etsy-mania

Someone, help me! I'm addicted and I can not stop. Is there a recovery program for this?!

The last 6wks alone I've bought, earrings, a shrug, cake toppers and a hairpiece for the wedding. Wowza! And prior to that, the list is just as long.

You can sort on Etsy.com for your treasures by 1. local finds (purchasing from vendors of handmade or vintage goods in your area) 2. pounce (isn't that just fun to say), for a random list of things that are a. just posted b. something just sold from that shop or lastly, 3. searching through the treasury for hand selected collections.

I mean, just look at how cute and synchronized the home page is? Love teal and brown.

Galpals + New Orleans

Every year I am reminded of how fortunate I am to have such amazing, fun, feisty, adventurous gal pals when we make our annual girls trip. So for 2011, we combined that trip with my bachelorette party which was spent end of January in the French Quarter. This was my third time there and a few ladies first so we hit some old favs and some new hot spots.

Here are some of our highlights:
We only ate three meals, but all were simply cajun perfection! We started our Friday night with dinner at Cochan's. We sampled and shared various pork plates that make this restaurant famous. My favorites were the wood-fired oyster roast and the smoked brisket. Yummmm. We then hit up some of Bourbon street for some drinks, street hand-grenades, the haunted and dark Lafitte's Blacksmith Shop. The story is that this dark, candle-lit bar is haunted! No ghost spotting’s for us, but we did enjoy a "purple" and some piano bar hits!
The next day we dined at Commander's Palace for the famous brunch and bloody mary's. This place was worth the early (6 wk prior!) booking. The food (shrimp and grits and a strawberry shortcake) was top notch, the singing trio and wait staff really made you feel welcome and I LOVED the special note they left me! Next we walked the cemetery and then took the trolley down for day drinking and bachelorette non sense. Bars worth seeing: Cats Meow (we rocked it out), Sing Sing (good live music), Hotel Monteleone and Tujague's (old fashion cocktails and they were being photographed for a book featuring the oldest bars in the US!).

Thank you ladies for an amazing trip to New Orleans, looking forward to our next trip... where should we go?!