New Tattoo (About Time)

I have been wanting another tattoo since I got my first one, but I was always a bit hesitant. Either I couldn't decide on what to get or I didn't have the money, it was just alway something keeping me from getting one. I finally just seized an opportunity and did it, I can't believe how wonderfully amazing it turned out. I'm still in shock and just overwhelmed with how perfectly it turned out.

Today was the last day of school forever, it was my last set of labs and I was excited (and nervous) to be getting closer to doing what I enjoy doing, baking, and I wanted to celebrate this new start. I had a few ideas but I found a Kitchen Aid Mixer tattoo on pinterest that I liked the most. I walked into Blood Sweat and Tears Tattoo not sure if I could get an appointment today, but as soon as I showed the lady the photo she knew who to give to. Little Jenn Small is a great artist and I have seen some of her work. I basically gave her free range besides showing her the picture and saying I'd like the flowers behind it. I said I wanted the mixer blue and she suggested this color and all else fell into place. Even though I was getting tattooed I had a great time talking about incorporating my geekiness into my future wedding, Arrested Development (which I definitely need to watch!) and just chit chatting. I'm just in awe at how wonderful it turned out and so glad I finally got me another tattoo :)

Vintage Finds 5/4

I haven't been thrifting in forever since I don't have room for any furniture and I'm content with my current collections. Though I want to build up on some of my other ones I just don't have the room to display the things like I like so until then I was taking a break. However, I went to the thrift store with my Mom and scored some wedding stuff :)

Our wedding colors are being pulled from different shades of blue, red and yellow. The dessert tier was in perfect condition and the set of cloth napkins would be perfect for making a banner. I want to collect more for banners and to put on top of the dessert bar. 

My Mom had these beautiful goblets and even though I have room for them now I eventually want to use them in my future house. Until then I thought they'd fit perfectly on the tables for the wedding, maybe with succulents in them or a small bouquet. It's a set of 6 so I can use these and maybe throw in a few milk glass vases to mix up with the vintage soda bottles with single or filler flowers.

This is the gem of the finds but I can't take the credit for finding it. As I mentioned before my Mom and her husband run a little antique store, he was doing some picking and found this type writer. He fixed the ribbon and I started working on it some more cleaning it and making it type better. I told him how awesome it was and he said I could have it! It was sweet of him and I now have it running pretty good it just sticks on a few keys. I still need to clean off the keys some more but it's in great condition for being used.

I'm posting most of my wedding stuff via tumblr on Future Mrs. Cooper so feel free to check that out for some great ideas and current updates!

Busy Weekends, Busy Life

My weekends have been so busy with school work, helping my Mom at the antique shop to working on a future (not so future) business with a bff, it's hard to believe I have time to type even now. Though the point is to let you guys know I'm alive and haven't forgotten about the blog. I recently had a good score weekend and I'll be posting that later this week :) As school settles down and I'll have more time to work on wedding stuff, businesses plans and all kinds of fun stuff.

D.I.Y // Antique Cosmetic Jar Candle

So my Mom has this antique shop with her husband and his family called Union Antiques and there was this set of antique cosmetic jars that I adored. I had always thought they'd be beautiful turned into candles for my vanity area. So here is a quick and clean way to turn any small jar into a candle, without the messy wax.

What You'll Need:

- Glass or Ceramic jar/container (make sure the glass has a good thickness or it's heat resistant)

- Candle (the individual ones or tea lights) the same or less height and width of the container

- Candle, plate or mug warmer

1. Place candle inside the container, if your jar is short and you have to use tea light candles take off tin that is wrapped around the whole base. It's okay if your candle is a little loose inside the jar, but make sure it isn't too tall, otherwise, wax will spill over. 
2. Set it on the warmer and keep an eye on it; it took about 10 minutes from placing the jar on the warmer while it heated up before it started to melt.
3. Once the sides start to melt you can move it around to see if it will fill in the space. If it does then take it off and let it rest. The whole candle doesn't need to be liquid, it can mess up the wix.
4. After it has hardened again remove any wax that might have spilled or built up on top, then light and use like you would any candle.

This is super easy and you can get the candles for a cheap price at any store. 

Change it up by picking up a scented candle or do a few and give them out as a gift set or party favors :)

//Spring Cleaning

Howdy Ho! I know I haven't been a real active blogger lately and just popping in once in awhile,  but for some reason I have Spring cleaning fever. It started yesterday when I realized I didn't have anything to do for school, etc. and I actually had time to all the things this weekend. I've been over-worked (or schooled is more like it) and the apartment has just been a big cluttered mess fest. Dustin is the only one in his department and he's been working non-stop so we try as much as we can to keep it sanitary, but it's not up to my ocd standards. Same thing comes to the blog, though I have not had the time to be the joyful blogger I once was I still think about it and want it to be active. So after this long introduction my point is I would like to declutter the layout (I know again) and work on some newish layout and designs for this bad boy. I know what I want and I follow some lovely bloggers that inspired my whole design idea and organization.

//Thirftary

I love the layout and the whole design of this lovely blog, but what I like the most is everything up top. I love how Maddie keeps header simple with just a little color, and the navigation bar is neat and clean. Though I like my font and will keep the signature paint by numbers background I want to keep with this idea for my new design.

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//The 25th Hour

Besides Melissa being just plain awesome she also has great blog design. I like how everything is on one side; the intro, tabs, sponsors. She does a great job at making the layout look stunning while simple. Even though I'm still debating on what side, I have decided that the layout will be set up similar to this with a few variations. 

//Secondhand Sundays

Besides having fabulous style and interior design taste she also has great taste in blog design. I love how organized she has everything, even down to her categories and it's stylish and not boring. Sometimes minimalist and organized can come off as boring and stale in a blog design, but she makes it work and gives it a fresh artistic touch that I hope I can get with my blog design.

//Assemble

I stumbled upon this blog by what else? Pinterest. As soon as I clicked onto the page I just fell in love with the colors and their background. Despite all the wonders that a simple white background can do for a blog design I still love a little bit of a pattern. For my new design I want a background, but for it to be more opaque so it is there and not there in your face.

I'm going to be testing out this blog design I have in mind so please bare with me, because as you know, I can be very indecisive.

//Ombre Cake

Saturday I got together at my BFF Desiree's house to do some baking.  She wanted to make a "thank you" cake for some friends that helped with a water heater in her and her fiance's new house. I always enjoy baking with her because we bounce ideas off each other to create something great. It was actually her fiance that mentioned different colors, though he was talking about the inside we decided we could do an ombre effect with the icing easier instead. She has the cutest KitchenAid mixer in pink and it is perfect for whipping homemade buttercream frosting; this is something I'm putting on my wedding registery. We found the perfect cake recipe on the back of the flour box and it made a soft and fluffy cake. I always think Swiss buttercream is the easiest to make so I whipped some of that up and added some vanilla extract for flavoring. We wanted to do purple, but had food coloring instead of the coloring gel so we couldn't get as an intense purple as we wanted. However, I loved the lavender color we did get and I think it transitioned nicely. I showed her how to do buttercream beading on top and she did a fantastic job doing the same on the bottom. She had some delicious sprinkles that tasted like crushed up rock candy so we filled the top with those. I had to leave before tasting it all together but from tasting the scraps plus the message she sent me; it was a hit!

This week I'll have plenty of cakes to work on in class. Today is wedding cake day, tomorrow is our practical cake and then Wednesday I'm doing my Tardis specialy cake. Out of all of them I think I'm more nervous about the Tardis cake because there is so little to prep and it has to be done all in one day. Well hope everyone has a good Monday and I'll post pictures of the cakes from class once they're all done!

//Life at the Moment

I haven't posted regularly because of school and I haven't even posted that much when I do have time. Life has been just very routine and  not very eventful. I know you don't have to have exciting eventful moments to post but I just feel like I'm in a rut. There seems to be a lot of feels going on lately, like not having time to do this, feeling tired which in turn makes me feel bad for not doing something, not being able to keep up with housework or school, etc. I thought having the weekends off would help, and it does but it's just more days that I feel get wasted when I take me time and it shouldn't feel like that. I just stressing over little thing but sometimes it's hard not to when you don't know where to start on "fixing" everything. Sorry, not sorry for posting a downer post but it helps to let it all out.

//Just Going to Leave This Here

//This & That

Basically as it states I have this table on the left that I picked up at the thrift store when I was hunting for mid-century and I want that table from the set of Talking Dead. I actually like the whole studio set up, even though it's more rustic than I prefer I do like the contrast of mid century with the rustic/industrial. When I was collecting furniture for the apartment years ago I really went for mid-century everything, which I found a good bit of however my style has changes a bit. I realized I enjoy the eclectic style of a clean mid-century with antique/rustic accents (with a touch of Grandma's style). I can't find a table for sale that looks like that and even if I found this table it'd cost way too much (I mean the one I have now was $12) so I'll just swoon over that lovely table from a far and do a crazy diagram of a DIY for it that I'll probably never do.

//Chopped Challenge

Today in class we did our Chopped Challenge, where we were given  a "Mystery Basket", or really a note card with our ingredients, and we had to create a dessert. We had to include all items and some form of a foam or sabayon and meringue or fruit chip. Luckily we got first grab on Thursday and got to plan over the weekend. This is what me and my team member came up with:

"Mystery Basket" Items

• Canned Peaches
• Figs
• Balsamic Vinegar
• Instant Espresso 
• Cream Cheese

What we created:

• Cream cheese pound cake layers
• Peach sabayon folded in whipped cream between layers
• Fig fruit chips
• Balsamic reduction with brown sugar
• Espresso caviar (not really caviar but any puree or juice with some gelatin, dropped into cold oil to make it look like little caviar dots)
• Topped with quenelle of whipped cream and sugar garnish

I was worried about the balsamic vinegar because it smelled strong but I have heard people roasting strawberries and other sweet fruit with the balsamic, plus adding the brown sugar helped cut the strong vinegar flavor. The cake layers were soaked with the syrup from the canned peaches which helped give the peach sabayon more flavor. The espresso caviar were a little bitter but reminded me of an Americano. Putting everything together tasted awesome because the elements helped each out. The balsamic reduction helped to cut the super sweet cream cheese pound cake, the whipped cream helped with the espresso caviar and the sabayon was just a nice cream accent to the cake. I would totally make this again and I had tons of fun with this challenge.

Have you ever seen the actual Chopped t.v show? What would you all make from these items?