Valentine's Day - Rough Days Can Have Sweet Endings

My life may seem perfect to some people because I mostly don't post about my life problems but like every other normal person out there my life is a roller coaster filled with ups and downs.

Unfortunately, the day before Valentine's Day, I got into a stupid fight with my fiance all due to my lack of communication skills. We didn't even talk until 4pm on V-day.

When we finally had the chance to talk, we discussed our feelings for about an hour and talked about what we could do different in the future.

Ugh...first fight as fiance and fiance. But it did feel good to be completely open with each other.

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To get our mind off of all the fighting, E.W. cooked us a beautiful meal consisting of lobster tail, crab legs w/butter, crab salad, crab cakes and some white wine.

OMG it was so effin delicious!!

Let me tell you girls, make sure the man you marry knows how to cook. You will have a wonderful life if you both enjoy cooking for each other.


We ate everything. Not a morsel of food was left. The dogs even licked up all of the leftover crumbs and all.

All Goneeeeeee!!!!

Me: Smiles for the camera everyone!!

London: Cheeeeeeese!!

E.W: I still hungry! I eat you next!

E.W. kept blowing on the dripping candle wax until it formed a long wax icicle that almost reached the table!! It was quite hypnotizing watching the icicle form.


And in spirit of the ups and downs on Valentines Day, here are the ups and downs of the men in my life...

Gucci

Cute stuff - He snuggles his chubby tush into the palm of my hand, he lets me make funny noises with my mouth on his tummy, it takes one kiss on his neck to make him the happiest dog in this world, he sleeps between E.W. and I every night.

Not so cute stuff - He protects his momma from the world (because everyone is evil and trying to assassinate mommy), he will eat something disgusting just so London can't eat it, his paws smell like fritos.

London

Cute stuff - he has a snaggletooth, when I lay on my stomach he will take a nap on my back, he sleeps standing up, he does handstands, he loves to kiss and loves to play.

Not so cute stuff - He licks pee off fire hydrants, he swallows tampons, he growls at everything.

E.W.

Cute stuff - He wakes me up every morning with a kiss, he watches girly reality shows with me, he dresses better than most girls, he smells good without cologne, he loves my family, he's hilarious, he is in love with me.

Not so cute stuff - He's a workaholic, we aren't married yet...that's all :)

The good definitely out weighs the bad in all of my men!!!

I hope everyone had a great V-day!!!


Tags: valentine's day, love

Updos With Whirl-a-Style

As a ballerina of 15 years, I can proudly say that the one hairstyle I have worn more than any other has been the bun.

Normally it takes a hair band, tons of bobby pins, and a hair net to make a proper bun. But now there is something new!! Now you only need one product to create the perfect bun.

***Whirl-a-Style***

Whirl-a-Style allows you to create beautiful updo hairstyles in minutes. For this reason, it's very popular with brides and athletes.

Many brides spend hundreds of dollars on their hair and sometimes thousands of dollars on their bridesmaid's hair. Can you imagine how much money you could save if you used the Whirl-a-Style to create different updos for your bridal party?

With all that money saved you could use it on more important things such as your dress or event entertainment :D

It's simple to do too. Follow these four easy steps to make the perfect bun.

Tah-Dah! Perfecto!

I could have totally used this during all those years of ballet and bun making. Best of all, no painful bobby pins sticking in your head and giving you massive headaches.


And don't be afraid to get creative with the Whirl-a-Style!! By simply adding a white flower, I have created an elegant wedding look.

And it cost me zero dollars! :D

To find a store that carries Whirl-a-Style near you - Click Here.

Disclaimer :I received one or more of the products mentioned above for free. Regardless, I only recommend products or services I use personally and believe will be good for my readers.

Wedding Ideas Photo Collage

I have been planning different aspects of my wedding for a long time now. In fact, the Wedding Channel is my favorite channel next to the Food Network. Scary I know...

So now that I am officially engaged, I have started creating my wedding idea photo collages. These will be shown to my future wedding planner whoever he or she may be.

E.W. and I have such similar taste in everything so we have been pretty much agreeing on everything except for the budget. I think his budget in mind..should be doubled..and then it will all be perfect :D

We have both agreed on a chic, white, modern wedding. Imagine walking into a completely white space that is flooded with alternating blue, purple and pink lights.

Crystals will be draping and oozing from every corner of the room. Crystals will be dripping off the wedding cake (ala Sex And The City Movie 2), crystals popping out of my bouquet, and sparkling white branch centerpieces with white flowers and crystals hanging off.

Yep...that'll be my wedding :D

And it'll be stunning baby!!

This has got to be the most stunning wedding dress I have ever seen! There is an interesting story behind finding it.

When E.W. and I were in Athens, Greece a couple of months ago, we were strolling down a popular shopping area when I looked up and my eyes locked onto IT....the dress...the dress I was destined to be married in.

Calia Monoyiou is the designer and she works exclusively out of Athens and Cyprus. I'm pretty sure her dresses are in the $15,000 and up price range but I will try my best to get my dream dress one way or another.

I will find it somewhere in the budget...

So my wedding guests might not get 50 different desserts to sample...Maybe I don't need that ice bar and I can always nix the aerial performer.

The day is 50% about me and I deserve to get the dress of my dreams.

As for the bridesmaid's dresses, I love a shimmery champagne color. It's very sexy, demure and blends well with the light cream color in a wedding dress.

For my cake I want an all white cake with white sugar flowers completely covering the cake. I don't even want to see the cake!!! Not one inch. I want the flowers everywhere!

I'm planning on making the white branch and crystal centerpieces myself. I think it would be a fun project for my bridesmaids and I to bond over. Plus it'll save us money for THE DRESS hehe.

If anyone has good suggestions on how to save money at a wedding please let me know!! As a wedding planning newbie, I could really use some help :D


Tags: wedding, event planning

I Got Engaged In Puerto Rico!

We flew to Puerto Rico... We had a beautiful dinner... We had luck gambling... We took a stroll under the stars... We went up to our hotel suite... He knelt on his knee... He reached into his pocket... I cried on his shoulder... I SAID YES! :D

All of my dreams have come true this weekend. We have made our future marriage official and I am engaged to my soul mate and my best friend.

I am so lucky to be accepted into E.W.'s amazing family and my family welcomes him with open arms.

You + Me = A world of possibilities and dreams coming true.

Puerto Rico was a perfect place for E.W. to propose. This is where we first bonded and where we first began to fall in love.

On our first trip to PR we arrived as two people trying to get to know each other and left inseparable.


This particular trip was no different than any other except for E.W. constantly staring off into space for no apparent reason (reason is obvious now).

E.W. caught up on his work by the pool. He's a workaholic but eh... it pays the bills.

I chowed down on fruit and sipped on strawberry mojitos.

Once in a while we would get a cold drink from our favorite bartender Miguel. He is always there every time we visit PR and we love catching up with him. He usually charges us for only half our drinks so can we be considered Puerto Rico pool bar regulars?

A rare moment is when E.W. orders a beer.

An ever rarer moment is when a beer bubble forms inside the beer bottle. Miguel, a bartender of 30 years, has never even seen such a thing.


The pool bar was a nice place to do a spontaneous photo shoot so we took advantage of the beautiful scenery. It didn't hurt that E.W. is an amazing hobby photographer. Always makes me look my best :D


To all of the people that message me saying how much they love my photos, I want you to know that E.W. is responsible for half of them!


After finding out about E.W.'s plans to propose to me, the hotel offered to upgrade us to their one bedroom suite at no charge. I love El San Juan Hotel!!

The room included a bedroom and two full bathrooms...

A living room area and a corner bar for entertaining.

Every morning we woke up and headed straight to the breakfast buffet. It was a little pricey at $53 but had some wonderful options including my favorites - roasted potatoes, french toast, egg white omelets and doughnuts!


Breakfast was outdoors so these little black birds would sit on our chairs and stalkingly stare at our food.

The second we got up to get more food, a whole army of black would swarm over our tables and pluck the leftovers off our plates.


One birdie got too impatient and stole a Splenda, craft-fully opened it, and started gorging on the sugar inside.

Doesn't he know Splenda can cause cancer?

The day after we got engaged was spent mostly tanning at the beach and staring at my ring while tanning at the beach.


Can someone tell me what this green alien dropping is? It looks like a plant of some sort but has the texture of plastic netting. It was all over the beach.

Just making sure it's not alive...

As a tropical shower cleared up in the afternoon, a beautiful rainbow graced the skies. Call me corny but to me, this signified a new beginning and bright things ahead.

I can't wait to officially start planning our wedding and I think I want to add a wedding section to my blog. :D

P.S. Thank you to all of my friends and family that have been showering us with congratulations and happiness. Love you all xoxo


Tags: lady gagawedding, engagement

Get Hot With Original Red

This is a Sponsored post written by me on behalf of TABASCO® Original Red. All opinions are 100% mine.
Super Bowl is right around the corner and I know everyone has their own special "game day dish". But there's nothing wrong with trying something new.

Whether it be wings, pizza or bar-b-q, everyone has something special they like to eat on Super Bowl Sunday.

Now, I'm not suggesting you to stray away from your special dish. I'm just suggesting you enhance it! With what you may ask? With...

TABASCO® Original Red

TABASCO® Original Red is not about heat for heat’s sake. It’s about what heat does to the flavor of food. The simple combination of salt, red pepper, and vinegar are perfected in a 3-year aging process that produces a hot sauce with the uncanny ability to bring the most out of your food.

Other hot sauces add their own specific flavor to food. TABASCO® Original Red simply enhances the flavor of food.
One of my personal favorite ways to use TABASCO@ Original Red is to put it over pizza. Check out Pizza Perfected for tons of delicious Original Red pizza recipes.
How yummy does this sound....
Prosciutto & Arugula Pizza - Instead of ordering pepperoni, go gourmet with thinly sliced prosciutto. Add it to a plain cheese pizza, along with fresh arugula. Drizzle with equal parts Original TABASCO^® Sauce and olive oil.
That's sure to be a Super Bowl tradition once you try it!Don't forget to check out the Tabasco Game Day Menu page for more delicious things to try.

Puerto Rico Is Heavenly

I spent my entire day in PR lazing around and running away from tropical rains.

Damn tropical rain that comes every hour on the hour.

While E.W. was nice and dry at work, I was running back and forth between the pool bed and my hotel room because the clouds decided to rain in short but violent bursts today.

It wasn't all bad though. I got some color! I'm no longer Casper yay.

Even though there is tons of yummy food all around me, I've been pretty good with what goes in my tummy.

Had an apple for lunch the other day.

Oh look! E.W. got back from work and proceeded to work even more on his laptop!! Surprise surprise.

Best strawberry mojito EVER. And not just ever, but EVER EVER. I wish it had more strawberry pulp though.

Every pool bed has this canvas thingy over it. When it rained, it kinda protected me until the wind started blowing the rain in a diagonal...and right into my face.

Can't live without my morning non-fat latte. Luckily my hotel has not one but TWO Starbux's. They sure know how to cater to us coffee addicts.

I'm planning on a pretty exciting night in Old San Juan tonight. Need to get my beauty nap on.

My First Mobile Blog Post

I'm laying here at the pool in Puerto Rico and I suddenly got the urge to blog. My laptop is all the way back in my hotel room and i don't feel like paying the $15 for internet anyway (well technically E.W. would be paying for it but it's still a rip-off).

Anywho, I started thinking... There has to be a way to blog from my iPhone. I mean, it already does everything else for me such as wakes me up, calls my cabs, pays my bills, reminds me of appointments, takes my pics and vids, entertains me, and so on.

So why not write my blogs on my iPhone when I don't have easy access to my comp???

I googled this and within 5 minutes I setup my gmail account to forward posts to my blog!

Yay now I'm officially a mobile blogger!! There is a downside though. I can only post pics that I have stored on my iPhone most of which have been taken by my phone. And I think I can only add one pic per post. I could be wrong though. I hope I'm wrong. My pics are my eye candy.

Anyway, you like the pic up top? That's currently the gorgeous view behind me. Oh and did I mention I'm typing this on my phone?? Lol

If I end up liking this.. Maybe I'll add a mobile post section!!

This is called ingenuity people!! Ok I need to go work on my tan a.k.a laze around on my pool bed until I get bored.

If something interesting happens, I'll be sure to mobile post ;)

Weird Things I Do

Bathroom
I don't change the toilet roll when it's done. If I finish the roll, I will rest the new roll over the finished one. At one point, E.W. started a toilet paper roll collection to see how many empty rolls I would leave up. I think he got up to 20 rolls before I discovered the hidden collection and threw it away.

Clothes
I put all of my shirts and dresses on feet first. I do this so that I don't mess up my hair and so that my deodorant doesn't get on my clothes.

Sleep
Sometimes I sleep like this. It's a ballet thing.


Taste
I have eaten so many egg white omelets for diet purposes that I no longer like the taste of plain omelets. They taste almost bitter to me.

Food
I will never eat the last bit of food on my plate no matter how good it is.

Touch
I don't let E.W. touch my knee while we are watching TV. It gives me anxiety and I don't know why.

Bathe
I don't shave with shaving cream. The thick foamy texture makes me feel like I'm not getting a close shave. I prefer liquid soap and water.

Photo
I like to take pics of E.W. while he is sleeping. Yes, I know it sounds totally creepy but there is something so angelic about him when his eyes are closed and his mind is wandering.


Steer
Whenever I am pushing a shopping cart, I pretend like I am driving a car and try to stay in the lines of the tile. It's kind of ridiculous if you think about it especially since I don't even have a driver's license.

BH Cosmetics Giveaway & G.I. Jewelz

This Giveaway is over and the winner, based on my favorite comment, is Katie @ Cheep Ideas. Congrats!!!!

I love love love messing around with makeup so when I found out I was getting the BH Cosmetics 120 2nd Edition Shadow Palette to test out, I squealed with delight.

At first, I thought that these eye shadows wouldn't be of great quality because of the amazing price they are sold for. But I came to find out that they are highly pigmented and apply brightly!

They are even better than the brand I currently use. Hmmm, I think I might make a switch here?!?

BH Cosmetics is also supplying one of my beauty savvy blog readers a shadow palette of their very own! Rules to enter the giveaway are below.

This makeup palette is perfect for a color addict who is looking to explore new shades. I'm not too brave when it comes to using colors on my face so this was a perfect excuse to use some daring colors I wouldn't normally use such as greens and blues.

Just look at the beautiful colored rainbowness of it all!


BH Cosmetics has it all. Everything from neutrals to bright yellows and pinks. My favorite has to be the shimmery gray though. Gotta love the smokey eye.

I decided to play around with the green and blue shades of the palette.

Here was my inspiration:

I used a bright green in my highlight area and a shimmery cream color over it. I then used a dark gold (looks brown in the photo) in my crease and a bright aqua under my lashes. To finish the look, I penciled in a black liner to form a cat eye and applied falsies.

Oh, one more thing. I concealed the outer half of my eye brow and extended a fake line about an inch higher.

And here's the look!


G.I Jewelz!! *insert gunshot sound effects here*

The colors are so beautiful and bright... believe it or not, this look was achieved with only one layer of color. Yes! One! No applying and reapplying to darken colors. They sweep on and stay on. In LOVE!!


Time for your chance to win a BH Cosmetics Shadow Palette!

How To Enter?
Mandatory Contest Entry (Choose one or both):

• Follow this blog via Google Friend Connect (in right column of blog)
• Follow and tweet @Jewelzdancers while linking back to this post.

Optional Contest Entry (Counts for an additional entry)

• Follow BH Cosmetics on Twitter.

*If you follow me via Google Friend Connect, post a comment with the name you used to connect and your email address.

*If you follow me on Twitter, post a comment with your Twitter name and email address.

Simple as that!

The Rules
Contest ends Feb 15th, 2011 when I will pick a winner at random. If there are less than 20 entries the contest will be extended until there are 20 entries or more.


*Reminder* just commenting on this post will not enter you into the giveaway follow me on Google Friend Connect OR follow and tweet @Jewelzdancers while linking back to this post to enter! :)

All contestants must live within the continental United States and must be able to provide a valid mailing address upon winning. I am not responsible for items that are lost, stolen or damaged during shipment. The winner will have 48 hours to respond to my email and redeem the item or a new winner will be chosen.

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I received one or more of the products mentioned above for free using Tomoson.com. Regardless, I only recommend products or services I use personally and believe will be good for my readers. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commissions 16 CFR, Part 255 Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising. Tomoson Product review & giveaway Disclosure.
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