weekend though is making these fudge popsicles from smitten kitchen.  don't they look so delicious?  and they seem relatively easy to make...i will report back on monday though.  i have a feeling i might be regretting saying that!

 

what about you kiddos?  any exciting plans this weekend?  we would love to hear!

sweet prints for your kitchen

these adorable prints from anek's shop on etsy make me smile.  i bet i would want to spend my whole day in the kitchen if i had this print.  well that is sadly probably an exaggeration but maybe i would be motivated to do more than pour my bowl of lucky charms.  

i am guessing that i love this store because the artist is from croatia...have you ever been there before?  i went a few years ago and fell in love with split.  i would move there in a heartbeat for sure. 



i have a painting of this exact view in my room.  it brings back such good memories. 



s'mores

happy monday!  how was everyone's weekend? 

saturday night, alanna and i, along with a few of our other friends, joined our neighbors for an outdoor party.  the weather was beautiful that night - the perfect temperature - and it was great company.  in my mind, those are the two things that can make any night fun: great weather and great company.  the only thing i would add is great food...and we had that as well!  our neighbors have a fire pit so we roasted marshmallows and made s'mores.  i can't remember the last time i made s'mores, but i wish i did it more often because they're delicious!  and it's fun to make, too, especially with a good crowd like we had. 

here's a picture from that night.  i apologize for the quality.. it's an iphone photo and the dark and smoke from the fire make it more difficult to see.  but you can still get the idea!

summer salad

with the weather in the 90s every day this week, i have been craving lighter foods like water ice, watermelon...even salad.  and when i spotted this delicious looking salad over at hither and thither i realized i would have to stop at the grocery store today for some ricotta so i can make it for lunch tomorrow.  i will let you know how it goes, but i doubt it will be anything less than delicious.

i will probably stop at the grocery store after i get my hair to look just like this...

i fully expect to have paparazzi waiting for when i leave the salon, because my hair dresser will be able to make me look just like reese, right?? i mean miracles do happen...

kicking off the summer season!

even though the official summer season doesn't begin until june 21st, for many, memorial day weekend is considered the start of summer.  i've always been so anxious for summer to come that i consider memorial day the perfect kickoff!  unfortunately i won't make it to the beach this weekend, but i do plan on attending a bbq or two and very much looking forward to sunday and monday when alanna and i are going to washington, dc to visit her friends and see our phillies play the nationals.  although dc isn't very far, road trips are always fun when the weather is nice so i'm excited for the drive too.

nationals park - i tried to find a picture with actual people in the stands, but those are hard to come by... image via nytimes.com

to kick off the summer movie season, the hangover 2 also came out at midnight this morning.  the first hangover movie is one of my all-time favorites, so i'd love to spend a few hours in an air conditioned theater to catch the sequel on its opening weekend. 

image via imdb.com

what are your plans for the holiday weekend?  tell us in the comments!

a drunk, batman, and the cutest little winemaker

somehow, i have managed to last the past 10 years or so not watching the bachelorette since the first bachelorette...i remember watching trista and ryan fall in love so clearly.  he was obviously the best choice from the beginning and i was so afraid trista would choose the standard hottie charlie in the finale over sweet, handsome and sensitive ryan. being content with that fairytale, i never had any real desire to watch another season...

until i saw this bachelorette bracket over at say no to cosmo...a girl's version of march madness brackets?  i'll take it!  my roomies and i settled into our couches last night to watch the premiere, prepared to fill out these brackets and bet on who will be the final choice.  about 20 minutes into it, we realized that were just way too many bachelors to make our picks that first night, but we are definitely going to fill it out once the pickings are slimmed down a bit.

still - brackets or not, there were some definite memorable situations from last night.

1.  have to put it out there - jeff in the mask...jeff what are you doing?? you seem attractive, you have really pretty blue eyes and you are probably relatively smart.  i totally agree that ashley should look at what is inside and not just your looks, but come on more than an hour in the mask is plenty.  you got your point across now let ashley know all of you!

2.  how about west's heartbreaking story about his wife?  we were tearing up over at my house, but do you think that he is ready to fall in love again?  i would be a little intimidated to be ashley after seeing that introduction.  but then when he gave her the compass pointed to west, i started to swoon for sure.  still in love with his wife or not, he will be making my top pick.

3. jessy's dream is to have her own vineyard and make wine AND she wants to live in san diego, so is ben f her ideal or what? while i am not a huge fan of the shaggy hair and his head shot is not the best, on the show he seems so charming and h-o-t.  i want to make it my mission to set them up now, who needs ashley h when you have jessy t??

4. okay - it needs to be mentioned...what the heck was tim thinking?? the bachelorette mansion is not a college frat house. learn how to control yourself.  everything about him annoyed me from the moment he put the pillow wall up between him and jeff.  tim - for your own sake, grow up a bit.

5. and finally - my number one pick - jp.  this boy is p-e-r-f-e-c-t.  that smile, those eyes, that body.  sign me up for the bachelorette if i can hang out with someone like him :) he is definitely who i want ashley h to end up with based on this episode alone.  or maybe i want him to be kicked off so i can move to nyc and fall in love with him instead...

ipad keyboard

i really want an ipad, i think that i have made that abundantly clear in this blog and i cannot wait until i bite the bullet and actually go to the store to pick it up.  seeing this keyboard pad on likeCOOL makes me that much closer to making the big purchase.  i like how the keyboard mimics the feel of a real keyboard, making it much easier to type on your ipad. 

awesome right??

even cooler is that you can go to kickstarter and help make this product become a reality!  by pledging to fund part of the production of the ikeypad, you can do your part in bringing this product to market.  i am going to go make my pledge right now...i guess that means i have to get an ipad now!

how clever

blue strawberry, one of the blogs i follow, directed me to this really cool website where marketing nerds like me can search through the ads of the world.  here is one of the more clever ones i came across. 

image via adsoftheword.com

i'm still not sure what the yellowish-orange "h" in between facebook and twitter stands for, but the point of the ad is that heineken has been "social networking since 1973."  very true, my friends, very true.