San-Sational Weekend

Sorry to all my followers... it's been awhile since my last blog update, but I've been busy traveling around the country doing fabulous things. First off, after traveling to Ames Research Center for a work project, I met up with Malibu Ken in San Francisco!

Oh look, there he is waiting for me!

Resemblance? I think so!

Malibu Ken and I had a fanciful weekend in this lovely city, starting with a trip to the Golden Gate Park.

Wowza this place was massive!

Oh yeah, and feeling like real city-ers, we took the bus. If I hadn't been wearing my cute little yellow yuppie coat, I would have totally fit in... Or maybe my semi-panic/ paranoia attack when some questionable folk got on bus on our ride back to the hotel gave it away that I wasn't from these parts. Continuing on, this place was gorgeous!



What a way to spend an afternoon... sigh

Cherry blossoms EVERYWHERE!



A real life waterfall



Spooky trees. Muahhahahah!!

While in Golden Gate Park, we visited a Japanese Flower Garden

 

And we had an afternoon snack of Jasmine Tea and Mochi (a green tea biscuit, which really tasted like a mix between jello, a gummy bear, and a lemon bar)

This was our view....

Succulents, succulents and more succulents. I love these guys!



The next day was the farmers market at the Ferry Building! But not before shopping...



There's me, posing in Union Square



Finally we made it to the Ferry Building... Woah was this place amazeballs or what!?



Yeah like a real farmers market... I'm pretty sure that was a real farmer behind that stand.



Who thought of this? Take note, hot pocket people...

Next we got our cheese, bread and salami. 

Oodles and oodles of my favorite food group at the Cowgirl Creamery Stand



And here is our picnic laid out at the wine bar inside the farmers market



This is the best ever!



Afterwards, a visit to local chocolate maker, TCHO

For reals, folks...



TCHO Hot Chocolate



 That wraps up my weekend in the beautiful San Francisco.

Cheers,

      Bay Area Barbie

Curb Appeal

One of my favorite things about this time of year is the pretty landscaping that starts popping out all over the neighborhood. Time for planting brightly colored flowers and freshly mulched beds. Especially after the hard freeze we experienced here in Houston over the winter, the beds in my area definitely were in for some freshening up. I know, I know... a "hard freeze" is like it gets really really cold. Everyone freaks out because there might be some snow flakes for like .3 seconds. But seriously, our plants aren't like those up north and just can't handle the cold weather. So after winter was over, I had to end up pulling up a bunch of plants. And a few weekends ago, I was off to the local garden center, coupons in hand. After walking around the garden center for what felt like an eternity, I finally selected some varieties to fill in my landscaping.

It doesn't look like a lot here but I got 8 plants total.

 I was most excited to bring home this thing.

I saw a something like it with a twisty branch when I was at Disney World last year. I had to have it.

So after the very arduous experience of choosing plants and setting them in the beds where I wanted them to be planted, I called Alex, the landscaper. And voila.



Twisty branch tree with purple flowers




Lamb's Ears, so soft



Redish Purpleish grass thing-y



Agave plants. Very Cactus-y.

I'm glad I made the time and put in the effort for this home improvement. A few plants, a few bags of mulch, and a check to Alex for approximately the amount of a good time at Express went a long way.

Into The Swamp We Go

 So about a month ago when my friend Pam invited me to attend her bachelorette party in New Orleans, I'm all like "yes please!" Last weekend was when it all went down.
I had never been to New Orleans before, and I have to admit I was a teensy bit scared on the inside. What if it's smelly and gross? What if some gangster tries to to rob us? What if some drunk girl pukes on my Michael Kors heels? As much as I was confident these were all valid concerns, I was still excited to go, especially when I heard we were staying at the W Hotel... snazzy, right? So I went, and I have to say, it was amazeballs! Besides the fact that we were totally high rollers because we were staying in a super fab hotel, we also had some really good food, had a fantastic time dancing and listening to some live music, and got to pet an alligator. Yeah, for reals.


This is our hotel lobby... it's ok if you're jealous

First let's start with the swamp tour. Here's 5 city gals on a swamp boat.



That's Luke, our swamp captain, next to our bachelorette

me, keepin' it real in the swamp

 Our boat looked like this:


However it's occupants were much more fabulous than the ones featured in the above photo

 And then came the wild life.

Luke lured them in with marshmallows, which ended up being pretty scary later on.

Before snatching one out of the water

Getting a little too close

So why do I mention the marshmallows? Well, there's this thing I call the "marshmallow phenomenon". Basically that's when the unsuspecting alligator eats a marshmallow or 2 and hasn't yet had a chance to digest it, only to be scared sh*tless by Captain Luke, who pulls him out of the water to let young women pet his belly. The alligator is so pissed off by this point that he starts foaming at the mouth and making scary sounds. The marshmallows subsequently start foaming out between his sharp little chompers and girls start screaming.

The rest of the vacation involved us standing in long lines for food that was so so. Here's the line outside of Mothers, a Cajun restaurant that bragged the "World's best baked ham".



Here we are waiting in line

It was featured on the Food Network and the Travel Channel. Food Network... Travel Channel?? Normally I'd be jumping up and down to eat here. But Mother's just ddn't do it for me. After standing in line for over 30 min, I thought the food was just ok. I had the shrimp po boy, which was good, but not that good.
Next we have the famous Cafe Du Monde. Basically it's an out door cafe that serves 2 things: beignets covered in powered sugar and coffee.


Did I say outdoor patio? I mean crowded out door patio.



And here's the line for Cafe Du Monde. People freaking love this sh*t.

In short and in summary, fried dough covered in powdered sugar dipped in a cafe au lait is delicious. I just would have preferred to enjoy my treat minus 5 hundred people all jammed into a 3 inch square. And to the Cafe Du Monde people, take a hint from Grande Lux and provide us some sauce next time. Raspberry or chocolate is preferred, thanks.

So you ask, did you girls go out? Indeed we did!! New Orleans is a great place to people watch, and I had just the game for this activity. It started out as a harmless Girls Night Out game card. Just spot the events listed on the card and press down the tab. Get 5 in a row and you have a Bingo!


Found this thing at Pier One 50% off.

 At the night progressed, we found it essential to make our own card.


Just some good clean fun.

As you can see, some of the girls took it upon themselves to update the card as they saw fit throughout the night. We even got a couple fellow bachelor partiers to assist us with the game. Like this guy...


too bad he turned out to be at least one of the people featured on the card... 

 All in all, it turned out to be a pretty Saint-saitional weekend. And I would definitely go back.

The first step to solving a problem is admitting you have one.

I like jewelry. No, I luv jewelry. Like mega amounts.

Here is some of it.



It's just the rings, some of the earrings and some of the necklaces. There's more...

  Here's the rest.

Just the rest of the earrings. There are more necklaces. Oh and the bracelets... those are in another drawer.

All together now.


Well mostly all together. I have 2 of those lamps and there are necklaces draped all over both of them.

 So how do we cure this problem? Buy less jewelry.... "Oh heavens no", she says. We find a helper....

Like this one.

She hails from a magical land, Pottery Barn

So here was this morning's thought process:
Me: "Dang, I have alot of jewelry (mostly earrings)"... yes, I think with parenthesis.
Me: "It must have been those totally rad coral earrings I picked up at Target last night that put me over the edge"
Me: "What on earth am I going to do about this situation?"
Lola: "Didn't you see a cute earring tree in the PB catalog that you liked? Surely you can find something there. Oh and tell Dexter to stop humping me.
Me: "Oh yippe! I also have a $25 PB coupon that's been burning a hole in my pocket. Dexter, stop humping Lola. She doesn't appreciate it."

Hopefully that helped to set the scene for the celebration that ensued after I discovered a 10% off coupon in my most recent PB catalog later this afternoon. Happy Happy Smiles. Plus and also, free shipping was being offered on this item. 

So, you can imagine my disappointment when I added the item to my cart and I saw this:



THIS ITEM WILL BE AVAILABLE TO SHIP AFTER JUNE 3!!??

 So I called the PB hot line and talked to Debbie, a very nice lady at PB, who told me that yes indeed it was on back order till June 3, and the item was pretty much sold out in the entire universe. However she did give me the numbers of 4 stores that MIGHT have the item since their inventory was showing there was 1 in stock at each of the stores. Oh yeah and this lil tid bit. IT WAS ONLY $23 VS. THE $39 IT WAS SHOWING ONLINE.
After calling 3 out of the 4 stores, I finally got in touch with Jane at the Sacramento, CA store and.... SHE FOUND ME ONE!!
So after getting the item super on sale, a $6 shipping charge, taxes,  a 10% off coupon and a $25 gift card, I paid $3 for this item. And THAT is what I call beating my addiction.


I would like to add a side note regarding my complaints with West Elm, a Williams Sonoma company. Read about my issue in January here. Fact: Pottery Barn is under the same company umbrella of Williams Sonoma as West Elm. As it turns out, the catalog portion of the company does communicate with the store entity, as I found out today. Thank you Debbie from Pottery Barn! That's certainly strange, as I received an opposite response from the company directly when I complained about their lack of communication between catalog and store. And I quote "Please be advised that our Catalog/Internet Division is a separate entity from our Pottery Barn Retail Stores and do not have access to all their inventory." Really, West Elm?

Triple D Challenge Complete!

A few months ago, I wrote about the Diners Drive-Ins and Dives challenge I was working on completing. There was one last place featured on on Triple D that I hadn't yet been to, and last month, I finally made my way there.
Lankford Grocery is located in Midtown and features a very tasty burger menu. The atmosphere is VERY relaxed, and there is a nice outdoor patio. 



Don't let the outside scare you ladies, even a Diva likes a good burger

 Here are the top 3 things I liked about Lankford Grocery:
1. Yummy Yummy Food. The burger I ordered was topped with avocado. I love avocado scary amounts.
2. It's a cheap lunch. For 2 people, it was about 14 bucks.
3. Nothing says classy like a Schlitz Beer mirror in the restroom with a tinsel garland wrapped around it.

Have any H town folks visited Lankford Grocery or any of the other Triple D locations?

Berry Skinny Girl

If I was a reality TV star, I would be Bethenny Frankel. Love her scary amounts.

Bethenny's claim to fame is her stint on the drama-ful (that's drama + wonderful) series, the Real Housewives of New York. She is also famous for her business, Skinny Girl, best known for a low calorie Margarita mix.


It costs $13 a bottle.



And makes this.

But I can do it for cheaper...



Lauren's version.

1. Slice 1/2 a large lime (or a whole small one) into wedges and squeeze, along with 1/2 a clementine, into a mixing glass/shaker
2. Add 4-5 fresh raspberries and a generous drizzle agave nectar (~ 1 Tbsp) and muddle with a wooden spoon.
3. Add ice
4. Add a 1 1/2 - 2 oz. shot of 100% agave blanco tequila and a splash of triple sec

The ingredients

5. Shake it
6. Strain through a Hawthorne strainer (the raspberry seeds tend to clog the holes in a standard cocktail strainer) into a glass over ice

Other stuff you need.

7. Top off with Sprite
8. Garnish with a fresh raspberry on a cocktail pick, a lime wedge, and an orange wheel
9. Serve with a straw

Luv you, Skinny B*tch*s