Favorite Shopping Sites

Happy Happy Friday! 

Lately I have been doing a little internet shopping. This is nothing new, and is something I blame (or we co-blame each other) my sister in law, Kortny on. When I first moved to Oklahoma, I lived with her and my brother. If you ask Matt, all I spent my money on was Old Navy and Taco Bell. Old Navy is true, but a girl goes to Taco Bell once and he hasn’t forgotten it! There were some really fun (and funny) memories I have from living in that house with them, but one of them is definitely of me and Kortny sitting side by side online shopping together. 

Matt, Kortny, Bryson and me at my wedding.

I have moved on from ON and are now concentrated on my new home! I might also add, that I am a tad wiser with money than I was 7 years ago. Each month, we have chosen a little project for something I want to add to our décor. This month is window treatments for our living room (which I’ll post about later!).

As much online shopping as I do, I thought I would share some of my favorites with you! Now, keep in mind that we are newly married and are not exactly rolling in the dough. So, these are my favorite sites that offer cheaper alternatives. One day I might be able to shop at the pricier places for some staples, (Horchow & Restoration Hardware, I’m talking to you!) but that time is not now!

Let me know if you have any gems worth sharing as well!

Have a wonderful weekend!

MIA No More

OK, I get that I’ve been MIA, and I’m sorry…kind of. Now that life has come to a slight slowdown, I’ll be able to share more of myself with you! Guys, I seriously can’t wait to share with you every single detail of our wedding, our marriage and our home!! So let’s start…

First off I’m now officially a Stewart! Hence the blog name change. I will miss being a McGuire, and let’s get real, it’s not like that is something that is mistaken by anyone who is familiar with the McGuire clan…I’m still loud and obnoxious and cuss occasionally. But I full on embrace my new name. I’m in love with being married… (Did you know when you get married you get to see that person every day? Not just a few times a week? Um, hello! Why hadn’t anyone informed us of this first?)

Jake and I have been busy settling into our new home, and our new life. It has been so much fun! We’ve started new shows…SCANDAL (OMG!) We’ve fought over dishes, bank accounts, my decorating choices, thermostats and sleeping habits (apparently I move…a lot) and we have recently relived our favorite day ever! Yes, we got our wedding pictures back! Lots of giggling, laughing, crying and finger pointing went on and we just had the best time.

Our photographer is Caroline Rentzel of Caroline Rentzel Photography. She did such a wonderful job capturing our perfect day and putting on paper what we had dreamed of.

I’ll share more about Caroline, our other fabulous vendors and about our DIY’s in the future!

I’ll leave you with this picture, just a little glimpse of the complete and utter joy we felt that day!

The BIG 10,000!!

Well guys, this past week I accomplished something HUGE. Well, maybe not huge....its a little more like: hmmm....what does she do with her time? Or does she have a job? How does her phone still have charge? No...not Candy Crush. Pinterest! I, Mallory McGuire (soon to be Stewart), have PINNED 10,000 PINS!!!

I of course had to take screen shots of this momentous occasion! Don't Pin? Know how excited you get when your car reaches 9,999 miles...and then turns to the 10,000 mile mark? Don't you want to be on some exciting vacation when driving that one mile? I sure would!

That's exactly how I treated my 10,000th Pin! You ready for this.... 

Don't be shocked by the time stamp. We've already established that I've replaced sleeping with Pinterest. I had to make sure that I pinned something awesome. Well, let's get real, everything I Pin is awesome ;) But I wanted it to be something that I love...that is current in my life right now. 

Here is the pretty pretty living room I chose. I can not even begin to tell you how excited I am to live in mine and Jake's first home. I can't wait to decorate it, over decorate, choose wrong paint colors, too big of furniture, make Jake cringe at some of my decorating choices, making myself cringe at some of my decorating choices. And so on. 

My point is that I realize that my home will never look like the one above. And when it does I'm sure we'll have a baby soon after and then it will NEVER look like it! 

Some of the things I LOVE about this set up is: 

1. The focal wallpaper. LOVE! I love that wallpaper is back. I'm sure it will be "out" tomorrow, but I'm glad its back today. I want a wallpaper wall so bad! 

2. Animal hide rugs. I fell in love with one at market a few years ago, and haven't gotten it out of my mind. It has gold and silver splatter paint marks all over. I think it is the perfect combination of Jake and mine's style mash-up.

3. The plant. I have always like indoor plants. Not your momma's fake plants. Real ones. Whether it is a centerpiece of garden hydrangeas or succulents or a tree like the one here. 

Thanks for those of you who follow me on Pinterest. I have a lot of fun looking through other people's pins and seeing what we do and don't have in common! 

I hope ya'll enjoy my Pinterest page as well! 

Addressing Envelopes

So my first big DIY wedding task was addressing my Save the Date envelopes.

I know what you're thinking....not exactly a "DIY". Well, for those of us who can't figure out the whole "mailings" part of Microsoft Word, tune on it!

First off, lets start with my inspiration. Hashtag shocker....it's from Pinterest. Typography is everywhere on there. From basic stationary to wedding signage to gift tags. I'm obsessed! Here are just some of my faves...

{http://www.etsy.com/listing/111335192/the-julia-dashingly-chic-calligraphy?ref=shop_home_feat}

Whew! My heart swoons for this envelope! This is from Etsy. I SO wish it was in my budget to have this done. I wish even more that I could do this myself!!

{http://www.stylemepretty.com/2012/12/04/tulsa-oklahoma-ranch-wedding-from-imago-vita-photography/#}

This is from the Style Me Pretty site. Could you imagine how AH-MA-ZING your pictures would be if you had this bad boy behind you?

{http://www.stylemepretty.com/living/2012/09/14/diy-vanilla-sugar-favors-from-kimbry-studios-photography/}

Also from SMP. Adding a simple tag like this adds so much to a favor.

I love to see different fonts put together. It gives it a very modern touch and personalizes the most basic aspects. OK, I got off track there for a little bit...

Here are my STD...

My friend Keith designed them for us. He's pretty awesome. 

And our envelopes! I ordered them through Vistaprint.com. I had our return address printed on them, which was pretty awesome and a time saver.

What I did was downloaded an A2 and A7 template from this site: {http://www.archiversonline.com/pages/templates.} They have a lot of different templates that you should check out as well. 

Then you open up the file and since my envelope had a pre-determined box, I had to play with my layout for a little bit. And if you're anything like me, you have a 1,000 different downloaded fonts that you have to choose from! I get a lot from kevinandamanda.com. They have a lot of fun ones that look like handwriting. I tend to go for the less formal calligraphy fonts. Picking a font took about an hour...I had to go through and see what different "Ms" looked like, and find one that the numbers were fun also. I MAY have a tendency to over think these things :) 

This is time consuming. I'm not going to lie.... But I created a folder with individual files of each person's address. It makes this a one time process and when it comes to addressing envelopes for the actual invites and thank you notes it will be ready to go for you. Just plop down in front of your newest netflix addiction and take off! 

I can't even tell you how excited I am that I have figured this out. I realize that this may only be cool for me....but man I am excited!! 

My next wish is for a font/template that would help you create an envelope like the first one I showed you. If I could guess it will probably be all over Pinterest the day after I get married....Classic! 

Hope this helps those who are challenged in this area. And sorry I got so distracted...but hey, I just like sharing pretty things that I find :) 

-Mal

MMM....Bell Peppers!

Lately I have really been trying to eat healthy. With the wedding on the way Jake and I are trying to get into shape! One of my latest snack obsessions is bell peppers. I LOVE them! Grilled or raw. The only problem was I REALLY liked dipping them in ranch...which is a no go if you're trying to eat healthy. Well, in walks Pinterest with yet another fix to my problems!

Several months ago I pinned {THIS Faux Ranch Dip} onto my Healthy Choices board. I always had it in the back of my mind and finally decided to try it. 

Guys. 

Look at me in the eyes right now. 

THIS RANCH IS AMAZING!!!!!!! 

All you need is 0% Greek Yogurt, Fat Free or 1% milk and a Ranch packet. I use Fat free milk always, so that's what I used. You take 1 cup of Greek yogurt, 1/2 (or a little less) cup of milk and a ranch packet. The amount of milk decides your consistency, so if you are wanting it for a dressing add a little more milk. 

I was really excited about this. I went through 3 bell peppers and 1 cucumber and still had half of it left! 

Another pin I found was {THIS Mini Pepper Nachos} one. I didn't follow everything she suggested, but it inspired me to make my own nacho creation! 

This is a pic of her nachos. I would have LOVED to show you a pic of mine...but we ate them too fast :) But trust me, I'll make them again soon. Maybe tomorrow. In which I'll post a pic :)

Here's what I did....

Ingredients:

Bag of Mini Peppers (found in your produce section)

1lb ground beef

taco seasoning

1 can of Rotel

shredded cheese

1) Preheat oven to 350 Degrees

2) brown your meat, drain excess fat and follow Taco Seasoning packet directions

3) While meat is cooking, half all the peppers and take the seeds out

4) drain the Rotel, and add the can to the ground beef

5) On a baking sheet lay down foil and place peppers on it (press the peppers a little so they flatten)

6) fill each pepper with the meat filling and then top with cheese

7) slide them into the oven for about 8 minutes, until cheese is melted

Both the ranch and nachos were Molly approved...and we had a fun last night as roomies together. Little sis is moving out! 21. New job. New place. She is acting adult like and its weird :) 

I'm not going to lie....we definitely finished off the ranch and dipped our nachos in them. From now on I'm gonna make that stuff in bulk! 

Wedding craft blogs will come soon....we haven't done a ton yet...but soon! 

-Mal