Spring Wish List

I pretty much think he is the most attractive J. Crew model I have ever seen.

I would be happy with just him this Spring.

Mmmmmmmmm suit-y.

Ever since 8th grade when I begged my mother to buy me this fabulous green and white stripped shirt for St. Patrick's Day this color combo strikes a particularly agreeable cord with me.

I completely (and unintentionally) avoid neutral colors on the lighter side of the spectrum. Give me grey, black or navy any day. But I never pick out anything mushroom, tan or white for myself. Which is why I need this shirt. Its beautiful, and something that would really pick up my wardrobe.

I adore red. Its one of my favorite colors.

So I cant understand why I have virtually no red in my closet.

I need a really great pair of earrings that cost more than $5.

Because they just bring an outfit together.

Plus the color of these earrings makes my heart a little weepy.

They are just so romantic.

Outerwear really whips my cream.

Especially if it's in emerald!

Yellow is my FAVORITE color, and I should have more of it in my collection.

Plus this dress just screams tulip picking.

I love stripes, and I think that lace is a severely misunderstood fabric.

I see fields, streams, picnics, and lots of kissing when I wear this shirt.

I love clutches; they are so small and mysterious.

Last but not least...

I just got into wearing pink, and I love it!

plus I need a feather weight cardi to wear at all times.

Love, Lucy!

A promise

I really need to be better at blogging.

Here and Here.

SO I am making a pledge, to blog once a day.

Monday through Friday, naturally.

Tomorrow get ready to enjoy some killer cup cakes, compliments of me and Marianne via Martha Stewart.

Which will be complimented greatly by an uber overreaction story, on my part.

-Love, Lucy.

I sell it to you, cheap

I have been giving sexy eyes to this jacket for months. I want it to feel lusted after as well as safe and secure in my presence, so that when I club it over the head and take it home with me, it doesn't see it coming. The problem is, its 128 dollars. Which is way too much money for my coin purse.

Just last week, one week ago exactly, I was at the DI with my sister Marianne. We went because we had some time to kill between Del Taco and going to watch Grey's Anatomy and Private Practice with my cousin Melissa. As we were riffling through the macabre, I started spouting off sonnets, for this jacket. Or rather telling Marianne, about this jacket and how much I wanted it, and how my life would be complete if I just had that damn jacket. I was describing its beauty. Saying "Its beautiful Grizz (Marianne is know by us as Marebear Grizzly bear, therefore we often call her Grizz, Mare, MareBear and sometimes Gummybear) its tweed and the sleeves are almost three quarter length and..." 

Mare holds up this amazing little tweed suit and says "Kinda like this!"

And I almost cry. Its a Grey tweed jacket and skirt suit. The jacket has the same length arms and even better a tiny puffed shoulder. It is beautiful and it fits and its only eight dollars! And then my heart grew ten sizes that day.

I wore the jacket the very next day with some jeans and it was fabu. Then today I am wearing the whole suit and it is fabu. Essentially my life is complete, now that I have this jacket.

xoxo-Liz

Road to Paris

 I took french in school. It is the only language I can even pretend to speak, other than English. And guess what, I can't even pretend to speak it. My sister Marianne and I were talking the other day about what we remember from our french classes. It took us a whole twenty minutes to cover everything we remembered. Which most of the memories consisted of watching a kids show called Téléfrancais , which is about two kids; boy and girl, who hang out in a junk yard with a talking pineapple. It was really good times.

xoxo- Liz

Road to Paris

My parents just gifted me some dough to help out with tuition this semester. I don’t know how much I can turn around and say, “I am going to Paris, when you just helped my sinking ship with tuition.” Maybe the date needs to be prolonged….

-Love, Lucy

I want to be Forever young.

So we here at Bloody Paws. Inc have a seriously passionate love/hate relationship with Forever 21.

Just on Saturday we went there to get some cheap jeans. All of the sudden we were in the throws of a new section that was inspired by the 40's.

Everything seemed to be cute and kind of the 21 style that looks like it could be Anthro stuff.

Anyway, I got this top.

It looks much better in person, not so silky and trashy.

It has a light sheen to it, but nothing over bored.

Also in person the rosettes are much more delicate and girly.

It’s a great top though.

Love, Lucy!

Hi Hello!

{Many Lemons}

This week has been so crazy.

Good things to come next week for sure.

Enjoy the day off Monday!

love, Lucy

ps. Proof Lemons are simply amazing.

Road to Paris

So- Lucy and I (& maybe Marianne) are going to Paris this summer. How exciting? Very exciting!! We decided that we would keep sort of a journal here on this blog about our struggles and such, in our preparations for said trip.

So far, my first hurdle consisted of sitting at the store for a half hour convincing myself that I didn't need to buy a shirt (even though it had the best ruffle detail, ever) because I don't need it, but I do need money in my Paris fund. It felt really good putting the shirt down and walking away. I know it's a small thing but really every little bit helps.

-xoxo Liz

A Dinner Party

We had a small dinner party at our apartment last night.

I invited one of my best friends from high school, Erika and her boyfriend Aj, over for dinner.

I found out he was vegan, and not only that, a raw vegan. I searched the web looking for anything raw, but nothing had pictures.

Its probably just the amateur cook in me, but I really rely on pictures in cook books to give me inspiration.

Luckily before I had a full blown melt down, she said he was expanding his eating, and it just needed to be vegan (a huge sigh of relief on my end.)

{Aj and Erika before the feast began}

After much deliberation we decided to cook Green Pizza, via msn.delish.

We had been itching to try this recipe for some time and we decided that without the mozzarella, it was vegan.

Ingredients:

• 
  
  Your preferred pizza dough. {I used the easy-peasy bread stick dough, because its vegan. It worked swimmingly.}
  
  
  
• 
  
  2 cups of chopped broccoli. {we used chopped frozen.}
  
  
  
• 
  
  2 TBS olive oil
  
  
  
• 
  
  5 ounces (about 6 cups) arugula. {Spinach and arugula look almost identical. However arugula is a slightly more spicy leaf.}
  
  
  
• 
  
  Pinch of salt
  
  
  
• 
  
   Pinch of pepper
  
  
  
• 
  
  1/2 cup prepared pesto. {we used Organic Sweet Basil Pesto from Whole Foods, because its Vegan.}
  
  
  
• 
  
  1 cup shredded mozzarella cheese. {We used rice cheese. It was amazing, soy cheese is less than delightful sometimes, but the rice cheese was great. Also from WF.}
  
  
  

{You dont always have to go to Whole Foods to get Vegan friendly things, Albertsons has a wide and friendly selection, as do other various stores.}

{Green Pizza, pita chips, Liz with a knife}

Liz picked up some Pita Chips and Hummas from Target, so yummy, and so vegan.

Directions:

*preheat oven to 450°F*

Spread pizza dough onto a pizza pan (or inside a casserole dish in our case) and bake for 8- 10 minutes, until slightly golden.

While dough is cooking, add broccoli and oil to a sauce pan and cook until soft, slowly adding the arugula leaves. When the mixture is fragrant and moist add salt and pepper.

While the broccoli and argugla are cooking, similtaneously prepare your pesto.

When the crust is ready, pull it from the oven, slather with pesto (this is your pizza sauce) dress it with your green mixture of vegetables, and top it off with cheese!

Cook 8 - 10 minutes, until cheese is golden bubbly!

{Liz getting ancy to sink the knife into the pizza}

We had Vegan chocolate cake for dessert. But now I cant find the recipe. I suck.

-Love, Lucy

Lemon Bars

This recipe is from Lion House Recipes, First Edition.

{Lemon Bars}

Ingredients:

Crust:

• 
  
  1 1/4 cups butter
  
  
  

{We used sweet cream butter; you may want to as well if you care at all about your happiness}

• 
  
  2 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
  
  
  
• 
  
  1/2 cup powdered sugar
  
  
  

{Marvelously textured dough}

Filling:

• 
  
  4 eggs
  
  
  
• 
  
  2 cups sugar
  
  
  
• 
  
  6 tablespoons lemon juice
  
  
  
• 
  
  4 tablespoons all-purpose flour
  
  
  
• 
  
  1 teaspoon baking powder
  
  
  
• 
  
  Lemon Zest from 1 large Lemon
  
  
  

 {Real lemons; sigh}

Make crust first: *Preheat oven to 350 F.*

 Use room temperature butter, if its not room temperature, put it in the microwave for 5 seconds at a time, just until the side gets a bubble. You don't want it to be melty, so be certain to watch it carefully. Mix your (room temperature butter) until creamy. Add flour and powdered sugar and mix on low speed until combined. This creates the most marvelously textured dough that is so buttery and delightsome you will weep. Spread (pat, pound, and proud) dough evenly in a 9x13-inch pan. Bake10 minutes or so, until the corners are golden bubbly.

Remove from oven and pour lemon filling on, while crust is still hotsy totsy.

{Golden Bubbly dough}

{Pouring filling onto dough}

Make filling while the crust is baking away.

 Mix together eggs, sugar, lemon juice, flour, baking powder, and zest at a low speed for a few minutes.  Pour on top of partially baked crust and bake for 30 to 35 minutes.

Allow to cool slightly and dust with powdered sugar.

{Lemon bars, un-dusted}

I feel like now would probably be a good time to tell you that these turned out miserably, but they had potential. What happened was that I doubled the recipe so I could bake them in a jelly roll sheet (as per their directions) only the jelly roll pan could not fit into my mothers oven, so the filling all fell to one side, and wasn't very thick. (If you do double it, I still wouldn't suggest a jelly roll pan; its too large)

Sometimes there are variable that you didn't foresee, or maybe that you ignored. Either way, try not to get too discouraged, and keep cooking!

-Love, Lucy

Souper Salad

Tasty Thai  Red Curry Soup

Made this dish last night for Marianne and Lucy. I feel like even though it was my first attempt and it was super spicy and a little more curry like, than soup like, IT WAS DELICIOUS! and fast to make, dinner in minutes!

Ingredients

• 12 ounces chow mein noodles or spaghetti

• 1 1/2 tablespoons red curry paste

• 2 14-ounce cans coconut milk

• 1/2 cup low-sodium chicken broth

• 2 teaspoons grated ginger - note* I just used the spice, not fresh and it turned out well

• 1/2 teaspoon kosher salt

• 4 ounces sugar snap peas, cut in half -note* I subbed peas with bamboo shoots

• 4 ounces shiitake mushrooms, sliced

• 1 pound medium shrimp, peeled and deveined - note* I subbed shrimp with red onion, Marinanne and Lucy not shirmp people.

• 1 cup fresh cilantro leaves

Directions

Cook the noodles according to the package directions.

Meanwhile, in a large saucepan, over medium-high heat, combine the curry paste, coconut milk, broth, ginger, and salt. Bring to a boil.

Add the peas, mushrooms, and shrimp. Lower the heat and simmer until the shrimp are cooked through and the vegetables are tender, about 4 minutes.

Divide the noodles and soup among individual bowls - Note* this step is important, if you combine noodles and soup in one pot, its more of a curry pasta, but still good. Sprinkle with the cilantro.

-Love Liz

Happy 2010!

I dont know if its just me, but I had the weirdest time adjusting to the fact that we were starting a new decade.

Probably its just the small fact that I wasn’t this old the last time a decade ended, so it didn’t mean as much to me.

2000-2009 seemed like a collaboration of all the other decades and I couldn’t really put my finger in how we would be remembering that decade.

Anyhoo, I spied this blanket over at Anthro and it inspired me to knit pillow cases.

- Love, Lucy