Ombre nails

Tried an ombre mani today, inspired by the one found at this site. First, I painted two coats of the silver color, then I added the black at the tips with a make-up application sponge, darker at the tips.

Finally...

...finished a book that I have been working on for a loooooong time! It's The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot. As a person whose interests lean toward the biological and medical, it was a fascinating read for me. It is about the life of Henrietta Lacks, the woman whose cells were taken, regrown, and used world-wide for research without her knowledge or her family's (for many years). Although there were some slow parts, it was definitely a good reminder that the patient's interests ought to be held above all else where scientific progress is concerned.

Felt so good to finally finish a book I had been working on for about a month, especially considering 99% of my reading consists of chapters in textbooks. Oh well, back to that in just a few days. Bought my textbooks for this semester, costing more than just a pretty penny!

Date night hair

Out for a date night tonight! Didn't have long to do my hair so I went with this option. Here's how to do it:

Braid one side of the hair, first in a French braid then a normal braid. Secure it at the end with a hair tie.

Twist the other side into a bun, and secure it as well.

Wrap the braid around the bun, then hold it in place with bobby pins around the braid.

...and here's the final product!

Wax fiasco

So, the other day when I was packing up to return to Boulder for school I had absolutely all of my clothing laid out on the floor of my room. I walked in with a lovely, big, three-wick candle that had been burning for a few minutes and tripped. Wax went EVERYWHERE! It covered pretty much every piece of clothing and shoe that I own. So instead of spending the day packing up, I spent it wiping wax off of every possible surface.

It wiped off of almost everything relatively easily, but the worst damage was to a pair of light brown leather boots that weren't even four months old:

This is what they looked like, post-splatter.

I tried it all. I froze them in the hopes of hardening the wax and scraping it off, I ironed them through a brown paper bag. Nothing. Since it seemed like I could only go up from there, I decided to cover them completely with wax, essentially dying them darker completely with the residue.

This, the problematic candle, actually smells amazing and can be found here (Goji Berry). As unhappy as I am with it right now, it is still one of my all-time favorite scents. 

So I lit the candle, dipped a paintbrush in it, and began to wax every inch of my boots. It was one of the strangest experiences I've had lately.

Here is a boot, waxed up. Darker already!

In order to prevent the boots from getting too dark, I placed them in a plastic bag and put that bag in the freezer about an hour after I waxed them. 

Super nervous to see the result, I was pleasantly surprised when I opened the bag and scraped off the excess wax. Here is what I ended up with, I even like them better now! Whew!

Cheese blintzes

Made some amazing cream cheese blintzes with my Mama. Lots of fun to make, and ended up being the perfect mix of sweet and not too sweet. Basically they consisted of crepes, with a cheese filling, and a blueberry compote on top. We started with the recipe from here and came up with the blueberry compote on our own:

Crepes:

1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour

2 cups milk

3 T butter, melted

2 T granulated sugar

2 eggs

1/2 t. vanilla

1/2 t. baking powder

1/2 t. salt

additional butter (for pan)

Combine all the ingredients and blend until smooth. The batter will be thin.

Heat a 10-inch pan to medium, add a thin layer of butter, and pour 1/3 of a cup of batter into the pan. Rotate the pan to spread the batter into a thin layer, and let it cook until lightly brown. Flip the crepe and brown the other side.

Filling:

1 cup cottage cheese

1 cup softened cream cheese

1/4 cup powdered sugar

1/4 t. vanilla

Combine the ingredients and mix. The filling won't become smooth, even if blended.

Spoon 2-3 tablespoons of filling into the middle of a crepe and fold up the sides.

Once all blintzes are complete, it's compote time. 

 Blueberry compote:

1 1/2 cup blueberries

1/3 cup granulated sugar

3 tbsp water

1 tsp lemon juice

Combine all ingredients in a small saucepan. Heat until bubbling.

To serve: heat the blintz and cover with warm compote, powdered sugar, and whipped cream. Then enjoy!

Home-made headbands

Re-purposed an old t-shirt to make two headbands today!

Cut the t-shirt like so...

Simply twisted the thicker, bottom loop into a figure-8

And placed it around my head. End result :)

Cut the top three loops along one seam and stretched them so the ends curled

Tied a knot in one end and braided the strands until they made a band that fit around my head

Put the knot on one end of the braid through the braid to keep it in place

End result #2 :)

Spiced tea cakes

Got this new bundt and candy pan for Christmas and have been dying to try it out!

How cute are these little shapes?

Anyways, searched for spiced tea cake recipes online and ended up working off of this one and adding some extra spices. Here's how I made them:

• 1 cup butter, softened
• 1 1/2 cups sugar
• 3 eggs
• 1 tablespoon vanilla extract
• 3 cups all-purpose flour
• 1 tablespoon baking powder
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 1/4 teaspoon cloves
• 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
• 1/2 teaspoon nutmeg

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees Fahrenheit.

Cream together the butter and sugar.

Beat in the eggs and the vanilla.

In a separate bowl, mix the flour, baking powder, and salt. Add this to the butter mixture.

Add the cloves, cinnamon, and nutmeg.

I put the batter into my pan, but if you don't have one like this you can just drop teaspoon-sized amounts on a greased baking pan. Bake for about 8 minutes.

Mine overflowed a bit while baking, so I scraped off the top layer when it had cooled and ended up with some extra cookie-like creations that aren't quite as pretty to look at but are still super delicious, especially with powdered sugar sprinkled on top.

Here are the final spiced tea cakes, with a mixture of granulated sugar and cinnamon sprinkled on top. They turned out better than I could have anticipated, and they taste just as good as they look!