Winter wonderland

We got so much snow. It is bitterly cold out. Welcome to winter. I love the song Winter Wonderland ..too bad it couldn't snow when it was warm out! I am already over winter. Bring on spring. Please. I did not manage to get outside today for photo taking purposes because I am still very, very sore. Also, did I mention it was bitterly cold out? Both of those things mean I'm staying indoors unless it's running to& from my car!

Also, you guys are getting quite familiar with my friend's online boutique, La Quaintrelle. I posted about the grand opening, first photo session& then a second one! She liked my photos so much, one of them made her main page. I'm so good like that ;) Well, she's making the big move from the internet to the real world! In case you aren't sure what that means ..she's opening a real, live location for her shop. How exciting is that?! The shop officially opens Saturday but because she likes me, I got a sneak peak into it tonight. I took my camera along& snapped some photos for a little virtual tour. The place is so much fun. It is above an old library in our town and it just works so well for her clothing! I have a total of 17 photos of the shop (which, if you're interested, you can view here) but I will only post one or two of them for your viewing pleasure. First up, is a photo of some shoes in her shop.

Linked with Fabulous Friday!

Don't you just love these?! I want the boots on the second shelf. I think I may have to treat myself to them for my very own Christmas present. I mean, they are awesome. What pair would you pick? I am not going to lie ..I sort of wish I had thought of this whole idea except for 1 thing.. my shop would sell skinny jeans& cardigans. I am so not stylish so I guess it's a good thing Meg ended up being the one to run a fashion-required store! It was nice to meet up tonight for a tea& catch up chat while I took some photos of the shop. I also promise to play photographer for her grand opening in a few weeks!

Also, I'm thinking I may have to purchase one of the dresses for some Christmas fun. As I age, oddly, I'm feeling the need to dress fancy more often. Why? I have no idea other than I spent my youth in barn clothes& one-piece bathing suits. I think my body may be rebelling against casual wear. At least in situations when fancy clothing is socially acceptable. I have a few go-to dresses that I love& am thinking I need to expand on that. So I guess I'll be having a very Quaintrelle Christmas! Also, did I mention I love colored tights? I think those may be a factor in me wanting to wear dresses as well! In honor of my slowly forming love of dresses, I figured I should show one off to you guys.

Linking to {snapped}& SES

Isn't that lovely? I also love that painting! I should have probably gotten a full shot of it but I was in pain so thinking ahead wasn't really in my mind. Thankfully, since then, I have taken some medicine. It doesn't really help me now since I am not in the store anymore so there will be no photos of the painting until Saturday. I'm sure you're all crushed! I'm also equally sure by the time Saturday rolls around, you'll have completely forgotten about this painting.

And with that, I am off to take some more muscle relaxers! Can anyone give me any helpful tips to getting rid of back/ shoulder pain? I'll take even the weirdest suggestions at this point. Medicine, stretching, heat& pretending it doesn't exist have all failed me so far. Next step? Chiropractor. He's like magic.

Candy canes

Christmas isn't my favorite holiday (Easter& my birthday are firmly tied for that honor!) but I will admit to loving a few things about it. Mostly, I love Quality Street chocolates& candy canes. Neither of which will make an appearance in my blog today. Wah wah wah. Instead, I have a delightful photo of some raspberries because they were my breakfast. Raspberries in the winter? So special because it makes it feel a little bit more like summer. Considering it is cold& there's snow on my car ..I can honestly say a reminder of summer is nice. And it is only November. So that is fun. So yes, I am definitely grateful for being able to have berries shipped to me from Guatemala or wherever these in particular came from.  Plus, how pretty are red berries in a white dish? Very pretty!

Linking with Sweet Shot, Communal Global,

52 Weeks, Simplicity& Touch Up!

My big plans for today include eating some of those butterscotch candy canes (best. kind. ever.) while washing all my bedding& wishing my shoulder would stop hurting. Looks like I'll also be spending some of today driving into Sydney to go visit the chiropractor. He always helps but it takes a few visits, acupuncture and electricity along with readjusting of my bones. It feels worse before it feels better which has all kinds of downsides to it. Namely, feeling worse before I feel better. I have to take the pup for a walk as well because he's going to drive me nuts from his whining. If I tucker him out for a good while then that means he'll be sleeping instead of crying. Remember that time I tried to sell him? Yes, well. That offer still stands if anyone wants to take me up on it ;) I do love that photo of him at the end of that post! I think I'll get it printed off, actually. It can be his Christmas present to me! I am such a thinker. Granted, this is my first year ever making my dog get me a present but I almost always get him a little holiday treat. Do most people do this or am I all alone here in my crazy love for including my dog in everything?

Exercise!

So, this post is about getting jacked and everything that comes with it! I was training to run a half marathon& also test my skills at a triathlon and then I had to stop. First, I ripped a ligament in my foot and that took forever to heal. Shortly after being able to move my foot again, I tore my rotator cuff. That sucked and hurt WAY more than my foot ..and my foot hurt a lot :(

So, now I'm all healed up (thanks, chiropractor! You rock) and am back on the exercise train. I am restarting Insanity this evening and I took advantage of the nice-ish weather this afternoon and went for a 25km bike ride. I LOVE my bike. Seriously .. it is easily my favorite form of exercise. It doesn't even feel like I'm exercising.

I can't wait to get back to my former jacked self. I am going to lay off the crappy eating& start back up on yogurt& fruits. I genuinely feel so much better about myself when I am exercising& eating well. Some motivation to get back in shape? Me, semi-jacked after P90X. Hello, abdominals! I've missed you in my life. Time to see you again. I really wish I'd taken more photos along the way ..oh well!

So, now that the weather is getting nicer& there's bikinis / swim trunks in your future ... what are YOU doing to get in shape? Any favorite activities or healthy foods to eat? Feel free to post recipes in the comments .. I'm always up for new healthy meals :) Enjoy your Thursday!

PS my day 89& 90 of Project 365!

An ear& forelock from Dewey <3

Keeping it real with 2 different colored eyes! Penny hates me :(

Smart phones!

Sorry for my lack of posting yesterday ..I was planning on writing one last night while watching the Lakers game. Instead, I ended up at Steel City. It was ..interesting.

So -big news: I entered the world of smart phones. I'm pretty sure I was one of the last people around to still have a flip phone. So, off I went the other day to purchase a new, smarter phone! I got this one:

So, basically an Android. Which means that no one has ever heard of it probably. But it's cute. And it does what I want ..except it won't sign me into twitter. Which is disappointing. So, seeing as I've spent the last few days playing with my phone& generally being busy+ tired, today you are not getting any kind of clever post.

Read: There will be no pathetic attempts at photoshop in this post. I'm sorry. Here, enjoy this instead:

Isn't that cool? If you have a smart phone (and let's be honest, now that I've bought one ..I'm pretty sure EVERYONE has one) ..you can scan that beauty and it will take you to my site via your phone. But you're obviously already there in some form, so I'm not sure why it matters.

I'm pretty sure there is a clever marketing scheme behind this, but like I said. I'm lazy& tired so you're really not getting anything entertaining me from me today! I will be back later this evening to post my photos of the day (HOW do I keep falling behind? Man I'm bad at this).

So my day so far has consisted of the following:

1. Sleep in until 9.30 when I got a wake up call from the boyfriend. Then go to the chiropractor. My regular guy was gone away, so I had to see a different one. It was so exciting.

Or not. Then I went to the mall& bought some Easter treats for my boyfriend. I'm hoping he'll come over later when he gets home& we'll paint some eggs. I am truly a 10yr old at heart. I can't help it ..Easter is so much fun!

For now, I'm laying here watching the Real World and finding QC codes that I can scan on my phone. I have seen these stupid codes for forever and my poor slide phone did not do anything with them. I'm so excited. I also have a barcode scanner to tell me if I'm getting a deal or getting ripped off .. and a calorie counter and more games than you can imagine!!

PS if you are like me and getting on the smart phone train WAYYY late... get an Android of some type. Apps are mostly free. Even lots of the same ones you'd pay for on an iPhone. Sucks to have an iPhone. Mine is way cuter AND costs less money. GO ECONOMICAL FINANCE DECISIONS!

Contest Winner

So, time for my blog post filled with details about Tiffy! Today was her lucky day .. she got her prizes, a lunch date with me& it was even nice out. Or, at least as nice as it gets in the Cape this time of year! So, here is a breakdown of everything we accomplished in an hour :)

Interview
So, we started out with a trip to a little coffee shop callled Mandy Jays! We both had ham& swiss paninis. They were delicious. It was a super cute little place.. If you ever find yourself on the Northside one morning, be sure to check it out! Here's the end result of our interview& lunch!

Alrighty, now .. onto the interview. You may note that Tiff& I discussed how this was going to work. I'm taking the rough idea of what she said& hoping to get most of it right. I'll include a photo of the notes I took to show why getting everything right may present a major challenge.

Onto the parts of the conversation I could scrap up from that pathetic attempt at 'note taking':

Yvonne: So Tiffy, can you tell me what some of your favorite hobbies are?
Tiff: The only ttwo things that my life consists of are drinking coffee in my car& working out. I like movies also.

Y: That's awesome! You sound a lot like me, only I drink tea. So, if you could be any animal at all, what would you pick?
T: Well, this one time I read an email about bears. You can probably find it online. It basically says that bears gorge themselves on food, get knocked up, sleep through the winter& their labor while delivering babies the size of walnuts. When they wake up they have missed the infant stage of their children and are skinny again because they lived off their body fat for the last few months. Also, it's spring.
Y: That is badass. I always used to want be a dolphin. I wanna be a bear now.
T: Can't say I blame you for that switch.

Y: So, keeping with that what would you be theme. If you could be any kind of food, what would it be?
T: Pizza. For sure. Everybody likes pizza. Even vegans who don't like pizza like pizza. It's all kinds of variety.

Y: I like the way you think. So, now .. if you could pick any three descriptors for yourself, what would those be?
T: Breeding material. Do I need to say anything else? That basically covers all my greatest qualities.
Y: No, that's great. But, seriously. This isn't a game. Pick two more please.
T: Hahaha okat. I'll go with elite athlete, at least in my own mind. And indecisive, because I can never decide on things.

Y: Brilliant! So, now that we have a basic outline of your life, onto to the more personal questions. Who would you get to play yourself in a starring role about your life?
T: Jessica Biel. Before the that weird teeth thing she got done.
Y: She got weird teeth thing done? Remember that time she got in trouble with her religious parents on 7th Heaven because the doctor told them she was pregnant but really he messed up& it was her mom?
T: Yeah. But in their defense, she was a wild card. She would be pregnant as a teen.
*Journalists' note: I don't know what the tooth thing is. If anyone does, feel free to explain with a photo before& after. I tried to find it but I'm too tired / sore / distracted to do a thorough job. Help me out.

Y: This is true. I'd blame her for having premarital sex and not praying hard enough afterward. Now, when your movie makes you trillions of dollars, what would your dream vacation be?
T: Well, it would be in Las Vegas, At a 5* resort called the Wynn. It has an amazing golf course. I will be a pro-golfer at this point. Even though I have yet to swing my clubs.

Y: I like your ambition. So, in real life I asked you more questions. In the blog world, however, I've been typing a really long time& the Lakers game is on. My shoulders are also aching. On that note, I'm going to skip some questions& ask you the 2 most important remaining ones. First, how has winning this contest altered your life?
T: Well, it has greatly expanded my horizons. I'm in a café ..eating a panini ..being interviewed. Let's be real, does it get anymore glamorous than this?!
Y: Valid, valid point. Now, last one! It's a toughie. What's your favorite thing about the person currently interviewing you. That's me, in case you didn't catch on.
T: YOUR BLOG! It includes everything I love about you AND it gets my blog hits. I love when you link to it.

So, that's Tiff in a nutshell. Then I had to go to the chiropractor so our date ended. I hope you enjoyed Tiff's interview, I know we sure laughed while doing. I'm not sure whether that translates well into this online thing. Being a journalist is hard. Especially when you're a journalist with no training, sore shoulders& a Lakers game on in the background providing maximum distractions. Here are some photos of Tiffy post-prize obtaining.

With my autograph& daily affirmation that you, yes YOU, are grrrreat!

And that surprise! A gold bar. Don't say I didn't make you rich, Tiffy ;)

PS my car is fixed& returned. Thank you, boyfriend. You are the best ever, ever, ever. I appreciate it :) My Civic is very glad to be returned to the yard. Even though the other 2 cars, while newer, still managed to get more privileges than her. They are tucked into the garage& she's out facing the elements. Poor thing.

Meghan& Buddy

These two showed up here for some photos! Thanks for braving the wind& drizzle. We ended up with some pretty cool shots, overall. Meg had asked me if we should still do the shoot, since it was overcast. I quickly told her of course we should ..having absolutely NO idea what kind of difference overcast shots would make. Turns out, it's basically perfect conditions for portraits. So, ahead we forged. Buddy& Squirt have a love / hate relationship and there are no photos of them being in love. I managed to capture one, but you can see the fear in Squirt's eyes from being so close to such a huge dog. Poor Buddy, he just wanted a friend! Squirt does not play well with others. I have to mention I didn't get my photos of the day done for today or yesterday. Sorry, there ended up being a lot of good shots from today and I figured these were more fun. Now I'm photoshopped out and so you'll get 3 photos from me tomorrow .. plus lots of other things. Mostly, I can't believe I got this all done before the Lakers game!

So, what else happened since my original post this AM? Let's see...

Honda
My poor Civic is broked :( The boyfriend, thankfully, is both mechanically inclined and very sweet. He is going to fix her for me and he drove me home so that I could have a photo shoot with Meggy! Thanks, boyfriend :) So, it's the brake caliper that needs to be fixed. Who is impressed I even remembered that?! I am. Hopefully it will be back on the road tomorrow, but if not my other options aren't too awful. Either the Mini or dad's new Civic! I suppose I won't be complaining too much if I have to take one of those instead ;)

Chiropractor
He told me that my shoulders were awful. He knew I'd be back. And I need to see him everyday for the rest of this week. Then he did a few of my favorite things! First, he laid me down. He took some needles. He stuck them in me. He ran electrical impulses through them. Mmmm electric acupuncture, I have truly missed you in my life!! Then, he folded my body into weird positions (previous to experience with a chiropractor, I would have said my body would never fold like that) and cracked my shoulders / neck / back. Life was great. It always is at first. Then comes the post-chiropractor pain. So now I'm laying here, having overexerted my shoulder as per usual, in pain. Oh well, they will feel about 100 times better in another week or so. If you have chronic pain, go see a chiropractor! They're great. Just make sure you trust them, because apparently they can paralyze you. You even have to sign a waiver ..oddly, this didn't even slightly deter me. Clearly, I was desperate.

Meg& Buddy
Here you go ..hope you love them!

*More of Meg& Buddy here!

A great day.

If you enjoy rain and no sunshine. Oh well, at least the weather man tells me it's supposed to only drizzle for the next few days& today will reach 12°C. Whether or not I believe, that is another story. Oh well, I remain hopeful and the weatherman continues to provide me with less& less reasons for doing so.

Wing Night
I don't eat wings. Or drink beers. Despite this, I still find myself ending up at wing nights more often than would make sense given these 2 things. Instead I order a beautiful blue drink and that was it. I never managed to have food, but not for my lack of trying. The little man taking orders didn't bother to ask me. So, I hunkered down& focused on the excitement that was last night. I paid $5 to gamble on the championship college ball game. I lost. Although Josh won, so that was exciting. And then the team that I had wanted to win (Butler) lost. So, really ..if last night was a night that I was rooting for you, you weren't going to be doing that well. Oh well, it was a fun evening! I always appreciate when I go to wing nights& sports I like are the event.

Voodoo dolls
So, you all remember my obsession with these things? My sheer joy from beating the system and getting these dolls for $1 instead $2? Yes. Well. It gets better. The other night, boyfriend& I rented the Fighter. I told you about this. Well, I forgot to mention that we also purchased 2 more voodoo dolls. They are awesome, I forgot them in his Jeep. Best part? He only had 2 quarters. He tells me to try them. I tell him it will never work, but try anyway. Guess what folks? IT WORKED. I can now get EIGHT dolls for the advertised price of one. It would be safe to say that I am ecstatic. Suddenly owning a gaggle of these dolls seems cheap& doable. If you have any ideas on how I should store / display / show off these things, please. Help me out. For the life of me, I don't know what I'm going to do with them! I love them. I won't stop buying them, especially for 25 cents a pop.

Insanity
Ahh.. fit test. You made me sweat last night. It was nice to have officially exercised again though! I have an appointment with my chiropractor today, who will fix up my incredibly sore shoulder, hopefully quickly, and then I'll be ready to tackle the remaining 59 days. I am decidedly back on the fitness train, with no plans of getting off any time soon. Why do I always seem to fall off the wagon right around the same time the general public will see me in a bathing suit? Oh well, Shaun T. I'm back in your loving arms. Sculpt my body, please. I'm even going to eat your diet. Mostly because I love carbs. And pancakes. Yumm.. I'm going to dye them colors& maybe they'll be my photo of the day.

You
Yes, I'm taking a break from my all-about-me blog to include you, the person currently reading this. I hope that you are enjoying my blog (I know I sure am) and that you love it. If you have any brilliant ideas for how to make it better / prettier / funnier (wait, who could make it funnier than me?!) / special features .. just drop me a line& let me know! Interactive blogging is fun ..I don't know how to do it or if it even exists, but how I imagine it is fun! For now, the actual layout / comment section is boring, but I'm pretty sure I'm not advanced enough to change any of that. Let me know and I'll do my best!

Tiffany
My girlfriend who won the blog contest? Yeah, we're getting together soon for a morning filled with funny adventures at a local coffee shop. There will be an interview, some photos, a general sense of hilarity and the end result? Hopefully a very funny update on how the world is treating my very first contest winner! I'm going to try to make it happen for either tomorrow or Thursday! Keep your fingers crossed, pretty people :)

Photo of the Day
Yeahh ..sorry guys, I don't have any yet. However, I will post back later this evening while I watch the Lakers game with both my photos. Today& yesterday. I pinky promise! Since I have no photos for you, I will instead leave you with some older photos I have taken. No, it's not part of the 365. These weren't even taken BY me, but they are OF me. They also include one of my most favorite& missed things -Shyann <3 Yes. I am missing my pony.

Actually, this photo includes all kinds of things I miss: that family& especially those kiddies, summers at the barn and my pony!

My favorite photo of myself& my girl!

And one of my favorite photos of us! I will always have a soft spot for my girl :)

I hope you enjoyed me& Shy as much I enjoyed looking through all my old photos to find these gems. I hope she is loving her new life in PEI at a show barn.