Saturdays~ Clean & Sweet

It is Saturday and time to bake! There are few better ways to spend a morning (or afternoon) than mixing dry ingredients, spooning out cookies....smelling the sweet aroma while you...clean?



Yes, do something "good" while the cookies are in the oven and the guilt floats away~ organize your recycling or dust the living room and then you feel great~ for two reasons: you can sit down with a warm cookie and hot tea or cocoa and look at your dust-free credenza~ yay!


You can get the recipes for the cookies above at cookinglight.com (the Black & White Cake Cookies and the Cocoa Fudge Cookies) and thanks, as always, to MarthaStewart.com for the super great organized cleaning bucket~ in case your ready to get started!

Sweet Summer Shuffle

Sometimes just hearing the right song can take you into the heart of summer. If you are looking for some sunshine in your music shuffle, try a little bit of Tristan Prettyman. Her album twentythree is just the fix you might need to get you off the lounge chair and onto the sand (even if it's just in your mind...). It does help that she is a native San Diego girl, too, but that's just a coincidence...really~

Classic Taste

This place setting from Crate and Barrel's reproduction of the Classic Century line of porcelain is just wonderful~ it makes you want to go back and re-do your wedding registry from 6 years ago (hypothetically, of course!).... Below are the teapot and sauce bowl from the collection...so sweet.

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Why not finish it off with the perfect around-the-whole-house apron, from Lotta Jansdotter....Her work is always so beautiful. And she has a great blog on her website, too, that shows you all sorts of fun things that are going on in her design life~ it is inspiring...take a look at jansdotter.com.

Coffee & Marshmallows

This is a little follow-up to the ideal breakfast (of hot chocolate & a cupcake) posted below. Bialetti has come out with a super addition to its stove-top espresso maker collection. The beautiful little espresso maker above also has a compartment to steam your milk at the same time, giving you a beautiful capuccino with so little effort- grazie! You can find them online at sites like surlatable.com.




Top off your cappucino with these yummy handmade marshmallows from a local company, Little Flower Candy Co., which have been favorites around here for awhile! You can buy them online at littleflowercandyco.com. Hope this helps to give your day a happy kickstart.....caffeine & sugar have been known to do that I guess.

Cold Comfort...

Well, today it is 93 degrees....in March. Some people are happy about that, some not so much. Either way, here is a vision of comfort for those of you are are too hot, too!


If, on the other coast, you are too cold.....here is some comfort for you. It seems like Macaroni & Cheese can just warm you right up from the inside out! enjoy....

Spring Cleaning...

This time of the year is when it really seems like things are ready to be shaken out, scrubbed and either trucked off to Goodwill or tucked back into their appointed places....In the midst of this frenzy of organization and tidyness, here is a fun way to stay clean this spring. Thanks (again) to Martha Stewart for the fun homemade soap recipes on the website~ add your own flavor, color, exfoliant (if you dare!) and celebrate the spring with your own crafty hands!

This is breakfast...

This is a breakfast option that is offered at Sprinkles Cupcakes here in Los Angeles.....It just seems so yummy and the fact that it is, in fact, on the breakfast menu means that you should feel little or no guilt when consuming it. After all, breakfast is the most important meal of the day, right?

Ready.....Desk.....GO!

A new project for the month of March....By the end of the month, have a desk that is functional! Let's see how it goes. To inspire you, here are some wonderful things that go on or in your desk~ enjoy! (p.s. this is not my desk, yet.....but you can get it at dwr.com)

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This POCKET book (from Lovely Design, in Canada) is just perfect for jotting to-do lists in, or just for sittin' pretty on your desktop.

This is just about the coolest rolodex out there. So if you need one, like seriously need one, this is it....It makes you happy to look up your plumber's number after all. (also from Lovely Design)

Friday a la Francaise

Look how cute these macaroons are! Sweet and pretty, too. These small little almond cookies are just amazing, although they require a little bit of effort. (The recipe is from Martha Stewart's Baking Handbook....a super find!) Mix up the colors or flavors to meet your needs and these petite cookies will shine!

Speaking of shining, these glitter spatulas from Le Creuset are so much fun to use! It used to be that all kitchen utensils were only useful, but now they are just too inspiring (as if you need another reason to bake!).

This year is the year!

Sometimes you forget a birthday~ it happens to the best of us. But lately there have been a few too many belated wishes going out to those who are near and dear! What's a girl to do? How about take a page out of this notebook (courtesy of MarthaStewart.com) . Make your own "birthday binder" so you can just put all those embarassing late cards behind you and actually say "Happy Birthday!" instead of "I'm soooooo sorry!"....Show them you care~ on time! That is one change you can make this year that will last for years to come.

Tripped Up

Gosh, it seems like summer is on the way already. Okay, maybe not summer, but spring is definately knocking right now. In that vein, these little items might make you want to take a trip! The hat above (from Hable Construction) makes you want to sit on a beach with a good book and just let it all go....

This bag would also work for a tropical getaway... It is just right~ the blue says relax already...

And finally, if you can't go on a trip can you have this wallet? Even paying for gas (ouch!) would seem fun if your cards were in this cutie! (both from Orla Keily)....Little things like bags, hats and wallets may seem trivial to lots of people....perhaps, but every once in awhile it is fun to play trivial pursuit!

why the heck not!

today I decided to start this little blog. a little late, a little short, a lot to learn...but what the hey! i figure i spend time doing little things like making tiny cupcakes or sewing little bags for my cell phone- useless use of my time. but no! i think that it is fun! it makes me happy...

this will be my spot for sharing what makes me smile, laugh, hungry....you get it.

the first thing that i had to post about are cupcakes. yes, they are everywhere....but they should be, darn it! they are the best....so enjoy this vision of yumminess from Cupcake Mama in Portland, OR (via Cupcakes take the Cake). it is just right for a saturday afternoon....or sunday morning, wednesday night....