Holiday Overwhelm (in a good way)

So much holiday happenings this past week. Last Thursday was the West. 3rd st. Holiday Party. The stores open their doors with yummies and treats for all (including rose champagne at one amazing establishment). I was a little shameless (to Brian's annoyance) of my partaking in the free goodies. "Well then whats the point of putting it out if no one is going to take it" was my response as I quickly walked in, grabbed a beverage, took the obligatory gander around the front half of the store and made my way onto another.  I seem to remember that he wasn't above trying everything at Jones on Third. Later,  B and I had to stop off at the dress-up photo booth/bench creating that stunner above, ha. Stilt walkers dressed up in holiday costumes strolled around, which to be honest is quite frightening to me sometimes. Kinda borders along that whole clown phobia which was instilled in me from awful horror movies like Killer Clowns from Outer Space and I think also some scary stories from Unsolved Mysteries (remember that gem of a show?). All in all, it was fun to enjoy the atmosphere and the holiday spirit. Saturday night we celebrated Brian's sister's one year anniversary at her boutique, Luscious Soul in Thousand Oaks. She does such a great job picking out clothes, house decorations, jewelry and all sorts of fun stuff. I was in heaven. Brian bought me a beautiful bracelet and I scored myself a black day dress with wrap belt (so perfect for my strolls around 3rd st.). She's done such an amazing job with the store and everyone was out to support. Afterwards we had to head down to Newport Beach for an Christmas Party with some friends. Tina and Matt, the hosts, have been fixing up their home for the past year and the work really paid off. It looks incredible. After that festive jaunt, we stayed the night at Mike and Mel's house so we can all head down to the Charger game together for Sunday Funday. We won, so of course made for a great day and we also managed to see a web video celebrity ("What What in the Butt" music video featured on Tosh.0).
Needless to say, we had a fun weekend but definitely were exhausted. Just starting to get back in the swing of things and thankfully so as B and I have a three day weekend to spend in San Diego. Here we go again. :)

Blurry, but wanted you to see the scary festive stilt walkers

-J

Christmas Soiree

Christmas season was officially started last Saturday as we gathered together our friends for a little shindig. We had so much fun. Well to be quite honest, too much fun. I'm pretty sure I blinked and it was 4:30 in the morning. There were so many laughs especially with the white elephant gift exchange, spontaneous dancing all over the place and drinks were spilled everywhere, but all in good fun. The girls did a fabulous job of decorating, the tree looked perfect. My favorite part of the night though was when I got to hand out my homemade gifts to my friends. It meant a lot to me and I think that they all really liked them (can't explain more as there are a few more to be given out). It makes me want to make my gifts every year since I had such a good time creating them and it gave me more enjoyment to give. I will share more about them once they're all out in the open. :)
There were more people later, but we didn't really use the camera once the party was in full swing:

The girls

The boys

My gifts all wrapped and ready to go

-J

Rocking Around A Non-Existant Christmas Tree

Source

I went with my friend Lindsay on Tuesday night to get the Christmas tree for the girls' apartment to get ready for the party. I am a die-hard Noble Fir tree buyer, Douglas Firs be damned (sorry if you like those kind, just not my cup of tea). This year however there was a new type of tree that popped up: a Nordman Fir. Apparently this tree is popular in Europe, but I had never heard of it. Basically all I can gather is that it looks like a high quality Noble Fir. Love! The needles have almost a sheen to them and it is very strong and full. Honestly, I don't think the two of us could have picked out a better tree (and trust me, we have bought a couple trees together and have run the gamut).  While we were there, I saw a couple taking home a cute 3' - 4' tree. I wasn't going to get one for Brian and I, but I'm thinking that this was pretty doable and am now making plans in my head to pick one up this weekend.

-J

Thanksgiving Love

Hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving. I got to spend time with my mom and sister which was nice (the two and a half hour traffic to get down there, not so nice). Of course there was yummy food and drinks although my sweet potato dish turned out very lackluster. I will definitely try something else next year. After the food, I rolled myself to the car and drove up to pet-sit at my Dad's house. Always so fun for me to be surrounded by animals and fortunately Blinky, their cat, was ready to have some love and comfort from me. Every time I sat down she wanted to be right there with me. Moving around once I was sitting was not prohibited and I was given quick, snappy meows each time I tried. I even got the evil eye when I turned the pages loudly on the catalog I was trying to look at. But oh how I loved every minute of it. The boys (their two dogs) were giving me the cutest looks and did their best sleepy, can't-get-out-of-bed-in-the-morning snuggles in the morning. It was so much fun, hope I get to head down there again soon.

-J

My New Walking Destination

 

 

West Elm finally opened! It's only a couple blocks away and just in time for the holiday season. Yes, I went there on the day that it opened and it was magical. I slowly walked around, looked at each piece and mentally put it in my imaginary home. So much fun! I thought that maybe they would have a grand opening special going on to celebrate, but that wasn't happening so in turn my purchasing wasn't happening either, haha. Oh well, it was one of the best walks I've taken in a long time (so much sights to see). 

 

My New Walking Destination by jillianso on polyvore.com

-J

New website addiction

 
Since my shopping is limited these days, I found a website to curb my urge. Polyvore lets me create "sets", basically I can put together outfits and designs to create something like the above. Makes layout design a piece of cake. Loving this! And it can post straight to the blog. You can bet that there will be more of these in the future. 


-J

You say it's your birthday

One way to make me automatically happy is to employ some trivia gaming tools. My birthday was on Saturday and my amazing friends took me to a new (to me) restaurant called Vodvil. Guess what? They have game night every single night and on top of that, they have some pretty darn yummy food. I was in heaven. They have a moderator that organizes the games and you break up into groups of 2, 3 or 4. So much fun to have different groups in our party tie a round, so then a member of the groups has to go on stage and answer the tiebreaker question under the spotlight. My group knocked the "name as many movies as you can that feature Brad Pitt" game out of the park! So proud! Haha. All this industry work has paid off for something. This is a place that I will definitely be returning to (and will be sure to get that mac n' cheese).

Tie Breaker

The old roomies

I have the best friends!!
-J