Birchbox

Hey, y'all!

I just wanted to tell y'all about a little box of awesome I'm starting to get every month.
It is called Birchbox, and it contains beauty products and samples. You pay $10 a month and receive it in the mail. It's like Christmas every month!

This is the first month I have gotten it. For the month of March, Birchbox teamed up with TeenVogue and let the editors pick what went in the box for the month.

Inside was the following:

• Sample of hair serum
• Essie nail polish
• Lip gloss/moisturizer
• A TwistBand
• Sample of Twirl perfume
• Discount for TeenVogue
• Discount for ModCloth

I like being able to try out products :) I'm not sure if it will always be this type of stuff since it was picked by TeenVogue, but I'll find out next month!

If you like something in the box, you can go to the Birchbox website and purchase it. Most of the things in the box are samples, but some (like the nail polish and lip gloss) are full-sized. They offer full sizes of every product in the box.

If you are interested in learning more about it or getting it, go here!

(I am not affiliated with or compensated by Birchbox)

Just thought I'd share!

Xoxo, 

E

Orlando 2012

I figured it was about time I got my Disney trip pics and stuff on here! I've just been so busy within hours of getting back to Baton Rouge from our trip. I won't be able to put all of the pictures in the blog, so check Facebook for those. Anyway, here we go! (Click the pictures to make them larger)

Before I go into day-by-day stuff, here's some of the stuff I bought:
Super cute keychain! It's an "E" with Mickey on it, and it's brushed nickel looking.
A Minnie Mouse skirt apron! I've been wanting an apron, and it was just too cute. I would have bought an entire Mickey and Minnie kitchen set if I could and it wasn't such a cheesy thing to do.
A vintage-style Minnie Mouse ears cap!
I bought Clay an R2D2 Mickey Mouse ears cap, haha.
A little "Vinylmation"- it's little figures shaped like Mickey, but they are all painted different things. They had an "occupations" series, so I bought a teacher one that had an apple painted head, and a books painted body. I got Clay one that is computer themed, since that's what he is studying.
We got Mickey & Minnie Princess Leia and Luke Skywalker.
And a cute scarf! It's white with green polka dots, and some of the dots are really Mickeys.
I can't think if I bought anything else...

DAY ONE
On Friday night, Clay and I arrived in Orlando where his aunt picked us up. It was after 11 PM, so we didn't do anything too exciting. We stayed our first three night at a hotel off of Disney grounds. That's about it...

DAY TWO
On this morning, we had awesome breakfast! It was at this Greek restaurant (at the Boardwalk, if I remember correctly). Clay's aunt let me taste her waffle, and it was the best waffle I've ever had.  Saturday was our first day in a park! We went to Epcot! We rode pretty much all of the rides and shows and whatnot. My fave ride there is Mission Space... intense version of course! We spent a good bit of times in the countries. That's probably what makes me like Epcot so much. All the culture they imitate there is awesome. Clay and I got matching-ish shirts haha. I wasn't aware, since I haven't seen it in about ever, that Snow White was based in Germany. In the Germany gift shop, they had shirts that (in English) said "I Know a Little German" with one of the seven dwarfs on it. Mine has Dopey, and his has Grumpy. PERFECT. It also said the same thing on the back, but in German.

Greek breakfast

Our shirts!

That night, we ate at the Ale House and just relaxed a bit.



DAY THREE
Sunday morning, we went to Property Control. That's where only cast members can go and buy Disney items at a discounted price either because it is slightly defective or isn't selling well. We got a few things there- nothing defective! My favorite is the SUPER soft blanket Clay bought. It might go missing from his house.
We spent the day in Universal Studios and Island of Adventure! Guess what Island of Adventure has!? HARRY POTTER WORLD. It was our third time going on it. Still just as amazing. I love that ride. GO RIDE IT.
Anyway, if I've ever had a Cinnabon cinnamon roll, I can't remember. So I just HAD to get Cinnabon from the City Walk thing at Universal... it was my first one as far as I know. It wasn't bad, but it wasn't fresh. Sort of a let down :(
I love universal because most of the rides are thrill rides. The only problem was that Superman was down for refurbishment, and Rip Ride Rock-It was down just cause it a lot-- and that's one of my favorite rides. Of course, it opened AS we were leaving, and even with our FastPass, we would have had to wait a pretty long time to ride it.
We ate lunch at Finnegan's-- and Irish pub/restaurant-- and that was pretty good. I got my Cinnabon, Clay got his fish&chips.
That night, we went to the bar at the Ale House again. I was stuffed from lunch still, but Clay and his aunt got really good wings and beer!

DAY FOUR
Monday, we switched from the off-grounds hotel to the Animal Kingdom Lodge. Clay and I treated ourselves with this stay :) It was so amazing to have the animals right outside the window. Even the inside of the hotel was so well decorated and very, very nice. If I could afford to, I'd stay there every single time. LOVED IT.

At the Animal Kingdom Lodge

The room

We spent the day in Hollywood Studios. I still have a hard time not calling it MGM. We had lunch at the Sci-Fi Drive in Theater. It was so cool! We say in little cars in a dark-ish room and watched old black and white clips on a big movie screen as we ate. The food was pretty good, too!

     

 


Even though Mardi Gras is usually not very busy at all at Disney, it was President's Day weekend so a LOT of families were there for the three-day weekend. We didn't get to ride Rock-N-Roller Coaster of Tower of Terror. I love the coaster and finally prepared myself to ride Tower of Terror for the first time. I was actually bummed for once that we couldn't ride it.

That night we ate at Victoria and Albert's- the night we were looking forward to the whole trip. If you haven't heard of Victoria and Albert's, it's a very very fancy (therefore, expensive) restaurant in the Grand Floridian Resort. When you eat there, you can eat at the Chef's table (table where you interact with the chef the entire time), Queen Victoria's Room (which only has 4 tables), or the regular dining room. The first two include 10-course meals. The latter is a six-course meal.
We ate in Queen Victoria's Room. There was only one other table reserved and they wound up cancelling, so Clay and I had a romantic dinner to ourselves in the cozy room by the fireplace. We had two servers, a husband and wife. They were so fantastic. It was being treated like royalty.

The lamb! Our favorite course.

We also got a personalized copy of our menu. In the actual leather-bound menu they presented us with at the beginning of dinner, they had a sheet with our names and it said "Happy Anniversary!" Clay told them it was our anniversary even though it is really May 18 haha. Although, we did make 21 months a few nights before...

        

The menus

They also gave me a single rose that had it's own mini watering vase, and a little breakfast cake for the next morning.
The meal was a little over $200 for each of us, not including Clay's alcoholic beverages. It was BY FAR the best food either of us had EVER eaten. Even though each course was generally just a few bites each, those bites added up quick. I can't believe I nearly completed every single one of them. Unfortunately, the awesomeness of all the different flavors and foods I had never had before didn't settle too well with my stomach. I got sick, but it was still totally worth it. I would highly recommend doing it at least once. It was such an awesome experience. If we go back, we will definitely stick with the six-course meal!

After dinner, we watched the Magic Kingdom fireworks from the Grand Floridian Marina. It had a perfect view of the backside of the castle. We got to enjoy the fireworks with very few people around. It was nice!

After fireworks, we went back to MGM because they had Extra Magic Hours until 1 AM. We had a FastPass to ride Toy Story since we didn't get to earlier, so I got to ride it for the first time and I loved it! Even with the Extra Magic Hours, we didn't ride Tower of Terror... I wasn't feeling so hot. Toy Story alone mixed me up. I will definitely ride it next time though! We did the walking museum-like tour of Walt Disney's life. It was really interesting. Now I want to read a biography on him!

At 1 AM, we went to the hotel and crashed.

DAY FIVE
Tuesday, we got up and went to Magic Kingdom. I love this park because it has more rides, and my favorite- SPACE MOUNTAIN! I can't get enough of that ride. Except we could only ride it once. We each wore a Mardi Gras shirt and saw a lot of other folks doing the same! We walked around and rode a good bit of rides.

The Buzz Lightyear Ride

Fantasyland being built in Magic Kingdom

We left a little early to go shower for dinner. We went Downtown and did a little shopping/walking around, the went to dinner at Portobello. It was awful. The food sucked, and the waitress was even worse. It got a 10 star rating, so hopefully it was just a bad night. Not to mention, I was pretty much falling asleep at the table haha, so that didn't help. Needless to say, we went to the hotel and crashed for the last night.

Before dinner!

DAY SIX
Our last day :( We got up packed, then checked out. We then went to Shades of Green, a really nice Military/Golf resort right next to Magic Kingdom. They had a military store where you could buy stuff tax free. It is the only store you can get Mickey affiliated with any military branch! I bought Clay a nice polo that had Mickey and it said USAF Orlando on it. He also bought one for his pops.

After that, we went back to the Animal Kingdom Lodge to eat at Sanaa. I urge EVERYONE to go eat there the next time you go to Disney World! It is an African restaurant with awesome, flavorful food. Clay has eaten there a few times, and I had eaten there once before. It's both of our favorite restaurant at Disney World. Just go try it! You also get a view of the Savanna while you eat. We got a window table, and a beautiful bird was by our window the whole time. He was a cool dude. Three or four zebras got pretty close, too. Our waitress was cool-- she was nice and had an accent. The waiter for the table next to us was from Baton Rouge!

Our view at lunch

After our lunch, we went to spend our last day at Animal Kingdom. There aren't too many rides there, so we got to ride them all. We actually rode Mount Everest twice. I really wanted to see The Lion King performance, and we did :) So cool. It was a nice park to spend our last day in. The crowds had died down a bit, and it is a more relaxed park to go to.
Then, we went to the hotel and caught a bus to the airport. Sad stuff. Our plane got delayed like an hour... so we didn't get to NOLA till late, then had to go to Slidell and get the pup and my car, then go to Baton Rouge. Got into BR around 1 and went to bed around 2.

You can see all of the pictures on Facebook!

Back to liiife, back to realityyyy.... BOOO.

Love you all :)
Xoxo,
E

Happy Valentine's Day! And such...

Hi y'all!

I have some exciting things to tell! Well, they're exciting to me anyway.

This morning, Clay gave me the coolest V-Day gift ever. And it's perfect cause we are both nerds. I, like many others, am IN LOVE with the Hunger Games series. If you've read it, you can look at the gift and immediately know what the relation of my gift to the series is. If you haven't read it.. well... you really need to because it's amazing. And then you would totally get my gift.

Hunger Games necklace

I also went to Chick Fil A before work today to get a drink, and they gave me this beautiful carnation!

After work, Clay and I went to my apartment where I cooked him a meal.  He didn't know what it was until it came out of the oven! I made Chicken Rollatini with gnocchi. It was gooood. If you don't know what Chicken Rollatini is, I'd be happy to tell you! It's chicken breast and a combination of ricotta, mozzerella, and spinach all rolled together. It's coated in breadcrumbs, then topped with a yummy tomato sauce and melted mozzerella cheese. YUM!

For dessert, we went to the always delish Melting Pot. We got the Banana Foster chocolate to dip in. The Melting Pot never disappoints. And I have like three pictures of Clay and me because... I wanted my whole outfit shown hahah. And... a cute picture and a goofy one (on Clay's part at least).        

Now, we are ending the night doing homework. Reality is such a drag... but I'm escaping just a little longer to write this entry!


Okay, onto other exciting news. On Monday night, I finally found out who my big is! Correction: bigs. Yes, I was blessed with two! The lovely Cally and Elise are my big sisters, and they are fabulous. I'm so excited to be in this with them! Once I get the pics from one of them, I'll add them :)


AND GUESS WHAT ELSE, Y'ALL!!! Our formal is just a little over a month away, and it is at the amazing Nottoway Plantation!!!  I've never actually been, but I've fallen in love with the place just through pictures. Also, I have a reason to buy a new pretty dress. Yay!

Well, that about wraps up the excitement for the past few days.
Except, of course, that Clay and I leave for Disney/Universal/maybe Busch Gardens in JUST 3 DAYS!

Love you all!
Xoxo,
E

P.S. You can click on each picture to make it bigger!

Happy Birthday to Me!

Hey, y'all!

So, last Friday was my birthday. I didn't do anything super exciting, but I did have a great day!
My mom and Margaret came and met me in Baton Rouge for lunch and shopping. We ate at Bravo which is always delicious! I bought a dress but that was all... mainly because I had a gift card to Forever 21 and can't really spend much before Disney. I really enjoyed seeing both of them and it was fun!

That night, Clay and I drove into Slidell and had a late dinner at Copeland's with my parents. Of course, that was delicious too! And on top of that, Clay brought in a "Fresh Strawberry Cake" from Ambrosia bakery in Baton Rouge. IT. WAS. AWESOME. The icing had strawberries in it, and the cake itself was just so good. If you're ever in Baton Rouge, I'd suggest going to that bakery. Everything they have there is just fantastic.

I didn't really want to be in the picture...

As far as presents go, I asked my parents to pay for my Universal Studios ticket as my gift... and they are! That's such a big help. Clay got me this leather bag I fell in love with from Versona (new fave store), and painter's palette charm for my Pandora bracelet, and the TOMS I wanted! My first pair were worn to holes and my second pair was destroyed by Elwood. I was SO happy with everything! He always gets the best gifts.
   

The charm!

Bag and TOMS from Clay!

A few family members gave me money... which is amazing! I really needed some more for my trip :)


Earlier this week, I took a little stroll to see Mike the Tiger. I'm going to do this more often. Why not take advantage of having a pet tiger?! He's pretty lazy during the day. He usually sleeps in the same corner, like he was doing today. He's more active at night, so I'll have to drag my roommate with me to go see him one night!

Sleepy pants.

Monday, I had my Chapter meeting. All the pledges got surprise gifts from our "Bigs," but we don't know who they are yet! I got this cute little bulletin board and lamb pillow-pet (the lamb is our symbol). I'm anxious to know who my Big is! I have to wait until next Monday to find out.

Early in January, I won a prize pack from the awesome company Nylabone that contains $200 worth of their products for Elwood. I've been waiting for a few weeks for them to come in and, alas, they have arrived! Elwood is an insanely intense chewer, and they are one of few brands that makes toys durable enough for him (so they aren't cheap either...). We got 8 toys, two large boxes of Nutri-Dent treats, and a smaller bag of treats. That may not seem like a lot for $200, but Nylabone's prices have to be a little high for how durable they are.  Winning this was definitely a blessing. Look, he's so happy!

         

                                                            



And, last but not least, I sold another Star Wars painting! This person only wanted Yoda... and I'm cool with that because I don't really have the time or energy at the moment to do all six. Yay, sales!

XoXo,
-E

The latest

Hello, hello!

There hasn't been too much going on, but I'll blog anyway just in case someone else finds this stuff exciting! Each little section is about something different, so don't be confused when I go from babies to Star Wars...

As you know, I don't have siblings. This obviously means no nieces or nephews for me unless I marry into that. That basically sucks 'cause I love babies.
Well, Clay's sister, Niki, and her husband, Steve, are expecting a baby in June! I am SO excited even though I'm not even related :)
We have all been waiting to know the sex of the baby, and on Thursday of last week we finally found out! They had a "reveal" party at Clay and Niki's parents' house. Niki baked cupcakes that contained either pink or blue icing in the middle of it. To find out what the sex of the baby was, we bit into the cupcake to see the color of the icing! I have seen something similar to this on Cake Boss and thought it was a fantastic idea. It was really fun, too! Annnnd....

IT'S A BOY!

I did finally finish all of the Star Wars paintings for my Etsy sale on Saturday! I'm hoping to sell some more!

     

 

I also added two more characters to my collection (and I made the pattern for them all on my own which is really exciting!)-- Han Solo and Obi Wan Kenobi! They haven't been painted yet, though.


Clay and I have crazy schedules that don't usually meet up, so we did my birthday dinner last night. He took me to Ruth's Chris! And it was absolutely amazing. I hadn't ever been before. I just can't get over how delicious everything was. For an appetizer we had barbequed shrimp. I got steak and mac&cheese, then they brought out a chocolate moose/cheesecake thing for my birthday. It was awesome! I have a wonderful boyfriend :)

             

The thing I am MOST excited about is that I leave for Disney World with my love in 17 DAYS!!! According to the countdown widget, it's 16 days. But that's a tease. We don't even leave until 5 PM on the 17th, so I feel like I (unfortunately) have to count that day, too. We have some awesome plans, and I just cannot contain my excitement. We will be there during Mardi Gras, so I bought one of the cheesy large-striped purple, green, and gold polo shirts to represent.

That's pretty much all that has been going on lately other than the dreadful school and work.  See you later!

XoXo,
E

Phi Lamb Rush! And other news.

Hey y'all!

So, I finished rush for Phi Lamb! I don't have all the pictures yet... someone else took the pictures from the first night (the mock meeting) and the Progressive Dinner night. I'll add those if and when I get them.  I do have some from the 80's party though!

For the progressive dinner, we all separated into small groups and carpooled to different Active's apartments. It was a really good social event- I met A LOT of girls I still hadn't met. We had wraps, veggies, dip, pinwheels, and then we all met up again to eat ice cream. It was a lot of fun.

First stop in the dinner! Some actives and new pledges.
My "Lamb Pal" was Louann, on the far left in front

On commitment night, there was an 80's party. That was fun too. We had to do a little bingo type game in which we had a small sheet of paper with different squares, each containing something like "eye color" or "major." We had to go around and find a different girl for each square that shared the quality that square said. It was also a really good way to meet other girls. Everyone looked awesome in the costumes, too. They played 80's music for the longest time and we all somehow found a way to dance to it. It was just a really good bonding time for all of us. All the pledges (that's me) got to leave with a little picture frame with our letters on it. AND WE ATE CANE'S! I love Cane's :D

Everyone's really into singing I Don't Want to Miss a Thing

Julia, Camryn, and Me

Camryn and Me! (I know Camryn from my dorm
last year)

Julia and me in front of our letters

All I have left to do is a "tea party."  Each girl who wants to pledge meets at PJ's coffee for an interview to meet some of the execs.  After that, I'm an official pledge! Mine is today at 2:30 PM.

In other news: I woke up sick yesterday morning. I feel like I'm ALWAYS sick. If Clay and I ever have kids, they're totally screwed between my immune system and his allergies.

Tonight, I'm going to try to knock out at least half of the six Star Wars paintings I have to do by the weekend... Thank goodness I don't work until Friday so I have some time after school to do this! (If you're lost on what the heck I'm talking about, I painted a set of six Star Wars character paintings for Clay a little while ago, then listed them on Etsy as made-to-order. Someone on Etsy bought the whole set!)

More later...
XoXo
-E

I'm gonna be a Phi Lamb!

Hey y'all!

I know blogs without pictures are boring- and this one is going to be a long one. PLEASE bear with me.

Most of you don't know this, but last night I started rushing for a sorority- Sigma Phi Lambda.
Before you're all "oh my goodness, she's going wild and will be drunk in bars all the time throwing away her opportunity for an awesome education," let me just tell you that this sorority is a Non-Panhellenic sorority, meaning it's the exact opposite of the sororities we all know. (PAUSE: I HAVE AMAZING FRIENDS WHO ARE IN SORORITIES AND ARE NOT PART OF THE STEREOTYPE- AND I LOVE YOU GIRLS!) This sorority does not require you to meet with a bunch of frat guys at a bar each week, spend a million dollars on meaningless things, or run around being chased by people trying to freeze you with ice water. This is a sorority for girls to get together and have fun without all the ignorant frat guys or pitchers of beer. The motto of Sigma Phi Lambda is "Sisters for the Lord."

Warning: I hate typing things sometimes because it sounds different than I think it would if I were speaking it aloud. It's going to sound like I am going on some religious tangent, but I'm not. Don't get me wrong, some people are very very religious, and I admire them for that. That just isn't me, and I don't want it to appear like I'm going through some crisis because most of you have never heard me open up about these things. I also don't want to come off ashamed of my beliefs. It's hard to explain- just understand I love God and I practice in my own ways that I find comfortable.

I decided to this because I honestly don't feel like I have anyone around me that feels the way I do when it comes to God. I am not the type of person to shove it down anyone's throat, and I'm not super religious either. I don't have very strong views about any of it. But, I am a Christian. I simply believe in God and want to be in touch with him. When I put myself through the Aldersgate United Methodist Church youth group and services, I always felt so much better just being there. There were plenty of times I went there just to hang out. Religion wouldn't even come up in conversation, but I knew I was home there. When I left Slidell for LSU, I lost touch with my faith. This gives me the opportunity to meet a bunch of girls that feel the exact same way I do. They don't just get together and talk about God every single second (we do that, just not every time). They do activities and plan events, but it's with a group of people that are so full of love and will never judge, and it's all in the Lord's name.

Well, last night (the first night of rush) was a mock Chapter meeting like the ones I will have to go to every Monday. As soon as I walked into that room, I knew that I was home. I've kind of been feeling a void in my life lately. I knew immediately that I was exactly where I belonged.

I have two more events before I am an official pledge of Sigma Phi Lambda. Tonight, we have a progressive dinner. I LOVE progressive dinners! Monday night is commitment night, but it's an informal party that's 80's themed. HOLLA!

I'll be sure to take lots of pictures, and on Monday I'll put a new post with all the details!
Again, I'm so sorry I have this really boring picture-less blog. It'll get better, I promise!

Till then...

XoXo,
E