instagram love

I need to express my instagram love for a second here. I'm totally smitten with it.
(sidenote: I'm rounding up my favorite iphone apps for a different post but i thought instagram deserved its own.)
At first, I just used it to take photos and put fun filters on them but then I realized the whole social networking part of it is the most fun. It's like twitter with photos. An exclusive little iphone community!

Not to mention, the filters are the best of any iphone camera app i've used so far. And the tilt shift feature is really fun to play with.








The best part, its free. Need I say more??

If you don't have instagram, get it! And if you do, come find me and lets be instagram friends. My username is vanillaandlace.

yesterday was my favorite day in a long time

The sun was shining.
We browsed around powells.
Ate at the foodcarts on 10th and alder.
ate a doughnut.
relaxed at home on the couch.
took a long walk around our neighborhood.
all while having long talks about the past and the future
it was pretty perfect..





bbq sandwich for him

spinach and pesto crepe for me.



oreo doughnut. maybe overkill... or maybe the best doughnut ever.




this is my favorite house in our neighborhood. i want to live in it.

from last week

1. breakfast - greek yogurt with granola
2. his favorite spot in the house
3. afternoon lounging
4. kale chips in the making
5. lunch - quinoa, feta, asparagus, kale chips
6. left-over wings = messy husband
7. sweet baby calvin. (he's growing too fast)

soda dates

Josh and i discovered a soda place a few blocks down from our house that has become one of our favorite simple date places. (sidenote: we've been going on lots of fun dates lately, making up for lost time!) Now I'm not a soda drinker in terms of regular soda (ie: coke, sprite, ect) but i love me a specialty soda, made with cane sugar and natural flavors like juice (what a concept!). One of my favorites is Dry soda, i LOVE the lavender one. The one below was lemongrass and it was also great.

We went again yesterday and i got Thomas kemper bumble berry, with hints of honey and vanilla.. SO GOOD!





josh has been working his way through all the different orange cream sodas. (..boring)

p.s. have i mentioned how awesome it is to have him home.. i'm on cloud 9 all the time.

a few things...

Just dropping in to say hello!

I am proud to say our little house is finally organized and everything is in its place. I wanted to be done by the time josh got here and I really pushed it to the deadline (he'll be here tomorrow!).
I'm still in the process of decorating and making it home (it takes time and i'm okay with that) but what a huge sigh of relief that there's not piles in every corner.

Also, I'm putting together a little couponing post. I'm kind of addicted to it right now and i wanted to share some of the awesome deals i've got and show you its not just getting 500 candy bars and bottles of ketchup for free every month. So that'll be up soon!

Hope all you mothers had a happy mothers day!

healthier banana bread

I had a huge banana bread craving for the past few weeks but since i was "off" sugar i thought i should wait to make it. Well, last week I had bananas begging to be used and I figured I could sub something natural for the sugar so thats what I did! This is the first thing i've baked in the new house.. actually, i think it's the first thing i've baked since i moved (January). crazy...

(the muffin pan and liners are from ikea. they make the cutest tall and skinny muffins)

3 or 4 ripe bananas, smashed
1/3 cup canola oil
3/4 - 1 cup honey (or agave... or sugar)
1 egg, beaten
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 teaspoon baking soda
Pinch of salt
1 1/2 cups of all-purpose flour

Preheat the oven to 350°F With a wooden spoon, mix oil into the mashed bananas in a large mixing bowl. Mix in the honey, egg, and vanilla. Sprinkle the baking soda and salt over the mixture and mix in. Add the flour last, mix. Pour mixture into oiled muffin pan (or loaf pan if making a loaf). Bake muffins for 18-20 minutes, (if baking a loaf about 1 hour). Cool on a rack.

spring

There has been some really amazing spring days here lately... (don't be fooled, they are few and far between.. it's mostly grey and drizzly) I try to take advantage of the sunshine whenever possible and take strolls around the neighborhood and one day i walked to the cute ice cream shop a few blocks down and had a couple scoops by myself.. (have i mentioned i'm ready for josh to be home..getting ice cream by yourself is pretty depressing!)

The house is finally completely unpacked.. and mostly organized. I even managed to get a few of the DIY's done last week. Now I'm just focusing on getting it decorated and feeling homey. I'm pretty much starting from scratch as far as decor so it'll be awhile before it really is done they way i want.. but it'll get there! I actually bought rachels style your space e-course and it has been worth every penny. So much useful info in there! I'd highly recommend it if you want a cute space but don't quite know how to pull it all together.

p.s. josh will be here in two weeks. countdown is on!

cupcake head

Going baby pink all over is something i've been wanting to do for awhile with my hair. I've secretly been stashing pictures from the internet of gals that have done it (or wigs) and i rediscovered them about a month ago and decided since I'm planning on going dark the beginning of May I thought I might as well go for the pink while i have the plain palette. So here it is. I'll probably be keeping it for a couple weeks... just in time for easter, yeah? It's fun to have. Little girls everywhere want to talk to me now.

I took these pictures yesterday right before heading out to lunch with chelsea and another lovely (blog-less) lady. We ate at blossoming lotus, then after talking about how we should cut back on sugar, we decided nah, forget it and went to get some frozen yogurt. It was the best i've had in a long time.. red velvet mixed with peanut butter with lots of mochi of course. Then we shopped around at some local vintage shops. Pretty perfect afternoon, yes?