Oscar Night: The Party

I hope this is just the first of many more intimate get togethers. I've been thinking for a while now about starting a Sunday dinner club. I have to do a bit more brainstorming before any of that, but I hope to have my first 'meeting' in March. I'll certainly be posting all the details here!

Prayers going up to all those affected in the Midwest by the tornado storms sweeping through the area. My heart is in Harrisburg, IL this morning.

~Ashley

*Shane helped take photos Sunday night, and somehow avoided being captured in ANY of them! I'm so sorry, Shane! 

Oscar Night: The Details

I'll be back tomorrow with party pictures, but I thought I'd share a post full of the food and table decor. I had so. much. fun. putting this night together. I loved brainstorming for the tabletop and thinking of simple and movie-centric bites.

I went with a black and gold theme with touches of white and regal purple. I think tulips are one of the most elegant flowers and was so lucky that my local Trader Joe's had bunches in purple, red, and white this weekend.

 

 The Twig and Thistle ballots were a hit! My guests were so impressed. The fun and funky pencils were a birthday gift from my best friend and I thought their festive flair was just perfect for celebrating the Oscars.

The smoked mozzarella, prosciutto, and arugula pizza was a combo I thought up and hoped for the best in execution. I was so very excited that the flavors were spot on and not too salty at all (which I was afraid of). Jeff is a classic pepperoni kind of guy and didn't love my pizza tart, but the other guests did so, Whew!

You can't have movies without popcorn! My brother, Tim, is a air pop expert and was kind enough to take charge in the kernel department.

Jeff made up the cheese board. If you haven't tried Toscano with black pepper you are missing out! Buy some on your next grocery run, please. You will thank me.

Pardon my pun, but the icing on the cake was the icing on the sugar cookies. Royal icing is so easy to make and I love how it gleams. I topped the cookies with some Sugar in the Raw which just so happens to look like little golden sprinkles.

We can't forget a sparkling drink to toast Hollywood's big night. A champagne sangria with blueberries and blood oranges was the lightly sweet and refreshing cocktail we needed to fully enjoy our Oscar celebration, trophy or not!

I am so thankful to my guests for coming! I really couldn't have asked for a more enjoyable time. I hope your Oscar night was just as award worthy!

Cheers!
Ashley

Notes, Thoughts, and Ramblings: Pt. 2

• Last night Katie came over for dinner. We hadn't seen each other since Smith and Annabel were little baby kitties (a looooong time ago). We had delicious slow cooker chicken tacos and iced tea and finished the meal with some delightful strawberry shortcake. It was so nice to catch up! Katie is such a sweetheart.

• Tomorrow morning I'll be flipping some pancakes on the griddle and sitting down with Jeff and my bro to go over final Oscar party prep. We'll have lots of grocery shopping, cookie baking, and decor sorting to get through and you know what? I can't wait!

• I really need to start planning what to pack for London and Paris next month. I'm still on the hunt for beautiful brown flat riding boots and I'll probably need to purchase some sweaters as well. Here's hoping Gap, J.Crew, et al. will have sales coming up to clear out their winter merchandise. This is SoCal after all and yesterday's temps were nearing 80!

Happy Friday and I'll be back next week to share all the Party details!

 xo,
Ashley

What Would You Wear: Oscar Night

 

 

I know this outfit it a bit over the top, but it's for the Oscars for heaven's sake! I am deep in preparation for my black and gold themed fete and this dress with its gorgeous scalloped hem, the clutch with its daring chevron pattern, and the stemless glass of bubbly are just what I need to get in the party groove. I assembled the Twig and Thistle Oscar ballots yesterday and they came out beautifully. Here's hoping the rest of the prep work goes as smoothly! What are your plans for Oscar Sunday?

xo,

Ashley

Back to Black

This week I'm gearing up for Sunday's Oscar party! The colors are black and gold and I thought I'd kick off the week in a skirt (I know, ANOTHER one!) I'm trying to overcome my skirt aversion first attempted with last week's Chambord hued beauty. I know I mentioned incorporating more color into my daily wears and today I failed. Big time. Ah well, all in trying to keep with the theme.

 

I had such a fun Saturday with my cousin and her roommate. We ventured out to The Grove for people watching, had lunch at Golden State, played board games in the evening, and picked up a few things at Trader Joe's for homemade pizza and ice cream. I hope I'll be seeing more of Stephanie around these parts.

Happy Presidents' Day for those of you with the day off, and Happy Monday to my comrades in their office chairs.

xo,
Ashley

• Skirt - Gap
• Tank - Club Monaco
• Blazer - Express
• Booties - Calvin Klein

Notes, Thoughts, and Ramblings

• My cousin Stephanie is coming to visit this weekend. I'm not entirely sure what we're going to do but I am entirely sure that I'm exited about our day :) Stephanie is Staci's younger sister. This will be our first time hanging out as adults excepting holidays when the "real" adults are around. Here's hoping we get into trouble!

• I'll be putting together a care package for my mom over the weekend. She underwent surgery yesterday (and is doing fabulously, thank God!) and I'd really like to create an "entertainment" package for her.  I work in the industry, this shouldn't be difficult, ha!

• I'm also planning an Oscar party for next Sunday! This will be a cocktail attire kind of shin-dig and I'm so excited to set a beautiful tablescape. I'm probably more excited for the decor than for the show. I have a few ideas percolating, just need to head to the craft store and see what we can whip up. I'll be using ballots from Twig and Thistle and will probably do an Oscar themed bingo using How About Orange's playing cards. Hmmm, now what to wear?

•  A new pizza place has opened in Westwood Village and I am dying to try it out! It's called 800 Degrees. It's make your own style Neapolitan pie using only the freshest high quality ingredients and is phenomenally well priced to boot. I've heard nothing but good things about this place and am dying to make it our next date night destination.

Happy Friday and Have a Great Weekend,
~Ashley

Outfit Post: Chambord

It's been so long since I've done an outfit post! Hello, welcome to 2012, Ashley. I am forcing myself to purchase more color. I have a closet that ranges in shades from black, to tan, to charcoal and after a self imposed "no-buy" during the month of January I was anxious to slowly incorporate more of the color wheel into my everyday attire. Cranberry red is a shade I have a little experience with so when given the choice between the gorgeous Chambord color above and basic black for this accordion pleat skirt, I took the plunge. I am ridiculously proud of my decision.

I played it safe and wore the skirt with black and jean but I'll get better, I promise. I was thinking of, get this(!), pairing the skirt with a jewel toned top of a different shade for summer.

I hope you all had a wonderful Valentine's Day with your honeys be they human or of the pet variety. Jeff and I had a picnic on our bedroom floor and ate some yummy takeout Thai. There were candles, flowers, and chocolate, bien sur! I'm brushing up on my French for our vacation next month, if you can't tell ;)

• skirt - ella moss
• tank top - club monaco
• jacket - levi's
• shoes - banana republic "mad men" collection
• sunnies - forever XXI

All the best,
~Ashley

Weekend Drink: The Paloma

Saturday afternoon, after a marathon session of house tidying (woo!) I was in need of a drink. I'm not much of a liquor drinker, but wanted to test out a simple cocktail that Jeff and I would be able to match a meal to. Jeff pulled up a mixed drink app, while I searched around a few of my favorite lifestyle blogs for inspiration.

I found just the drink over on Austinite and entertaining guru, Camille Styles's site. I'm newish to her blog, but this chic has it going on! She threw a 40th birthday party for her husband a few months ago and one of the drinks featured was a favorite cocktail of his, the Paloma.

I googled a few recipes for the drink and ended up making the most simple version with just three ingredients!

• Tequila
• Fresh Squeezed Grapefruit Juice
• Agave

 I added a few blood oranges for sweetness and color (oh, the color!)

I also squeezed in a little lime after shaking everything up in a handy mason jar.

Jeff manned the stove top and we enjoyed our light, citrusy, way too easy-to-drink Palomas with steak fajitas. The Paloma is quickly moving up the ranks of my favorite drinks list and I don't hesitate in saying that I definitely got my fill of Vitamin C Saturday evening!

Cheers!
-Ashley

How To: Valentine's Day Cards

This weekend I got my behind in gear and spent quite a few hours (Hey, I'm still new at this!) embossing little love notes for a few of my loved ones. There's a video at the end of this post sharing my how-to! Fair warning: this is the first video Jeff and I have ever made so please don't throw up from motion sickness watching it.

Step 1: Cut card stock to size.

I painted water color on a few of the cards.

Step 2: Start stamping. I used all transparent water mark ink, then used colored powders lightly sprinkled over the water marked stamps.

Step 3: Every few letters/images blast the powder with the hot air gun and watch the magic happen :)

The video is below...eek!